Prior to the 1980 riot, the New Mexico prison system and the State penitentiary at Santa Fe were riddled with official corruption manifested in the intimidation of reformers, violence against inmates, prison overcrowding, and inferior prison services. Although nothing can justify the prison riot that resulted in at least 33 dead, the torturing of eight guards held hostage, and the raping, wounding, and terrorizing of scores of other inmates, the riot was a predictable incident based on an assessment of prison conditions. This book recounts the events of the riot, the seige that ended it, and the failure of the criminal justice system to hold accountable the inmates who murdered and pillaged during the riot. An assessment of the aftermath of the riot concludes that little has changed in the New Mexico corrections system since the riot, except the building of two new prisons which have succumbed to the same inhumane and overcrowded conditions as the State penitentiary at Santa Fe. There have been no rational policy revisions or legislation designed to counter inhumane and overcrowded conditions. Reformers still fight an uphill battle against the overuse of imprisonment and a penal policy of retribution. 225 notes and subject index.