An assistant warden of the Eastern Correctional Institution in Somerset County has been fired after a 24-year career in the state prison system.
Division of Correction spokeswoman Maxine Eldridge said Lewis E. Williams' employment would end Dec. 23. She refused to say whether he had been terminated, although she acknowledged that he "received notice" last Friday.
"Beyond that, this is a personnel issue." she said. "I can't go into specifics."
A woman who answered the phone yesterday in Mr. Williams' prison office said, however, that he had already left his job.
Mr. Williams, 52, said last night that he was given no formal reason for his firing, although he asked for one. He said his dismissal was unjustified and that he intends to fight it in court.
Mr. Williams, 52, has been assistant warden at the 3,000-inmate, medium-security prison since February 1990 -- six months after the firing as then-assistant warden Thomas Kimball, another longtime Division of Correction employee.
Mr. Williams became embroiled tangentially in the controversy over the early release of John F. Thanos, a convicted robber and rapist who later killed three teen-agers.
John P. O'Donnell, the former ECI records supervisor who signed papers releasing Thanos 18 months early, said at the time that the release had been approved by Mr. Williams and another supervisor at Division of Correction headquarters.
Thanos was executed by lethal injection last May.
But the Thanos issue was not the reason for the firing, officials in the prison system said.