Women at a California Prison Reported Abuse. Then Came ‘Operation Breakdown’
In 2022, former correctional officer Gregory Rodriguez was charged with sexually assaulting thirteen women in the Central California Women’s Facility near Chowchilla. His arrest sparked a renewed wave of abuse complaints within the prison. Then one morning, just before Rodriguez would finally appear in court, over 150 incarcerated women were marched from their cells into a prison chow hall. When tensions escalated after hours without food or water, correctional officers turned chemical weapons on the women, pepper spraying and gassing them. The women say it was payback for speaking up about abuse. In this excerpt from the series “We Are Jane Doe,” produced by KQED and Snap Studios, reporters Madi Bolaños and Anna Sussman investigate the complaints about sexual assault and retaliation within CCWF.