• SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) -- After the April 2011 murder of a guard at the state penitentiary in Sioux Falls, Chief Warden Doug Weber said he had no idea what to expect from his staff in the following days.
• Weber, who is retiring this month after more than 30 years working in corrections in South Dakota, said the murder of prison guard Ronald Johnson two years ago was one of the most challenging times in his career. Two inmates killed Johnson on his 63th birthday during a botched prison escape.
• "It was very traumatic on me and the staff and, interesting enough, the inmate population as a whole," he said. "I didn't know if the next day I came to work if 25 percent or half of my staff would just say, 'I can't do this anymore, it's too dangerous.' Or if their spouses would say, 'You're not going back to work there because it's too dangerous.'"
• In actuality, Weber said, nobody left following the murder.
• The prison made more than a dozen procedural changes after Johnson's death to improve security and safety.
• Overseeing three executions and a 1993 prison riot also were challenging, Weber said.
• Executions are "something very few people in the country are asked to do or participate in and we did it without incident and carried out our duties, I think, exceptionally well," he said.
• Weber, 58, said he is leaving his position content with having made positive changes in the state's prisons and will miss the work.

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