Old Main, the Penitentiary of New Mexico: The 1980 Riot, Its Ghost Stories and Tours

Old Main is the original building of the Penitentiary of New Mexico, on State Highway 14 south of Santa Fe. It opened in 1956 to replace the territorial prison of 1885, and on February 2 and 3, 1980, it was the scene of one of the most violent prison riots in American history. Inmates held the prison for a day and a half, took 12 officers hostage and killed at least 33 other prisoners, many of them in Cell Block 4, where the prison kept men it was protecting. The building was repaired and used until 1998, and it now stands empty inside the grounds of the working state prison.

Because of that history, Old Main appears on almost every list of haunted places in New Mexico, and officers have told stories about the building for decades. The New Mexico Corrections Department, which owns it, takes a different line: its tours present the riot as history and deliberately leave out ghost stories, out of respect for the dead, the survivors and their families. This guide does the same with the history and is careful with the legends.

History of Old Main and the 1980 riot

New Mexico’s first territorial prison opened in Santa Fe in 1885. By the 1950s it was too small and too close to a growing city, and in 1956 the state opened a new penitentiary on open land south of town, now called Old Main. It was designed for about 900 men. By early 1980 it held 1,156, and conditions had been getting worse for years: crowding, poor food, staff shortages and the cancellation of education and work programs in the mid-1970s.

Investigators later described a culture of informing at the prison that the state attorney general’s report called the snitch game, in which prisoners were pressured or falsely labeled as informers. In 1977 an inmate named Dwight Duran wrote a 99-page handwritten civil rights complaint about conditions; it became the case that would eventually force reform. Trust between staff and prisoners was already badly damaged when, in the early hours of February 2, 1980, inmates overpowered officers during a count in a dormitory.

Within minutes the prisoners had keys, and they soon took the control center. Twelve officers were taken hostage; several were beaten and some were raped, though none was killed. Inmates broke into the pharmacy and found blowtorches and tools left behind by construction workers. They used the torches to cut through the grilles of Cell Block 4, which held about 96 men in protective custody, among them suspected informants and men with mental illness, and killed prisoners there one by one. Sixteen of the dead were in Cell Block 4. Fires were set and parts of the building flooded.

State police and the National Guard took the prison back about 36 hours after it began. At least 33 inmates were dead, from killings and drug overdoses, and more than 200 were treated for injuries; some writers believe the true number of dead was higher. Few prisoners were ever prosecuted. Reform came slowly, largely through the Duran consent decree, which shaped New Mexico’s modern prison system. Old Main was repaired and kept in use until 1998, when it closed for good.

Since then the building has been a film set, used for the remake of The Longest Yard and scenes in Zero Dark Thirty among others, and the Corrections Department began public tours around the state’s centennial in 2012. Officials have floated plans for a museum and training businesses on the site. Hatchet marks and burn scars from 1980 are still visible on the floors.

The ghost stories of Old Main

The shadow in the corridors

The most consistent story is not dramatic. Corrections officers and members of the New Mexico National Guard have described a human-shaped shadow moving in Old Main since 1981, the year after the riot, and a 1984 account has two officers seeing it at the same moment. The Southwest Ghost Hunters Association, an Albuquerque research group that made nine visits, collected those reports. Its write-up suggests the shadows could be explained by how peripheral vision and tired minds work, and it says the group could not rule the reports out either.

Slamming doors

Staff and visitors have also described the sound of cell doors slamming shut in empty wings. The same group heard the noises only twice in nine visits and says it traced them to their ordinary sources. In an old building with heavy steel doors and no heating, that is not surprising.

Cell Block 4

Many of the ghost stories told online center on Cell Block 4, where 16 men were killed. Lists of haunted places say visitors feel watched or followed there and that some believe they took something home with them. We could not find any of those claims in a named, first-hand account. What visitors can see is the real damage: the marks left on the floor in 1980.

Why the tours leave out ghosts

When tours resumed, the department’s public affairs director told the Santa Fe New Mexican that they would avoid ghost stories, hauntings and overly graphic detail, while not censoring the history. Tour leaders follow the attorney general’s report, because survivors’ accounts conflict. Some earlier tours were billed as ghost tours, and our older guide said paranormal tours were offered; that is no longer the case.

Where to look

• Cell Block 4: the protective custody unit at the center of the riot, seen on the guided tour.
• The floors: look for hatchet marks and burn scars left in 1980.
• The control center: which inmates seized early on the first morning.
• The long corridors: where officers say the shadow figure has been seen.

Visiting Old Main

Old Main sits inside the grounds of a working state prison, so you cannot simply turn up. The Corrections Department arranges guided tours for private groups of up to 25 and for school and large groups of up to 50, booked by email with Corrections Industries. Everyone must complete a waiver, a background check form and a copy of a driver’s license, and the background check takes at least five days. The minimum age is 16, and visitors under 18 need a parent’s signature and an adult with them. Fees are given on request.

Inside there is no electricity, running water or working restroom. It is dark and cold in places, and there is a lot of walking and stairs. Bring a flashlight and a light layer, and wear closed-toe shoes. Past tours have run in the warmer months, from about May to October, because the building has no heating.

Treat the visit as you would any memorial. Officers who worked here, families of the men who died and former inmates still live in New Mexico, and the department has invited survivors and first responders on its own tours.

• Visiting Closed prison on the grounds of a working one; visits only on booked, escorted tours
• Tours Guided history tours for private and school groups, booked by email
• Tickets Ask the Corrections Department for fees; background check needed at least five days ahead
• Ghost hunting No: tours focus on history and the department does not offer ghost hunts

Tips for your visit

• Email Corrections Industries well ahead of your trip; background checks take at least five days.
• Bring a flashlight, a light jacket and closed-toe shoes.
• Read the attorney general’s report or a good history first; the tour assumes you want the facts.
• Pair the tour with Santa Fe’s haunted hotels, La Fonda and La Posada, for the ghost stories.

More haunted places nearby

• Haunted places in Santa Fe: La Fonda, La Posada, Loretto Chapel and more
• La Fonda on the Plaza: a haunted hotel with an 1857 hanging in its story
• La Posada de Santa Fe: Julia Staab’s mansion, now a hotel
• Haunted places in Albuquerque: an hour south
• Haunted places in New Mexico

Sources

Facts on this page are checked against the official website, historic records and news coverage. Ghost stories are reported as staff, visitors and investigators tell them, and we say where records contradict a story.

• Wikipedia: New Mexico State Penitentiary riot
• Santa Fe New Mexican: Old Main prison tours resume with emphasis on history, not ghost stories
• New Mexico Corrections Department: Old Main filming and tours
• New Mexico Corrections Department: Penitentiary of New Mexico
• Prison Legal News: Site of gruesome prison riot becomes New Mexico tourist attraction (2017)
• KRQE News 13: 35th anniversary of the 1980 prison riot (2015)
• KUNM: New Mexico eyes opening deadly prison riot site as museum (2013)
• Southwest Ghost Hunters Association: New Mexico State Penitentiary (Old Main) investigation