Hector Bravo UNHINGED
Official Hector Bravo Podcast
Hector Bravo UNHINGED
The Devil in Prison: A Whistleblower's Story
Kenny's journey from a 36-year-old fiberglass factory worker to a respected Lieutenant in the California Department of Corrections reveals the dangerous reality behind prison walls and the moral challenges facing those who work there.
Walking the toughest yards at SADF Corcoran, Kenny witnessed firsthand the violence that defines level 4 maximum-security units. His candid account of firing warning shots to prevent riots, maintaining boundaries with manipulative inmates, and navigating the complex prison politics offers rare insight into a world few ever see. "You forget who they are," Kenny warns, highlighting the dangers of the fading line between officers and the violent offenders they supervise.
The conversation takes a shocking turn as Kenny describes blowing the whistle on a fellow officer with alleged Mexican Mafia connections – and the devastating retaliation that followed. "They're trying to send you to prison," a district attorney warned him, as the department fabricated charges to silence his revelations about institutional corruption. His legal battle against the department exposes how CDCR protects those who compromise security while punishing those who speak out.
Kenny's firsthand accounts of administrative failures – from the deadly Fresno Bulldog integration that resulted in multiple deaths to supervisors who refuse to act on known threats – paint a disturbing picture of a department that has shifted from law enforcement to politics. "We had a plan of ops with ambulances on standby because you know it's going to be a mass casualty event," he reveals, suggesting administrators knowingly allowed violence to occur.
For current officers, Kenny offers wisdom earned through decades of service: know your policy, maintain your distance, and remember who you're dealing with. His unwavering faith helped him persevere through false accusations and career setbacks, emerging with his integrity intact. In a system increasingly compromised by politics, Kenny's story stands as both warning and inspiration for those who believe corrections can and should do better.
Hector Bravo unhinged.
Speaker 2:Chaos is now in session. Welcome back to our channel Warriors. We are still growing. We have not stopped. You guys keep asking for it. You guys keep getting it. Another banger today, a former lieutenant, another one from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation with a lengthy time and honorable service under his belt. We have today none other than Kenny. What up, kenny? How you doing? Good dude, how was your travels over here to San Diego?
Speaker 1:It was a little crowded on the freeway than we're used to, because where I live now we don't have no traffic. Do you miss California? No, except for my kids. Some of my kids are out here, our kids you don't miss the weather.
Speaker 2:The weather, yeah, the ocean.
Speaker 1:The ocean and that's about it, that's it.
Speaker 2:That's about it. That's pretty much what I see.
Speaker 1:The food, the Mexican food I had menudo last night.
Speaker 2:I haven't had it. You can't get menudo where I live. For sure you like menudo, or?
Speaker 1:pozole better. I like menudo. That's what I was raised on, that's what my? Grandma made my mom. Where were you raised at, dude? I was raised in Madera, California, and I lived there a good portion, really a long portion of my life.
Speaker 2:I didn't get married until I was 33 years old. You did not get married until you're 33. I was 33, god bless you, bro.
Speaker 1:I waited and it didn't work. It did not work. No, I got divorced. She divorced me when I was uh, that's part of the story, but anyway. But I met my wife now, uh, 14 years ago.
Speaker 2:We've been almost 14 years of marriage I have come to the conclusion last night, that marriage is a scam, bro, and no man should participate in. This is coming from my experience, yeah, and my experience is pretty fair and knowledgeable, yeah, but oh, go ahead.
Speaker 1:Here's the biblical thing Whoever finds a wife, finds a good thing, finds favor with God. And you just got to find the right one, the one I have now. God bless you, man, you're blessed. She was with me through chemotherapy and cancer and never, never, never. You know, she was always by my side and I'm thankful for God because you don't know, when you say till death, do you part, or sickness and health Right, that they really mean it until it comes Right.
Speaker 1:Oh absolutely you know, and so it you know, I don't know what I do without her.
Speaker 2:I'm grateful for you, dude, I'm glad. Is madera, central california or northern california central?
Speaker 1:central right. It's the heart of what they call the heart of california. It's right in the direct center of california, geographically I had no idea.
Speaker 2:They called madira the heart of California.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, and there's a place on the freeway, freeway 99. It's a tree and it's the exact geographical center of California.
Speaker 2:I thought maybe Los Angeles would be the unofficial heart of California. No, everybody flocks there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, it's Madeira. In fact, their logo for the town is a heart Interesting man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Did you have any family members in the department that maybe gave you the guidance or awareness to want to join?
Speaker 1:absolutely not no, wow, you want to know why I joined the department. Yeah, oh um. Well, I had a pretty wild childhood. I mean, I had a daughter that I didn't find until 32 years after she was born. She found me, actually, but I had a wildlife and at 25 years old, jesus found me. None of us were looking for him, but he found me and my life changed forever. And so I went from 25 to 33. I was working, ministering to kids at the juvenile facilities in Madera, and then had a ministry, a little ministry with the youth, and I went to Mexico to preach, of course with an interpreter, because, my dumb self, I don't speak Spanish.
Speaker 2:You don't speak Spanish, man. No, bro, man Jimenez is your last name.
Speaker 1:Well, listen, when I was going to school okay, I'm a lot older than you are speaking Spanish on the playground you got in trouble. By who? By the teachers? I didn't know that, yeah. And then five, six years later, they started a bilingual program. Wow, so go figure.
Speaker 2:But yeah, it was. You know things were a lot different then. You know, I read something recently or saw something recently that they were trying to erase people's heritages by doing that, eliminating people's languages out of culture.
Speaker 1:They didn't want to, because they were giving an influx more and more of Hispanic people. Of course Not just through green card, but people were actually coming there and then families were growing. You know, mexicans, we breed fast.
Speaker 2:It was Alaska. It was Alaska that they were saying they didn't want those original people to be speaking that language, and they wanted to strip them from the native tongue.
Speaker 1:I'm sad that I didn't keep that part of my heritage, but you know I can understand. I can eat Mexican. Menudo Menudo.
Speaker 2:So how old were you when you joined the department, Bro? I was 36 years old. Oh dude.
Speaker 1:So here's, what happened From 25 to 33, when I got married I was doing all that ministry stuff, so that was my focus and I was working at a fiberglass insulation plant Making good money. But I hate it, bro. I wanted to be Fresno Police Department. All my friends were in Fresno PD, so I wanted to go to the academy but my then wife said absolutely not, because we'll get divorced. I should have done it because we got divorced anyway. Oh, come on, man.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean. I once had a Challenger that I traded in for a Highlander. Yeah, what are some of the dangers of working around fiberglass? It seems like pretty dangerous, a lot of cancer.
Speaker 1:Oh man, Like I can't attribute what happened you can attribute? No, I don't think so, but I know a lot of friends that because there's a lot of chemicals, we would be cleaning this duct work and take the stuff put in a bag and they'd take it to a toxic waste dump. Go figure, no, freaking way, dude.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, wow, yeah calusha wasn't a thing, or just I don't know how they got away with that, but, um, I had some pretty good jobs there but I I just my heart was always doing some type of police work, investigations and stuff like that. I always had that, my mom and I growing up. We watched the shows, you know detective shows and all that, and I thought, well, someday I want to do that. What were the shows back in the day? Oh, I'm trying to remember, um unsolved mysteries.
Speaker 2:Oh, like way before way before that.
Speaker 1:Right, but way before that, bro.
Speaker 1:Like you know the streets of bro, like you know the streets of San Francisco, you don't know that, carl Holland the old guy Different shows like that. Okay, so it was always kind of like what I wanted to do. So I suffered through that career because I had a family, you know doing that work Fiberglass. I had a family, I had kids, you know doing that works fiberglass. I had a family, I had kids, you know, and I just I worked. I remember I was so exhausted because I would work 12-hour shifts and then work overtime and and I come home and I lost like two or three years because my son never slept so I was up with him because I wanted to miss that. I didn't want to miss that time, but it was always wanting to get out of that. And one day I came I told my then wife hey, what about the Department of Corrections? Because we had a friend that worked at CCWF? Oh, that wouldn't be bad. So she agreed and I went to the academy in 1998.
Speaker 2:1998 as a 36 year old man. Yeah, a lot of people ask me hey, hector, is it too old for me to join? And I tell them no, absolutely not. What would you say some of the perks of joining later on in life? My thing is you guys have wisdom already under your belt.
Speaker 1:Yes, and what I, the big, uh, fortunate, uh, you know happenings with me when I was at at the academy is all my roommates were the same age, really the we would. We were very disciplined we go to bed when it was time, get up in the morning at four, five o'clock in the morning. The kids next to us stayed up all night doing all kinds of crazy stuff and they would get mad at us because they could hear us getting ready in the morning. Oh, and I'd be like, hey, shut up in there, go to sleep when you're supposed to fool. But you know we had that discipline. You know I learned that discipline from working and my dad Absolutely my dad used to make me go work in the field.
Speaker 2:So Was it a six-week academy to make me go work in the?
Speaker 1:field. Was it a six-week academy? Six weeks, six weeks, six weeks, very intense six weeks.
Speaker 2:At that time frame? Looking back in hindsight, did that differ from when you were a sergeant at the academy?
Speaker 1:Yes, and the reason I went back is because of the influence that the sergeants had on me that were there, my company commanders.
Speaker 2:What kind of stuff were they leaving impressions, or how were they leaving impressions on you?
Speaker 1:The most important thing is to go home at the end of the day, defend yourself, the alertness they always wanted us to be alert and just the discipline. The PT was a little bit more intense. We had PT when I was a sergeant. In fact, I led PT. I was in pretty good shape even though I was 50 years old and so, anyway, it was very intense and they talked about a lot of their experience and the things about if you get into it with an inmate, they're used to fighting all the time.
Speaker 1:We're not Right, true, true. I mean, they live like that, true, and especially like with weapons and all that. Who has a weapon? I don't carry a weapon, right, but so things like that and it just made an impression on me. It was all about integrity and watching your partners and being disciplined, going to work on time being a good relief, you know, supporting your, your partners and that type of stuff. So it was, it was a big influence on me. I wanted to be that and so, as I moved up on my career, I said you know what I'm going to do, like those guys did. Because it made an influence, because I have to admit and I'm not trying to play a song for myself, but I had a pretty good career and I attribute it to those guys.
Speaker 2:Right now the experiences and characteristics that you just described, uh, from your academy sergeant, it seemed to me that it was very simple, to the point and focused around the bread and butter of corrections yes, right, it's all about safety and security, safety and security. Yeah, looking now at present times corrections 2025 do you believe everything is chaotic because they have uh gotten away from that?
Speaker 1:absolutely, absolutely. And uh, there's no. Uh, I'll give you an example. When I was going to the academy, it was 30 percent of the people were military, right or ex-military. Of course, they wanted to double dip, get that 20. Someone had 20 years and they wanted to get to 20 years. And so they had that discipline and they had an effect on us too. And now I talk to an academy administrator not too long ago 3% 3% military.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1:The rest of them? He just told me they're kids that want to get a job.
Speaker 2:Okay, cool, perfect, we'll go off of that. Is working in corrections man? A place just to go get a job?
Speaker 1:Absolutely not, absolutely not. Why a place just just to go get a job? Absolutely not, absolutely not. Why? Because you can't have a that kind of mindset. Go to work and be safe and be. Let me give you an example.
Speaker 1:You remember when we had to do the run at the end of the academy and you had to pass Right, you had five minutes and 15 seconds or I can't remember exactly, but anyway, now they up the time with 30 seconds. What does that tell you? Let's up the time 30 seconds. So we got some guy that's a little slower and, dan, what I heard is they're trying to eliminate it that time. So you just run and you know, maybe an hour later you come running in or whatever.
Speaker 1:I don't know what the what the whole you know timing is, but I think it's no time. And the reason being is there was a. The administrator from the academy told the sergeants we have too many cadets that are failing and we spend $45,000 just to get them through the academy. And one of the sergeants asked him hey, wait a minute. So you're telling me that if I'm in the middle of the yard fighting with some inmate and he's stabbing me or whatever, I got some excuse me some big tub of lard, and he can't make it to me in time, so my life is not worth having those standards. That's what I'm disgusted about.
Speaker 2:You know that's the difference between public safety and the public sector and the private sector. The public sector is able to get away with stuff like that because it's tax funded money. You know there's already procedures, so they are able to lower standards and just kind of fill the cesspool. Yeah, what's more important? Having the proper mindset or being physically fit, both Working in corrections, both.
Speaker 1:Both. You have to have both and you weren't around, but we used to have the. You had to take physical fitness tests when you were working in, when you were already at the institution.
Speaker 2:Physical fitness test yes, yes, sir. Or the physical, annual physical, no, it was you had to take a fitness test.
Speaker 1:I didn't know that if you passed you got extra money. I didn't know that. Yeah, and you did a run and there's some steps and all that kind of stuff. You know a lot of people wouldn't even take it. They said forget the money, I'm just not going to do it.
Speaker 1:I mean, you got to be, you know, fit, because when I was at the academy, like I said, I was an older man and I did all you have to qualify to do the physical fitness teaching. So I did, and we would run. I don't know if you remember You'd run the corners, run the straight, and then you'd do 220s and then the 440s. Well, I'd beat two-thirds of my company, damn, and I'd chew them out. What the heck's the matter with you guys? You're in your 20s and I'm 50 years old. Yeah, how are you going to be ready to fight somebody if you're not in shape?
Speaker 2:You and I both talk an awful lot about fighting inmates. Are we embellishing that, or is that the realities of working in a prison in California?
Speaker 1:It's a reality. It's a reality because I've been in two or three different you know, hand to hand. Right One dude punched me in the jaw and my sergeant in the jaw and we fought on the tier and dude came out. Just he came out swinging Absolutely and because we told him, hey, sergeant wants to see you, Opened this level 4-180, opened the door, came out punching, Went to court and they found him not guilty. I'm like they're trying to make it sound like we did it, but anyway, I love to ask this question to former employees.
Speaker 2:One of them is you know, there's also a misconception that inmates do not attack staff for no reason. Is that true?
Speaker 1:No, no, and sometimes you never find the reason they have it inside of. Whatever their reasoning is, you might find out later or find out from you. Know some of your informants. You know you develop informants when you're working the units and stuff like yeah but sometimes you don't know why.
Speaker 1:Sometimes they're just crazy. They just go off, you know, and uh, especially on that 4-180, they lived in violence their whole life and so that's how they know how to solve things. So the horrible thing now about the Department of Corrections is it's not a law enforcement agency anymore, it's political, it's a political agency.
Speaker 2:Dude, that's profound that. You said that. Now let me ask you this Is Corrections an arena to be a political agency? No.
Speaker 1:How do you play politics? How do you play politics with safety, with lives and with somebody that's going to Human lives.
Speaker 1:I was working in a gun tower and Manny Gonzalez got killed when In Chino. No, I was a sat-up, but they made the announcement. Everything was locked down after that and that hit me. That hit me really hard. In fact. I got on my knees in the observation booth on the yard. I got on my knees and just prayed for the family and for the guys that I was working with, Because you just never know. It just hit me really hard.
Speaker 2:Did word travel about that incident. Oh like fast, Fast and everywhere.
Speaker 1:Fast, I can't see. Yeah, I mean, once we heard it, it was a radio announcement at our prison no way, yeah. And then we, everything was on lockdown. What exactly did they put over?
Speaker 2:the radio.
Speaker 1:It was just like an honor type of thing, okay, and then the sergeant called me, said, hey, everything's locked down and they just, you know you're not supposed to bring a cell phone into prison, but I had a cell phone up in the tower because I couldn't call my then wife if I was working overtime. But anyway, anyway, I called different people that I do and you know it got.
Speaker 2:It got around fast dude, what uh was the first institution that you started to work at? Sad if sad, if sad of corcoran. What is the makeup of that institution, the layout, the levels, two level, two yards dorms, and this is the dumbest design ever created by CDCR.
Speaker 1:If you work at Salinas or Pelican, you have a yard and then there's a walkway and then there's another yard, so you have a sister yard, right? Something kicks off here. Here they come, right. Where I was at SADF level 4, 180, 180 by itself. How close is your nearest help? Uh, probably about, I don't know, trying to think maybe a couple, two, three hundred yards away and then they have to come through the complex, go on to the patio and then go on to the yard.
Speaker 1:Was there a procedure for that, an alarm response protocol for that? It was a protocol. When I first started it wasn't a protocol. You didn't have alarm response, it was like a Royal Rumble. We just had to handle it when I first got to SADF. Oh, and let me finish. And then there's two level three 270s, delta and Echo Yard, and there's the misnomer substance abuse treatment facility F Yard, and there's the misnomer substance abuse treatment facility F-Yard and G-Yard. Two level three GPs, gps.
Speaker 2:Well now, At that time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, at that time.
Speaker 2:And this what year? So you went to 1998. You probably touched down what 1998, 1999?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and 98. And then there's the F and G are which are supposedly substance abuse. The state kind of to me they duped the federal government into getting money for a substance abuse program, oh and you know what's funny? Of course they did Guess who worked for me in the kitchen. I did work in that yard for a little bit. Who's that? Robert Downey Jr.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he had sobriety under his belt, man that guy. Yeah, yeah, so Robert Downey Jr was your kitchen worker.
Speaker 1:Well, he worked, for it was a couple of overtimes, but I remember him, but he was working in the kitchen?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I yelled at him a few times. What facility was he at? He was at that substance abuse.
Speaker 1:Yep interesting man, yeah, um, what was it like hitting those yards, dude, like the real yards, with the big boys. I said that's where I stayed all my career, or that I was as sad if it was on a level 4 180, because I just like that atmosphere of helping your partners working through riots, working through all the stuff that was going on. We started out level 4-180. So we got all the Salinas garbage and Pelican Bay garbage. So it was crazy. We had alarms. We had to pick which housing unit we ran to. No way, yeah, because it's like there's two over there and two over here and you know, try to figure out were they separate incidents, meaning, okay, there's code three riots where blacks and mexicans kick it off, and it's.
Speaker 2:It's blacks and mexicans fighting in all the buildings, in the chow hall and on the yard. Were these like just separate incidents? No, they were all.
Speaker 1:Sometimes it was a distraction for what was happening on the yard.
Speaker 1:But sometimes sometimes it was just separate incidents. Okay, and my first day and you correctional youngsters I hope you never run into the guy that I ran into. My first day I walked on the yard as a yard cop. I had a one-yard cop, s&e, and then you got the building. You got the gunner, four buildings on one side of the yard, big wall in between, and four buildings on the other. Is it a wall or a gate? It's a big wall, okay. And then uh, and then there's a wall, two gates for the patio, for for medical or school?
Speaker 2:is there an officer that mans those patio gates, gunners? Oh, with buttons.
Speaker 1:Yeah, up on top, oh, that's interesting. But there's a patio cop that radios hey, I'm ready for the education or I'm ready for whatever. And so I get on the yard and I ask the guy hey, what do I do? He said oh, you see those bloods over there on a corner by the gym and they're out of bounds. Go tell them to get in bounds. So I walked. I thought he was going with me.
Speaker 1:This fool sent me by myself and these bloods, their shoulders were bigger than my stinking calves or my thighs. And I looked up to him and I said hey, you guys, get back in balance. They all kind of looked at each other like who is this fool? I said, okay, you never see me before, I'm new, whatever. Still, got to get back in balance, dudes, you know Absolutely. And I said you know back.
Speaker 1:Then I really didn't know what to do. But I, hey, you know? Um, you don't want to turn this to paper, you know, you don't want me to write. And, uh, they said they looked at me. They said why are you gonna do that? I said I'm not, but I want you to get back and bounce. I looked up to make sure the gunner was watching me yeah, and the gunner that we had was horrible. This fool would be asleep with his feet sticking out the window at a level four with the yards out, anyway. Um, that was a test, and so I walked back and he was just standing there. He gave me the side eye like all right, rookie, don't ever. If you're a seasoned cop, don't ever do that to anybody. Um, you teach that guy what you need to know and what they need to know, and then they're they're actually giving more help to you later. What if you run into something? So I couldn't believe that we had some crazy people.
Speaker 2:No, I like that you gave that experience and then said the right thing to do, because that's reality.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know they're rookies, but let me ask you this From what you know.
Speaker 2:looking back in hindsight, do you think if you would have started getting your ass kicked, you think that guy would have helped you out? Your partner? Is that why he felt so confident in telling you to go? It's just kind of whatever those guys were back in those days.
Speaker 1:I'll tell you what used to happen. I didn't do it because I always thought, hey, if I have to do it, yeah, I'll do it. These dudes would go out on the yard, the shoe yards, so I heard, and take an inmate out there, take their belts off, put it in a 4-180 building. There's like a little triangle, door door to the outside, door to the shoe yard. So they would put their belt in that triangle and go take it, battle it out with the inmate. And there were some pretty bad dudes that I worked with. I couldn't do that. I mean I'm not going to do that.
Speaker 2:It's strategy, bro, yeah strategy, and you've got to use your brain.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so I just thought, well, what a crazy way to do things, but it was effective.
Speaker 2:It was effective. Let me ask you this it is not abnormal for us to have heard stories of COs taking off their belts and fighting inmates. That is not an abnormal story. But where do you see a happy median where we go from taking off our belts and fighting them to playing pickleball and softball and handball with them?
Speaker 1:Why we got escapes, why we got so much violence, why we got violence against officers, is they've taken away the line.
Speaker 2:But would you agree that we don't and this is me speaking with wisdom now would you agree that we don't have to fight the inmates one-on-one without a belt to effectively do our job?
Speaker 1:No, and I'll tell you what happened to me. I was working in a substance abuse building with my partner, gina. I don't know if you remember, but we talked about it. Oh yeah, yeah, we did, we did and she was awesome. But I went to chow. She lets the inmates out and then they come back and then I come back. So I'm walking back and I could see her face like something was wrong. I said what the heck's going on? And she said some man may come walking in, kick my podium and said my vagina stank and you're a B-I-T-C-H and he was giving it the. What race was he? He was black.
Speaker 2:That was a trick question, man. I got to do my joke out there.
Speaker 1:And so the sergeant. She said the sergeant was standing there and he walked out. He didn't do nothing. I said you've got to be kidding me. He didn't back you up. No, I said, hey, open up. And it was four sections. Four sections, four doors, and the inmates are housed in those sections. They're all in the day room.
Speaker 1:And I said, hey, call that inmate out. I remember his name was Gibson and he. So she called up and I said close all the doors. I took off my belt and I said, hey, come on, let's go. You don't talk to my partner like that. We don't do anything in here to disrespect you guys. We give you your program. You don't talk to her like that.
Speaker 1:So I took a step and he backed up. I said I got him. So I chased him literally around the podium. It's a big podium and all the inmates in every section was standing up watching me. I said get out of here, go back to you. Well, and all the blacks got around him. They took him. I don't know what they did to him, but they probably tuned him up a little bit.
Speaker 1:But I, I I called all the mac reps and I said, hey, I'm gonna go right now and start tearing up rooms right. And I said uh, I said it, you ain't gonna do that in this building especially for her. And and I had a white inmate. That's the funniest thing. This is where I got my nickname. I'll tell you my nickname. He's sitting there and he goes hi, cabrones. Un pinche diablo told you that called yeah, yeah, and just not kind of in a joking way yeah, yeah, it was dude, you're something else. I said hey, anyway, well, that's, that was my name. When I was at saturday was diablo and I made him stop calling me that because I said hey, dude, I'm debriefing yeah and I can't go to church and tell my pastor I'm diablo, right so?
Speaker 1:but yeah, I agree that you do not have to do things like that, that, but you do have to stand your ground I really want to dive more into what we are talking about right now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because I have also been in the same exact situation as you 2007, level four GP. But how can we convey the message to these new cops that you cannot do that anymore? You probably couldn't have done it back then, but you still need to stand your ground within policy, procedure and common sense.
Speaker 1:Stand your ground, be respectful, because you can get discourteous treatment of an inmate. Now, with the body-worn cameras, they still hear everything you say, which that's another thing. That's horrible cops on the street. They don't turn their body cap cameras on until they go to an incident. Right, right and uh, it's taking away the ability for cops to talk to each other about stuff. You know what I mean, but anyway, so yeah, it's yeah, or realistically, is it?
Speaker 2:let me ask you this an honest question Is it impossible for correctional officers to survive in this climate?
Speaker 1:It's impossible for them to survive in the way that we used to survive. You don't understand what I'm saying because the line has been erased. You're playing pickleball. I saw one where the guy was popping the dude's neck. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I saw one where the guy had his hand on the officer's shoulder, talking to him like he was their buddy, so what? And all of a sudden we worry about escapes, you're? That's why the whole thing the california model of teaching it to me at the academy, um has marred the line, because we have to remember who they are. We have to remember I'm not saying, yes, there's people that got in prison for you know, and they just messed up in life and all that, but you also have to remember who you're dealing with. Some dude may be acting like your friend and all of a sudden he's got a cuff key and he's running down the street and an escape, or stabbing you in the neck, stabbing you in the neck, stabbing you in the neck. You just don't know.
Speaker 2:Should young officers trust inmates? No?
Speaker 1:Here's the thing I had dozens, especially in ISU, of informants. A lot. Did I trust them? Heck no. When I was in ISU I had an informant and I said I'm going to listen to his phone calls. Guess what? I got a $12,000 drug bust because his mom was bringing in stuff I didn't trust him.
Speaker 2:Should young correctional officers try to befriend inmates in an attempt to not be victimized? No, why?
Speaker 1:Because then once you do that, once you let that door open, then you got to get the doors open. Yeah, keep the door closed. Keep the door closed, keep it closed, because just like an ant can find just a little crack to get into your house, that's the same thing that that inmate will do what he can to manipulate you and get into the crack.
Speaker 2:Is it the role of a correctional officer to punish inmates?
Speaker 1:No, okay, so they already got their punishment Correct Right. They got their punishment, they got to serve out. But it's our role to keep them disciplined, because you have to remember.
Speaker 2:Disciplined enforced.
Speaker 1:Enforcing the rules enforcing and then, of course, as lieutenants, we do the disciplinary hearings, right and uh, you know you, you have to, you have to remember these guys are especially level 4 180s. They're in prison because they don't know how to live. They don't know how to live life on the street without being in trouble. So they need a structure in their life. And that's why, when you're working with them, as long as you're respectful, as long as you keep the line there, as long as you're not afraid to shoot, as long as you're not afraid to use your spray, your baton, you set up like a boundary for them and they are good at staying within those boundaries because they have their own structure, their own things, they have going on. You have to maintain that. You have to maintain that line.
Speaker 2:I'm going to ask you a question from the perspective of a new CO that doesn't know anything. Hey, LT, people keep talking about this line, this line I should be having between me and the inmate. What the hell is the line? What you know?
Speaker 1:and what you read. Take that Title 50 now Read the Title 15. Know your procedures. Know your procedures. Know your inmates. The more knowledge you have, find somebody who's got some time in. That's what I did.
Speaker 1:I was real fortunate because I had guys after the first fool who really helped me. I had a friend named Mark and I watched that guy stand there. Of course there was always a distance, but he would take the inmates from being jacked I'm not locking up, I'm not doing this and he would start talking to them. Hey, listen, I want to see the sergeant. He goes. I'm going to call the sergeant. It's going to be a mad sergeant. You're going to take him away from his coffee and his donuts and he's going to listen to me. Right, I'm going to be the one that's going to tell the story. That's a difference than now, too, between supervisor. You got uh and he would just take him. He goes. I'm going to work on your bed move, but you've got to give me time because I got a lot of stuff going on and he would take that dude down to calm. All right, man, lock it up and the dude would lock it up. That guy was perfect at doing stuff like that. That's verbal judo.
Speaker 2:How important is effective communication working in a prison?
Speaker 1:It's everything, it's everything. And I've, even when I used to take my cadets on casets, I would take them over to an inmate and I would tell them hey, tell them, would you tell them what's the best thing you can do when you're working? He said hey, be respectful, maintain your distance and communicate to them in a way that they can understand and, just like my friend, just take them down you know, but if they don't want to go there and it's time to tussle, it's time to tussle.
Speaker 2:Speaking of tussling, do you believe that there are correctional officers that don't have it in their mind, that are prepared for that tussle?
Speaker 1:Well, I'll give you an example. I have a cadet ex-cadet that works at the academy. He had a female cadet and they're doing at the academy now. They have role players. You dress up in an orange jumpsuit and you have pads on and you have to go the officer and not go, but you do something for them to react.
Speaker 1:So the sergeant walks up to the female, punches her in the stomach or in the chest and she starts crying. Okay, and he said look, maybe she suffered violence when she was younger. I got to be sensitive, took her aside, don't she was younger? I've got to be sensitive, took her aside, don't you? She just was upsetting to her. So next scenario she's laying on the ground, the sergeant straddles you and he starts like punching you and you have to work your way out of it and she just flails her arm, just starts crying. Well, he writes a lieutenant and he says well, just put it in her file, the institution knows about it. How are you going to send somebody like that If you and I, hector, and we need some help, and somebody meets her and she starts crying, what help is that going to be?
Speaker 2:You just reminded me of a similar incident that I took part in as a alarm response instructor at donovan charley yard. Same role playing, same scenario. I was the inmate, the officer. Hey, I'm gonna see how close I can get to you and how aggressive I can get before you actually utilize a use of force option. I was in this officer's face, cocking back and nothing. I had a piece of paper in my hand, I crumpled it and I threw it at his face and he sprayed me with it. I said really, you guys don't need to get assaulted to utilize force. I said did I have to throw a piece of paper at your face to get a reaction out of you? None of this shit gave you a fucking an alert that you were about to be assaulted.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, shit, gave you a fucking uh an alert that you were about to be assaulted. Yeah, yeah, I. Well, let me tell you a funny story. I think I told you when you and I talked, when I was at the academy I was training, I trained my guys that way. I did it in the, in the classroom. We weren't in the gym or anything. Anyway, at the end of the academy they they have like a contest, physical stuff port riding, alarm response, and so anyway, I was busy doing something else with one of the other contests. Well, I went to go check on my guys how they doing and one of the tactical sergeants was like dude, your cadets, because you were supposed to respond. Do a radio call, give the warning to get down and then fight.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:He said your cadets don't do nothing. They just run in there and they figure they're going to kill somebody, and then they'll call on the radio afterwards. He said, dude, they're going to survive. And I just told him, hey look, you got to do what you have to do to go home. At the end of the day, that's the most important thing. This job ain't nothing. It's not that important.
Speaker 2:Facts when did you get into ISU for the first time as an officer?
Speaker 1:I was in, I was on the facility C and I worked on the yard and under control booth and, uh, I worked in the uh, worked in the gun for a long time. Uh, uh, 157 less lethal shots, two mini 14s. That's why I got hearing aids, because my ears were blown out. Um, where'd you shoot the mini to?
Speaker 1:the ground yeah, well, we had. Okay, the first time I had six months. What was the incident? Uh, the first time, uh, I was I got duped in the. Well, I didn't. This guy says, hey, I'm in the gun, you're the sne, but I want to be on the ground. Serge says we're going to redirect. So he put me up in the. He must have knew something was going to happen, dude, and so I looked and said man, there's so many, right, these, the blacks, were all grouped up. So all of a sudden, in front of the building, the fight started. Enemies were fighting the officers and, uh, so all the rest of the blacks started running that way. So, being the guy in the other observation, I was on the corner because my yard was not out and we both put it on the ground. Was it a staff assault? Staff, it was a staff assault. The whole yard was going to attack staff and I had an inmate. I put the shot in the ground and he said hey, let's go, they can't shoot all of us. So guess what I did?
Speaker 1:I got on my knee and pointed at the one dude that said that, because I said well, you're going to be the first one, one of the inmates actually shouted let's go, they can't shoot all of us, yep. Yep, I mean that just goes. Was out on the yard and as soon as it started, the fool ran off like a chicken. Oh, of course he did yeah, so it's coiled it right then and there. And then the second time I shot the mini Real quick.
Speaker 2:I want you to give your perspective of you chamber a round. You pick a location in the dirt, you fire the round. Everything stops. People get down.
Speaker 1:Yeah, people get down right away. Both of us shot at the same time.
Speaker 2:Restrained operations start happening. They start putting handcuffs on people.
Speaker 1:No, it's just they were down and we waited for. It was a radio call, it took forever, but I just stayed on my knee on the catwalk and just I had my sights pointed at. If they would have got up I probably would have shot a person, you know. And they got down and they understood that we meant business. It wasn't just for nothing.
Speaker 2:Absolutely 100%. And the funny thing is, policy has not changed since you fired that shot. Yeah, did ISU go up there and retrieve that weapon?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I had to get the round Dude six months in the department. I picked that round. My hand was shaking because you know it was intense.
Speaker 2:Which round the casing yeah 223.
Speaker 1:So I had to give the gun to him.
Speaker 2:Hopefully you put it on safe.
Speaker 1:man, I put it on safe took it out, so I handed it to him. Did you at that time feel that you were going to be in trouble? No, and I had some older cops that said hey, man, you and I think his name was Mora, was the other guy he goes. You saved us, man, because we wouldn't have been fighting. There was only two, four, six, eight, eleven people, with all the inmates that were out.
Speaker 2:I just need to stress and emphasize the importance of utilizing the Mini-14 in a per policy in a life or death situation like that, because there is no telling. Let me ask you a simple question Can 50 inmates kill three officers?
Speaker 1:Oh, absolutely. Second time I shot. That was a scenario. What was the scenario? I was up in the gun. Some of the staff were coming for shift change. I hadn't been relieved yet, so I was standing there and there was an alarm what they used to call a bad handoff. You remember that when they? I hadn't been relieved yet, so I was standing there and there was an alarm.
Speaker 2:What?
Speaker 1:they used to call a bad handoff. You remember that when the cop would give you the alarm, yeah, the house alarm and boom, hit it accidentally, to the relief. So the sergeant went over to clear it. But during the time when the yard was up, put the yard down, Everybody get down. A big loudspeaker and there was two or three Southerners that were they wouldn't get down, they were just kind of walking around. They finally got down and so when it was over, yard was still down. They didn't get up until I said get up. And cops went over and said hey, you guys need to get down. So they started jawing. They were you know what the F you, you don't just. And they said, hey, let me see your ID. We're not giving you our ID. Okay, cuff up. So they went to cuff him up. They jumped up. But here's the thing and I want to tell, like, look at the camera and tell you youngsters, you have to find out and know, wherever you're working, who is who. I saw this shock collar get up. So what happens?
Speaker 1:everybody gets everybody gets up. If I didn't know that, I knew and then I knew in my mind because I had played this scenario a hundred times absolutely what I was going to do. It's just like playing say, you're playing center field in baseball, you got a, you're ahead three to one. There's a runner on second, get a base hit. Hey, if I get a base hit, I'm throwing it to second because I don't want that guy to get in scoring position. Who cares if that guy? If you don't do that ahead of time, you're going to be slower to react 100% when you're on your commute to work.
Speaker 1:Think about the scenarios. Think about hey, what if this happens? What if an inmate hits me in the face? What if an inmate throws a tray at me? What if an inmate does this? What if an inmate attacks my partner? What if I'm in a gun and somebody's stabbing some dude to death? An inmate's in a day room In the eyeball Stabbing dude to death Two minutes as soon as they start stabbing him, as soon as the first stab wound hits and that dude's kind of like not fighting back or when you start seeing a lot of blood.
Speaker 1:that's a good indicator and nobody is going to crucify you. You might go through the ringer.
Speaker 2:But that's why they pay you $150,000 a year I was a DVI.
Speaker 1:I was actually the California Gang Task Force.
Speaker 2:Real quick on the Sureños or Mexicans. They jumped up All of them 60.
Speaker 1:And there was three cops and my buddy, steve. I'll give a shout-out to him Steve Rivera, this dude's I don't know how 6'3", maybe 6'2" big Mexican dude. His hands are about that big, as big as two of mine. The shot caller ran right towards him. He had no equipment, he just kind of measured him up. Boom, one shot and the dude was out. Who was out?
Speaker 2:The shot caller.
Speaker 1:Knocked out on the yard. Boom, Because we've seen it later on the videotape. But he had to do what he had to do. And and they, but all the strangers as soon as I fired the shot, right in front of them.
Speaker 2:Yeah, when they got out.
Speaker 1:And so what? Right in front of them? Yeah, and they got out.
Speaker 2:So what was the scenario that you ran through your head prior?
Speaker 1:Hey, if my partner that type of thing, if the yard gets up and they're going after my partners, shoot Right, could I justifiably say that I thought their life was in danger? 100 fucking percent 60 inmates and three or four or five cops maybe.
Speaker 2:And common sense and experience tells you they all got fucking weapons.
Speaker 1:Well, actually. Or in their fucking waistband. The two of them that were running that direction had weapons on them? Of course they did, and so when I fired, they all got down and I was given a couple of days off by the captain. I was allowed to take holidays, just to you know, chill and everything was fine. I cleared both investigations because I did what policy said.
Speaker 2:What would you say if I was a brand-new young officer right now, 24 years old, two years under my belt, and I look at you in the eyes and I say, yeah, that's all fine and dandy, but they're going to burn me if I shoot the Mini 14 when inmates are attacking my partner, I mean if they're scared tell them to go to church.
Speaker 1:Don't go to church. Go to church, man, if you're scared. If not, go to work at Starbucks. There ain't no shame in that, you know there's no shame. But don't be in a place. What if your partners need you? They will need you. That's why I shot all the shots that I fired. Here's what happened. Because we didn't have help on that yard Right, you just explained that earlier. I told the cops. I said let me do what I can do first. I had those. I think it was a 205. It was a long range, 150 yards. I broke a Norteño's leg with that thing in a riot. The what? It's a CN gas round and it was shaped like a little rocket and that thing would go forever Was that 37 millimeter.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, 40. Oh 37, and then the 40. And I grew up with the 37. And we had, we switched to the 40 and uh, I just said, look, I'm gonna shoot gas, I'm gonna shoot, I'm shooting with the with the impact, I'm gonna do whatever I need to do. I shot a lot of guys with impact. I broke some bones. One guy had to have surgery because it broke his arm and two. I said don't respond until you let me do what I need to do, because then what if it turns to lethal? And then I end up shooting again. I've racked around and a lieutenant said hey, you've got to write a report.
Speaker 2:Did you feel totally confident in your abilities to articulate why you shot those many 14 rounds Per policy and procedure?
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah, because you've got to know policy, you've got to know the use of force policy. You have to know that you can do your job. I don't care what a captain or an AW says, or even a lieutenant, because I had a lieutenant say lieutenant say, hey, we racked around, you got to write a report. I said really I said, when I drop my baton and don't hit anybody, do I have to write a report?
Speaker 2:or pour your pepper spray.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, we're not advising people to start racking rounds, but situations dictate if you know in that scenario, whatever happens, then rack it and then, if it continues, then shoot it. I stopped because the dude got down.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And he was running right towards one of my partners and I said I'm not having that. And I said but you've got to know, you've got to know those guys. How would I know? I would be scared because the lieutenant told me to write a report.
Speaker 2:I told the lieutenant I just told him hey, hey, that's not policy. Would you agree in this statement that there are managers and some supervisors that are advising cops to do things that violate policy and when confronted, they're going to deny those accusations?
Speaker 1:yeah, because you know you they will. I know that for a fact and I know that for a fact. But you still have to do what your job entails Right, and that's what I, you know. Tell people, hey, look, whatever your actions are with your partners or with yourself, go home at the end of the day. Could you get fired for hitting an inmate with a baton? If he's trying to stab you, maybe, but you'll get your job back. You'll go to SVB. You know that. Oh, I don't think it's like I forget the number now, but it used to be. Like 75% of the cases that went to SVB they overturned it. That's probably way more than 75 percent. Judge said yeah, you shot the mini 14 and you hit an inmate in the head because he, you know he was stabbing another inmate and the inmate was, you know, lifeless yeah lifeless and, uh, you know, so you, you can you have know, you have to study and know.
Speaker 1:And then if somebody has an incident, see what they write. Look, you know you're not going to do it for them, you're just going to look and say, oh yeah, that's pretty good verbiage. Maybe I ought to use that if I ever get into that trouble. Don't just go to work, drink your, sit down, oh we're, you know, get the inmates out and kick back and do nothing. Yeah, you gotta, you gotta, you gotta you gotta read did you get on isu at sative? Yes, after that gun, I went to sative, I issued sative as an officer and, uh, that was a great experience. I had great partners. Shout out to my partners.
Speaker 2:What roles or responsibilities did you have?
Speaker 1:I had actually started with a female partner. I was her partner on the four yard and I thought, well, what do you mean? You don't want me to deal with the Mexicans, you want me to just do the blacks and the whites, or the blacks and the others. What's up with that? And then I started seeing things. She would walk around the yard talking to some of the serenos by herself.
Speaker 2:And she was in her black patches.
Speaker 1:Yeah, which is you and I know that a sereno. If he sees another sereno walking talking to an inmate, he can stab him right then, and there he don't want to need permission 100%. So I just watched that and I began to kind of complain a little bit. Tell her you know you shouldn't be doing stuff like that. Oh no, I could walk across the yard and they wouldn't hurt me. I'm like, oh my goodness, across the yard and they wouldn't hurt me. I'm like, oh my goodness, you, you're, they've already got you.
Speaker 2:So here you are, an isu cop trying to do your job, but at the same time you have this female partner who is over familiar with inmates. Oh absolutely, were you in a conflict?
Speaker 1:yeah, because you know, or were you conflicted? I should say I was conflicted. I should say I was conflicted because I didn't know everything. Maybe she's got it like that, I don't know, maybe it's inexperience. She didn't have that much time in two, three years, maybe. So anyway, I was switched. No, actually, yeah, I was switched to the level four SNY. So they switched you and not her. Yeah, and I did search warrants, got bussed, but it didn't happen until I got a call from a guy by the name of Mike Ruff. He was the chairman of the California Gang Task Force. He was like a senior special agent or something Rang on my issue phone and I'm like what the heck? What number is that? 9-1-6. He says hey, this is Mr Ruff. He said I heard you got a dirty partner. And he said I heard you got a dirty partner. And I said, yeah, it just seems over familiar. She goes, look, he goes, look my. Some of my agents said she would never testify against the Mexican mafia, ever, and they just think she's dirty.
Speaker 1:And he goes I got undercover people in there, I got SSU agents and I got others and he said could you write down and then send it to this person I didn't know who it was Send it to this person in Sacramento? And I said you know what's going to happen. They're going to come after me and not her. He said, oh well, we have protection, you know whistleblower protection. That's not going to happen. Yeah, okay, and so I did it.
Speaker 1:As soon as I did it, as soon as I did it, as soon as I did it, as soon as I did it, send it in a fax, I began to get bust after bust after bust after bust, I sent a bunch of people to prison and put more time on inmates Probably I don't know maybe 75 years worth of time or more. And one inmate got 25 to life as a result of dope yeah, as a result of dope. What were they doing? Conspiracy to bring in. And this fool told me hey, told my partner, you'll never catch us. And I caught him, but he was a serial child molester on a SNY yard, and so that I just for me, probably one of the best things that ever happened to me what were some of the ways that dope was coming in at that time?
Speaker 1:One lady had a pair of panties sewn and had a pocket and she put the torpedoes of dope in there and they'll, you know, look about this big and then just carried it in. You know, um, that was most. They used their kids Staff also. Uh, I never dealt with staff, you know, because that's not our job. That's a misconception of other officers that ISU is are investigating other officers. We can't do that. It has to be a sergeant or above. If it's a sergeant, it has to be a lieutenant on a mailroom.
Speaker 2:The mailroom. Legal mail For dope.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they do that. One guy, this officer in the control booth, calls me. He says, hey, listen to this phone call and I'm listening to it and basically what he's telling his girlfriend just get some meth and then happy cards they called them and they soak a paper card with no coating on it and then dry it, send it in. So I got him and his name was Wainwright. Wainwright Got him for a few six years.
Speaker 2:And this was on an SNY yard.
Speaker 1:Well, the one that I got for the paper. He was on the level four yard GP, yeah, gp. And so I was kind of like, hey, stuff happened Sometimes. It happened. You know I would catch a case. But I know that old partner that I had she was hiding stuff from me as far as the Serenios, you know I would catch a case. But I know that old partner that I had she was hiding stuff from me as far as the Serenios, you know.
Speaker 2:But how was she acting towards the rest of the team of ISU? I mean, I know from what I've seen the ISU always kick it with each other. They're in the office bullshitting. They walk together. Were they embracing her? Was she welcome or not? They kind of they kind of.
Speaker 1:They kind of knew you know right, you know your intuition knows. So after that happened, uh, internal affairs called me so I had to go interview. Now, like I told them, I don't know, I don't know for sure. I do know that I, and we'll go to this case, there was a guy by the name of Trigger Beltran from King Cobas, just when Artie Guzman was a shot caller, next door at Corcoran, but he was a shot caller for Facility C and Trigger Beltran had different kind of politics. Um, and there were some of the, some of the serenios that were on the mesa really didn't like the way he dealt with things. Like if I was going to discipline you, I'd make you do, uh, 500 burpees and I thought, instead of tuning you up and you got to pay a, you got to pay a fine. So it was his way to making money. And then sending.
Speaker 2:Some of the members were doing those type of consequences and they didn't like it, so they would be paying off. Paying off their uh, whatever trouble they got into.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, they're drug dead. Yeah, whatever else, but anyway, um, a guy by the name of trista Costa, he informed on Beltran, said hey, he's got dope, he don't trust nobody, he keeps dope in the house. And he was housed with another guy named Little Trigger and Contreras I think. His name was so the yard, not ISU the yard. Name was so the yard, not isu the yard, because here on charlie yard there's a on the wall there's a mental health building, so acosta was working in there, so they would go from the back talk to him. So they rushed to the cell and they got dope and they he basically got housed in atzik, him and his. What did the rushing?
Speaker 2:of cells look like Because that practice went away throughout time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, basically you kind of time it. You hit the rotunda and then you just start to run and the cop opens the door and all these people rush until you get down.
Speaker 2:Did that create adrenaline?
Speaker 1:for you. Oh, yeah, but I was in the gun.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I'm sure you partook in many when you do stuff like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's an adrenaline rush because you don't know what's going to happen, right? Anyway, they got the drug bust and he went to AdSync. Well, a little while went by and the non-contact booze were in the level four section and, uh, they had set up a camera, a hidden camera. It wasn't, there's no cameras in the booze, but they set in on the podium where the cops stood and they they hit it. So. So he spells out Acosta's name, kill him on video.
Speaker 1:So when I asked my old partner what happened to that video it should be an evidence oh well, it doesn't work anymore. What do you mean? It doesn't work anymore. You took it from the camera. You're supposed to put it directly into the evidence. So, anyway, and then I started thinking wait a minute, acosta's on the mesa. You've got to have proof if you're going to stab somebody like that. Because they went to stab him in the housing unit and that's what my partner, barnaby torres, my buddy, he's my friend two guys were stabbing acosta as soon as he came out of the cell and he shot, killed one of them, shot one of them in the lower back and shot and killed him, didn't stop it.
Speaker 2:No no.
Speaker 1:The other guy was still stabbing. That tells you what the orders were you go until you die or we're going to kill you if you don't. So the guy kept stabbing but the staff Torres said he was going to shoot the other guy but he heard the king and the cops were coming in and he said I always told him not to do that but but I didn't want to shoot because if it ricocheted I could. I could hit hit staff.
Speaker 2:So let me break it down. Acosta informed on the shot caller. Yes, the female ISU saw knew that there was evidence, video footage of him giving the green light in the order made the video disappear miraculously, which it does happen in the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, let me put emphasis on that. And then they fucking stabbed the shit out of Acosta in the housing unit. Yeah, and he lived, he lived, he lived. Did he go SNY?
Speaker 1:He did eventually.
Speaker 2:Is he still around, do you know? No, he died. Oh, he died Good, because I didn't want to have to fucking bleep out his name.
Speaker 1:I'm lazy man he died.
Speaker 2:Not good that he died, but when you said the name earlier I'm like fuck, am I going to have to bleep it?
Speaker 1:out In a hot shot and they gave him a hot shot. Yeah, anyway, so. But as anyway, so, uh, but as you and I know, as lieutenants, lieutenant, uh, they're probably gonna kill acosta. What do we do with him? Lucky, that's no they didn't do that, which to me, to me, is a violation of his civil rights, or bring in fucking acosta in the interview.
Speaker 2:I mean, man, we got credible information. You're about to get fucking. You're done, dude?
Speaker 1:no, I'm not well I didn't do that either, and I believe I heard that later on he he told her hey, you knew what's gonna happen, you didn't do anything, I'm just saying. And so, um, that to me was like, you know, know, I thought, man, that's a civil rights, that's a violation of the color of law statute.
Speaker 2:Let me ask you this, man, because you're a wise individual, You're a man of the Lord how did that make you feel At that time, dude? I could only imagine you were going through it.
Speaker 1:I was conflicted and once I informed I knew that they were going through it. I was conflicted and and when I, once I informed I I knew that they were going to come after me. Um, I even hid the paper because I thought you know what they're going to do? A search warrant come in my house and I hid it behind a picture and I said you know what? I don't know what's going to happen to me, but I know they're going to come after me because this, there's an AW that was over isu and he said he always told us you ever go against the unit, I will ruin your career. And that's what they tried to do. They put me under an investigation. She had investigation, but they cleared her. First of all, you're guilty of destroying evidence. Where's it at? Whether it works or not, it should be in there, facts and uh oh.
Speaker 2:So what was her fucking lame excuse that it didn't work so she threw it away? Yeah, whether it works or not, it should still be in there well, yeah, it should have been in there from the get-go.
Speaker 1:And how would you know? It doesn't work if you put it directly in the evidence, right, oh yeah, that's common sense.
Speaker 2:So I mean, yeah, it's evident, it's very evident that she was corrupt.
Speaker 1:They put me under investigation. But here's the thing I was good at what I did investigating. I'm not tooting my own horn, so don't put an investigator under investigation because he's going to investigate 100%. I've been investigating for the last 17 years. There you go, man. And so when I saw stuff was happening, I was I. It was hard. Um, they redirect, they took me out of isu.
Speaker 2:Um, how soon after did they remove you from as?
Speaker 1:soon as I talked to internal fears.
Speaker 1:Oh, fuck, but they were trying to burn me too. I had several times where I had a cap, uh, and a um confidential that I gave to a captain the two brothers might be enemies because one believed that the other one told on him on a search warrant that I did so. The captain signed it and then I gave it to the CC2. And a sergeant came to me. He said hey, I think you're in trouble. I said why? Because you didn't move these guys. I said, uh, am I su? Do I work on the yard? Am I the sergeant? Am I the officer? No, I gave it to the number one man on the yard, the captain, and I gave it to the cc2. Yeah, you did your job, so got it. You guys out there, you got to know, you've got to know what procedure is if they try to dupe you on something.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you notify the sergeant. You notify the sergeant, you're done.
Speaker 1:But you've got to document it. Yeah, I had to document it, and I don't do bad moves, I'm an ISU.
Speaker 1:I don't work on the yard Anyway. So the pressure came more and more and one day I got a call. I was out watching my son's soccer practice. It was from the DA and a friend of mine great guy, ty Ford, shout out Worked now in Orange County defending cops on shooting and stuff like that. Anyway, get a call, they're trying to, they're trying to send you to prison. And I said what do you mean? He goes. They say you were having sex with an inmate in AdSync, the one that you, you just put six years on, and you're coming up on your on his mother's trial. Man, it hit me like a ton of bricks. I'm like they're trying to send me to prison. What are these people doing? It felt like remember how you felt when they put the search warrants on you. That's the way I felt and in fact my ex-wife was like I think I'm leaving because I don't know what they're going to do to you.
Speaker 1:She already had an agenda anyway she was going to leave. She already had an agenda anyway she was going to leave. But anyway, so a friend of mine, they did the same thing to him because he told Internal Affairs about her dealings. Ryan Couch, he's not afraid for me to say he was.
Speaker 2:Was the warden at the time, would he later be a secretary of the department?
Speaker 1:No, he was a captain? Oh, he was a captain at that time, and then the warden was a guy by the name of King.
Speaker 2:Clark, I was wondering what position that dude was in at that time, yeah, he was.
Speaker 1:King Clark was a warden and Kathy Allison was the acting warden.
Speaker 2:Shout out to Kathy Allison man, she let us fucking go through hell at Donovan.
Speaker 1:Yeah, anyway, I got all these charges of letting an inmate make an illegal phone call, conducting surveillance on inmate visitors, and I'm like.
Speaker 2:All because you blew the whistle on a dirty ISU cop.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's retaliation, right 100% and because now you exposed me, you pulled my covers and now I got to do something From your angle.
Speaker 2:I think you just mentioned a little bit. You exposed me, you pulled my covers. Do you think the managers were just trying to hide a black eye from the department?
Speaker 1:They were trying to hide their dealings with the mafia.
Speaker 2:I think they were trying to hide their dealings with the mafia.
Speaker 1:oh yeah, yeah, jesus christ, dude, yeah, and, and you know here's the thing, um, you know you, you know there's a cost, you know there's a cost, you know there's a cost.
Speaker 1:You know, when you do the right thing, it's always going to cost you something. But here's the thing when they were doing all that, my buddy and I went to a law firm Morrison Forster and at that time was the biggest law firm in the United States and they took our case pro bono. And at that time was the biggest law firm in the United States and he took our case pro bono and they sued CDCR. The lawsuit named the people, three people involved. One of them was the person you named as far as later on would be the secretary. The other one was the AW and the other one was the ISU cop and it was under a RICO statute and our fair speech, our abilities as a public servant to our First Amendment rights to speak out. If it was against whoever, In other words, the department, was trying to push down our free speech rights, it has to be. I forget what the statute is, but it has to be above and beyond your normal ISU duties, which it was who investigates administration.
Speaker 2:Being dirty Right, it's supposed to be the FBI, but Actually actually it's supposed to be Office of Internal Affairs, but they're in bed with the administration Later on. Well, I want to just commend you and credit you, dude, for blowing the whistle, because that's what that is blowing the whistle at that point in time, man, yeah, that couldn't have been easy to do the right thing.
Speaker 1:It helped me because it helped me be stronger as far as knowledge even more knowledge in the department. If something bad happens to you and you're under investigation, then study more and know more, because they're going to try to do crap to you and you don't have to take it.
Speaker 2:But I know the personal feeling of when the veil gets lifted and you realize your own department is corrupt. It's not a good fucking feeling. It's a punch to the gut, dude.
Speaker 1:When it was all said and done, I cleared everything, um, and I forgave those people. Jesus forgave me of my sins. He said you, if you don't forgive, then you know I'm going to forgive you. But he forgave, so I forgave Even that AW. I had a friend that passed away, went to his funeral. I walked right up to the AW, shook his hand because two things I wanted to know hey, I forgive you, and two, I'm still here, dude. Right, I'm still here, standing tall, I'm still working, and what you tried to do to me didn't work. So I forgave because you know it's good to have forgiveness, not just for them, but mostly for yourself. It's like a burden that just goes away.
Speaker 2:Not having any resentment.
Speaker 1:I mean, I had a story, I had a mellow valor and was nominated for another one, and so I just said hey, you know what? There's nothing you can do to me. First of all, oh, and here's the thing, while I was going through all that, they were trying to send me to prison. God gave me a scripture, jeremiah. He spoke it to my heart. He said they'll fight against you, right? Because? But they won't prevail because I'm with you to deliver you. And I hung it on the side of my bed and they didn't, they didn't, they didn't prevail, they didn't prevail at all.
Speaker 1:And so, when all that was happening, I bid the first watch and I was at the hospital most of the time because I lived in Fresno, so I went to the hospital. In fact, the sergeant down the yard got mad at me. He said I'm going to pull your bid and all that because you're only going to be opening and have been here six days out of the whole year. I said you can't anyway, so I'm not worried about it, right? I said you can't anyway, so I'm not worried about it, right? Um and uh. So I promoted, I, I, they stopped me from promoting the first time. How? Because I called the Avanale. I called the because there was a custody captain. It used to be a lieutenant. I had uh sat if he said well, we're not, I want to hire you but I can't because there's this thing with the ISU or something going on, and so I didn't. And then.
Speaker 2:so I waited Real quick to the viewers out there, maybe new correctional officers that haven't seen this quite yet. Does the department block promotions, transfers, special assignments? Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the transfers, and they even do transfers that they're not supposed to do. Look at the people at ccwf.
Speaker 2:they had to suffer through all that, true no, but they do block, oh, absolutely, through illegal means.
Speaker 1:Oh, absolutely frivolous investigations yeah, frivolous investigations um all kinds of uh you know word of mouth. Word of mouth smutting people's names up, smutting their names up and doing all that. And then, yeah, I'm just amazed at what the department does to people in their career that do the right thing, that do the right thing. It's horrible. I mean, both my buddy and I had to go through all that?
Speaker 2:Do you think the department, the upper management actually favor people that are more moldable and willing to jeopardize their ethics and values?
Speaker 1:Well, yes, right now there's a lieutenant at CCWF, more experience than all kinds of people, but they won't promote her to captain because she's too outspoken, she doesn't play the game, she doesn't drink the Kool-Aid, she's too outspoken and I'm just glad that I was able to promote away from. That's the worst institution I've ever seen, seriously, sadf. I don't think so. I thought, oh dude, it's horrible, you don't know. We're not even done with all this stuff. You want to know the stuff that I know about SADF?
Speaker 2:You got any more juicier than that or as juicy.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah got any more juicier than that or as juicy oh yeah, we had a supposedly uh a a confidential was found on an inmate's phone, but not the confidential like he's taking pictures of off the computer screen. They knew the number of building, three, the person's from what I understand the person's name, their confidential. One of them died was killed next door at quark at one jesus christ dude and that person was allowed to retire. That was kind of the person they investigation because here's the thing they said. Oh, I well know it was a shared computer so we don't really know who got on there, which is bull crap, because I know I had ITs do forensic work when I was a lieutenant at DVI.
Speaker 2:Explain to these newer cops what is the difference between a good cop and a bad cop Meaning hey, it's okay to utilize a Mini-14 per policy and procedure when it meets the deadly force criteria, versus do not give inmates confidential information that's purposely going to get other people killed.
Speaker 1:You could, you should. If you do that, if somebody dies, you should go to prison for the rest of your life, 100%. And so I kind of oh well, you know that person retired. Well, why wasn't that information turned over to the FBI? And I know the department does that. You know why, when I was a DVI and I was a lieutenant, I had a staff member and what happened is the M8, warden called me and said hey, m8 escaped. I said what? What from the minimum outside? No, from the from the inner perimeter. I said no, there's no stinking way. We didn't have electric fence, but we had people at every tower. So I went, we went, I got put my clothes, got there and they the dude was working in metal shop during the day. I said let's go over there because he's probably there. So they searched in the rafters. He's probably there. So they searched in the rafters. He had overdose on methamphetamine.
Speaker 2:In the rafters.
Speaker 1:He was in the rafters of the metal shop. He had butt naked, overdose, he had crap all over himself. He went to the hospital and was in the hospital for three days for acute methamphetamine intoxication. In your humble opinion.
Speaker 2:I know you're not a doctor, but do you think he went to the rafters to get high or do you think he got high and then started fucking climbing up the rafters?
Speaker 1:No, his clothes were down on the ground.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay. So he got high on the ground and then climbed the rafters. He crapped all over himself took his clothes off.
Speaker 1:Well, anyway, he went to the hospital for three days. So I said, you know what? I'm going to look at this lieutenant and started looking. And I looked and we could get financial information if it was electronic. So I seen, hey, he got $6,500 from the money store at Walmart. The lieutenant did, yeah, no, the teacher. The teacher did the teacher that was teaching that class.
Speaker 1:So I anyway, push come to shove, I did the investigation, got them on camera, Cause Walmart has some killer, killer. Uh, surveillance cameras, really killer, they can follow you all the way to the parking lot. Anyway, got this dude getting running and then I looked at the people oh, those are my family members. Hmm, you know, two and two and uh.
Speaker 1:So, anyway, I got the MA come back, I got him to roll I was real good at getting him to roll so he rolled and uh, and so I called away hey, we've got enough for a search, search warrant. We can bust this dude, send him to jail, probably find more dope and find money. Well, he can't do that, it's going to make the department look bad. I said, well, that's what we do now. What year was this? This was 2017, 18. And so I know that the OIA is a crew hoots. They protect what the headquarters wants them to protect, like that thing at SADF with the confidential memorandum and my two illegal search warrants Two illegal search warrants you brush that. All that stuff gets brushed under the rug.
Speaker 2:So I just got to address the public. Right now, office of Internal Affairs is in cahoots with upper management, cdcr, and they do not always do the right thing, period no, I I mean, I'm not saying they're, they're bad, it's just well, you got bad apples, it's a culture, it's rough they headquarters controls what they do. Yeah, it's like the German Gestapo.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like yeah and yeah, you have some people that get disciplined. You know that deserve it. Another thing from Sedef Popeye Roman Danny Popeye.
Speaker 2:Roman you ever heard of him.
Speaker 1:Yeah, popeye Roman was stabbed to death on the yard. A guy came through from CSP, sac going to LA for court, so he was just there for a short time. So what happens to those guys? Does anybody do you know what happens to those guys when they come in and they're not really classified?
Speaker 2:Oh you go and add, say you go, go to the hole or they put him in the yard.
Speaker 1:They put him on the yard and he's on orientation status.
Speaker 2:He can't go nowhere but take a shower maybe a phone call priority, though you go to the hole pending court and then, yeah, put you on the yard.
Speaker 1:They put him on the yard and they they approved him to go to the yard. How do you do that? They just oh, he's fine, he can go to the yard. How do you do that? They just said oh, he's fine, he can go to the yard. That was one of the suspects in the Popeye murder that was the MA member that stabbed one of the.
Speaker 2:Alvarado Spy that stabbed him.
Speaker 1:Lennox Stabbed him to death.
Speaker 2:Holy shit, bro. I had no Hold on. He was housed at CSP, sac he was. He is out to court at SADF.
Speaker 2:And technically, you're either supposed to be in the hole or be kind of slammed for the most part. Oh, but you know what? I will say this that practice started coming on later on in the future. But why do you let him go to your? No, check this out, I hear you. I was a lieutenant. Yeah, we were getting these dudes from Calipat. This is fucking retarded and this is why you shouldn't do it. We were getting fucking level four GPs from Calipac going out to court in San Diego and the management did not want any more inmates in that sake. That was the orders they got from headquarters. So we literally had AWs cool AWs too saying ah, fuck it, put them on the yard, fuck it, put them on. And we're like no dude, I'm not putting them on the yard. Yeah, because that was a newer lieutenant and the older ones were telling me don't do that, man, put them in the hole. Yeah, you don't want to eat that. So I didn't know that that dude was out to court.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he was out to court, from what I understand. Wow, I got a lot of friends all around the department hear stuff and see stuff, and I was still a lieutenant at dvi when that happened, so so that, um, and then you have the case of the inmate that came, was transferred, was in cells, but they transferred him to go to the sny, level two the he told the non-designated uh designated sny and they send him.
Speaker 1:It was a non-designated, designated, that's why. And they send him and he tells the counselor where he came from. I forget I'm going to kill somebody if it's a child molester, and then he goes to the counselor on the yard. I'm going to kill somebody if it's a child molester. Goes to the staff on the yard. If it's a child molester, goes to the staff on the yard. So he's in the unit and there's a child molester watching I don't know some kid's show or something. Anyway, he walks up to him and beats him to death with the cane. What year was this? Oh, it was probably 20, 21. And you were, and yeah, I wasn't.
Speaker 2:I wasn't at sattiff. This was at sattiff, okay I? I looked at the pictures of that incident. He killed two child molesters and then he walked out, looked around no staff in the building and went back and said you know I'm gonna give me another one, and went, got another one.
Speaker 1:You know what? I'm going to get me another one and went and got another one.
Speaker 2:There was brains all over the floor, skull hair it was horrible.
Speaker 1:So who's responsible?
Speaker 2:Who's responsible? Well, in the case of a dead child molester, you know that's just doing the Lord's work, yeah.
Speaker 1:And it's one of those things where you're like okay, but still Right. It's one of those things where you're like, okay, but still. If it's threat, violence and he says I'm going to kill somebody, what do you do? You just say, oh, okay, whatever, go kill somebody. Like DVI with Jared Lozano Correct, I worked at DVI.
Speaker 2:Let me ask you an honest question. Honest, fair question. I worked at the NBA, so let me ask you an honest question. Honest, fair question how many deaths could have been prevented if people had just acted around ballpark?
Speaker 1:percentage, fair amount well, here's another thing at. I didn't tell you about the other case. So the same isu cop was talking to a guy I I know I seen her talk to him. I worked overtime. We worked overtime in the same building um, and kept pulling this inmate out. Talked to him Guy by the name of Flaco Zavala, and one day I was I forget where I was at I wasn't there, I was sick, I had to have my son sick, but my sergeant says they were responding to a homicide in Building 2. Guess who it was. Who, flaco Zavala. After the ISU cop had talked to her so much, I guess he was warned stop. But he was trying to get some some of that. You know what prison was this sad?
Speaker 2:if still talking about sad, if you think they're all that great, no, they're not anyway no, I didn't say they were all that great well, especially after watching that fresno bulldog integration but I just said there's some pretty fucked up prisons out there, donovan, csp, sag.
Speaker 1:It's always been one of them and their thing is to retaliate. Well, anyways, zavala was dude. It was brutal. You should have seen that weapon made out of. They did the soap thing with the metal shelf and cut it out and then put soap in Was it a two-on-one or. It was well, they don't know. But yeah, it was two-on-one because there was a couple, two or three were on one because the dude they were, all you know, transferred put in that signature. Where was the?
Speaker 2:body at. Where was the body found? In the day room the body was. They just found the body.
Speaker 1:Well, what they did was they responded and he was there and the day room was out. And then so later on there was an inmate, they had a confidential and made that guy unreliable. Made him unreliable, huh yeah, made him unreliable. And then those two sergeants that sergeant and officer were fired later for some.
Speaker 2:That's so weird, dude. I don't know what the hell's going on there. Now that you mentioned everything that you're mentioning, it's almost like I don't want to believe you, but I know for a fact that shit like this does happen.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so anyway, that whole thing was part of and you know it's funny, in the cost of murder and the result of murder, who's the lead investigator? She is, and investigator she is. And I even heard a videotape of an inmate saying she asked an inmate at another prison why was he killed? Because my cellmate said that it was because of you. I told her it's because you were talking to him. What was ultimately her fate?
Speaker 2:Did she get fired?
Speaker 1:No, she just continued to work, continued to work and then, eventually, because of the pressure, she left ISU.
Speaker 2:But she continued to remain a peace officer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and then she went to Bravo Yard, I think, or something like that. So weird dude, she resigned, resigned or retired, I think she resigned. I don't think she resigned or retired. I think she resigned. I don't think she was old enough to retire, but she might've been, I don't know. But um, yeah, the whole thing, uh with with your experience.
Speaker 2:I want to um bring up a couple of uh relevant newsworthy events from your perspective. The escape of level four inmate, cesar Hernandez, who escaped from Kern Valley State Prison on a transportation run to the courthouse yeah what are some of the deficiencies you observed through?
Speaker 1:that whole incident or the California model marring the lines of officer and inmate, we'll get relaxed. Well, this dude's good with me, he's cool with me and all that. You forget who they are. To maintain your highest security with with him checking him, make sure he ain't got no cuff key in his pocket, make sure he ain't got no cuff key in his mouth, make sure he ain't got no cuff key in his nose, um that type of thing.
Speaker 1:And and to keep that line and keep your ultimate um, I will tell you what I did and I know that the policy has changed. But when I used to take guys out that had any kind of uh, escape history, I said, hey, I would stop in the sally port to give a weapon, come back in and say I'm gonna tell you something. I shoot and I don't miss you. Take off, I'm gonna shoot you in the head, I ain't gonna miss. I would tell him that and the youngsters would be like, why did you do that? I said because I want to take that thing out of his brain I don't think that was ever within policy.
Speaker 2:Yeah too, no, that wasn't. Yeah, you weren't ever able to tell him that before within policy.
Speaker 1:What back then? Yeah, probably not, of course you weren't, but still, I hear what you're saying. Was I always perfect in everything I did?
Speaker 2:No, because you started off the conversation by saying hey, man, I know the policy has changed, but this is what I used to tell them. I'm like no, that wasn't ever the policy. No, no, that wasn't ever the policy.
Speaker 1:What I'm saying is you can't shoot them now, even if they're running.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's what you're saying. Yeah, you can't shoot. You can't shoot them now. Okay, let me give you an example. When I was at when I'm sorry about that, yeah, I talk fast sometimes, but anyway, no, uh, when I was a dvi, I had to escape. So I was the isu, I was the interim incident commander, so I I'm getting everybody to go ready to go out was a minimum. But here's the thing you supervisors, don't just send people out, talk to them, because what I do I told them okay, here's a scenario. You run across this dude and he's running across the field. What are you going to do? And the guy says I'm going to shoot him with the main and hit him. I said are you kidding? How are you going to justify that? He's not a threat to you or anybody else, right? Here's another scenario. It's during the day. Kids are in the playground and he's jumping the fence to go over to the kids to take a.
Speaker 2:To me. It's all how you can articulate it. That is an imminent threat.
Speaker 1:I'm going to shoot him because I thought he was going to take a hostage from the kids. It's all how you articulate it, as long as the kids aren't in the direction of the shot, Correct? You have to know this stuff. You can't just oh there he is, Shoot him Right, absolutely. You call on the radio. Tell the SSU and other people where the dude's at?
Speaker 2:Damn, that shit made me laugh, bro. Talking about, uh, the policy policy. Well, no, I meant you know, correct now. Um, another notable incident was a recent murder at salinas valley state prison, where two north angels brutally murdered a victim for two and a half minutes and the mini 14 was never utilized. What are are some issues that you see may have arise there.
Speaker 1:Well, you, you have a job. Okay, I understand that you're going to, you're going to go through an investigation and you're going to go to defit, we're going to have all that kind of stuff. But if you don't know, I gonna use this mini 14. If you don't know, if this happens or that happens, if you don't know, don't get up there, do not be in the gun. Um, that's awful, because that dude was brutally murdered. His I'm sure his family had to get his body back. They did.
Speaker 1:They did Not that I love you at Bates or anything.
Speaker 2:No, it's preservation. It's just, you got a job. It's preservation of life and that's in the dom.
Speaker 1:And you know it's just, but you got to know ahead of time. If you're not going to do that, then don't get in the stinking gun. But I know, hey, I'm a sergeant and I got this, then go don't get in the stinking gun. But I know, hey, I'm a sergeant and I got this peak. I just don't have picos anymore. You know, yeah, pies, I have this new cop. I need to fill a spot.
Speaker 2:I'm just yeah, it's all about filling spots and getting running program yeah, and that's to me if you were on the street.
Speaker 1:You're not going to send some rookie to Compton by himself. He's going to have a training sergeant or a training officer and he's going to, especially at night. You don't just send anybody anywhere.
Speaker 2:That was a good analogy, because what you have right now are not only rookies in Compton, but rookies in Skid Row. In Compton, everybody's getting fucking crazy, crazy and they don't have a clue yeah, you know I don't that should be like that with the department.
Speaker 1:Hey, don't don't send, don't put somebody there if they don't have the experience.
Speaker 2:They're more concerned about having daddy-daughter dances. Yeah, they're more concerned about not safety and security. Yeah, yeah, it's. It's just fast forward. You were a sergeant at the academy. What was the lesson plan like then? What was the curriculum versus? Did they give you guys the authority, as sergeants, to free ball it and shoot from the hip?
Speaker 1:you're you okay, so you give them what they need to graduate okay okay.
Speaker 1:Okay, so PCA 32 post, and you got to some of the use of force, report writing, different things like that, things that they had to test on. But then you give them your experience, you fit it in. You don't just get up there here's a PowerPoint, right, and you know, read the whole thing. You tell them them, hey, this happens, this is, you know, this is your effective communication. You know, this is this is how I give them instances. I had a guy that was, you know, gonna assault me and I, we just sat, I just talked to him you know that type of thing and I spoke, I maintained my distance and I was ready to fight. And then I let the gunner know hey, I got a little thing going on right here and so I would give him.
Speaker 2:Do you know what was a huge problem and probably around the time frame? What year did you teach at the academy?
Speaker 1:2013 to 2015.
Speaker 2:Okay, definitely after your timeframe. This around 2018, we were getting brand new cadets from the academy who were getting punched in the mouth by inmates and still trying to verbally deescalate. This was plaguing the department and we kept telling them what are you guys doing? Well, they told us at the academy they want us to verbally de-escalate.
Speaker 1:I said fuck no and so when I was at dvi as a lieutenant they had they were hitting the cell my cops, four of them. I was with the sergeant in the day room and uh, not to speak, I had the dude at dvi had the best. Some about three or four of them, are SSU agents now, but they were awesome, every single one of them. But anyway they went up. It was an Asian cell that they supposedly had phones and dope or something and I was watching and I just always went with my troops I didn't sit in my office and drink coffee, so anyway I could see them like jawing at this dude and I said something's going on. So I ran up those steps, left my sergeant behind.
Speaker 1:I ran up those steps and I told the M8, it was on the top bunk with one cuff and the officer was well, they were trying to order him. I just said cuff up, we're going to pull you off that bunk. So I cuffed him up. We back to the office. But I just told him look, what was that all about? Well, we're supposed to verbally de-escalate. I said we had a de-investigator in the office. I said, hey, when you're on the street and you get to cuff one dude cuff his arm and he starts to fight. Where does he go? He said on the ground. I said I don't care, pull him off that bunk, I'll run into it. You have every single thing in the use of force criteria. He's an attacker because he's got a one cuff. He's resisting. You're trying to affect custody. You're giving him orders, everything's there check, check, check.
Speaker 2:That's right, check, check. That's. What you have to do is mentally check the blocks to use force. Is he hitting these fucking marks, yes or no? Use it, pull him down.
Speaker 1:I don't care if he hits his head or whatever. Here's the thing, and I know you don't like him, but ron davis one time was in in when I was at vsp. Uh, we were doing use of force. I was his isu sergeant. So I was sitting in use of force and the administrators are saying, well, yeah, but they, the inmate broke his nose. I love Ron, I just do. But anyway, he said really, he said was a force reasonable and necessary? They said, yeah, that's all I care about, I don't care what happened to him. If he broke his nose, broke his face, broke his arm, it doesn't matter, I'm shocked, as long as it's reasonable and necessary. That guy to me, when I had him.
Speaker 1:I'm shocked. He said that when I had him, when he was with me at VSP, he was awesome, him and Rick Field, they were both.
Speaker 2:As we wind down, and I told you in the beginning we're going to discuss do people change when in the department? What rank was Ron Davis at that point in time? He was a warden, yeah, Okay, Because when he was an associate director he sat right next to me and told us you guys cannot put handcuffs on inmates if they tell you they do not want handcuffs to be put on them. Well, I don't know.
Speaker 1:No, no, no, that happened, he was right here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, no, no, that happened. Yeah, he was right here, no that definitely did happen.
Speaker 1:People could definitely change. People could change I mean the secretary we just had. I think he just got worse and worse. Now McCumber, ruff, dias, correct, okay. So anybody out there, go look at the real chit, because he's got some interesting information about Ralph Dias and the AW that I was involved with Same thing.
Speaker 2:So what advice do you have to correctional officers, being men or women, humans, when it comes to the job and or the way you conduct yourself? Should you be consistent through and through yes, or should you change? Consistent through and through, yes, or should you change up, like some of the people were talking, no, here's the thing I never all the way to lieutenant.
Speaker 1:When I was at, I talked to the officers and just the same as I did when I was, you know, an officer, because I wanted them to learn I would. They would come through with cossets and I would stop them in the rotunda, dvi, and say, okay, where is your loyalty? I want to know. I know God, your family? No, I'm talking about the department. They said well, my partner, my sergeant, the warden? I said absolutely not. I said you're going to lift your hand and swear at the academy to uphold the laws of the state of California and the constitution? Those are the two things you're loyal to. Because what happens if your sergeant, your partner, the secretary, the warden turn dirty and they're doing things to violate those two things? Because Title 15 is law, right, penal code is law, penal code is law. So you have to know if they're doing something or asking you to do something that is not right. Don't do it. Will you be under investigation for insubordination? Maybe?
Speaker 2:Oh, you will.
Speaker 1:And the reason, the reason I came two reasons to glorify jesus christ. Thank you, because he, he's my everything and he has helped me along the way um, it's actually been been the one that do things. And then two, the safety of the people that work in the department. And maybe another thing we have people out there that pay taxes to an entity that's supposed to do the right thing. We should expect that from them. And if you just sit on your hands, that's what's happened. People just sit on their hands and they don't get active. Write your congressman, write your senator. Hey, I'm not going to vote for you anymore if you keep letting this stuff go on. Gavin Newsom, he ain't going to change. Correct, that's the only way the department's going to change If we change the governor. Well, first of all, it's a spiritual battle. Facts, it's a spiritual battle and prayer having people turn. A lot more young people are turning to God a lot and I think things will begin to change.
Speaker 1:But we need a new governor, we need a new organization for the department. They need to restructure it. They need to say look, we're going to hold everybody to the highest integrity. They need to take internal affairs and put it on another entity, because with no connection to the department, so that from an OA to the secretary they can do everything the same as far as discipline. But right now I don't do that.
Speaker 2:How do?
Speaker 1:you get an AW that does the right thing at SADF and says, look, they're going to get killed if they come on the yard. And then you put a plan of ops with ambulances on standby because you know it's going to be a what is it? A mass casualty event. How do you do that? And then in that AW, after she does the right thing, you put her in the mail room.
Speaker 2:So you're? First of all, you hit the nail on the head with everything you just said. Right now, man, that was perfect and immaculate, but right now you started touching about the Fresno Bulldog integration at SADF. But right now you started touching about the Fresno Bulldog integration at SADF. You're telling me there was an AW that spoke up and spoke against the integration and therefore found herself in the mailroom.
Speaker 1:From what I heard, told the warden hey, this is going to happen, Just brush it under the rug. Okay, From what I heard, this person sent emails to the headquarters.
Speaker 1:Connie Gibson your favorite, that's another winner in my book, and so that came back down on her and here's how it did. When the whole plan was to have them come in escorted, with officers on the yard. Why would you do that, for one thing, and why would you do it the way? Just let them all in, take some of them or escort them to the building. Then you have a small incident Not all of them get killed.
Speaker 2:Real quick and I don't mean to laugh. What did you think when you saw video footage of the Prenton Bulldogs? Just get in just on their own right there. I'm like, yeah, here.
Speaker 1:Hey, we're going to go. It's like the you watch Gladiator, yeah. Oh did he walk into the thing all by himself. That's fucked up, man. That's not right. He walked in. Oh, anyway, they walk in and they're looking around. We'll go this way. Oh, there's inmates over there. We'll go this way. Anyway, what made me laugh, not laugh?
Speaker 1:No, not laugh, because it's not funny but shake my head was if you watch the whole thing, the gas and everything didn't come to. All the inmates were gone and they just gassed the Bulldogs. But anyway, how that happened is nobody escorted them. The lieutenant said, hey look, just let them in. So the lieutenant actually changed the plan of operation.
Speaker 1:I will say this, though even had they been escorted, they still would have kicked it off because we experienced the same thing, and then the officers would have been in the way you and I know I don't know if you've ever seen the video of them escorting the bulldog in salinas valley and there was 30 serenios and they did not see that they rushed.
Speaker 1:This is like when I started okay, I did they rushed the um, the bulldog is and, uh, they told the officers get out of the way, get out of the way, get out of the way. What do you do, man? They tried, but they still got the dude. But you don't want your officers in the way getting hurt. Here's what you do in that situation anybody you take okay, say you got three of those bulldogs that were housed in this building I don't know if they were all housed, I don't know if they were all housed together or whatever you take them and escort them and then if it kicks off, it's just those. They say, okay, you know what, we're not continuing to do this because they're going to get attacked.
Speaker 2:Yeah, then you have enough reason to say you got to go on ad sec pending safety concerns. Possible safety concerns.
Speaker 1:Well, that should have been done from the beginning. Facts, because you have a confidential information. They're all making. They're making weapons.
Speaker 2:It's going to be the Norteños and Serenos, and it's a conspiracy to commit attempted murder and or murder or to batter other inmates and then and we know what's going to happen, so we'll just put a couple of ambulances on standby.
Speaker 1:How do you do that? Well, anyway, and then, from what I heard, a lot of the people administrators were in ISU watching the live cameras like they're watching stinking WWE, you know what I mean? And then the captain asked somebody that's what I heard that hey, you want me to put the yard down there? Everybody's grouping. Nah, let it go. It's going to happen. Let it happen, Needs to happen, Whatever.
Speaker 2:So that is wild man. Well, I want to thank you for traveling abroad. All the way over here, man sitting down and conversing with me. I would have loved to touch more on your experience from working the line as a sergeant lieutenant academy, but I felt like we needed to give all that experience. Dude of lessons, lessons for these youngsters.
Speaker 1:Lessons and just from the people that are out there at the academy learn what you need to learn to. I have gotten to speak like two or three times to my old cadets company. I just told them hey, do what you need to do to graduate, but have the mindset that you're going to go in every day, every day, and be alert, learn, ask cops, read the title 15, get to know it. It saved me a few times in my career and, and you know, just just just. Be good partner, get there early for your relief. Sometimes you get relieved late, but don't change your attitude about it. And I prayed every day. I would go with a gun and pray every day. Pray for my partner's safety, pray for mine.
Speaker 2:And was I a perfect man?
Speaker 1:now I'm not, but but I still love people, that I have a lot of friends that are still in the department and I have cadets that I they've graduated with me and people that I've run across and, uh, I care about them and I want to see them succeed. And you know, if you ever need any advice, you need to get a hold of me. One of the things I would leave the cadets is my phone number. When I spoke, you know, even lately, and I said call me If you feel like committing suicide or something's getting too overwhelming, call me I. You feel like committing suicide or something's getting too overwhelming, call me. I'm always. I'm retired. You know I deal with sheep and I mean goats and chickens, but call me because I had a lot of, I had some really good friends commit suicide because it was too much for them.
Speaker 2:No, I hear you, man. If you're comfortable with it, I'll link your Instagram or whatever you let me link so people can get a hold of you, that's absolutely the, the, you know the the thing, then, and and this world is not going to get any better, it's getting worse.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and there's corruption everywhere. But thing is uh, jesus said something put your treasure in heaven so nobody can touch it. Facts Clothes we have, money we have can go, but if you send your life ahead to heaven, to Jesus Christ, that life's forever and maybe things won't change around you because it's corruption. Right, it's going to get worse. It's like a piece of meat that's rotting, but your life can be better. Facts your life can overcome all of that.
Speaker 2:Well, I want to thank you, kenny, for coming. Man, it was perfect timing. I had a pleasure conversing with you, dude, dropping knowledge as always, and you're always welcome to come back and visit me.
Speaker 1:No, I would love to. I I had I don't know how long it's been, but I have so much more I I could share, absolutely.
Speaker 2:So we're gonna save it for next time, man, but thank you, that was two hours. I told you that was gonna go fast. So there you guys have it. Folks, I keep doing it for you guys, man, and thanks to people like kenny that are coming all the way over here and giving their experiences to help others, just as God would have wanted. So if you like what you saw, make sure you hit that subscribe button. Love you, keep pushing forward.
Speaker 1:Story never ends.
