The Internal Affairs Of Prison
Section 1
Psycho Babble
Authored By: Bradley Chapline
July 2023
Section 1
Psycho Babble
Authored By: Bradley Chapline
July 2023
A true story about one man’s fight against prison corruption and his survival in a system overwhelmed with malversation.
Authored By: Bradley Chapline (written in the first person)
August 2023
Disclaimer: While every attempt has been made to write factually, there is a possibility of unintentional errors and omissions due to the extreme passage of time.
THOUGHTS BEFORE MY FIRST SHIFT OF DUTY AT THE SOUTHERN DESERT CORRECTIONAL CENTER
In the autumn of 1988, I was driving northbound out of Las Vegas on Highway 95. I was heading towards a small township of Indian Springs. I thought, “This long lonely drive with no radio in my car is going to bring me towards rumination.”
I soon realized I was having trouble putting my recent past behind me.
Just a few days ago I had been chastened with a transfer from the Southern Nevada Correctional Center (SNCC) to its sister institution, the Southern Desert Correctional Center (SDCC). I didn’t like the smell of this forced transfer. However, what I had going for me was that my probationary period had been completed at SNCC. Soothing my nerves a bit, it would now be difficult to have my employment with the Nevada Department of Prisons (NDOP) terminated.
Even though it might well have appeared so, I was no rookie when it came to the internal practices of prisons.
My thoughts then went back to my years in the Marine Corps. I remembered I had years of experience transporting military prisoners from their courts-martial to Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas. I was proud of the fact that no prisoner had ever escaped my custody. In later years, I was promoted to Assistant Regional Director of Prisoner Security for the Far East region.
Still musing, I came to my honorable discharge from the Marine Corps. I smiled as my thoughts then turned towards fond memories of my years in college. I majored in Administration of Justice and minored in Psychology. I beamed as I remembered my perfect 4.0 grade point average in those classes.
But, just as fast as that smile had come to my face, a frown then took its place. Oh, how I remembered in 1987 the Associate Warden of Operations (AWO) from SNCC coming to my college in Las Vegas. He was trying to recruit a new breed of educated and ethical corrections officers.
I surely remembered having foolishly accepted the AWO’s speech as genuine. I was then to come onboard with the Nevada Department of Prisons. I couldn’t completely blame my poor decision making on the AWO of SNCC. I knew his heart was in the right place as he was only attempting to put some integrity into a fine tuned network of corruption. Anyway, I needed the money, because my family debt was soaring. My veteran benefits and working part time was just not enough to pay for my college tuition and adequately support my wife and child.
My continued drive on northbound 95 brought me to the cutoff of the Paiute Indian Reservation. I stopped at their convenience store and bought a cup of coffee and a pack of cigarettes.
I said to the cashier, “There sure is a bitter taste to this coffee.” He responded, “You’re a new officer at the prison aren’t you?” I replied, “Yes”. The cashier replied in a condescending manner, “You’ll either get used to the taste of bitterness, or you won’t last at that prison job.”
Still at the convenience store, I sat down at a patio picnic table smoking a cigarette and finishing my coffee.
I then remembered being stunned while signing all my paperwork at SNCC for the prison’s personnel department. I was assigned the rank of a corrections officer trainee. This suddenly angered me. With all my experience and college, my rank as a trainee was an absolute slap in my face!
Moments later, back on northbound 95, I reached the Mount Charleston cutoff. I was now getting ever so close to SDCC. I needed to divert my anger and focus on what would be my first day at the institution. I wanted to make a good impression.
Once in the prison’s parking lot, I could tell my blood pressure and pulse rate was spiking. I walked into the prison’s indoctrination center. There was a group of trainees. In my mid-thirties, I was by far the oldest of the group..
The trainee group was given a tour of SDCC. We then attended several classes in the training room. Afterwards, we were all given our shift and position assignments.
I was assigned to tower three on the graveyard shift. It was known as, “No man’s land”.
REPORTING FOR MY FIRST POST ASSIGNMENT AT SDCC
Just before midnight on that evening, I gingerly walked into the muster room. I had been surprised just moments before when the officer at the gatehouse post waved me through his high security post without any kind of search.
During my walk down a tunnel from the gatehouse to the muster room, my memory momentarily reflected back to my years at the Ft. Leavenworth military penitentiary. I thought, “Should a post guard have ever breached security of this magnitude, the guard would have been placed in handcuffs and court-martialed.” But, not at SDCC. For, at this early stage. I saw this type of dereliction of duty to be an open and common practice.
However, I did not say a word. There were two supervisors present at the head of the muster room. A tenured officer sitting next to me in the muster room leaned over and whispered in my ear, “The big fat disgusting black lieutenant is a criminal. His nickname is Bubba. But, don’t worry about him, he sleeps all night. The big, fat smelly white guy is pet named Fat Elvis. He is our shift sergeant. You never have to worry about him either. He’s too lazy to make post checks around the institution. He just sits in the sergeant’s office all night long and tells lies to new officers about his years as a Navy seal and Elvis Presley’s bodyguard. Be glad you’re out in a perimeter tower and far away from them all.” That officer was so right. For the next three months I loved the job that no one else wanted.
Departmental regulations required a supervisory post check on each and every shift. The post log must be signed and dated by either the shift commander or his designee. When I opened the tower log, there were no entries from the graveyard shift in the entire log.
In those three months, I only received six phone calls in my tower. They were all from other officers who wanted to talk. But, none of those calls were business related. My tower post orders gave specific instructions that no personal phone calls are allowed while on post. When I realized the call was not in the line of duty, I abruptly terminated the phone call. After this, only the shift sergeant spoke to me in the muster room. All he would say after glancing at me, was, “Tower three”. When I properly relieved the swing shift officer of duty, the rest of my night on post was absolute peace and quiet. There had been no incidents in my areas of responsibility.
MY FORCED REASSIGNMENT TO DAY SHIFT
I had a bad feeling about this change of shift. But, the regulations were quite clear. All newly hired officers must work each shift for a minimum of six months, every five years.
When I walked into the gatehouse at 6:30am, again, the gatehouse officer just waved me through without conducting any type of search. Walking into the muster room, a short butterball shaped lieutenant called me to his desk. I glanced over to his sergeant sitting next to him. He was a mean looking gestapo type character who had open sores about his arms and neckline. I then quickly took my eyes off him.
The shift lieutenant then told me to report to the sergeant’s office located in the middle of the prison yard and wait for his arrival. I assumed he wanted to brief me on my new job.
Once I arrived at the sergeant’s office, I was hearing some bad things about this shift commander and his sergeant. Tenured officers were telling me that the lieutenant and his sergeant were using trainees as their snitches in obtaining information about the activities of other officers.
The yard officers were telling me the truth. Behind closed doors, this is exactly what the shift commander wanted me to do. Politely, I refused the lieutenant’s unlawful order. I replied, “I’m no snitch for anybody, lieutenant. If you want to know what your officers are doing on their posts, you and your sergeant are going to have to do it. I’m not your boy.” The lieutenant replied, “Let me remind you that you are a probationary officer for one year and can have your employment terminated without cause.” The lieutenant was smiling in my face. But, that ear to ear grin came off his face real fast when I said, “Fuck you, I’ve already passed probation.”
The lieutenant jumped on the phone and called the institution’s administrative offices. They confirmed that I had, in fact, passed my one year probationary period at the Southern Nevada Correctional Center (SNCC). Now, I was the one smiling at the shift commander.
The lieutenant didn’t say a word for the next two minutes. Laughing, I broke the ice by saying, “What’s the matter, lieutenant, “cat got your tongue?” This apparently angered him.
The lieutenant, in a raised voice said, “I’m banishing you to tower five for the remainder of your time on this shift. You report out there to tower five and relieve the officer that’s on duty, right now. “You got that, officer?” I replied in a snotty tone, “Yeah!”
It was a long walk from the sergeant’s officer to tower five. During the hike I had a good bit of time to reflect on where my life was going. I realized things for me were not looking bright. I was considering resigning from the department, divorcing my second wife, and leaving Las Vegas and my son for some unknown destination. I just knew at this point I needed a new life.
The transition at tower five went smoothly. I just sat in the tower chair, relaxing, and looking around my areas of responsibility. I was stunned to see inmates on an inner perimeter fence line. Some were hanging their prison clothes on the fence to dry, and others were actually hanging from the fence line doing their pull up exercises.
I had already had more than enough of the Nevada prison system. But, in the interim, I wanted those fucking inmates off that security fence line. I called via two way radio to the institutional control officer and said, “This is tower five, I have a group of inmates breaching the inner perimeter fence line behind unit seven. Someone in management needs to tell me something quick.”
Moments later, the control officer announced an emergency recall on the prison yard. All inmates were to immediately lock down in their assigned cell. Apparently, the control officer had received those orders from either the shift commander, the AWO, or the institutional warden.
Then, my tower phone rang. It was the shift commander. He said, “I’m relieving you of duty and placing you on administrative leave pending investigation.” I hung the phone up on him. I then called the control center and asked for an outside line. My request was granted. I called my wife and asked her to drive out to the prison and bring me home.
As soon as I hung the phone up from talking to my wife, the phone rang again. It was, once again, the shift lieutenant. He informed me he was coming out to my tower. I advised him not to, in that there is a lot of firepower in my tower. The lieutenant then hung the phone up on me.
Moments later, the institutional warden called me in tower five. He said, “I’m ordering you to come down out of that tower, right now.” I replied, “No, I’m not abandoning my post. My relief is not here.” The warden then threatened to calI Metro’s SWAT team. I then yanked the tower telephone cord out of the wall. Next, I threw the phone over the rail of the tower. From five stories high, the casing to the phone had smashed.
The institution was now at a complete standstill.
Approximately a half-hour later, I saw the shift commander making his way to tower five. Once he was inside of approximately three hundred yards from my tower, I got on the bullhorn and told the lieutenant to freeze and not come any further. Surprisingly, he complied.
Approximately fifteen minutes later I saw my wife pull into the prison parking lot. The shift lieutenant turned around and made his way back to the parking lot where he met my wife. Moments later, my wife, the lieutenant, and my tower relief officer were walking towards the base of my tower.
Once the three were at the secured entry door of the tower, I dropped the key down on a rope to the tower door. On this, I had followed the written procedure of my post orders. As my relief made his way approximately halfway up the five story flight of stairs, he said to me, “Is it okay to come up?” I replied, “Absolutely, I have no problem with you whatsoever.
Again, the transition of officers on this post went smoothly. The relieving officer noted in the tower logbook that there was no telephone. But, as well, the officer wrote that the rest of the tower was intact, to include the gun cabinets and ammunition. He made sure his log book denoted that the gun cabinet seals, and ultimately the weapons, had not been tampered with.
When I arrived at the base of the tower, the lieutenant asked me why I decided to create all this upheaval. I replied in a snotty tone, “Because the guns were talking to me.”
I said no more to the lieutenant. I then went home with my wife.
On the way home, my wife and I talked. I decided I would call the shift sergeant from my residence and tender my resignation from the Nevada Department of Prisons.
The sergeant accepted my resignation..
But, two days later I reversed that resignation. Regulations clearly stated that when an officer resigns, there is a three day window before that resignation becomes permanent. The department then officially notified me that I was no longer allowed on state property. That meant I was formally banned from entering all state run institutions until I was fully cleared to do so by a certified clinical psychologist. I couldn’t even renew my driver’s license.
Getting this injunction reversed would be a tall order since my shift commander had made formal accusations on his reports that I was mentally ill. In writing, he implied that I was suffering from both delusions and hallucinations. The lieutenant had also laid charges on me in his reports that I would frequently threaten violence against authority. The shift commander then completed his reports by stating that he had documented evidence that I was not aware of my behaviors. Therefore, in the lieutenant’s closing statement, he said, “The return of this officer at any future time as a sworn peace officer would not be in the best interests of departmental safety and security.”
The rumor mill at SDCC was going crazy. The word was out about me over the entire prison yard. I was a confirmed psychotic.
ADMINISTRATIVE LEAVE AND THERAPY SESSIONS
My first appointment was with a so-called independent clinical psychiatrist. After an initial consultation, I could tell right from the beginning that he was loyal to the Department of Prisons. However, while I watched the psychiatrist’s facial expressions as he reviewed all of the lieutenant’s reports, I got the feeling that his loyalty towards the department was steadily weakening. In the aftermath of reviewing all of the institution’s reports on the tower five incident, he began shaking his head in disgust. He said, “I don’t find the lieutenant’s reports believable. Who does that lieutenant think he is? A mental health disorders analyst?” But quickly, my shrink got himself back on track. He then said to me, “I’m not here to pass judgment on the lieutenant or the Department of Prisons. My job is to assess your mental capacity in determining whether or not, at some point, your return to full duty as a corrections officer can be effectuated.”
The psychiatrist then stared at me for the next few moments. He was making me very uncomfortable. But, I held back both my temper and sarcastic mouth. The psychiatrist then said, “I want you to look at the time on the wall clock. Then, in three minutes describe to me your past life. That means from childhood to the present day. Can you do this?” I nodded my head, yes.
I stated, “The family I grew up with: abusive, negligent, perverted. The schools I’ve attended: poor grades and poor vision went hand in hand. Lacked confidence, and was picked on a lot by bullies. My teenage years: became angry, lashed out, abused alcohol, became increasingly violent. Sentenced to six months in the state reformatory for boys. My Marine years: Saw the Corps as unfaithful. The Department of Prisons: Cannot trust anyone.”
The psychiatrist then said, “I’m a former U.S. Marine, myself. Could you briefly expand your negative opinion of the Marines?” I replied, “In Vietnam, I witnessed a Navy commander sink a refugee boat that was comprised of mostly women and children into the South China Sea. They had posed no threat. The majority of my fellow Marines cheered their death. Requesting a Congressional investigation got me labeled as a traitor by fellow Marines and my family. During an expeditionary mission in Cambodia, three of my fellow Marines were knowingly left behind in the hands of the enemy. They were executed by Khmer Rouge forces.”
The psychiatrist appeared stunned. He then said, “In short, can you briefly tell me what led up to the tower five incident at the Southern Desert Correctional Center. I replied, “Yes. This entire prison system here in Nevada is a hotbed of corruption. The officers are as bad as the inmates.” The psychiatrist interjected, “Can you be more specific?” I sighed. “There are two types of corrections officers. Both are no better than street gangs. One is associated with the Aryan Brotherhood and the other is related to the Black Panthers. Additionally, inmates are allowed to have possession of quarters in the prison yard. Some female officers received payment from the inmates in exchange for sex. Next, an officer shot from a guard tower at a “Flight For Life” helicopter that was arriving to transport a critically ill patient. And yet, another officer, drunk on duty, fell out of his tower window. His loaded shotgun landed on the prison yard. And, the final straw was, my shift commander took my home phone number from my personnel file and attempted to make a date with my wife.” The psychiatrist then asked, “What did you do then?” I replied, "I caught the lieutenant after work and off state property and physically attacked him.”
Over the coming weeks I was given a series of psychological examinations that would measure, among other things, any presence of psychosis.
While the warden of SDCC and his day shift lieutenant were dependent on the findings of the clinical psychiatrist to end my career in corrections, they did not get what they wanted. In contrast, the clinical psychiatrist’s report gave me an all clear on psychosis. I had scored well on the (PANSS) Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale examination. His written words to the Department of Prisons were, “I find little credibility in the shift lieutenant’s reports. However, the subject officer is suffering from high levels of (PTSD) Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The officer will at some point be cleared to return to full duty as a corrections officer once he has completed a series of talk therapy sessions with a board certified therapist.” I heard that prison management was in shock. I too had to admit, I was quite surprised at the doctor’s adjudication on my case matter.
After over two months of counseling with a mental health therapist I was finally cleared to return to work in a full duty status. But first, the assistant director of prisons made contact with me. He wanted to see me in his downtown office before I went back to work at SDCC. I wasn’t really concerned about this meeting, but I wanted to get it over with.
The assistant director gave me a warm greeting. I took a seat in front of his desk. He now looked concerned. He said, “Initially, I wasn’t going to sign off on your clearance to return to work in a full duty status at SDCC. I felt like I’d be throwing you to the wolves. I then reconsidered.” I replied, “Thank you, sir.”
The assistant director then told me, “I want you to know the AWO from SNCC that recruited you from your college was actually my roommate in college. We are still, to this day, best friends. He truly wanted to begin the turnaround from the massive corruption that infects our entire state penal system. But, he was successfully set up by some pretty shrewd good ole boys. This is when you saw the AWO in the muster room arrested, placed in handcuffs, and escorted off of state property by agents of the inspector general’s office.” He had hired more than a few top quality recruits from local colleges. His only mistake was, he tried to do too much, too soon, in changing the system. All of those officers, with the exception of you, are gone now. They either quit, became alcoholics, or committed suicide. I don’t want any of this to happen to you. I’m going to teach you command presence.”
The assistant director (AD) gave me lessons on facing difficult problems for which there was no simple, clear-cut, by the book solutions. He emphasized that I must always, above all, use my knowledge, skill, experience, education, values, and judgment in making good decisions.
The AD was also instructing me that character is the foundation of command presence. People must know that I am worthy of trust and respect. The AD moved on to tell me how important my demeanor is as an officer. He said that poise and self-assurance play a large part in me being able to influence the actions of others. And finally, the AD taught me to not hesitate in taking charge of dangerous situations by acting both with reason and decisiveness.” The AD’s final words to me were, “Your command presence will always be the determining factor in whether or not you can seize an opportunity to overcome and succeed against overwhelming odds.” I would take his words to heart, but wasn’t sure if I could live up the standards of command presence.
About five weeks later the AD of prisons was fired from his position. My mentor was gone. The prison grapevine was quoted as saying that an internal investigation revealed that the AD and his older brother were found to be skimming profits made by the department’s inmate store system.
Having just returned to work at SDCC in a full duty status made me feel both weak and fair game to all those in power at SDCC.
THE LIFETIME OF A CRAZY LABEL THAT I USED TO MY ADVANTAGE
For the time being, I put all the elements of command presence on the back shelf. I felt I was once again thrown into a survival mode.
Nevertheless, custody supervisors had no idea where to assign me. They couldn’t banish me again to a perimeter tower, due to the fact that people believed I had pulled a long range rifle on my shift lieutenant.
Officers working on the prison yard threatened legal action through their union if they were forced to work with me. The institutional lockdown unit also refused my presence in this high security unit. There was only one position open. It was the institutional culinary. I couldn’t believe it, I would now be directly working for that mean and nasty gestapo sergeant. His pal, the butterball lieutenant was still the day shift commander. But, he was keeping his distance from me.
The gestapo sergeant and I only had one thing in common. The theft of food was staggering. The culinary budget was in shambles. I promised the culinary sergeant to do my part in stopping the theft. We had informally brokered a truce between us.
But, we still had our skirmishes. I was fed up with the culinary sergeant constantly spying on me through a bullet proof glass window when I was monitoring the serving of an inmate meal. Finally, with the culinary sergeant’s face now very close to the glass window, in anger, I turned around and hit the window with my fist. It cracked the glass in several places. The culinary sergeant immediately left the area. I was not written up for the incident, but my reputation of being psychotic was certainly strengthened.
Some months later, and still working in the culinary, drama free, there was an inmate kitchen worker that I suspected was stealing food. I had finally caught him. But, I let him off with a warning not to do it again, because I had more than a few vacant inmate positions in the culinary. But, the inmate continued on his streak of stealing culinary food. I finally resorted to telling the inmate, “You steal anymore culinary food and I will take a butcher knife from the cabinet in the custody office and I’ll cut your nuts off.”
It wasn’t but a few days later I caught the same inmate stealing culinary food. I grabbed the crotch of his prison trousers and dragged him into the culinary office. I opened the tool cabinet and brought out a butcher knife. The inmate ran out of the kitchen area by way of the loading docks. He jumped an eight foot fence and made a straight line to the lieutenant’s office. He got to see the AWO. Reports were he was in tears. The AWO released the inmate from working in the culinary. Later that day, the AWO called me into his office. I didn’t lie. I admitted what I had done to the inmate. The AWO began laughing. He then asked if I had taken my psych meds. I told him I had not. The AWO then said, “Quit making my inmates cry.” That rumor about me pulling a butcher knife on an inmate had also spread throughout the institutional grapevine like wildfire.
But, the following day the institutional warden had relieved me of duties in the culinary. He reassigned me to the unit eight lockdown unit. This was against the wishes of the lockdown lieutenant. On day shift, I would join a team of five other officers. I didn’t last long. I refused to comply with their shit work details that were being assigned to just me. To get me to comply with their orders, the senior officer and his boys, in the computer control center, got me down on the floor and duct taped my body, making me look like a mummy. I swore revenge once I was freed. After about twenty minutes I was cut loose. I said nothing. But I quietly walked back to a storage cabinet inside of the control center. I grabbed a can of lighter fluid. I saturated a quarter roll of toilet paper. I took the toilet paper out of the control center and walked behind the senior officer of the lockdown unit who was now positioned in the rotunda area. I lit the toilet paper on fire and stuffed it in the back pocket of the senior officer’s jumpsuit. The inmates in the lockdown unit went crazy. But, the senior officer had only burned for several seconds. The other officers had come running out of the control center with fire extinguishers. However, I continued to laugh.
I was immediately relieved of duty from the lockdown unit by the senior officer. A few minutes later, the lieutenant arrived, unaware of the incident that had just taken place. I knew the mouths of these custody officers would be kept shut. The unit eight senior officer and his boys had not only assaulted me first, but they were also guilty of false imprisonment. It was not surprising that charges were never filed on me for this incident. The senior officer that I had set on fire resigned from the department on the next workday.
Word of me setting a fellow officer on fire hit both the inmate rumor mill and the staff grapevine with a bang. But still, no investigations, no charges filed on me.
People came to avoid me like the plague. I knew both the inmates and staff were now really scared of me. So, a few months later I decided to stop all my shenanigans. Enough was enough.
I became, seemingly overnight, a “by the book” officer. This threw everyone that came into contact with me into a tailspin. On day one of the new me, I was not the same person that I was the day before. But, it's exactly what I wanted. Staff and inmates were now even more sure that I was not only psychotic, but, as well, they strongly believed I was possessed with multiple personalities.
MY FINAL FACE - THE PSYCHO WAS GIVEN POWERS
I had finally achieved tenure in the newly named Department of Corrections. I could now bid on positions where I could give both staff and inmates that I despised the most amount of grief on a daily basis. I was virtually salivating. It was now my turn to pay back my enemies. The greatest thing about my strategy was, as long as I stayed smart and in control of myself, I would always have the rules of my post on my side as I harried anyone of my choosing.
So, until I retired, I picked the two most difficult positions to work in the institution. No problem, I lived to retaliate against those that I hated. So, It was all in my hands. When people arrived at my post, I unequivocally had all the power. They could not avoid me.
For, depending on whether I was working at the k-gate or the gatehouse, no one could come or go from either the prison yard or the institution until I decided to allow them to proceed.
Now am I just babbling, or was it a miracle that I made full retirement? I mean, I had some powerful and overwhelming forces in the department that greatly desired to end my career prior to becoming fully vested for retirement.
By believing that I was truly psychotic, both staff and inmates conferred on me an immense advantage. Only I knew the truth as to what extent they were being played.
The fact is, following the rules of my post ensured that I never lost a single dispute while assigned to either the k-gate or the gatehouse. And I had to face-off with some people who had a lot of juice.
Now, this is what I call command presence. “Thus endeth the lesson.” >Sean Connery<
Authored By: Bradley Chapline (written in the first person)
August 2023
Disclaimer: While every attempt has been made to write factually, there is a possibility of unintentional errors and omissions due to the extreme passage of time.
THOUGHTS BEFORE MY FIRST SHIFT OF DUTY AT THE SOUTHERN DESERT CORRECTIONAL CENTER
In the autumn of 1988, I was driving northbound out of Las Vegas on Highway 95. I was heading towards a small township of Indian Springs. I thought, “This long lonely drive with no radio in my car is going to bring me towards rumination.”
I soon realized I was having trouble putting my recent past behind me.
Just a few days ago I had been chastened with a transfer from the Southern Nevada Correctional Center (SNCC) to its sister institution, the Southern Desert Correctional Center (SDCC). I didn’t like the smell of this forced transfer. However, what I had going for me was that my probationary period had been completed at SNCC. Soothing my nerves a bit, it would now be difficult to have my employment with the Nevada Department of Prisons (NDOP) terminated.
Even though it might well have appeared so, I was no rookie when it came to the internal practices of prisons.
My thoughts then went back to my years in the Marine Corps. I remembered I had years of experience transporting military prisoners from their courts-martial to Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas. I was proud of the fact that no prisoner had ever escaped my custody. In later years, I was promoted to Assistant Regional Director of Prisoner Security for the Far East region.
Still musing, I came to my honorable discharge from the Marine Corps. I smiled as my thoughts then turned towards fond memories of my years in college. I majored in Administration of Justice and minored in Psychology. I beamed as I remembered my perfect 4.0 grade point average in those classes.
But, just as fast as that smile had come to my face, a frown then took its place. Oh, how I remembered in 1987 the Associate Warden of Operations (AWO) from SNCC coming to my college in Las Vegas. He was trying to recruit a new breed of educated and ethical corrections officers.
I surely remembered having foolishly accepted the AWO’s speech as genuine. I was then to come onboard with the Nevada Department of Prisons. I couldn’t completely blame my poor decision making on the AWO of SNCC. I knew his heart was in the right place as he was only attempting to put some integrity into a fine tuned network of corruption. Anyway, I needed the money, because my family debt was soaring. My veteran benefits and working part time was just not enough to pay for my college tuition and adequately support my wife and child.
My continued drive on northbound 95 brought me to the cutoff of the Paiute Indian Reservation. I stopped at their convenience store and bought a cup of coffee and a pack of cigarettes.
I said to the cashier, “There sure is a bitter taste to this coffee.” He responded, “You’re a new officer at the prison aren’t you?” I replied, “Yes”. The cashier replied in a condescending manner, “You’ll either get used to the taste of bitterness, or you won’t last at that prison job.”
Still at the convenience store, I sat down at a patio picnic table smoking a cigarette and finishing my coffee.
I then remembered being stunned while signing all my paperwork at SNCC for the prison’s personnel department. I was assigned the rank of a corrections officer trainee. This suddenly angered me. With all my experience and college, my rank as a trainee was an absolute slap in my face!
Moments later, back on northbound 95, I reached the Mount Charleston cutoff. I was now getting ever so close to SDCC. I needed to divert my anger and focus on what would be my first day at the institution. I wanted to make a good impression.
Once in the prison’s parking lot, I could tell my blood pressure and pulse rate was spiking. I walked into the prison’s indoctrination center. There was a group of trainees. In my mid-thirties, I was by far the oldest of the group..
The trainee group was given a tour of SDCC. We then attended several classes in the training room. Afterwards, we were all given our shift and position assignments.
I was assigned to tower three on the graveyard shift. It was known as, “No man’s land”.
REPORTING FOR MY FIRST POST ASSIGNMENT AT SDCC
Just before midnight on that evening, I gingerly walked into the muster room. I had been surprised just moments before when the officer at the gatehouse post waved me through his high security post without any kind of search.
During my walk down a tunnel from the gatehouse to the muster room, my memory momentarily reflected back to my years at the Ft. Leavenworth military penitentiary. I thought, “Should a post guard have ever breached security of this magnitude, the guard would have been placed in handcuffs and court-martialed.” But, not at SDCC. For, at this early stage. I saw this type of dereliction of duty to be an open and common practice.
However, I did not say a word. There were two supervisors present at the head of the muster room. A tenured officer sitting next to me in the muster room leaned over and whispered in my ear, “The big fat disgusting black lieutenant is a criminal. His nickname is Bubba. But, don’t worry about him, he sleeps all night. The big, fat smelly white guy is pet named Fat Elvis. He is our shift sergeant. You never have to worry about him either. He’s too lazy to make post checks around the institution. He just sits in the sergeant’s office all night long and tells lies to new officers about his years as a Navy seal and Elvis Presley’s bodyguard. Be glad you’re out in a perimeter tower and far away from them all.” That officer was so right. For the next three months I loved the job that no one else wanted.
Departmental regulations required a supervisory post check on each and every shift. The post log must be signed and dated by either the shift commander or his designee. When I opened the tower log, there were no entries from the graveyard shift in the entire log.
In those three months, I only received six phone calls in my tower. They were all from other officers who wanted to talk. But, none of those calls were business related. My tower post orders gave specific instructions that no personal phone calls are allowed while on post. When I realized the call was not in the line of duty, I abruptly terminated the phone call. After this, only the shift sergeant spoke to me in the muster room. All he would say after glancing at me, was, “Tower three”. When I properly relieved the swing shift officer of duty, the rest of my night on post was absolute peace and quiet. There had been no incidents in my areas of responsibility.
MY FORCED REASSIGNMENT TO DAY SHIFT
I had a bad feeling about this change of shift. But, the regulations were quite clear. All newly hired officers must work each shift for a minimum of six months, every five years.
When I walked into the gatehouse at 6:30am, again, the gatehouse officer just waved me through without conducting any type of search. Walking into the muster room, a short butterball shaped lieutenant called me to his desk. I glanced over to his sergeant sitting next to him. He was a mean looking gestapo type character who had open sores about his arms and neckline. I then quickly took my eyes off him.
The shift lieutenant then told me to report to the sergeant’s office located in the middle of the prison yard and wait for his arrival. I assumed he wanted to brief me on my new job.
Once I arrived at the sergeant’s office, I was hearing some bad things about this shift commander and his sergeant. Tenured officers were telling me that the lieutenant and his sergeant were using trainees as their snitches in obtaining information about the activities of other officers.
The yard officers were telling me the truth. Behind closed doors, this is exactly what the shift commander wanted me to do. Politely, I refused the lieutenant’s unlawful order. I replied, “I’m no snitch for anybody, lieutenant. If you want to know what your officers are doing on their posts, you and your sergeant are going to have to do it. I’m not your boy.” The lieutenant replied, “Let me remind you that you are a probationary officer for one year and can have your employment terminated without cause.” The lieutenant was smiling in my face. But, that ear to ear grin came off his face real fast when I said, “Fuck you, I’ve already passed probation.”
The lieutenant jumped on the phone and called the institution’s administrative offices. They confirmed that I had, in fact, passed my one year probationary period at the Southern Nevada Correctional Center (SNCC). Now, I was the one smiling at the shift commander.
The lieutenant didn’t say a word for the next two minutes. Laughing, I broke the ice by saying, “What’s the matter, lieutenant, “cat got your tongue?” This apparently angered him.
The lieutenant, in a raised voice said, “I’m banishing you to tower five for the remainder of your time on this shift. You report out there to tower five and relieve the officer that’s on duty, right now. “You got that, officer?” I replied in a snotty tone, “Yeah!”
It was a long walk from the sergeant’s officer to tower five. During the hike I had a good bit of time to reflect on where my life was going. I realized things for me were not looking bright. I was considering resigning from the department, divorcing my second wife, and leaving Las Vegas and my son for some unknown destination. I just knew at this point I needed a new life.
The transition at tower five went smoothly. I just sat in the tower chair, relaxing, and looking around my areas of responsibility. I was stunned to see inmates on an inner perimeter fence line. Some were hanging their prison clothes on the fence to dry, and others were actually hanging from the fence line doing their pull up exercises.
I had already had more than enough of the Nevada prison system. But, in the interim, I wanted those fucking inmates off that security fence line. I called via two way radio to the institutional control officer and said, “This is tower five, I have a group of inmates breaching the inner perimeter fence line behind unit seven. Someone in management needs to tell me something quick.”
Moments later, the control officer announced an emergency recall on the prison yard. All inmates were to immediately lock down in their assigned cell. Apparently, the control officer had received those orders from either the shift commander, the AWO, or the institutional warden.
Then, my tower phone rang. It was the shift commander. He said, “I’m relieving you of duty and placing you on administrative leave pending investigation.” I hung the phone up on him. I then called the control center and asked for an outside line. My request was granted. I called my wife and asked her to drive out to the prison and bring me home.
As soon as I hung the phone up from talking to my wife, the phone rang again. It was, once again, the shift lieutenant. He informed me he was coming out to my tower. I advised him not to, in that there is a lot of firepower in my tower. The lieutenant then hung the phone up on me.
Moments later, the institutional warden called me in tower five. He said, “I’m ordering you to come down out of that tower, right now.” I replied, “No, I’m not abandoning my post. My relief is not here.” The warden then threatened to calI Metro’s SWAT team. I then yanked the tower telephone cord out of the wall. Next, I threw the phone over the rail of the tower. From five stories high, the casing to the phone had smashed.
The institution was now at a complete standstill.
Approximately a half-hour later, I saw the shift commander making his way to tower five. Once he was inside of approximately three hundred yards from my tower, I got on the bullhorn and told the lieutenant to freeze and not come any further. Surprisingly, he complied.
Approximately fifteen minutes later I saw my wife pull into the prison parking lot. The shift lieutenant turned around and made his way back to the parking lot where he met my wife. Moments later, my wife, the lieutenant, and my tower relief officer were walking towards the base of my tower.
Once the three were at the secured entry door of the tower, I dropped the key down on a rope to the tower door. On this, I had followed the written procedure of my post orders. As my relief made his way approximately halfway up the five story flight of stairs, he said to me, “Is it okay to come up?” I replied, “Absolutely, I have no problem with you whatsoever.
Again, the transition of officers on this post went smoothly. The relieving officer noted in the tower logbook that there was no telephone. But, as well, the officer wrote that the rest of the tower was intact, to include the gun cabinets and ammunition. He made sure his log book denoted that the gun cabinet seals, and ultimately the weapons, had not been tampered with.
When I arrived at the base of the tower, the lieutenant asked me why I decided to create all this upheaval. I replied in a snotty tone, “Because the guns were talking to me.”
I said no more to the lieutenant. I then went home with my wife.
On the way home, my wife and I talked. I decided I would call the shift sergeant from my residence and tender my resignation from the Nevada Department of Prisons.
The sergeant accepted my resignation..
But, two days later I reversed that resignation. Regulations clearly stated that when an officer resigns, there is a three day window before that resignation becomes permanent. The department then officially notified me that I was no longer allowed on state property. That meant I was formally banned from entering all state run institutions until I was fully cleared to do so by a certified clinical psychologist. I couldn’t even renew my driver’s license.
Getting this injunction reversed would be a tall order since my shift commander had made formal accusations on his reports that I was mentally ill. In writing, he implied that I was suffering from both delusions and hallucinations. The lieutenant had also laid charges on me in his reports that I would frequently threaten violence against authority. The shift commander then completed his reports by stating that he had documented evidence that I was not aware of my behaviors. Therefore, in the lieutenant’s closing statement, he said, “The return of this officer at any future time as a sworn peace officer would not be in the best interests of departmental safety and security.”
The rumor mill at SDCC was going crazy. The word was out about me over the entire prison yard. I was a confirmed psychotic.
ADMINISTRATIVE LEAVE AND THERAPY SESSIONS
My first appointment was with a so-called independent clinical psychiatrist. After an initial consultation, I could tell right from the beginning that he was loyal to the Department of Prisons. However, while I watched the psychiatrist’s facial expressions as he reviewed all of the lieutenant’s reports, I got the feeling that his loyalty towards the department was steadily weakening. In the aftermath of reviewing all of the institution’s reports on the tower five incident, he began shaking his head in disgust. He said, “I don’t find the lieutenant’s reports believable. Who does that lieutenant think he is? A mental health disorders analyst?” But quickly, my shrink got himself back on track. He then said to me, “I’m not here to pass judgment on the lieutenant or the Department of Prisons. My job is to assess your mental capacity in determining whether or not, at some point, your return to full duty as a corrections officer can be effectuated.”
The psychiatrist then stared at me for the next few moments. He was making me very uncomfortable. But, I held back both my temper and sarcastic mouth. The psychiatrist then said, “I want you to look at the time on the wall clock. Then, in three minutes describe to me your past life. That means from childhood to the present day. Can you do this?” I nodded my head, yes.
I stated, “The family I grew up with: abusive, negligent, perverted. The schools I’ve attended: poor grades and poor vision went hand in hand. Lacked confidence, and was picked on a lot by bullies. My teenage years: became angry, lashed out, abused alcohol, became increasingly violent. Sentenced to six months in the state reformatory for boys. My Marine years: Saw the Corps as unfaithful. The Department of Prisons: Cannot trust anyone.”
The psychiatrist then said, “I’m a former U.S. Marine, myself. Could you briefly expand your negative opinion of the Marines?” I replied, “In Vietnam, I witnessed a Navy commander sink a refugee boat that was comprised of mostly women and children into the South China Sea. They had posed no threat. The majority of my fellow Marines cheered their death. Requesting a Congressional investigation got me labeled as a traitor by fellow Marines and my family. During an expeditionary mission in Cambodia, three of my fellow Marines were knowingly left behind in the hands of the enemy. They were executed by Khmer Rouge forces.”
The psychiatrist appeared stunned. He then said, “In short, can you briefly tell me what led up to the tower five incident at the Southern Desert Correctional Center. I replied, “Yes. This entire prison system here in Nevada is a hotbed of corruption. The officers are as bad as the inmates.” The psychiatrist interjected, “Can you be more specific?” I sighed. “There are two types of corrections officers. Both are no better than street gangs. One is associated with the Aryan Brotherhood and the other is related to the Black Panthers. Additionally, inmates are allowed to have possession of quarters in the prison yard. Some female officers received payment from the inmates in exchange for sex. Next, an officer shot from a guard tower at a “Flight For Life” helicopter that was arriving to transport a critically ill patient. And yet, another officer, drunk on duty, fell out of his tower window. His loaded shotgun landed on the prison yard. And, the final straw was, my shift commander took my home phone number from my personnel file and attempted to make a date with my wife.” The psychiatrist then asked, “What did you do then?” I replied, "I caught the lieutenant after work and off state property and physically attacked him.”
Over the coming weeks I was given a series of psychological examinations that would measure, among other things, any presence of psychosis.
While the warden of SDCC and his day shift lieutenant were dependent on the findings of the clinical psychiatrist to end my career in corrections, they did not get what they wanted. In contrast, the clinical psychiatrist’s report gave me an all clear on psychosis. I had scored well on the (PANSS) Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale examination. His written words to the Department of Prisons were, “I find little credibility in the shift lieutenant’s reports. However, the subject officer is suffering from high levels of (PTSD) Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The officer will at some point be cleared to return to full duty as a corrections officer once he has completed a series of talk therapy sessions with a board certified therapist.” I heard that prison management was in shock. I too had to admit, I was quite surprised at the doctor’s adjudication on my case matter.
After over two months of counseling with a mental health therapist I was finally cleared to return to work in a full duty status. But first, the assistant director of prisons made contact with me. He wanted to see me in his downtown office before I went back to work at SDCC. I wasn’t really concerned about this meeting, but I wanted to get it over with.
The assistant director gave me a warm greeting. I took a seat in front of his desk. He now looked concerned. He said, “Initially, I wasn’t going to sign off on your clearance to return to work in a full duty status at SDCC. I felt like I’d be throwing you to the wolves. I then reconsidered.” I replied, “Thank you, sir.”
The assistant director then told me, “I want you to know the AWO from SNCC that recruited you from your college was actually my roommate in college. We are still, to this day, best friends. He truly wanted to begin the turnaround from the massive corruption that infects our entire state penal system. But, he was successfully set up by some pretty shrewd good ole boys. This is when you saw the AWO in the muster room arrested, placed in handcuffs, and escorted off of state property by agents of the inspector general’s office.” He had hired more than a few top quality recruits from local colleges. His only mistake was, he tried to do too much, too soon, in changing the system. All of those officers, with the exception of you, are gone now. They either quit, became alcoholics, or committed suicide. I don’t want any of this to happen to you. I’m going to teach you command presence.”
The assistant director (AD) gave me lessons on facing difficult problems for which there was no simple, clear-cut, by the book solutions. He emphasized that I must always, above all, use my knowledge, skill, experience, education, values, and judgment in making good decisions.
The AD was also instructing me that character is the foundation of command presence. People must know that I am worthy of trust and respect. The AD moved on to tell me how important my demeanor is as an officer. He said that poise and self-assurance play a large part in me being able to influence the actions of others. And finally, the AD taught me to not hesitate in taking charge of dangerous situations by acting both with reason and decisiveness.” The AD’s final words to me were, “Your command presence will always be the determining factor in whether or not you can seize an opportunity to overcome and succeed against overwhelming odds.” I would take his words to heart, but wasn’t sure if I could live up the standards of command presence.
About five weeks later the AD of prisons was fired from his position. My mentor was gone. The prison grapevine was quoted as saying that an internal investigation revealed that the AD and his older brother were found to be skimming profits made by the department’s inmate store system.
Having just returned to work at SDCC in a full duty status made me feel both weak and fair game to all those in power at SDCC.
THE LIFETIME OF A CRAZY LABEL THAT I USED TO MY ADVANTAGE
For the time being, I put all the elements of command presence on the back shelf. I felt I was once again thrown into a survival mode.
Nevertheless, custody supervisors had no idea where to assign me. They couldn’t banish me again to a perimeter tower, due to the fact that people believed I had pulled a long range rifle on my shift lieutenant.
Officers working on the prison yard threatened legal action through their union if they were forced to work with me. The institutional lockdown unit also refused my presence in this high security unit. There was only one position open. It was the institutional culinary. I couldn’t believe it, I would now be directly working for that mean and nasty gestapo sergeant. His pal, the butterball lieutenant was still the day shift commander. But, he was keeping his distance from me.
The gestapo sergeant and I only had one thing in common. The theft of food was staggering. The culinary budget was in shambles. I promised the culinary sergeant to do my part in stopping the theft. We had informally brokered a truce between us.
But, we still had our skirmishes. I was fed up with the culinary sergeant constantly spying on me through a bullet proof glass window when I was monitoring the serving of an inmate meal. Finally, with the culinary sergeant’s face now very close to the glass window, in anger, I turned around and hit the window with my fist. It cracked the glass in several places. The culinary sergeant immediately left the area. I was not written up for the incident, but my reputation of being psychotic was certainly strengthened.
Some months later, and still working in the culinary, drama free, there was an inmate kitchen worker that I suspected was stealing food. I had finally caught him. But, I let him off with a warning not to do it again, because I had more than a few vacant inmate positions in the culinary. But, the inmate continued on his streak of stealing culinary food. I finally resorted to telling the inmate, “You steal anymore culinary food and I will take a butcher knife from the cabinet in the custody office and I’ll cut your nuts off.”
It wasn’t but a few days later I caught the same inmate stealing culinary food. I grabbed the crotch of his prison trousers and dragged him into the culinary office. I opened the tool cabinet and brought out a butcher knife. The inmate ran out of the kitchen area by way of the loading docks. He jumped an eight foot fence and made a straight line to the lieutenant’s office. He got to see the AWO. Reports were he was in tears. The AWO released the inmate from working in the culinary. Later that day, the AWO called me into his office. I didn’t lie. I admitted what I had done to the inmate. The AWO began laughing. He then asked if I had taken my psych meds. I told him I had not. The AWO then said, “Quit making my inmates cry.” That rumor about me pulling a butcher knife on an inmate had also spread throughout the institutional grapevine like wildfire.
But, the following day the institutional warden had relieved me of duties in the culinary. He reassigned me to the unit eight lockdown unit. This was against the wishes of the lockdown lieutenant. On day shift, I would join a team of five other officers. I didn’t last long. I refused to comply with their shit work details that were being assigned to just me. To get me to comply with their orders, the senior officer and his boys, in the computer control center, got me down on the floor and duct taped my body, making me look like a mummy. I swore revenge once I was freed. After about twenty minutes I was cut loose. I said nothing. But I quietly walked back to a storage cabinet inside of the control center. I grabbed a can of lighter fluid. I saturated a quarter roll of toilet paper. I took the toilet paper out of the control center and walked behind the senior officer of the lockdown unit who was now positioned in the rotunda area. I lit the toilet paper on fire and stuffed it in the back pocket of the senior officer’s jumpsuit. The inmates in the lockdown unit went crazy. But, the senior officer had only burned for several seconds. The other officers had come running out of the control center with fire extinguishers. However, I continued to laugh.
I was immediately relieved of duty from the lockdown unit by the senior officer. A few minutes later, the lieutenant arrived, unaware of the incident that had just taken place. I knew the mouths of these custody officers would be kept shut. The unit eight senior officer and his boys had not only assaulted me first, but they were also guilty of false imprisonment. It was not surprising that charges were never filed on me for this incident. The senior officer that I had set on fire resigned from the department on the next workday.
Word of me setting a fellow officer on fire hit both the inmate rumor mill and the staff grapevine with a bang. But still, no investigations, no charges filed on me.
People came to avoid me like the plague. I knew both the inmates and staff were now really scared of me. So, a few months later I decided to stop all my shenanigans. Enough was enough.
I became, seemingly overnight, a “by the book” officer. This threw everyone that came into contact with me into a tailspin. On day one of the new me, I was not the same person that I was the day before. But, it's exactly what I wanted. Staff and inmates were now even more sure that I was not only psychotic, but, as well, they strongly believed I was possessed with multiple personalities.
MY FINAL FACE - THE PSYCHO WAS GIVEN POWERS
I had finally achieved tenure in the newly named Department of Corrections. I could now bid on positions where I could give both staff and inmates that I despised the most amount of grief on a daily basis. I was virtually salivating. It was now my turn to pay back my enemies. The greatest thing about my strategy was, as long as I stayed smart and in control of myself, I would always have the rules of my post on my side as I harried anyone of my choosing.
So, until I retired, I picked the two most difficult positions to work in the institution. No problem, I lived to retaliate against those that I hated. So, It was all in my hands. When people arrived at my post, I unequivocally had all the power. They could not avoid me.
For, depending on whether I was working at the k-gate or the gatehouse, no one could come or go from either the prison yard or the institution until I decided to allow them to proceed.
Now am I just babbling, or was it a miracle that I made full retirement? I mean, I had some powerful and overwhelming forces in the department that greatly desired to end my career prior to becoming fully vested for retirement.
By believing that I was truly psychotic, both staff and inmates conferred on me an immense advantage. Only I knew the truth as to what extent they were being played.
The fact is, following the rules of my post ensured that I never lost a single dispute while assigned to either the k-gate or the gatehouse. And I had to face-off with some people who had a lot of juice.
Now, this is what I call command presence. “Thus endeth the lesson.” >Sean Connery<