Two men who were held at the Salt Lake County Detention Center were charged with felonies on Thursday after a prison-yard brawl that allegedly involved one of them trying to stab the other with a pencil.

Prosecutors filed one count each of assault by a prisoner against a 30-year-old and a 38-year-old. Charging documents allege the two were in the jail’s recreation yard on Sept. 18. A guard could hear tapping on the yard’s window, and when he went to see what the noise was, he saw the 30-year-old inmate on the ground with blood on his head and with no shirt on, court documents state.

The 38-year-old inmate walked up to the guard shortly after and allegedly told him to “cuff me up.” He also had blood on his face arms and hands. The 38-year-old allegedly told the guard that the other inmate tried to stab him with a pencil several times, so he “had enough and let him have it.”

The other inmate was taken to the hospital for treatment.

Kimball Bennion