In December 1999, six Cuban inmates at the St. Martinville prison in Louisiana, used homemade knives to take several guards hostage, and then used the guards to take over the prison control room. They demanded to be freed or sent back to Cuba on the premise that they had finished serving sentences for their crimes but were being held in legal limbo -- immigration wanted to deport them, and the U.S. has no extradition treaty with Cuba.