WEEKEND EDITION
THE WEEK
IN PHOTOS
FORMER EOU AD CAMP UMATILLA GETS
ROB CASHELL MAKES FUNDING FOR MORE
HISTORY UPGRADES
THE BACK PAGE, A10
SPORTS, B1
REGION, A3
JANUARY 9 – 10, 2021
145th Year, No. 36
CAPITOL BREACH
Insurrection
felt from D.C.
to Oregon
Former Hermiston
resident in the Capitol
covering the events for
Arkansas newspaper
By ANTONIO SIERRA AND
JADE MCDOWELL
East Oregonian
PENDLETON — Washington,
D.C., is about 2,500 miles away
from Eastern Oregon, but the rever-
berations were felt
across the country.
As a part of
an insurrection,
a mob of people
pushed past police
to breach the U.S.
Capitol building
Lockwood
on Wednesday,
Jan. 6, as lawmak-
ers were in the process of certifying
Joe Biden’s victory over President
Donald Trump. Legislators were
escorted to safety, and although they
eventually proceeded with the vote,
the siege left fi ve dead.
The journalist
One former Hermiston resident
was at the Capitol on Jan. 6, not as
a protester or a lawmaker, but as a
journalist.
Frank E. Lockwood, a Hermiston
High School graduate who covered
sports for the East Oregonian during
high school in the 1980s, is the Wash-
ington, D.C., correspondent for the
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. He said
on Jan. 6 he was rotating back and
forth between listening to speeches in
the House and Senate, and each time
he walked past the windows facing
outside the building, he could see an
unruly crowd growing larger.
“I realized, ‘They won’t be able to
keep them out,’” he said.
When he returned to the House
chambers for the last time, he could
hear protesters had entered the build-
ing. It was a “high-stress” situation,
he said.
“You would hear snippets of infor-
mation over police radio,” he said.
“Reports kept coming in, and they
were getting more and more alarm-
ing — calls for backup, updates that
things were getting out of control,
reports that tear gas had been
deployed.”
Soon, Capitol Police down below
were using heavy furniture to barri-
cade the doors into the chamber as
protesters smashed the windows
$1.50
WINNER OF THE 2020 ONPA GENERAL EXCELLENCE AWARD
EO SPOTLIGHT
‘I might not make it home’
Hundreds fall ill, two
die amid COVID-19
surge at Two Rivers
Correctional Institution
By BRYCE DOLE
East Oregonian
U
MATILLA — Brandon Baker was
already feeling symptoms when
offi cials at Two Rivers Correc-
tional Institution carried out a sick
inmate from two cells down.
Another inmate, four cells
away, said he saw the same inmate
lying on his bed ill for nearly two
weeks, receiving little care.
“He looked like death,” the inmate, who
asked for anonymity out of fear of retaliation,
said. “I walked by and told him, ‘Get better
bro’ and he didn’t even move. Like, comatose
on his bed.”
The sick inmate, who was between 50 and
60 years old and was serving his sentence at
TRCI, reportedly died on Saturday, Jan. 2,
after testing positive for COVID-19, accord-
ing to a press release that did not identify him
by name. He’s one of two inmates who have
recently died as the institution endures the
largest surge in COVID-19 cases among pris-
ons in Oregon, with 235 active cases as of
Wednesday, Jan. 6, according to data from the
Oregon Department of Corrections (ODOC).
“They aren’t actually doing anything,”
Baker, who said he tested positive for COVID-
19 around the fi rst of the year, said of prison
staff. “Right now, somebody could be in their
cell dying and they wouldn’t know anything
about it because they’re locked in their cell,
not being monitored, not being anything.
They’re just locked in their cell.”
Baker is one of 393 inmates at TRCI who
have reportedly tested positive for COVID-
19 since Dec. 10, 2020, according to data
from the department of corrections. Since
the beginning of December 2020, 50 TRCI
staff have also tested positive.
Interviews with four inmates, eight people
with loved ones in the prison, and two attor-
neys with more than 20 clients at TRCI, illu-
minate the conditions adults in custody are
facing as the prison is rocked by the case
spike. They described to the East Orego-
nian inconsistent mask wearing among
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian, File
Nearly 400 inmates at Two Rivers Correctional Institution in Umatilla have reportedly test-
ed positive for COVID-19 since Dec. 10, 2020, according to data from the department of
corrections. Since the beginning of December 2020, 50 TRCI staff have also tested positive.
prison staff, failures to both maintain social
distancing and to separate quarantined
and non-quarantined inmates, meager and
expired food supplies, and an environment
that has put inmates and prison staff at risk
of infection since a power outage left the east
side of the institution largely in the dark on
Dec. 16, 2020.
The power was restored on Dec. 24, 2020,
according to offi cials. But since then, infec-
tion has surged rapidly, with 281 additional
inmates and 40 staff reportedly testing posi-
tive.
“Just because they’re an inmate doesn’t
mean they don’t have people out there who
love them,” said Erika Sjolander, whose
husband, an inmate at TRCI, was rushed to
the hospital on Thursday, Jan. 7, four days
after testing positive in the outbreak.
Sjolander’s husband, who she said was
to be released from the prison in 27 days,
has asthma, diabetes and has gone through
chemotherapy for cancer. She’s worried he
won’t make it.
“He called me (on Wednesday, Jan. 6), and
he could barely talk.” she said, crying. “And
he says, ‘Tell my kids I love them. I might not
make it home.’ And hearing that is breaking
my heart.”
Baker and the anonymous inmate each
said that since the virus began to spread
through the prison in mid-December, infect-
ing hundreds and forcing their unit into quar-
antine, prison staff had only conducted brief
daily checks for temperature and symptoms.
They are released from their cells once a
day for a brief phone call, which Troy Marin,
an inmate, said is due to the shortage of staff
caused by the outbreak.
In an email to the EO newsroom, offi -
cials from the department of corrections did
not respond to multiple questions regarding
the source’s allegations of minimal medical
care, but said, “DOC employees are making
decisions based on medical and operational
expertise,” and added staff are limited by
“institution design” and the number of hospi-
tal beds available for COVID-19 patients
across the state.
Offi cials said inmates who require medi-
cal attention beyond what is available at the
prison are transferred to hospitals. The offi -
cials did not respond to questions regarding
the circumstances around the sick inmate in
the cell near Baker who died.
Statewide surge
The surge at TRCI comes as the state’s
prison system endures a signifi cant spike in
cases, with 545 active cases among adults
in custody as of Jan. 6, according to ODOC
data. Only three of the state’s 15 prisons do
See TRCI, Page A9
See Insurrection, Page A9
Two Rivers Correctional Institution is bathed in the
afternoon sun on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2021. The prison is
in the middle of the largest surge in COVID-19 cases
among prisons in Oregon, with 235 active cases as of
Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021, according to data from the
Oregon Department of Corrections.
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian
COVID-19 NUMBERS
TOTALS FOR WEEK ENDING 1/9/2021
IN UMATILLA COUNTY
RISK LEVEL
HIGH
NEW
WEEKLY
CASES
878
TOTAL
CASE GOAL
40
OR LESS
OVER 2
WEEKS
POSITIVE
TEST RATE
18.8
%
POSITIVE
5.1 TEST GOAL
%
%
5