San Quentin State Prison official named acting warden

Oak Smith, San Quentin State Prison’s chief deputy warden since 2021, has been appointed acting warden.

Smith was tapped for the appointment last month while Warden Ron Broomfield is on a different assignment, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Smith has worked at San Quentin since 2015, starting as a classification and parole representative before becoming an associate warden in 2019, according to the department.

Representatives of the department did not immediately respond to inquiries about the nature of Broomfield’s assignment, its duration or whether he is expected to resume his position at San Quentin afterward.

Before coming to San Quentin, Smith worked at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City in 1997 and 1998, Corcoran State Prison from 1998 to 2005 and Kern Valley State Prison in Delano from 2005 to 2015.

Smith’s salary is $167,076 per year, the prisons department said.

The prison also has appointed a new public information officer, Lt. Guim’Mara Berry. Among other duties, public information officers act as liaisons to the news media.

A two-decade veteran of the agency, Berry is the first African American woman to hold the position at San Quentin, the prisons department says on its website.

Berry began in 2003 as an office assistant at San Quentin working on parole and intake transfers, became an office supervisor and in 2007 applied to become a corrections officer, according to the CDCR.

She started as an officer at San Quentin, worked as a limited-term sergeant at Folsom State Prison and became a sergeant back at San Quentin in 2016. In September 2021, she was promoted to lieutenant.

Berry’s salary is $124,584 per year, according to the CDCR.

The prison’s former public information officer, Sam Robinson, retired.

Both Berry and Smith declined to be interviewed “until a permanent warden is appointed,” Berry said in an email.