A 17-year veteran correctional officer stabbed Monday by an inmate at the North Branch Correctional Institution in Cumberland remains in serious condition, state officials said.

James Vinci, 50, suffered puncture wounds to the upper body and neck and was flown to the Maryland Shock Trauma Center, according to a hospital spokeswoman and the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services.

The inmate was identified as Travis Terry, 34, and a weapon was recovered, according to correctional officials.

Terry is serving a life sentence plus 45 years for first-degree murder in the death of longtime friend Edwin Lee Potillo and wounding Potillo’s girlfriend in a Dundalk apartment in June 2005.

Terry, of Baltimore, has been in prison since 2007, and was convicted of assaulting another correctional officer in 2009.

Patrick Moran, president of the state workers union AFSCME Council 3, said the union has warned Gov. Larry Hogan’s office about vacancies at facilities across the state that leave officers at risk.

“We have consistently warned the administration that an incident like this could happen,” Moran said Tuesday. The union estimates there are 1,100 vacancies, of which 700 to 800 are “front-line officers.”

Moran said the shortage of officers has forced the staff to cover shifts with overtime. “In their [the administration’s] eyes, it’s cheaper to pay overtime than hire,” he said.

But Gary W. McLhinney, director of professional standards in the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services, said the stabbing was not a result of understaffing. At the time of the incident, McLhinney said, Terry was housed in disciplinary segregation, which means he was only allowed outside his cell for an hour a day. McLhinney said Vinci was letting Terry out of his cell for a shower.

“This had nothing to do with staffing at North Branch. This was a very violent individual,” he said. “Not much more that can be done with him, but we have to house him.”

McLhinney said Terry used “an improvised weapon that was taken from a mechanical piece of equipment that was sharpened to a point.”

He said the incident remains under investigation, including whether policies and procedures were followed. Correctional Services investigators were speaking to witnesses and reviewing videotape of the assault, he said.

Rep. John Delaney, a Democrat who represents Western Maryland, has called for a “top-down review” of safety at state detention facilities, and noted there have long been concerns about understaffing.

“We know that correctional officers have a very tough job, but we have to do more to make sure that they can go home healthy to their families each day. Attacks like this simply cannot happen, and when they do, we have to re-evaluate everything that’s been done to lead up to this point,” he said in a statement.

Moran and McLhinney said Vinci is married. Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services Secretary Stephen T. Moyer visited him at the hospital, while Hogan called his family express his support.

jkanderson@baltsun.com

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