Ho ho... Yeah! I think..

[Ecks]

So last night was my last scheduled day working at the jail for the next 4 months. Starting Monday I'll be going to school (which I don't have to pay for) and getting paid to go to school until that's over with and I pass and get my certification. Which in turn, lets me earn even more $/per hour as soon as I complete the classes. Sounds great right?

Well it is great, I'm sooooo looking forward to this. Monday through Friday 8am to 5pm. Two 4 hour classes a day, with hourly breaks and an hour for lunch. Not to mention, there will be days where we'll get out early and still be payed for 8 hours. It makes me joyous just thinking about it. Plus, I'm really looking forward to the Defensive Tactics class and the Firearms class. I'll have more spare time than I've had in a while. (Was working 12 hour shifts, and even when we used to work 8 hour shifts, that generally meant we were going to have to pull overtime; which usually meant working 16 hours. Made for nice paychecks but one hell of an exhausted body, and free time, what was that?) Now I can come in and work at the jail anytime I want and I get overtime for it, so I'll probably hit that up for a few hours each week.

However, last night being my last night, I had hoped it would be a nice, peaceful, final night of work. Haha.. I should have known better. Granted, the day started out pretty nice. It's Correctional Officer Appreciation Week (I dont know if that's just a CCA thing or if it's actually more widespread than that) and today was the cookout day. So, when I got to work they had Burgers, Hotdogs, Brownies, Cookies and other stuff for us to load up on before we headed to our posts. That was nice, I grabbed me 2 burgers and loaded them up as well as 3 brownies for later snacks, clocked in, and went up to my post on the 6th floor (top floor of the jail, aka. penthouse).

Well things are about good for the first 30 minutes, everything seems normal and all that. I talk with my partner for a little while I handled the log book. She was ...adamant that I do all the work today since It was my last day for a while, which I laughed and pretty much said "Yeah, Right. I want a nice easy last day." Fuck! I think this might have been where I cursed myself. We do our first headcount everything's fine and normal, inmates being stupid and whatnot. Make their little comments as we're doing our count of the pods, which is normal.

We aren't DOC, so the inmates don't really act like they do in a DOC facility. 90-95% of the Inmates we have, have not been to court yet or are continually undergoing the court process. So they don't quite treat us with the same respect they might naturally give to someone in the brown uniform where they're sent after they've been convicted.

Anyway, time rolls around and we get our floorman out to clean up and gather the trashes from each pod and the hall trash by our desk. We open the storage closet and discover there's a busted broom handle, like it had been busted over the ground or something. So I pick it up and put it over my shoulder and carry it down to the desk so I can write a work order and we can get a new one. Our floorman comes down to the desk and and tells us, that there was a fight in his pod earlier and that broomstick was used in it.

Me and my partner are both like "What?" because the shift before us didn't tell us anything about a fight occurring in our briefing, they only stated that 6B was complaining because we didn't give them their trays the previous morning, which is BS and I'm not going into that any further. The point is, there was nothing said about a fight at all. I check the log book, nope, nothing in the logbook about a fight. But apparently the fight took place roughly about an hour before we got there. Visitation was still going on.

According to the guy's story, one of the officers (male) pretty much just watched the fight go on an didn't do jack shit. Didn't call a code blue like he was supposed to, didn't even call a supervisor. Where the other officer (female) on the floor was, we don't know. It seems likely that she must have stepped off the floor, and wasn't around to witness this, because we know she would have said something to us about it.

So then, I take a closer look at this stick I had carried without gloves on across my shoulder and notice.. Yep.. there sure is quite a lot of dried blood on it. Not to mention, this is a freaking fiber glass broom stick, they don't break easy, but this one was definately busted the hell up. Also I got some damn small fiber glass pieces in the tips of my fingers, so.. yeah I saw the nurses as soon as I realized this could be bad. They pretty much just told me to continually wash my hands, which I had been doing, and always do anyway. But they will be calling the doctor and informing him of what happened, and they wrote a small report up and sent me back to my floor.

So.. we had a crapload of paper work to do, Incident Reports. Witness statement from the floorman. We tried getting statements from two other inmates whom the floorman said were in visitation with him while it was going on. But they pretty much just denied having seen anything. One went as far as to say we were just making stuff up to get the male officer in trouble. Hmmm.. wonder why he would say that. The only reason I'd want to get someone in trouble was if they weren't doing their job.

Okay, now back up, about 3-4 weeks ago. This very same officer, when we came on the floor one day to relieve him and the officer he was with, told us he found a shank in C pod. Well the Warden came up to our floor briefly just to see how we were later on, and I mentioned the shank to him. He looked puzzled, to make a long story short, no one had heard anything about a shank being found. The Warden asked our Captain, our Captain had no idea, he then asked us, we told him what we were told in our briefing by this same officer. When the Warden had come up, I mentioned the shank information casually, thinking he must have already known about it. I mean, c'mon.. if someone finds a shank in your prison, you're going to know about it first thing. We (me and my partner, along with one of the Lieutenants) end up having to do a complete shakedown of the pod, go threw everything and check for contraband, trying to find this shank nobody had known about. Well we found nothing. The next day, this officer completely denies having said anything about a shank and tells me and my partner as he relieves us, that we're smoking something. Needless to say I was super pissed on my drive home. It turns out there never was a shank, and I believe he got his butt chewed, or atleast I hope to god he did.

And now this very same officer fails to inform anyone about a pretty brutal fight that went on durring his shift. We're short enough people as it is, but god damn, I really hope his ass gets fired. We had to take care of all the bullshit that didn't even happen on our shift. Both of the inmates involved went to lockdown, I had to sit and sift through all their property, which, in one guys property we found the shirt he had been wearing when he got beat up, quite noticable when it has a fuckload of holes and dried bloodstains all over it. It was taken as evidence.

So yeah, I had one hell of a going away night. Fuck.. Grrr.. I'm still a little pissed and I've been off for an hour and a half now. Thank god I'm off till school on Monday. Just keep thinking about that, I'll try to tell myself.

 

[Xalioniaf]

Yar, what a jackass. Grats on your "vacation", hope ya enjoy it while you can.

 

[Ecks]

:3 Things to look forward to: Playing .Hack G.U. Vol. 2: Reminisce (I bought it on Wed.), playing S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl (also bought on Wed.), putting my Income Tax check in the bank (...which arrived on Wed. but I haven't been able to make it to the bank yet), not to mention.. lots of time to play FFXI and attend all of our dynamis runs.

There are good things to look forward to. Plus, I need to sleep.

And Yeah, I hope he gets fired.

 

[Xalioniaf]

:3 Things to look forward to: Playing .Hack G.U. Vol. 2: Reminisce

Fucking shit, it's out already? I don't have any monies ;.;

 

[Karihkinz]

Reading your post was fun for me because I miss my job alot (Just moved to Cali and had to give up my coushy job at the Jail) and there were a ton of simularities. One thing, however, is I'm sure you should know by now that alot of the times inmates will lie about another officer. Even the nicest friendliest trustee will still make up BS, or rat out an officer that was doing him a favor. So I wouldn't be too hard on the guy until you know his side of the story. You know as well as I know, inmates know how things work just as well as we do, if not better. After all they have 24 hours a day and days/weeks/months while waiting for thier sentencing to figure things out. They know where they can stand that they are least likely to be seen fighting or smoking or tattoo'ing eachother with melted down checkers and a needle (I still dont understand how that worked and it was one shitty tattoo).

And fights happen fast. They know it has to. I don't know what kind of dress code your facility has but we had the good ol' orange jump suits. And when a fight broke out between two people, the other people in the pod were likely to crowd around so that it was just a big pile of orange and if you didnt get there quick enough there was no way of knowing which person was fighting which.

I do find it odd, however, that there was no inventory taken of broom sticks and any other possible item that goes into the pod and needs to come out. We had two sets of cleaning supplies to be passed out in the morning and if a broom handle didnt come out w/ everything else, TV's went off, and ever officer available was sent into the pod to retrieve it. So something deffinatly sounds fishy there. Sounds like if he wasn't atleast watching them fight, he wasn't doing his job entirely still.

What state do you live in Ecks? I lived in Missouri, and worked for the local sheriff's department jail until I moved. Wasn't too big. Had A through F for pods, housed about 100 people, but 75% were federal inmates for St. Louis that were too much to handle in large populations. Since I knew everyone in the county from being a waitress at the midnight diner when I was 18, I got in without the written/physical testing. I'm going out for the Orange County Sheriff's Dept. this week and have no idea what will be on the test. If you took one or had an oral board interview I sure would like to talk to ya. I'm also wanting to go into the acadamy here. I never enjoyed a job so much in my life, and I really hope and pray I get back into it.

Congrats on going to the academy AND being paid to do so! That really is an amazing opportunity. And you'll really enjoy the firearms class. Have you been tased with the X26 gun?

 

[Karihkinz]

And whats wrong with shake downs!? D: Dear god I loved doing those! So exciting to find a stash of hooch!

 

[Ecks]

LoL, Well I don't mind doing Shake Downs really, they are kinda fun. I just don't like the paperwork for when/if we find something that isn't minor. ^^;

I live in Florida. I don't work for the state though, I work for Corrections Corporation of America (C.C.A.). The Inmates here where Blue's, Orange is what the state uses (well, Females wear orange too). :3 I think there should be a facility somewhere in California that we operate too, but most of the company's reach is on my side of the states. Though, with one facility already in Cali I'm sure the company is doing well to expand it's reaches. I'm hoping they get a facility set up in Washington State. I'd really like to move there in about a year or two. (I'd move now if I could, but lack the money because I'm saving for a new car)

About the broomsticks, I do agree we need a better way of inventorying what goes in and out of the pods as far as cleaning supplies go. It's not very specific as far as my knowledge goes concerning what procedures if any are used in inventorying the items. I do know we're constantly missing bottles..

We had two sets of cleaning supplies to be passed out in the morning and if a broom handle didnt come out w/ everything else, TV's went off, and ever officer available was sent into the pod to retrieve it. So something deffinatly sounds fishy there.

We aren't quite as um.. what's the word? Anal? lol No, but we can't be quite that strict because unlike prisoners, the majority of these inmates haven't been convicted of anything, they're just charged until they go to court. If we can't find a broom stick, then we (the officers on the floor) will look for it when we're doing our walkthroughs and counts. A broomstick is likely to show up though, because they tend to like to use it to change the channels on the tv. It's the bottles that are harder to find when they're missing. Though, unless a large amount of bottles come up missing there probably won't be a huge search for them.

Concerning the other officer, okay, perhaps I shouldn't be so hard on him but still that bull shit with the shank that didn't exist last month is hard to look past. I mean, why would you lie about finding a huge shank? It's not like that accomplishes anything, and it definately wasn't worth all the hassle and trouble we had to go through.

And yeah, I'm sure, he (the Inmate/Floorman) could have possibly made some points up. Thing is he was pretty descriptive, he never used names of the inmates, but he could remember where they slept and we were able to determine who they were from that and the fact that he identfied them as "The little one and the big one" lol.. One guy was pretty tall, the other guy was about my height, aka. Short) But everything he told us about who was with him in visitation checked out, and I really do think that officer just wasn't doing his job.

I can see him sitting there and watching it go on, probably debating if he should do anything. Lets see, 1 hour left on the shift, and its about to be his 3 day weekend. Hmmm.. Call code blue and possibly have to stay longer (maybe up to an hour or more, having already done 12 hrs) to do all the paper work, or just not do anything and go home, let the next shift deal with it if they find out.

I know what the right choice is, but which option sounds better if you want to get the fuck out of there without much hassle.

I haven't been tazed with anything, thank god. I think you have to be tazed though, before you can used the weapon. However, I don't think that's part of the training, atleast not now. I might have to do that if I ever join the SORT team (think, company's personal SWAT team). I know that eventually in the Firearm's, or maybe its the DT class that we'll be sprayed with OC... definately making sure I come in rough and unshaven on that day.. not really looking forward to it either, but I'm curious as to how ill react.

I haven't done any oral board examines or any other big tests. I'm still pretty fresh >.>; I only just started in mid November. So, sorry ^^; I can't quite help you on that. The only test I took was the FBAT (Florida Basic Abilities Test) and I had to take that before I was elligible to go to school. I did pretty good and got a 93% on it, though it was mostly just common sense stuff. Still.. I think I got the highest score. >.> I couldn't believe some of the other officers had trouble with it and didn't score quite as high. I talked to a few others that took it the same day as me and they got like 70's or low-mid 80's. It was multiple choice, computerized test. Only like 1 part had me confused, and that's probably where I got the answers wrong.

 

[Karihkinz]

We aren't quite as um.. what's the word? Anal? lol No, but we can't be quite that strict because unlike prisoners, the majority of these inmates haven't been convicted of anything, they're just charged until they go to court.

Thats the same thing as a county jail. People dont serve out sentence there its a place to wait for convinction. But if theres a matter that is a danger to officers or other inmates they can still be searched. And charge with a crime for having a weapon if it permits the situation. I don't think its anal when we have people in there for murder and a broom stick goes missing. >_> And there was only 3 officer shifts. And one maintains the control center at al times, so by all officers I guess I should of just said two.

As for tasing, no you no longer have to experience the taser in order to use it. (Still have to with mace). But it looks so much better on you if you do. Helps you as well if you get sued. Then if you are in court and the lawyer asks you why you felt you had to use the weapon, you can say because you know how it feels and that it took that amount of force to control the situation. I volunteered to get 3 seconds of it, was pretty intense. But I deffinatly won over a few male officers for proving I'm just as tough as they are. (Hard to be taken seriously in this field when your a female and not butch at that.)

Have it on DVD too! If I could only figure out how to rip it off onto my comp....

I would deffinatly recommend doing it when your trained with it. Its alot better than mace. I would rather be shot with the taser than sprayed with mace any day. Taser hurts a hell of a lot worse, however, when the five seconds is over its done. No more pain. Mace is just a pain in the ass. Irratation can go on for hours. But then again everyone reacts differently.

I'll have to look up the C.C.A. It deffinatly sounds interesting. Hopefully I wont have to and land this job at the OCSD. >_<

 

[Ecks]

Thats the same thing as a county jail. People dont serve out sentence there its a place to wait for convinction. But if theres a matter that is a danger to officers or other inmates they can still be searched. And charge with a crime for having a weapon if it permits the situation. I don't think its anal when we have people in there for murder and a broom stick goes missing. >_> And there was only 3 officer shifts. And one maintains the control center at al times, so by all officers I guess I should of just said two.

Ah, well yeah, we are the county jail. Hmm, it's not like we give them extra broom sticks though. They get one and that's it. But like I said, the broom sticks aren't the problem when things go missing. The only reason they still had them in the pods is because they were still aloud to have the cleaning supplies during the time this fight happened. We usually let them have the cleaning supplies up until lockdown, or and hour or two before lockdown we'll take them if they aren't using them.

I'll probably get hit with the tazer for the heck of it, that is, if we're given the opportunity. I don't really know what to expect. ^^; But still, I'm pretty eager and am really looking forward to the classes. Mostly because it means I'll get a nice pay increase once I'm finished (and hey, who doesn't like that?).