The Oregon State Penitentiary on Tuesday, Aug. 17, 2021. (Amanda Loman/Salem Reporter)
State police on Sunday arrested a man who walked away from an Oregon Corrections Enterprises warehouse Friday morning.
Oregon State Police worked with the state Department of Corrections’ Fugitive Apprehensive Unit to arrest Benjamin Woods in Salem around 7:30 p.m. Sunday, according to a corrections department news release.
Woods, 38, of Keizer, walked away from the warehouse on Oregon State Penitentiary grounds in Salem around 10:15 a.m. Friday, according to a Friday news release.
People in custody can be paid to do varying jobs at the warehouse including making furniture, metal work and laundry, corrections department spokesperson Jennifer Black said on Friday.
Black said there are Oregon Corrections Enterprises employees and a corrections department security officer onsite at the warehouse. The Oregon Corrections Enterprises employees are responsible for counting the adults in custody and go through the same training as corrections department security except for firearms and use of force training. “OCE participates in general self-defense,” she said.
Woods entered the correction’s department’s custody on March 24. He pleaded guilty in February 2019 to attempted first-degree burglary and in March 2020 to first-degree burglary, both in Marion County Circuit Court, court records showed.
Before walking away from the warehouse, he was housed at the Santiam Correctional Institution and was working as a clerk at the corrections enterprises warehouse. His earliest release date is Aug. 29, 2024.
-Ardeshir Tabrizian
