A medium-security prison in Allendale County remained on lockdown Monday as searchers looked for a smuggled gun used Sunday by an inmate to shoot two others as they ate supper in a cell.

S.C. prison experts said they cannot recall a similar incident in at least 30 years and worry about the safety of other inmates and staff at Allendale Correctional Institution near Fairfax.

Neither inmate George Brown, 34, nor Dean Ford, 28, is likely to die from his injuries, said Charles Sheppard, the No. 2 official in the Corrections Department.

Brown, who remained hospitalized Monday in Columbia with a chest wound, is likely to be released today, Sheppard said. . Ford was treated and released.

No one has been charged or disciplined in the 5:15 p.m. attack that had no clear motive, Sheppard said.

Brown and Ford, who are not cellmates, were eating in one of their cells instead of joining other inmates in the prison cafeteria, Sheppard said.

A third inmate walked into the cell in the A wing of the Hampton unit with his head and face covered and fired a small-caliber gun, Sheppard said.

“I think he threw his shirt or something over his face so they couldn’t see him,” Sheppard said. “He shot and left.”

The Hampton unit has two wings that each house about 145 prisoners, he said.

Inmates are not allowed to cook in their cells but may eat there under certain circumstances, Sheppard said.

Twenty-five corrections officers were on duty at the time, the normal crew for that time on a Sunday, he said.

Though all 1,206 inmates were locked inside their cells shortly after the shooting — and 70 to 80 rapid-response team members searched the facility — the gun was not found, Sheppard said.

Brown is serving a 20-year sentence for assault and battery with intent to kill, according to prison records. He has been incarcerated since April 1994.

Ford is serving a three-year sentence for a traffic offense of failing to stop, prison records show. Ford has been in prison since August 2003.

Corrections director Jon Ozmint was unavailable to discuss the shooting Monday, Sheppard said.

No one is permitted to visit inmates during a lockdown. Prisoners are being fed in their cells while the investigation continues, Sheppard said.

A similar lockdown last month at Kershaw Correctional Institution lasted more than a week on a report of a gun within the walls, Sheppard said.

The incident raises many safety questions — the most worrisome being a missing firearm inside a facility, prison experts said.

“It is a very serious security problem,” said Joann Morton, who taught in USC’s former College of Criminal Justice and worked in the S.C. prison system for 12 years.

An inmate with a gun “would be the only one armed because corrections officers do not carry guns,” Morton said. “You don’t want guns inside of prisons.”

Sheppard, who has been with the agency fewer than three years, described the incident as “very uncommon.”

But two former S.C. prison directors, Bill Leeke and Doug Catoe, said they are unaware of an inmate shooting another in their combined 60 years of experience in prison work in this state.

Contraband in prisons, including weapons, is a constant problem, they said, though neither could recall a shooting.

The unaccounted-for gun is “the part that will give you nightmares,” said Leeke, who was director for 19 years through 1987 and is a corrections consultant. “The weapon’s still in there and there’s ammunition.”

Neither of the ex-prison directors had detailed knowledge of Sunday’s incident.

Catoe, who started with the agency in 1970 and was director of security for 14 years, said a lockdown, though necessary, can make the gun search more difficult. Corrections officers have less access to prisoners confined full time to their cells, so information is slowed.

“The fact that it got in there ... obviously indicates a breakdown somewhere,” Catoe said. “But it’s a constant struggle to keep contraband from getting in.

“The fact that it doesn’t happen more often than it does is fairly remarkable.”

Reach LeBlanc at (803) 771-8664 or cleblanc@thestate.com.