A sergeant apparently quit her employment at the Delaware County prison early Monday morning, but not before lobbing an email that was the equivalent of a hand grenade to the prison’s top management and also to county officials.

In the email, Sgt. Yolanda Holmes made numerous specific and generalized accusations about the facility, saying it was currently being managed under an ethos of retaliation, and that hiring and promotions were more likely to be driven by race than merit.

In the last year, Broad + Liberty has heard similar allegations from no fewer than six different sources who work inside the facility. Broad + Liberty is not republishing Holmes’s email or providing a copy because it makes numerous allegations that cannot currently be substantiated.

But the writing took specific aim at the current administration, and the facility’s warden, Laura Williams.

“I am writing to bring to light several serious issues I have observed in the Delaware County Jail, as well as to express my appreciation for the coworkers who have remained professional despite a hostile environment. After over a decade of experience in corrections, including more than 7 years at Rikers Island, I have never encountered the type of discriminatory practices I’ve experienced here in Delaware County. It’s disheartening to see how the county has systematically covered up reports related to Laura K. Williams, while African American staff continue to face unfair treatment,” the email began.

“I want to shed light on the ongoing issues within the Delaware County Jail, particularly with regard to the treatment of several dedicated staff members. What [Sgt. 1 – name withheld] is experiencing is not unlike what happened to [Sgt. 2 – name also withheld], who was wrongfully place (sic) on administrative leave for [X] months after fabricated stories were spread about him. He was targeted simply because he spoke with individuals who are friends with Warden Laura K. Williams. This kind of retaliatory behavior has been a pattern at the facility, and it’s disheartening to see hard-working individuals being mistreated for no other reason than their willingness to stand up for what’s right.”

Holmes also alleged two romantic relationships existed among current employees which had resulted in favoritism.

Williams has been the county’s only warden since the prison was officially deprivatized in April of 2022. 

A request for comment sent to the county spokesperson as well as to Williams was not returned. Also, a text message sent to a number believed to belong to Holmes was either not successful or was not returned.

This morning’s email serves as a kind of exclamation point to a slow-boiling series of complaints from the prison’s rank and file. Last year, those complaints culminated in the prison union affirming a vote of no confidence against Williams — a serious rebuke, but one that has been ignored by the county’s five-person council, all Democrats.

The missive was sent to the group-email addresses for all lieutenants and sergeants in the facility, as well as to County Executive Director Barbara O’Malley and County Councilman Richard Womack. Womack, who once worked as a corrections officer for the county, was not on the council when it voted to deprivatize. On numerous occasions he has expressed his interest in the ongoing complaints from the facility’s lower ranks.

In a June council meeting, Womack addressed the allegations of racism in the facility (video, time stamp 1:47:27)

“They say ‘where there’s smoke there’s fire’ — when I see all these people being terminated, I see all these people leaving the prison, you ain’t gonna tell me something ain’t wrong. Everybody can not be wrong at that prison. I know you’ve seen an article in the newspaper. Do I support the warden? I support her with her programs. Do I support her against retaliation, discrimination, unfairness? No I do not.

“And, I’m hoping and I believe that council is looking into the different situations that we have heard. I know they are. I’m asking you, I know you’ve been patient, you’ve been tolerant. Be a little bit more patient. Change is coming. One way or another, it’s coming.”

The other four members of the current council — Chairwoman Dr. Monica Taylor, Elaine Paul Schaefer, Christine A. Reuther, and Kevin M. Madden, who chairs the prison’s oversight board — all campaigned on deprivatizing the prison which previously had been operated by private entities for nearly 30 years.

The transition has not been smooth.

In the three years since the county appointed Williams, the facility has experienced thirteen deaths — a number the county would dispute. The county’s death toll has also previously been at odds with other media accounts. To the county’s credit, there have been no deaths in almost one full calendar year.

(Broad + Liberty’s death count differs from the county’s for several reasons. First, our count starts in February 2022 when Williams’s employment with the facility began. Several sources have all told Broad + Liberty that by that time, the private management entity, the GEO Group, had essentially ceded management to the county, and that the “official” transition date of April 6, 2022 was mostly a formality. Additionally, the current administration has, at least on two occasions, used a “quick release” method to get a medically distressed prisoner off of its books, so that by the time the prisoner passed away, the facility was no longer technically responsible for the person.)

In February 2023, the county referred to the death of an inmate only as a “delayed homicide.” Broad + Liberty’s reporting showed the inmate was a man, Mustaffa Jackson, who had been made paraplegic by a shooting years earlier. But because of his paraplegia, Jackson had to self-catheretize. The subsequent autopsy from the medical examiner revealed Jackson died from urosepsis, and was found in a diaper, face down in his cell that was strewn with new and used catheters.

A former corrections officer alleges — with documentation — the county and prison management covered up elements of its investigation into the alleged murder of one inmate by his own cellmate in order to lower the prison’s liability in the matter, which is now the subject of a lawsuit.

Documents obtained by Broad + Liberty regarding two suicides just two weeks apart in June of 2022 raised serious questions about the prison’s response to those emergencies. Both of those events are now in litigation.

Meanwhile, more regular management problems have not abated.

Under county management, the facility has had at least two improper releases of inmates — the second of which wasn’t discovered for several days.

A “citizen” member of the county’s Jail Oversight Board had millions of dollars in contracts with the county at the same time of his service on the board — a clear cut conflict of interest by most standard definitions.

Assault data for the GWHCF and spending on outside attorney’s fees have been on a steady climb as the prison fights off a slew of new lawsuits. Correctional officers have complained in public and in private about low morale.

And among many other problems, the prison’s budget has continued to shoot up even though the county has successfully “decarcerated,” bringing the average daily population down from 1,600 to about 1,200 inmates per month. The latest budget figures from the county shows the prison’s spending going from $53.4 million in 2023, up to $56.6 million in 2024, finally up to $59.3 million in 2025.

One bright spot for the facility is that sometime in December or January, the county was able to reach a tentative agreement with the independent union representing correctional officers. Broad + Liberty’s requests to the county to obtain a firm date for when that agreement was reached have been ignored.

Todd Shepherd is Broad + Liberty’s chief investigative reporter. Send him tips at tshepherd@broadandliberty.com, or use his encrypted email at shepherdreports@protonmail.com. @shepherdreports