Prison Investigations

In this episode I will discuss the investigation of crimes committed in prisons.

Transcript

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What is the reason the police respond to traffic accidents? Can law enforcement officers or employees be called for jury duty? Can the police arrest and charge someone if the victim refuses to cooperate? Well, hello and welcome to Inside the Criminal Process, a podcast where I discuss and explain the criminal justice system in America using real-life examples and true crime cases. My name is Scott. I'm a 29-year veteran law enforcement officer and an attorney. I've worked in various law enforcement roles throughout the years, and I've taught criminal justice at the college level. So today I'm going to talk about crimes and investigations in prisons and jails. So what kind of crimes occurs? What kind of crime occurs in prisons and jails? Basically, any crime you can think of can happen within a jail or prison setting. Everything from petty theft to major fraud, murder. I always wondered before I worked in a correctional setting how crime could occur in such a controlled environment. But inmates, they get to know the system and they exploit the weaknesses and security. I'm never really amazed to hear about crimes in jails or prisons because some inmates are very sophisticated and clever when it comes to hatching plans or committing crimes. One of the most interesting crimes I dealt with in a prison was a forgery case involving an inmate that had modified his midimus. A midimus is basically just the court order setting out when somebody is convicted, it sets out their sentence and basically orders them to be held within a prison or jail. This person had modified his midimus, sent it to the time and release division of the prison system. And time and release, they're basically the people that compute and track time of inmate sentences. In my opinion, they're some of the most underpaid people that work for the prison system. There's so many different formulas and confusing rules governing sentences, and they have to learn all of those and basically are they're pretty low-paid for what they do. It doesn't make sense. In this state, um forgery is defined as making, completing, altering or uttering a false written instrument with the intent to defraud, and it's uh basically a class five felony. So uttering in this context means to put into circulation or to offer or present a forged document, regardless of who forged it. So it's not the typical definition of uttering where you're uttering something speech-wise. It's just basically pass it, like you, if you pass a bad check, that's you've uttered that that instrument. So in this case, the the inmate had a family member who worked for the who worked for the courts in the judicial district in which he had been convicted and sentenced. He gave his family member a story about how he needed official documents because he was going to apply for reconsideration of his sentence. And he asked the family member to send him a copy of his minimus, we call them mitts, and a letter on the court letterhead. So he modified both documents, sent them back to this family member in an envelope, and asked the family member to send it to time and release, but make sure it was postmarked from the county where the where the court that he was convicted in was. And he also altered the letter on the letterhead and basically said um it was to notify the prison that his minimus had been changed to reflect the actual sentence and that he was to be released the following month. And I I don't know. I I didn't talk to him. I was just assisting the main investigator on this case. So I don't know why he put it out that long, other than maybe he thought somebody might catch on if they said release him immediately. But we do get those orders from courts saying this person is is to be released immediately. So the inmate actually had something like, I think, 16, 15, or 16 more years before he was even eligible for parole. So an observant time and release employee noticed what appeared to be a small, a little mark of ink that looked like it had been cut off with white out. And that's exactly what the inmate had done. Um the time and release employee contacted the court and was advised that there had been absolutely no activity on his case since his appeal. Um his appeal was denied like 10 years earlier. And had she not checked with the court, he likely would have been released and probably never seen again. Um they don't, or they didn't, anyways. I don't know if that case changed anything. Typically check with the courts prior to releasing inmates. They just go based on the original minimus and the computations within the computer system as to when the person's going to be released. They compute like earn time, good time, um, all of that other stuff to come up with a release date. And it changes frequently throughout the time that they're in uh that they're in prison. Another crime that's basically only with deal with in a prison or a jail setting, jet jail setting is an escape. So it used to be in this state that parolees that were on intensive supervised parole, if they cut their ankle monitor off and absconded, that's that's what it's called when they leave and stop reporting for to parole, um, they would treat that as an escape, and you could file that in a criminal court as an escape, as a as a felony escape. They changed that several years ago. Um, so there it's it's no more, it's no longer considered an escape. It's like a walk away. And um, I don't know why they changed it. I think it was probably to fudge the numbers of uh Richiviz and numbers that were that were kept climbing. Um anyway, inmates try to escape somewhat regularly in this state. They've jumped fences uh even over the razor wire, they've driven away in vehicles that have been left unattended, they've walked out of the facilities, they've been assisted by staff, they've run from work crews, etc. In those cases, the Department of Corrections will, if if it's a prison or whatever sheriff's office, if it's a jail, will lock everything down, call every available person to help with the search. And um, and that's why they have counts throughout the shifts uh during the day and night. They have counts where correctional officers have to go through the facility and look in to the cells where the the inmates are and and count the bodies in there and make sure the people are actually still in there. And they they say you have to see living, breathing flesh. So if somebody's just laying on the bunk, you have to knock on the door and wake them up, or you have to be able to tell that they're they're just sleeping or that they're just laying there. Um but they they count regularly throughout the shifts, and um if somebody's missing, that's when they kind of start going into the escape protocol. So in those cases, the uh everybody responds. Uh the Department of Corrections has search teams, tracking teams, special response team, emergency response teams, and they they also get usually get local law enforcement to assist with the search, or at least they advise them that there's been an escape. So if the inmate escapes without assaulting or injuring staff, it's usually a light sentence. I think escape without force is now like three years for your first offense. Um but if they if if they assault somebody when they escape that that's a sentence enhancer. Um or if it's their second or higher escape, they they give them a harsher sentence. So prison crimes often involve complicity of staff. Some inmates are masters of manipulation and can compromise staff with their charm, or sometimes promises or threats. That's not that common for the promises or threats. It's usually an inmate charming a staff member and making them believe that that they didn't really commit the crime that they did or that it wasn't that serious, or they're wrongfully convicted, something of that nature. I've I've worked a ton of cases where staff have assisted inmates to commit crimes. We had an officer that brought a fentanyl patch in to the prison for an inmate, uh a nurse that was well, she was stealing drugs from the from the clinic. She wasn't assisting a uh an inmate as far as as far as we knew. Staff having sex with inmates, which is a felony in this state. It didn't used to be. It used to just it violated the the policy, obviously, and they could get fired for it. But um probably twenty twenty-five years ago, they made it a felony. And so basically, inmates are unable to consent. They're treated like um like children. They can't consent to sexual relationships. So officers or employees that that have intimate relationships with inmates are committing a felony, and it's more common than you'd think. So family, friends, and loved ones also commit crimes and help inmates commit crimes, the most common being introduction of drugs during visiting. There's a lot of cases where inmates get their loved ones to bring drugs into the facility by telling the loved one that they're going to be killed by other inmates if their loved one does not help them get the get drugs into the facility. It's usually a lie. I don't know of any specific murders in the prison system in this state that resulted from someone refusing to help another inmate introduce drugs into the prison. So, and that's it's pretty sad. Um I always thought that it was sad when like a grandmother or a mother or a sister or somebody would get caught bringing the drugs into the facility and they're they're just trying to save their loved one's life. You know, it's a very selfish thing for the for the inmate to do because they know that they're gonna the loved one's gonna get convicted or at least arrested and charged with a felony. And many many prison crimes are discovered as a result of investigators or intelligence personnel or or other staff listening to the inmates' calls. Uh as I said before, all inmate calls are recorded, and uh it's not uncommon for officers to discover crimes based on inmate phone calls. Inmates and their loved ones also know the phone calls are recorded and that staff listen to the calls. So they'll sometimes use code to talk to their loved one. Um it's pretty clear when inmates are discussing plans to have someone bring drugs into them. They they'll they'll substitute a different term for drugs, and it absolutely makes no sense. I had an inmate once asked her boyfriend um to make sure he brought the front and rear tires when he visited on the weekend. So I confronted her about it, and because she had been caught by one of the intel officers or somebody overheard the the conversation when they were listening to calls. She told me that, well, that's just how we talk to each other, but she had no explanation what she was talking about when referring to the tires. So um I said that doesn't make sense. So at the time, and the warden was able to cancel her boyfriend's visit, um, unless she could pass a polygraph would take and pass a polygraph um on whether or not she was referring to drugs when she said tires on the phone call. So she initially agreed to take the polygraph, but the next day when the polygraph examiner was there and was setting up the polygraph equipment, she freaked out, got really angry, and revoked her consent to be polygraphed. So they did they canceled those those that visit at least, and I think they can they could do it up for up to a year at the time. Um it was pretty easy. All you had to do was have kind of uh reasonable suspicion that somebody was was planning on committing a crime. But this state has expanded inmate rights so much, wardens can't do that based on something like a suspicious phone call any longer. Um I guess lawmakers and prison officials feel that an inmate's right to see his or her loved ones is more important than making sure drugs don't get into the facilities, which kind of boggles my mind because many, if not most, inmate deaths result in lawsuits that cost taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars every year. So one would think that if there seemed to be a credible threat that someone was gonna smuggle drugs into the prison, the warden should be able to thwart that and cancel a visit or some visits. Um, but I was never in charge, so they never asked me. Some differences between street investigations and investigations conducted in prison and jail settings. Scene processing in a jail or a prison is is pretty easy. You lock everything down, make everybody get back to their cells, uh separate, just like in any other crime scene, do secure the crime scene after you've made sure there's no injuries or anybody needing needing medical help, no dangers in the crime scene. You separate the witnesses, victims, suspect. Um, you get all those people separated, and and then you start processing uh the evidence, collecting and processing the evidence. So the good thing about the prisons is rarely is it a uh a true who who done it. There's cameras everywhere, and most areas within the prison are covered. So you have video evidence if the crime is committed in a common area. Obviously, if it's in the bathroom or cell, you're not gonna have that evidence, but you can go back and look and see who went in there and in what condition they were and then who came out and and the condition they were in when they came out. So there was a a crime one time at a prison that I didn't work in where the inmate had been beat with uh somebody had a sock with a lock in it, and they beat the inmate with that. And the inmate and the witnesses, or the the victim and the witnesses all said, yeah, it was a he was hitting me with this a sock and it had something in it, but they couldn't find it, so they had to go back, look at all the video, and uh this prison had a canine program where people either bring their dogs in or the the prison operates a uh canine rescue as well where they take dogs, it's like a shelter, and the inmates learn how to train these dogs for basic obedience and they can train them to do tricks and stuff. And so this program, they had a they had a canine program, and when they saw on the video, this dog had walked through the pod when they were starting to lock down and had picked something up, and uh, so they went to the cell where the dog was, went through asked the the inmate. He said, Yeah, he had a a sock in his mouth when he came in. I threw it in the trash. So they went to the trash can and there it was, the sock um with the lock in it. So, and that I don't think that that inmate was trying to hide it. I think he just was like he didn't know what it was, so he just threw it away. Um, but they did charge the dog with uh tampering with physical evidence. I'm joking, obviously. So another advantage is phone calls. Um you can listen to phone calls after a major crime or or even a even a small crime or a lesser crime and uh listen to the inmates that you think were involved and listen to what they say to their loved ones. And uh that's completely legal. We've we've solved many crimes by doing that. Interviews, witnesses obviously, uh they have to live there with the other inmates, and they don't want to be labeled a rat or a snitch. So sometimes it's really hard to locate or convince somebody to talk. Um I've worked a murder in one of the larger prisons in this state, and the inmate, he was pretty unique looking, so we could identify him pretty easily. He stood there and watched the the being. It was in the it was in the either the med line or the chow line, and he watched this guy stomp this guy to death. And and when I tried to interview him, he said, I didn't see he said, either that's not me, or if it was me, I I still didn't see nothing. So he wasn't willing to cooperate. And I I can't blame him. I mean you can't force them to, you know, like I said, they have to live there, so it's completely going to be up to them whether or not they're gonna they're gonna talk about it. And a lot of them try to pull the well, I'll tell you, but you got to help me out with something or get me moved or or something like that. And if it's a major crime and they provide information, um, we didn't have a problem with moving them to a different facility and and maybe looking at putting them in uh protective custody. Does Miranda apply? So there's some nuances regarding the the definition of custody when it comes to inmates. Um the last I knew of the the U.S. Supreme Court had said basically if somebody is in custody but it's not for the crime you're investigating, that doesn't meet the custody requirement for Miranda, and you don't have to mirandize the person even if you're interrogating them. Personally, if somebody, if I was interviewing an inmate, I just considered them in custody for the purposes of Miranda, and I always Mirandize them. It just it avoids a lot of issues going forward. So, and what the issues you also have is with witnesses, sometimes uh they come in and you you ask them to talk to you, and there's you know, they're they try to invoke Miranda. Well, I want I want a lawyer before I talk to you. And you have to explain to them, well, you're not you're not being interrogated. I'm questioning you about the crime, um, so you don't have a right to an attorney. And they, you know, they don't they don't a lot of times they don't seem to to understand that. So those were most of the issues that I could think of. Um it's it's not a whole lot different than than dealing with the crime on the outside, and and in many ways, it's it's a lot easier. Um and you just file it the same way as you would any other crime. It's it it goes to the DA that has jurisdiction over where the prison is, where the main the main parts of the crime were committed. So again, if you if I didn't answer a question, if you have a question about the way things work or something happens, um, or you want to know something about something I didn't mention or or want to know further about something I I mentioned, uh again the email that I've set up is insidec81 at gmail.com. So just shoot me an email if you have any questions. Um and I'll cover that on a on a future podcast episode. So to the questions, why do police respond to traffic accidents? So the the main reason is because they get there quick. They can get there quick and assess the scene for injuries or dangerous situations. Call for the fire department, the paramedics. Uh, there was an accident in this state many years ago where a truck on the highway had had been carrying military torpedoes as the load, and one of the torpedoes had fallen off the truck and was in the middle of the highway. It made the news because people were freaking out about it being on the highway and thought it was going to explode. And I think they shut the highway down for like quite some time before determining that the torpedo wasn't actually armed, and uh, so it couldn't have exploded anyways. Um, they brought in a crane, lifted it back under the truck, and the person went on their way. So if there's no injuries or hazardous situations, the police are mainly trying to identify and cite the violators. They are not determining who is at fault. That's a big misconception, um, even among many police officers. You're not trying to determine who's at fault in the accident. That's for the insurance companies to fight over. And what the insurance companies do is they usually just default to whomever was cited for the offense or infraction. But the but the cops aren't there to determine fault. Can law enforcement officers or employees be called for jury duty? Sure they can. Um, it's not likely that they will actually serve. The courts are getting, or they were getting a little stricter on it, saying, look, can you be objective or not? If you can't be objective, um, you know, they'd kind of insinuate that you should probably shouldn't be a cop. Um, so it wasn't an automatic dismissal. I just I had jury duty a couple years ago, municipal jury duty, and I went in and they during their initial questions, they said, Is anybody in here work in law enforcement? Or do they know the attorneys or are they an attorney? So I raised my hand and the judge said, which one is it? I said, Well, I'm I'm law enforcement and an attorney, and the prosecutor and the defense attorney immediately got together and talked and said, Judge, we want to dismiss him. And I got the feeling, and I don't know, but I got the feeling it was more they were more concerned about me being an attorney just because uh like as much as it's supposed to be a search for the truth, uh a lot of lawyers don't want people that that are gonna know that they're either not allowing something in, or like if an attorney is serving on jury duty and they know like we didn't get the full story, and there's a reason for that. There's a reason something's not being admissible. And jurors aren't jurors aren't stupid. I testified one time and I couldn't I couldn't testify that I worked for law enforcement. Um and so after my testimony, and this was on uh robberies that this guy was committing at the at the gas stations in the area, the jury, they're allowed to submit questions to the judge, and almost every juror submitted a question and said, What's this guy's job? So they knew. I mean, they knew that there was something because the judge told them that that that they couldn't answer that. So and if there's a if there's a lawyer there, they're probably going to be able to speculate as to why something's not being admitted or why something happened the way it did. And I don't think either the prosecution or the defense attorney generally generally want that. Can the police arrest and charge someone if the victim refuses to cooperate? They can. Um, but it depends on whether they go forward fully to trial. So the cases where the state is a victim or so-called victimless crimes, the crimes that involve um voluntary or personal actions that don't directly harm others, but the legal treatment reflects societal values, public policy, moral judgments, uh, rather than the presence of a direct victim. And and those are drug possession, traffic, offenses, corruption, gambling, prostitution, public intoxication. Um you don't have to have a cooperating victim to go forward with those crimes. So the DAs, those crimes don't usually get dismissed for that reason. But in cases like domestic violence, sometimes the victims, you know, they they start blaming themselves. They don't want to go forward with it, they don't want to go in there and and testify against this person because they're working it out, they're getting counseling. Um, so the victims obviously and and understandably sometimes refuse to cooperate after the fact. And those cases are hard to prove, um, especially if the victim comes in and says that they lied to the police on the night that the spouse was arrested. So, and of course the police could charge that person with false reporting, but in reality that doesn't happen because everybody knew knows the victim, didn't lie, and they just changed their story because of the domestic violence dynamic, basically. So, and I haven't had a whole whole lot of those. Um the one of the jurisdictions I worked in, the DA's office went forward even if the victim refused to uh to cooperate. And um there weren't a whole lot of convictions in those cases, though. So, and there is a victim's rights act within this state that requires law enforcement and prosecutors and and cops to treat the victims in a certain way. Um, like if you know the victim says I can't do this, I don't want to do this, you don't want to re-traumatize them or or traumatize them by making them testify. So, although DA offices can basically do whatever they want without consequences because the DA is elected. I have personal experience with a situation like that, and I may cover it on a future podcast or future episode. So that's it for this episode. In the next episode, I'm gonna talk about some escapes, some escape cases that I worked. And uh again, I appreciate you listening. Thanks. Take care.