COAL TOWNSHIP - State police and a prison official confirmed the identity of an inmate accused of attempting to kill a prison guard last week at SCI-Coal Township.
William Cramer, 23, serving a life sentence for murdering his cellmate in Cambria County Prison in August 2012, has not yet been charged in the Aug. 31 attack on the unidentified guard. He has since been transferred to SCI-Dallas, Luzerne County.
Cramer's involvement in the attack was verified Tuesday after a press release was issued concerning a separate incident. Issued by Trooper Todd Leiby, the release said Cramer was stabbed by another inmate with a "homemade instrument" on Aug. 28, three days before the attack on the guard. Cramer's alleged attacker remains unidentified as an investigation continues. Charges are pending.
Trisha Kelley, the prison's public information officer, and a trooper at the Stonington station each confirmed Cramer as the accused assailant in the Aug. 31 incident.
Trooper Ronald Zanella is investigating the attack on the guard, which has been labeled an attempted homicide. In a Sept. 3 press release, he provided some details of the attack without identifying those involved.
The guard was reportedly placed in a choke hold and a weapon was used to cut his neck. Zanella said the officer was able to fend off his attacker, but suffered injuries to his neck, face, head, hands and back that required hospital treatment.
Cramer was first sent to prison in 2009 for up to nine years on a robbery case in Fayette County. Two convictions followed for simple assault in separate incidents in 2010 while in custody at SCI-Huntingdon.
Three aggravated assault cases have since been dismissed following his murder conviction: a December 2012 incident while he was being held at SCI-Rockview and two separate incidents in 2011 at the Cambria County jail.
Without naming Cramer, Robert Storm, vice president of the Pennsylvania State Corrections Officers Association, criticized the state Department of Corrections for allowing the inmate to be released back into general population following an alleged attack on another inmate. The "early release" preceded the attack on the prison guard at SCI-Coal Township, Storm wrote in a letter to the editor published in The News-Item on Tuesday.