Delaware Correctional Center
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The Delaware Correctional Center (DCC) is a state prison for men in Delaware, USA. It is the state's largest adult, male correctional facility.
Located near Smyrna, in the south of New Castle County, DCC houses some 2,500 minimum, medium, and maximum security inmates. It is also the primary facility for housing the Kent County pre-trial (detainee) population.
DCC also houses inmates sentenced to the death penalty. Executions are carried out by lethal injection at the Delaware Correctional Center, in a new lethal injection chamber built in 2000.
[edit] History
DCC opened in 1971 with a capacity of 441, which has since been increased to over 2,600.
In 1996, construction began on a $110 million, 888-bed addition including 600 new maximum security cells in six new units. The new addition houses the Security Housing Unit (SHU) and the Medium-High Housing Unit (MHU).
Prisoners in the SHU, which includes the prison's death row, occupy single-bunked cells in which they are locked for 23 hours a day. Inmates, other than those sentenced to the death penalty, may earn their way out of the SHU through good behaviour.
DCC has a major staffing problem. In order for the prison to operate normally many posts in the prison must be filled with staff on overtime. In many cases staff members are frozen, meaning they are forced to stay for an extra shift due to shortage of staff.
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