MANSFIELD – The inmate who held a female corrections officer hostage at the Mansfield Correctional Institution has been indicted.
Jermaine McKinney, 36, was indicted during the January session of the Richland County Grand Jury, according to Richland County Prosecutor Bambi Couch Page. McKinney was recently served his indictment.
McKinney is charged with two counts of kidnapping with repeat violent offender specifications, both first-degree felonies; one count of felonious assault, a second-degree felony; and one count of assault on a state corrections officer or officer of the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, a third-degree felony.
Couch Page explained the kidnappings were charged in the alternative, meaning McKinney would face only one count of kidnapping, and repeat violent offender specifications allow the judge to add up to an additional 11 years on his sentencing. First-degree felonies carry a potential 11-year sentence if convicted, second-degree felonies a potential eight-year sentence and third-degree felonies a potential five-year sentence.
“He has the potential of at least an additional 16 if not 18 years of prison if convicted of just the underlying accounts,” Couch Page said.
McKinney is currently incarcerated at the Ohio State Penitentiary in Youngstown. Couch Page said the next step in his case will be an arraignment via teleconference in Richland County Common Pleas court.
The charges against McKinney stem from an incident on Oct. 18, 2015 when he took a female corrections officer hostage in the ManCI library. The incident began at approximately 10:30 a.m. and was resolved by 9 p.m. the same day.
According to a report from WMFJ Channel 21 in Youngstown, McKinney called the TV station’s newsroom at around 3:30 p.m. on Oct. 18 to seek answers about his case while holding the officer hostage. McKinney is currently serving two life sentences for the 2005 murders of 43-year-old Rebecca Cliburn and her mother, 70-year-old Wanda Rollyson.
An Oct. 19 press release from the Ohio Civil Service Employees Association (OCSEA) called for an immediate halt to practice that left female corrections officers alone with inmates. The release stated that during the incident, an officer on a utility post in the library was pulled to another post to provide religious programming, leaving the female corrections officer alone in the library with the inmates.
“At the time they pulled the officer, all activity should have ceased in the library, but it didn’t,” said Doug Mosier, OCSEA leader and local union president at ManCI. “Obviously, the inmate saw an opportunity and took it. That is just not acceptable.”
Neither the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction nor ManCI officials have released the name or the extent of the injuries of the corrections officer involved in the hostage situation.
