LIFE AND TIMES Chapter 18

LIFE AND TIMES OF A CORRECTIONAL OFFICER
By R. Mark Shepard

On one of those Routine 4 to 12 shifts, Sgt. Tom and myself were performing our rounds as inside Security Officers. Our job that evening was to check doors that were supposed to be secure, to walk the fence line inside and outside the prison to check for any discrepancies, and basically to perform the tasks assigned to us according to our job assignment.

But this night would turn our lives around forever: Our jobs, our lifestyles and integrity and honor would be judged and challenged by everyone rather involved or not. Fellow officers and their families would label us just for doing our job, following orders, and at the same time participating in a situation that we did not have any control over.

We made decisions together, to tell the truth; to use our human instincts, to keep integrity in our jobs and our reputations as firm but fair officers intact, to just be good Correctional Officers.

That one evening, one of the Head prison inspectors had notified our institution that we would be receiving an inmate from a Central Florida Prison. This inmate was supposed to have severely assaulted a Correctional Officer.

The Captain on our shift had called the O.I.C. at the Central Florida Institution to find out what had actually happened. The Captain had called Sgt. Tom and myself into his office and told us that we were receiving an inmate who was very violent and dangerous. He went on to explain that this inmate, from what he could gather from the other Institution, had bitten off a Piece of Flesh from an Officer's face, and then looked at the Officer and told him, "I've got Aids and now you do too," and then started laughing.

At this time, this is all that Sgt. Tom and myself knew about this inmate. The Captain had told Sgt. Tom and myself that he had already talked to some of the other officers, and that when the Inmate arrived, he would be dealt with.

This means that the Inmate would be rushed through the receiving procedure, then hurried to the Medical Department for his Pre-Confinement check, which would be very brief, and then rushed to the Cell where he would be Dealt With with some type of Corporal Punishment by us and the Transport Officers from the other institution in retaliation for biting the Fellow Officer.

Everyone was anxiously awaiting his arrival, except for Sgt. Tom and myself. We knew what kind of situation that this could turn into, and we had even talked amongst ourselves and wondered why the inspector would transfer this inmate to our Institution, instead of another closer institution with the same capability and capacities.

Upon arrival of this Dangerous and Vicious inmate that we had been told about, there was Sgt. Tom, myself, the Captain, the Two transport officers from the other institution, and 3 more Officers from our prison to greet him.

When this inmate stepped out of the Van, Sgt. Tom and myself just looked at one another and figured out right away that this Not-so-very-big inmate who looked like he had not seen much personal hygiene lately, probably had one of those Little Man attitudes, and apparently was trying to prove to himself how much of a tough guy he was by injuring an Officer.

The inmate had just stepped through the gate when the Captain approached him and asked him if he thought that he was some kind of Bad Ass inmate who thinks that he can just go around and bite or hurt anyone he wanted to, especially an officer. The Inmate said, "No sir." The Captain returned by saying, "It wouldn't bother me one bit if I had to call your mother and tell her that you were dead."

The Captain then told the inmate that if he hit, kicked, Bit, punched or attempted any kind of Physical Violence towards any one of his officers, that the inmate would be dealt with and severely punished. Then the Captain asked the inmate if he understood that, and the inmate said, "Yes sir."

After taking off the other Institution's restraints and putting ours on, the inmate was quickly identified by the Control Room Officer, and then rushed to the Medical Department for his pre-confinement check. On the way to Medical, the inmate was bounced off of a door or two, you know, that kind of door that wouldn't open properly, or fast enough?

When we got to Medical Department, the Nurse already had the inmate’s Name and DC number, and told us to weigh him. Then the Captain said, "That's enough, get him out of here and take him to the Confinement Unit."

The inmate was rushed at a very quick pace across the Compound, running into that darn steel gate door that wouldn't open properly. When we arrived at the Confinement Unit, the Inmate was going so fast that he ran right into the front door of The Confinement Unit.

When we arrived inside, the Sergeant of the housing unit and his officer were waiting for us, and took over the escort of the inmate. After hitting the front door of the housing unit, the inmate accidentally hit another door on the inside of the unit, just before entering the Cell block. The inmate was then rushed up the stairway, which his feet never touched, to the second floor, to his assigned cell.

The sergeant of the house and myself stepped into the cell with the inmate, and before the Sergeant could take his handcuffs off, the House Officer, who happens to be a very large and very strong man, pushed the inmate against the back wall of the cell with enough force that the little holes in the metal grate made impressions on the inmate's right shoulder.

I stood the inmate back up on his feet and asked the sergeant to take the inmate's handcuffs off because I had something that I wanted say to this inmate. With the inmate's hands free so he could show me how bad he really was if he wanted to, he just stood there waiting to see if I was going to hit him or touch him in any way.

I explained to him, very factually that as long as he did his time here at this Institution not causing any problems, disrespecting officers or making any trouble at all, there would be no problems. I asked him if he did not understand anything that I explained to him, to let me know Right away!

I then Slightly, with little effort, put my fist on his right shoulder and pushed him in his chest, causing him little or no pain. Trust me, without bragging, if I hit this scared whipped little piece of human being, he would not be getting back up from one of my non-'slightly' touches or pushes. The inmate responded, looking directly at me, and saying, "yes" he did understand what I was saying. "Enough said," from myself, and I backed out of the Cell.

Sgt. Tom went in so he could unlock and take off the leg irons that the inmate still had on from the transport. The House Sergeant and his very large officer who were in the cell at the time of my little speech, stayed in the cell. As Sgt. Tom reached down to unlock the Restraints, the Large Officer and his Sergeant starting hitting this inmate unlike anything I’ve ever seen before.

I've seen officers have to jump on inmates to defend themselves and take certain courses of action in order to survive in different situations. After all, it usually comes down to just that, Survival, you or them, living or dying.

I had realized that this inmate was going to get paid back by some officers for biting a fellow officer from another Institution, But I wasn't sure how much until I saw this Sergeant and his officer beating this inmate, and I don't mean hitting him with just a little punch here and a slap there. These two had this inmate twisted and bent over the lower steel bunk beating the crap out of him.

Knowing the size and the strength of the officer that was paying this inmate back for his actions at the other institution, I figured that this would not go on for very long. And the Captain, who set this up in the first place, and gave the orders, finally figured out that it was in the best interest of his shift not to beat this man to death the first night he had arrived. Finally he told the sergeant and the officer that it was time to stop beating him.

After they had stopped, the one brave officer from the other institution looked at his Sergeant and the Captain, and went into the cell and hit the inmate in the head twice, and said, "That's for my friend that you bit."

Rules and Regulations state that an unruly inmate is to be stripped of all of his material items, including his mattress, his Clothes and undergarments. This inmate was stripped down to Nothing but a steel bunk. After everyone left the cell, everyone went into the officer’s station in the Confinement Unit to wash up and check for any injuries that might have occurred.

Now the Captain started to use his brain. He gathered everyone together, except for the transport officers, and ordered everyone involved who had any kind of contact with this inmate, to write a use of force report against the inmate, just in case the inmate got brave in the morning, and wanted to report to another shift that we had beat him or abused him in any way.

The stories from each officer were to be basically the same, but had to be put in a different context, to show the Institution Inspector and the Superintendent that this inmate gave us nothing but problems from the time he had stepped off of the transport van until the Cell door was secure.

These fabricated stories of fiction that we wrote, per the captain, were started by him and as we were writing them, he would critic our every sentence and word put on paper so that there would be no errors or discrepancies in any of the Statements made by all officers involved.

After all of the paper work was prepared and read over and over again by the Captain, he had asked if everyone was OK, and told us that we ALL would have to stick together, and not waver from any of the stories that he had compiled for the incident.

The only thing that the Captain did not tell us is that all of the documents that everyone had just falsified were totally Different and that no one else actually knew what the other one had written, except that the inmate was unruly and violent, threatening the lives of all he had come in contact with when he arrived.

For example, Sgt. Tom's statement and mine were the same, because we were appointed the escorting officers as soon as the inmate stepped off of the van. The Captain ordered us to write that, while Sgt. Tom and myself were escorting the inmate from the Medical Department to the Confinement Unit, the Inmate was supposed to have turned to Sgt. Tom and spit at him, trying to give Sgt Tom the virus, and when Sgt. Tom turned to avoid the bodily fluids, I was supposed to have slammed the inmate to the ground and take control of him so he could not spit on anyone else. This of course would explain some of the marks and redness on the head or body after my 300 plus pounds of body weight laid on him waiting for help.

Sgt. Tom and myself were team players and would always stand by one another, or another officer if he was in trouble. But this was rather unsettling to us, because we both knew deep down that this Falsification of Records, was something that we had Never done before. We have made statements before that we may have embellished on the truth a little, but I am here to tell you now, we have NEVER, EVER, Falsified a document or even thought of Falsifying any of our paper work in this Method, nor had we ever been ordered to do this before.

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