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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">View the full episode transcript.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Consumed with stress and fed up with how he’s being treated, Valentino Rodriguez reaches a breaking point at work. A veteran officer and mentor to Valentino starts looking into the murder that happened in the dayroom. Valentino and Mimy get married, then Valentino goes in for a final meeting with the warden of New Folsom. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC3540456241\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Resources\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you are currently in crisis, you can dial 988 [U.S.] to reach the National Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.samhsa.gov/find-help/national-helpline\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">SAMHSA National Help Line\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://988lifeline.org/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://www.nami.org/help\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) Helpline\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://www.hhs.gov/programs/prevention-and-wellness/mental-health-substance-abuse/index.html\">US Health and Human Services\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://warmline.org/warmdir.html\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Warmline Directory\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://journalism.berkeley.edu/programs/mj/investigative-reporting/\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Investigative Reporting Program\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism was a key partner in making Season 2 of On Our Watch. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The records obtained for this project are part of the\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://projects.scpr.org/california-reporting-project/\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> California Reporting Project\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, a coalition of news organizations in California. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you have tips or feedback about this series please reach out to us at \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"mailto:onourwatch@kqed.org\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">onourwatch@kqed.org\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Producer:\u003c/b> Before we start, I just wanted to give you a heads-up that this episode references violent incidents, discriminatory language, and substance use disorder. We also talk about someone’s death by fentanyl poisoning. If you or someone you know needs support, we’ve got links to resources in the episode description.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Okay, so it’s me Sukey and Julie, and Steven, and we’re here at Julie’s house. Two days after, we saw Val and Erma and got the phone, and we’re just–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We’re back from our trip to West Sacramento where I first got to meet the parents of Officer Valentino Rodriguez. And our reporting team is clustered around a computer screen. We don’t know exactly what we’re gonna find on the hard drive that Val Senior handed over in his office.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/b>Looking through kinda the materials that are on here that are many, many tens of gigabytes of information, um, and trying to figure out, like, what’s going on here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> It contains evidence he’s been able to put together over the past two years as he turned from grieving dad into an investigator trying to solve the riddle of his son’s death and how it might be connected to the place where he worked, New Folsom Prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> It’s a letter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Yeah, yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Um, then a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Also on the drive is what we’re looking at right now – a duplicate of Valentino’s cellphone, with messages going all the way back to 2017.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steven Rascon:\u003c/b> Oh, incoming. Incoming, outgoing\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mm-hmm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We’ve gotten hundreds of documents through public record requests. But they’re all steeped in official language, and some are so redacted they barely make sense. What Valentino’s phone promises is both so much more intimate and so much more telling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> What is that? Holy shit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> About what it was like to work at New Folsom, but also about who Val was.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> [sings] Super dog, super dog.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> A guy who sings to his dog.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> This is about Daisy the super dog\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr & Jr:\u003c/b> See you on the other side.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> All right, let’s go.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Lean back. Look behind you\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Zip lines with his dad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr: \u003c/b>This way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr: \u003c/b>Woo-hoo\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> A man who was loved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Hello, my love, um, I’m gonna see you after work. Also, I’m-I’m gonna try to get off early so we can do something.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> And we can see his text messages with the guys he worked with at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small: \u003c/b>Woah. It’s all of them, all the–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey:\u003c/b> Oh, all right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Yeah, these are the group texts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> And one message jumps out at us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Interesting. When’s the date on that one?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steven Rascon:\u003c/b> Okay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> It’s on the day, the day he died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steven Rascon:\u003c/b> Oh, he texted Steele the day he died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Wow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/b>I think it’s from Steele.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Oh it’s from Steele.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Sergeant Kevin Steele, the Bruce Willis-looking, former military guy who was kind of a mentor to Valentino. Just hours before Valentino died, in October 2020, the sergeant reaches out with this cryptic message.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> “I think you already know I did not set up the course, but I am running the race. Steele.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Valentino Texts back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> “Awesome, I just hope that I am not mentioned at all to anyone, not even to those who know my involvement. Not even among people I trust. Iwish that for everyone on this side of the race, my name is left out of everything.” So, they’re talking in some kind of code, right? “I did not set up the course, but I am running the race.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> But since both of these men have died, we’re going to have to figure out what these texts mean on our own.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Theme music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> As we sift through Valentino’s phone, his photos and videos, voice memos, and notes, along with the documents we’ve gotten from the prison, we’re hoping to find answers. What was Valentino going through? What would lead him to turn on his team? And what was the race he and Steele were running? And we’re also looking to understand the choices made by people in positions of power that he reached out to for help, people who were supposed to act and didn’t. I’m Sukey Lewis. This is \u003ci>On Our Watch,\u003c/i> Season 2: New Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> You can read this so you get to know more about him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> What he was going through… but don’t-don’t copy this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Okay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr: \u003c/b>Yeah, or use it maybe– I mean, you can like, uh–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We’d started looking into Valentino’s story to see if the death of this whistleblower was connected to all those cases we’d found showing off the charts’ use of force at New Folsom. But Val Senior was already way ahead of us in investigating his son’s death. So every few weeks, my co-reporter, Julie, would meet up with Val Senior to get more of the evidence he’d collected and she’d share what we were finding with him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small: \u003c/b>So we’ve started a database of the guard’s names and then different allegations against them. And then-\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Building this relationship with Val Senior has been tricky. He’s grieving and he feels like he was burned by other people who said they’d look into his son’s death and then dropped it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr: \u003c/b>Oh, I just-I just want this to work both ways–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small: \u003c/b>Right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Right?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Okay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I need to know what you’re doing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Okay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> That’s all I’ve ever asked. I might even– I-I– nobody even knows we’re having these meetings other than my wife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He says he’s not trying to swear our reporting, and it doesn’t seem like he is, but it does feel like he’s still testing us to see how serious we are about this investigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> You go through stuff and you decide, right? I don’t want to paint a picture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I never have.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Okay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I’m not gonna bullshit nobody and, uh, ruin anyone’s lives. I just want-I just want the truth told, that– that’s all I’m doing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small: \u003c/b>Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> That’s what we want too, but after years of working as reporters, Julie and I both know the truth can be a really complicated thing. Take the harassment Valentino experienced from the squad. As we go through Valentino’s phone, we can see that he was called ugly names. But we can also see that Valentino sometimes used offensive language too, calling his gaming friend a homophobic slur or sending a GIF of a swinging penis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These guys, ’cause they’re all guys on these text threads, work in a prison. Their conversations are dark and their jokes are not usually kind.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Dramatic music] \u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But there’s also a particular edge of nastiness to some of the other guys’ texts that feels different than Valentino’s off-color joking. One of our producers agreed to read some of them so you can hear what was being said. Heads up, it’s vulgar, but we’ve bleeped the slurs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Producer: \u003c/b>“Is that the jizz from A Facility? Drink up. In your mouth, you f––. Tell your lady I said hi. You f––. Send a picture of your girl’s ass.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/b>Those messages are all from this one guy, Daniel Garland. And Valentino doesn’t usually take the bait, but there is this one time where you can see he just snaps. It starts with Valentino texting the group something totally innocuous: how to log in to a new HR system for vacation requests. He’s just being helpful. And Garland writes back-\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Producer:\u003c/b> Who gives a fuck f––?!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> That’s when Valentino loses it and says, “Go fuck yourself, you dumb shit.” And this is what Garland does in response. He sends this weird video to the group, and it’s of a guy who’s probably in his early 20s, in a black and red sweatshirt at what looks like the gym talking straight into the camera.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Garland’s Son:\u003c/b> If you ever get outta the pocket again I’m gonna slap your fat ass.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> You ever get out of pocket again I’m gonna slap your fat ass. That was a flat-out threat. And when he got to work, uh, they laughed at him. They laughed about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> The guy saying he was gonna slap Valentino was actually Garland’s son. For Valentino, this was the last straw. Garland had been insulting him since he joined the squad about a year earlier. CDCR does have a no-tolerance policy against discrimination and harassment, which these text messages fell outside the lines of. In an email, an attorney for Garland and some of the other officers in those text threads stated that her clients never bullied, hazed, or harassed Officer Rodriguez while he worked at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said the officers coped with their stressful and violent workplace in different ways, but that they “Genuinely cared for and supported each other.” When Valentino first got that video from Garland’s son, he told his dad it wasn’t a big deal. But he told other people it really bothered him. It was clear he couldn’t take much more of this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> In the back of my head, I kept thinking all the time, “Well, the warden knows who he is. He’s gonna take care of him. There’s people that’ll take care of him. That’s-that’s not the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Droning music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Just after the new year, January 2020, Valentino had a lot going on. He was pissed off at the team about the Garland incident and he was stressed about that gruesome stabbing that happened in the day room. The one with the video that he showed his dad, Valentino was still working on writing his reports for that. He’d worked so hard to get here, achieved his dream of being an investigator. But now all he could think about was quitting. He wrote this note into his phone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> It’s entitled, “Reasons to Leave. Harassment, disrespect.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr: \u003c/b>“Disrespect, threats, whistleblower violations.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “Whistleblower violations.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr: \u003c/b>“Voted off team.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “Keep your mouth shut, or you’ll be fired. You do stupid work.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> “You do stupid work, they do important shit.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Just so you know, in his text messages, Valentino complains that the person telling him to stay quiet and demeaning his work was his boss, the new head of the unit, a guy named Sergeant David Anderson. Anderson was also on some of the terrible text threads, so it doesn’t look like Valentino felt like he could turn to him to step in. Anderson did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Valentino’s reasons go on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> “Depressed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “No money, bad health.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I’ll work for Dad. Be happy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Be happy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Around the same time that he wrote that note, he also texted a friend that he was getting out soon. He had a plan to stick around for a few months and then switch to a part-time position where he could work a few shifts and still get benefits. But a couple of weeks later, his plans to try and stick it out fell apart.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I remember him coming home and telling me that he broke down to the assistant warden.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> That’s Mimy Rodriguez, Valentino’s wife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> And he was sobbing and he had told her how he felt about things and he felt just like everything was kind of closing in on him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> She tells Julie and me that Valentino had a really rough day at work. The person he fell apart in front of was Gena Jones, the chief deputy warden of the prison. She was in charge of the squad, the investigative services unit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> And I remember sitting on the couch with him and him saying, “I left work. I left, and it’s gone. I’m not gonna be there anymore. I broke down to the assistant warden.” And I guess he opened up to her about everything that was going on. I remember this very clearly. He said, “This is my identity.” He’s like, “I feel like I’ve given up on everything. I feel like I gave up on my job.” And I was like, “No, you didn’t give up. Valentino, you’re doing this for you.” He’s like, “No, I gave up. This is who I am, and I-I don’t know who I am anymore.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy says something else happened in this meeting too. She says Valentino made some serious allegations about his fellow officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> That officers could have been planting drugs on inmates, could have been planting drugs on, uh, other officers. And I know that he was very nervous to talk to anybody because he didn’t want anyone to retaliate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy’s memory of this incident is all we have to go on, but this is important because from what we’ve been able to figure out, this would be the first time Valentino told higher-ups in charge of the investigative services unit that the squad, the very officers investigating crimes in the prison, might be committing serious misconduct. Mimy says at the time, she didn’t fully consider the implications of that—what kind of obligation to report or investigate that Valentino’s allegations might have triggered for Jones. But now she does.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I do believe that at that time, she had a right to say something or at least reported, mentioned something, write it down, document it, if anything, but from what I understand, nothing was even documented, which I find very interesting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> To be clear, Mimy says, Valentino also didn’t wanna make an official report. There’s an unwritten code among correctional officers: never tell on each other. But as a supervisor, Jones did have an explicit obligation to act immediately to stop the harassment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I remember specifically saying, “Valentino, if-if-if these people are bothering you and hurting you, you need to report that.” But he was– he didn’t want it to go back to him. He didn’t want it to get traced back that he had said anything about the team or that, um, any type of retaliation could have happened to him or his work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Now, everyone’s memory is imperfect and Mimy wasn’t in this meeting with Jones, so we don’t know for sure what he told her the day he broke down. But we did hear that this happened from another officer who didn’t wanna go on the record, but he confirmed that he’d also heard that Valentino had made these allegations to Jones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We asked CDCR if Jones had been questioned about this incident or her knowledge of discriminatory behavior in the unit, but the agency declined to comment. We asked for an interview with Jones, but a CDCR spokeswoman declined stating that wardens can’t talk about personnel matters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Driving music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The only action we know for sure the chief deputy warden took was to put Valentino out on medical leave for stress. That worker’s compensation claim was tied to an incident that happened years earlier, back in 2017, where Valentino wound up in the hospital.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Captain:\u003c/b> Hey Rodriguez, just calling to see how you’re doing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> A captain left this voicemail on his phone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Captain:\u003c/b> Good job toughing it out yesterday. But man, you need to take it easy. If, uh- if that really is a concussion, enjoy your time. Hopefully, uh, you catch up on any Netflix that you’re behind on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He wasn’t in the squad yet. He was still just a regular officer. And one day after yard time, they were lining up the incarcerated people to search them and escort them back to their cells. Among them was this one guy named Amon Morrison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> Hello?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Hi, is this Amon?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> It’s Amon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Amon, sorry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> I actually tracked him down, a prison in Corcoran in central California. The call was really bad quality, but he says he had an illegal phone on him that day. So when they were lining him up to search him and take him back to his cell, he got paranoid and he ran.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> I had the phone, I got paranoid, and they’re like here. I’m like, “Man, I’m good.” And then, you know, I ran- where I was gonna go, I had no idea. I wasn’t even, you know what I’m saying? Like where I’m gonna go?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Of course, this is a prison. There’s nowhere to go. Valentino tried to tackle him and they both hit the wall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> We both ran into the wall– when we both ran into the wall, I heard his head hit, well I hit my head like- like with a loud noise. It was like a “clunk,” like a–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> “Clunk,” he says their heads hit the wall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> I heard another like “clunk,” and it sounded like it could have been his head or whatever it was. I don’t know. I didn’t know the cause of it, but then I fell to the ground.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He fell on the ground. But Morrison and Valentino’s versions of this story are different. Valentino’s report, which we found a draft of on his phone, says that Morrison hit him with his elbow, knocking his head into the wall. Morrison says he never hit Valentino. He just panicked and ran. Still, he was charged with battery and assault.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> And what– ’cause I know you were charged with assault with a deadly weapon, right? Like what was the deadly weapon?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> [laughs] I’m the deadly weapon. [laughs] I swear it’s like a game I like. I don’t, there is no deadly weapon!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We simply don’t know what exactly took place. But we do know Valentino went to the hospital with a concussion and that his report became the basis for criminal charges against Morrison, charges he’s still fighting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> All right, bye.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> All right, have a good day. Bye.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> At first, the incident didn’t seem like that big of a deal to Valentino. Over text message, he sounds upbeat and he tells a friend that he’s been prescribed some medication for his injuries. “They gave me Norcos though, and Valium,” he texted. “Whoop whoop.” Norco contains the opioid Hydrocodone. Eventually, a psychologist diagnosed Valentino with anxiety and depression, and at some point he started having panic attacks. Looking at his medical records, his symptoms weren’t all because of this one altercation, though. He also witnessed terrible things at New Folsom—homicides and beatings. And along with the rejection and alienation he felt from his team, it seems like this created a powerful and traumatic feedback loop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In January 2020, just before Valentino decided to leave the prison for stress, something else happened. One day Mimy came home from work and the house was completely dark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He was just sick. Like it was the kind of sickness I’ve never seen. It didn’t look like the flu because he didn’t- he wasn’t throwing up the way a flu would make you throw up. But he was sweating and he was attempting to throw up and he was crying and he was upset. And I got scared and I didn’t know what was going on. And I told him we should go to the doctor. But he said, “No, it’s fine.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> The next day he wasn’t any better.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I look at him and I go, Valentino, what’s going on? You’re- I’ve never seen you like this. Tell me what’s going on. What finally made him open up to me is I said, “It looks like you have something to tell me, but you just don’t wanna tell me.” And then he just told me, “I’ve been struggling with something.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He was in withdrawal. Like a lot of people affected by the opioid epidemic, Valentino had become dependent on pain pills. He’d dealt with this before, years earlier when he was in college. He called his parents for help and they got him into rehab. He told Mimy this time he felt like he could stop using on his own.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> And my goal was like, “Okay, what can we do to get past this? This– you bringing this up to me, okay, great, how can we do this? Well, we have to go to therapy. We have to do these things.” At one point I was like, “Well, rehab?” Because I know that’s common, right? He was like, “No, it’s not that bad,” or “No, it’s not to that extent.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> In hindsight, after everything that happened, Mimy says she wishes she’d done things differently.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I wish I would’ve reached out to his parents ’cause he-he told me not to say anything, but I just wanted him to know that he can trust me and that I loved him and we were gonna get past this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy kept her word to Valentino. And though he was privately struggling, he presented a different face to most of his friends and family. His parents, Val Sr. and Erma, say they had no idea this was going on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Upbeat music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They were happy he was out of the prison and even better, he was coming to work with them at the family pool business.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> When he quit over there, I just felt like I had him all to myself. He was coming here and working all the time with me and his brother, and, um, was always happy. He worked really hard. He was very thorough. My customers loved him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 1:\u003c/b> Hi, Valentino. You were out here and gave us a estimate to resurface our pool.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 2:\u003c/b> Hi, Valentino.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 3:\u003c/b> Hey, Valentino.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 4:\u003c/b> Hey, Valentino.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 5:\u003c/b> Just checking in to see if you were able to send off the quote for us for a pool replastering.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 6:\u003c/b> I got the bid, I think I’d like to go with you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 7:\u003c/b> Your family finished our pool on Tuesday, it looks great.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Val Senior’s grandfather had gotten into the pool business years earlier and Val Sr. carried it on, creating generation pool plastering. Valentino’s mom, Erma, co-owns the business and largely runs the administrative side of things, and his younger brother, Gregory, is a skilled tradesman in plastering and pool construction. Val Sr. says Valentino’s specialty was sales.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> When he’d come in the office, sometimes he’d tell me what he did all day at work and I would- I would joke with him and tell him to turn around and I’d pat him on the back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Valentino loved getting his dad’s approval.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And he was just like, “Oh, that feels good, dad.” [laughter] I said, “All right.” [laughs] Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Then COVID-19 hit and there was the statewide shutdown. The pandemic was scary and things were uncertain, of course, but Val Senior remembers it as this golden time that he got to spend with his kids. None of them had anywhere else to go. Valentino would come over and they’d just hang out in the backyard and swim in the pool. Val Sr. says it was on one of these warm summer afternoons in 2020, Valentino was over at the house and they were barbecuing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> My world was just turning perfectly. Everything was just going good and we were swimming in the backyard and, you know, eating and just laughing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> But then he noticed he hadn’t seen Valentino for a couple of hours.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And I says, “Where-where’s– where the hell is Val at?” And he’s in front, he’s on the phone with the prison. I says, “What the hell do they want? He left that job.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Valentino had been out of the prison for a few months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> So I walked out to the front and he was talking and talking, and I just looked at him and moments later, he-he came in the backyard and I said, “What-what’d the prison want?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> It was Sergeant Kevin Steele, his old mentor, who was still working in the investigative services unit at New Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> He goes, “Oh man, dad,” and he told me about the Aguilar homicide. The video he showed me-\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> The one he showed him at the Christmas party—of the man, Luis Giovanny Aguilar, being stabbed while he was shackled in the day room.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> It was, according to Kevin, was actually orchestrated by officers to get rid of that inmate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> What Valentino was telling his dad was that this guy, Sergeant Steele, had found evidence that officers had played a role in that brutal murder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> He said, “Kevin, unveiled this, uncovered this, and now those guys over there at the prison, they-they don’t like him too much because he’s-he’s turning in this information, this-this evidence.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Clearly, Steele was making a really big allegation that officers set up a man to be murdered in prison. CDCR said it cannot comment on this case, and CDCR officials have denied these allegations in court filings. However, multiple sources have told us the FBI is investigating the incident and the prison is still facing a federal civil rights lawsuit from Aguilar’s family. We’re gonna talk to the people that Steele talked to and share the evidence we’ve uncovered in a later episode. We really wish we knew what Valentino knew about this incident and if this call from Steele was the first he’d heard of allegations about officers’ involvement in the killing, but we just don’t. It’s a crucial question because Val Senior would come to believe that his son’s death may not have been an accident—that his son was targeted at least in part for what he knew about this incident. To date, we have not uncovered any evidence that Valentino was purposely killed. But in order to help Val Senior understand what happened to his son, we also needed to understand how he came to believe this. At the time, Val Sr. says Valentino downplayed his role in the incident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Are you gonna be in trouble for that? And he goes, “No, dad, I-I wasn’t there. I just did what they told me to do and wrote it the way they told me to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> If Valentino did know something was off from the beginning, it’s not reflected in the reports that we’ve seen, which were leaked by a confidential source. In these documents, Valentino writes that Luis Giovanny Aguilar was in a prison gang and that he was killed by rival gang members. Aguilar’s family disputes this version of events. Valentino doesn’t write anything about guards being behind the murder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I just stayed in my own lane and just continued on with my day and my own life. That’s Val’s world. Uh, he’s got it handled. The state of California’s got it handled. The warden’s got it handled. All that’s being taken care of… and it wasn’t- it wasn’t taken care of.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Dramatic music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Val Senior says they never talked about the homicide again and he thought his son was doing fine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He was doing really well for his dad, but I can tell that as much as he loved working for his father- ’cause he did, he loved his dad. He wanted– he missed his job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> At home, Mimy could tell Valentino was not fine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He wasn’t at the prison physically, but mentally he was still there. He was still talking to people from the prison. He was still reaching out to people- people from the prison were reaching out to him, telling him what was going on within the prison. He-he had not at all let that go.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy tells my reporting partner, Julie, that Valentino’s health at this time wasn’t good. His doctors were concerned about his blood pressure and he’d gained a lot of weight. She says he was also getting increasingly paranoid and frightened. He would rarely leave the house and even at home, he’d set up elaborate security devices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He was nervous about anybody coming to the house. At one point, he had put things at the door, so if someone opened it you can hear the door open. He also– like he had a gun and he would sleep with it just to make sure. And I’m like, “What? Who’s coming?” And I would ask him, like, “Is everything okay? You know, who’s– who are you nervous about coming? What is going on?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Would he ever answer that question?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> No. He would just tell me not to worry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> She did worry. But she also saw that he was taking steps to get help: seeing a therapist, taking medication, and trying to eat healthier.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I just kept reassuring him like, “Just let– let’s let this year pass. We’re almost there. Just breathe.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Upbeat music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy was trying everything she could, and she thought maybe if they finally made things official, it could jumpstart their future together and they could leave behind the things that were holding him back. They’d been engaged for over two years now, but had put their wedding on hold because of COVID-19 restrictions. As the summer of 2020 went on, it looked like things might be opening up again and they decided to go for it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> We ended up just saying, eff it, we’re just gonna- we’re just gonna get married.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Even if they couldn’t have a huge gathering inside, they could have the reception at the family business on the patio and grassy lawn next to the warehouse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> They have a little– they have like an outside venue. They have a little patio, they have a little patch of grass. Like it’s a- it’s a really nice little spot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> They organize the wedding in a month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Full-size render… movies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Okay, could we go back to the chats for a second?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> As we look through Valentino’s phone from this time period, September, 2020, we can see it’s all a flurry of invitations: getting the taco guy to cater, a bachelor party near Lake Tahoe… But then we find a long text exchange that’s got a very different tone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Uh, this is the beginning of the conversation with Strohmaier. This is shorter, but, um–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Brandon Strohmaier is a Sergeant Valentino knew from the ISU squad, but from a different division. Importantly, Strohmaier worked in internal affairs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> He tells him that he’s gonna get married. He is, you know, moving on and he’s just started therapy. And Strohmaier says, “It sounds great. You left a place that isn’t good for everyone, and I think you made a good decision that will benefit you in the future. Congrats on the marriage.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> In response, Valentino launches into all the stuff he’s kept in about his boss, Sergeant David Anderson.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “Yeah, bro. I wasn’t happy. I wasn’t respected, and I was being fucked with like crazy by Anderson and the guys. Some unbelievable shit. Threatening to be fired with my job dangling in front of me daily, couldn’t get help, and had expectations placed on me way higher than everyone else. I kept it all to myself and tried to power through it, but at the end, it was too much. And it wasn’t worth losing my fiance or maybe even someday my life over.” Oh God.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mmm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> This text thread goes on for pages. Valentino tells Strohmaier the homophobic slurs that Daniel Garland would call him and about how another guy named Marcus Jordan would also use the “N” word and call Black incarcerated people monkeys. And Valentino tells Strohmaier these guys would say explicit and demeaning things about Mimy too. That she was, “Sucking and fucking other men,” and repeat anti-Black, and misogynist stereotypes.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “I hated it, man. I loved the work. I loved the investigations. I loved winning. But I hate being in that office.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He tells Strohmaier how Anderson threatened him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “If you say anything or open your mouth, I’ll fucking replace you like that.” Snap finger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Again, Anderson has not responded to requests for comment. Over text, Strohmaier says he wishes he knew all this was going on. “I put zero blame on you,” Valentino texts back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “I’ll say this, though. That team is broken. There is shit they do, say, or don’t do that could cause everyone from the warden down to get the boot. It’s my fault for not standing up to begin with. I sold my pride for the job, and it wasn’t worth it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> But he ends on a positive note.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “My life’s good now, man. I’m a lot happier. My relationship is 1,000 times better than before. She’s happier. My family is happier. They had been worrying about me for a while. I’m moving forward.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We check out the date on these messages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> That’s 9/19/2020. So a month before– a month, and a day before he’s dead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> In her email, the lawyer for Jordan, Garland, and two other officers denied that her clients harassed Valentino. And she also said there are, “No allegations or findings that any conduct by my clients in any way contributed to Officer Rodriguez’s death.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Emcee:\u003c/b> So it is my privilege to introduce to you Mr. And Mrs. Valentino and Irma Rodriguez. You may kiss the bride. Un beso.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> On a hot day in early October, Valentino and Mimy, whose given name is actually Irma, just like his mom, got married.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I wore this big white ball gown with– it was– it had a cream undertone, and then it had, like white lace and it sparkled. It was- it was really nice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Her long veil covered the dais steps in the cathedral in downtown Sacramento.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> The church was beautiful. I mean, so many people showed up. My parents, were- they both walked me down the aisle, and then at the end of the aisle, I got to say, you know, I got to see his parents, and it was just nice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy and Valentino rode to the reception in one of Val Sr.’s classic cars, a ’64 Impala.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Emcee:\u003c/b> Ladies and gentlemen, it is an honor for me to introduce Irma and Valentino’s first dance as husband and wife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Song: \u003c/b>I would need a million words\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If I tried to define\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All the things you mean to me, yeah\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For you, I’d die a thousand lives\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Our song was 17 by Pink Sweats. So I just wanted to commemorate how this song was us being young and in love. And I was gonna love him until the very end.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Song:\u003c/b> Special kind of energy\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>‘Cause love is born when hearts collide\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Every time you touch me\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You remind me that I’m still alive\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He wrote me a letter the morning of our wedding and same thing, just I love you. And it was- it was beautiful. But the speech was amazing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Song: \u003c/b>So promise you’ll never change\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And I’ll always be the same\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> Check, check. I want to thank everyone for coming tonight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> In this video of their wedding reception, Valentino holds Mimy at his left aside.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> I have a great partner in life. I couldn’t ask for anything different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> His arm wrapped around her, he’s wearing a burgundy shirt and a black vest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> You know, this-this whole wedding, I felt it strange that I wasn’t nervous or I wasn’t dreading the day. I was excited and I wanted it to happen. Uh, and it clicked with me when I was standing up there on the altar today that I’m right where I’m supposed to be in life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy leans her head into his shoulder. She’s changed out of the white gown into a dress covered in black lace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> I love you, Erma.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I love you too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> You are truly the love of my life. I’m excited to spend the rest of my life with you. I can’t wait to make babies, and see where the future goes. [cheering]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He hands her the mic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> You know, I– when I first met Val, I loved him. I’m going to be honest with every single one of you and just as my sister said she thought it was crazy but honestly I didn’t. I wake up every day and I look at him and I just– I don’t want to look at anyone else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> I told her on our third date, which was our third day knowing each other, that I loved her. So that’s how that’s how much I knew.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Yeah, he’s crazy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy thanks everyone including family members who came all the way from Mexico.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> [Spanish language]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Valentino thanks Mimy’s family, and he thanks her friends for keeping her company when he couldn’t be there. And he toasts his parents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> It’s one of the first memories I have with my dad is us go– walking into a movie theater on a rainy day. A man taking off his jacket, holding it over his date’s head. And my dad stopped and said, “No matter what you do in life, I want that you to be a man like that, that cherishes your woman.” Please, have a good rest of the night. We’ll party until we run out of money for the DJ or we run out of alcohol. Cheers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> It was a perfect day. For a long time he was so stuck on the prison, and I think for that day specifically, it just kind of brought him into a place of, like, “I am getting married. I’m moving forward with my life.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> But less than two weeks after his wedding day, on October 15th, Valentino went back to New Folsom to meet with the warden, the man who’s the head of the whole prison, Jeff Lynch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He told me that he went to go talk to the warden about all the corruption that was going on within the prison, at least within the officers that he was working with.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Dramatic music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Strohmaier, that internal affairs sergeant, had forwarded that long text thread between him and Valentino with all the names and the slurs straight to the warden. Now, Valentino was in the warden’s office, telling him in person about the harassment he’d received.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He told me that he had told the warden about this one sergeant. I believe he was the sergeant of that team, how he put his hands around his neck. And he said, “I can make it look like an accident.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We only have Mimy’s account of this specific allegation. But we do know that Valentino talked about threats from Sergeant Anderson and members with the squad. Documents and recorded testimony Warden Lynch later gave about this meeting largely corroborate Mimy’s account of what was discussed. Valentino told the warden that ISU officers planted contraband on incarcerated people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He spoke to the warden for some time, so I’m assuming there was a lot more said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> CDCR did not respond to questions about this meeting and said the warden can’t comment on personnel matters. As Valentino was leaving the prison, he texted the internal affairs Sergeant Strohmaier, “Let me know how things turn out. Also, I’m not telling Steele or anyone I was up there.” “10/4,” Strohmaier responded. When Valentino got back home, Mimy says he seemed lighter, like a big weight had been lifted off his chest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He felt confident that the warden was gonna help.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Mhmm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He was happy coming home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> And that evening after the prison, Valentino texted his dad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Uh, October the 15th. And, um, he just texted me out of the blue, “I love you, pop.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Val Sr. texted him back, “I love you too, kiddo.” Val senior says his son mentioned the meeting to him too. He says he told the warden everything.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And when he emphasized everything, he’d always say everything.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> What Valentino meant by “everything,” we still don’t know. One thing we really wanted to know is did Valentino talk to the warden about the murder of Luis Giovanny Aguilar. But so far, none of the documents or testimony we’ve been able to get address this, and Mimy and Val Sr. say they don’t know. We do know that after the meeting, the warden had asked Valentino to write up all his allegations into an official report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He was asked to write a memo, but he didn’t do it. He should have done it. But he never got a chance to write the memo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Six days later, on October 21st, 2020, Mimy came home from having dinner with her girlfriends and found Valentino slumped over in the bathroom and called 911.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>911 ER:\u003c/b> Edward 20. Edward 25.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>911 Dispatch:\u003c/b> 20.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>911 ER:\u003c/b> They’re saying this male is unconscious. We’re giving CPR instructions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>911 Dispatch: \u003c/b>Copy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> It was around nine o’clock at night, Val Sr. remembers. He was already in bed, watching TV after a long day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> The phone rings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> It’s his other son, Gregory. A friend had heard something on the police scanner and texted him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I call my dad and I go, “Hey, uh, we need to go down to Val’s house.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And he just says, “Dad, there’s something going on at Val’s.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Goes, “What am I supposed to do?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I didn’t feel panic or anything, I just stayed really quiet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I go, “Dad, just pick me up. Let’s go.” He goes, “Okay.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> “Yeah, let’s-let’s go over there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> We get there and, um-\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And then an ambulance was leaving with the lights off. So I remember feeling relieved, like, “Oh, good, nobody got hurt.” So I started to pull up. It was really dark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> We get out and there’s a cop that meets us at the end of the driveway.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I asked, “Is Val here?” He says, “My sergeant will come on and talk to you.” So Greg says, “Come on man, tell us something.” He kind of grins.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> My dad asked where Val was, and the cop used a term like he was dead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Just says he’s deceased.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Right away, my dad just fell to the ground and I was in shock. You know, I just couldn’t believe it. Uh, when I say I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, it was literally I could not believe it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Val Sr. thought his son’s body must have been in that ambulance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Uh, I just started to think, “I need to tell my wife.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I go, “Hey, just go home to mom.” I go, “I’ll stay here.” And I was there for about an hour by myself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And I walked in and my wife was on the couch sitting on her legs, and she looked at me and she’s, “What happened?” And I-I just told her, “He died.” I didn’t know how else to say it. I remember standing there. She passed out. She woke up and she was crying, “Where is he? Let’s go see him at the hospital. Is he still alive?” And then I realized, I don’t even know where he’s at. And, uh, the phone rang, it was Greg, and he says, “Dad.” I go, “Yeah.” “Val’s here. He’s in the house.” I can’t remember who the heck was driving, but we drove.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> My mom and dad and my sisters pulled up to the house and my mom took off running in the house and-\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And there he was on the floor with his arms stretched out. And, uh, he was all purple. I just- I just looked at him, you know, and she jumped on him right away and started holding him, crying, saying, “He’s cold, you know, wake up, Val.” She was telling me to wake him up. I had to reach underneath her arms and-and pull her out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Finally, she gets up and they take off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> On the way out, I looked at the cop and I says, “I-I want a full toxicology report.” And he says, “Oh, yeah.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Eventually, they all went home and Valentino’s body was taken to the coroner so they could do an autopsy and start doing those tests. The coroner’s report notes that the house is still full of wrapped and unwrapped gifts from the couple’s wedding. Valentino’s mom has difficulty speaking about that night. It’s almost too much for her to put into words. And after they went home, she called his phone three times. She gave us permission to play one of the messages she left for him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Erma Rodriguez:\u003c/b> “Val, you can come back. I know you can. Please. Please. Please, come back. Please.” [crying]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> After Valentino’s death, calls of condolence came in and people stopped by the shop, but there was one call in particular that Val Sr. kept waiting for.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> It didn’t ring like-like it never happened. And I says, “Man, this is really weird. It’s like, I haven’t got a phone call from the prison?” I was under this stupid impression that the warden would call me and say, “Hey, you know, I’m sorry about your son. Um, he was a good man. We’re gonna make sure we’re gonna find out.” You know, nothing. It was just-just complete silence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> The warden never called.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Theme music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Coming up next time, Val Sr. reaches out to a source inside New Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I text him and I asked him, “Are you still running the race?” He said, “What race?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CDCR Agent:\u003c/b> You are hereby directed to cease all communication with any and all employees of California State Prison Sacramento regarding Correctional Officer Valentino Rodriguez.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> The allegation is about ordering murders are-are very shocking. To have a correctional officer, a high-ranking sergeant in an investigative unit, releasing this kind of, uh, detailed report about misconduct, illegal activity, even murder. I don’t Know of another time that that’s happened.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Credits music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> You’re listening to On Our Watch Season Two: New Folsom from KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you have any tips or feedback about the series, you can email us at: onourwatch@kqed.org. You can also leave us a review in Apple podcasts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The series is reported by me, Sukey Lewis, and Julie Small. It’s edited by Victoria Mauleon. It’s produced and scored by Steven Rascón and Chris Egusa. Sound design and mixing by Tarek Fouda. Jen Chien is KQED’s director of podcasts and she executive produced the series. Meticulous fact checking by Mark Betancourt. Additional research for this episode by Cayla Mihalovich, Kathleen Quinn, and Laura Fitzgerald—students in the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism, whose chair David Barstow provided valuable support to the whole series.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Special thanks to Rahsaan Thomas of Ear Hustle, Sandhya Dirks of NPR and KQED Health Correspondent April Dembosky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Original music by Ramtin Arablouei, including our theme song. Additional music from APM Music and Audio Network.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Funding for On Our Watch is provided in part by Arnold Ventures and the California Endowment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And thanks to KQED’s Otis R. Taylor Jr., Managing Editor of News and Enterprise, Ethan Tovan-Lindsey our Vice President of News, and chief content officer Holly Kernan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Thanks for listening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">View the full episode transcript.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Consumed with stress and fed up with how he’s being treated, Valentino Rodriguez reaches a breaking point at work. A veteran officer and mentor to Valentino starts looking into the murder that happened in the dayroom. Valentino and Mimy get married, then Valentino goes in for a final meeting with the warden of New Folsom. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC3540456241\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Resources\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you are currently in crisis, you can dial 988 [U.S.] to reach the National Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.samhsa.gov/find-help/national-helpline\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">SAMHSA National Help Line\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://988lifeline.org/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://www.nami.org/help\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) Helpline\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://www.hhs.gov/programs/prevention-and-wellness/mental-health-substance-abuse/index.html\">US Health and Human Services\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://warmline.org/warmdir.html\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Warmline Directory\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://journalism.berkeley.edu/programs/mj/investigative-reporting/\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Investigative Reporting Program\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism was a key partner in making Season 2 of On Our Watch. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The records obtained for this project are part of the\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://projects.scpr.org/california-reporting-project/\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> California Reporting Project\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, a coalition of news organizations in California. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you have tips or feedback about this series please reach out to us at \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"mailto:onourwatch@kqed.org\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">onourwatch@kqed.org\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Producer:\u003c/b> Before we start, I just wanted to give you a heads-up that this episode references violent incidents, discriminatory language, and substance use disorder. We also talk about someone’s death by fentanyl poisoning. If you or someone you know needs support, we’ve got links to resources in the episode description.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Okay, so it’s me Sukey and Julie, and Steven, and we’re here at Julie’s house. Two days after, we saw Val and Erma and got the phone, and we’re just–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We’re back from our trip to West Sacramento where I first got to meet the parents of Officer Valentino Rodriguez. And our reporting team is clustered around a computer screen. We don’t know exactly what we’re gonna find on the hard drive that Val Senior handed over in his office.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/b>Looking through kinda the materials that are on here that are many, many tens of gigabytes of information, um, and trying to figure out, like, what’s going on here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> It contains evidence he’s been able to put together over the past two years as he turned from grieving dad into an investigator trying to solve the riddle of his son’s death and how it might be connected to the place where he worked, New Folsom Prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> It’s a letter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Yeah, yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Um, then a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Also on the drive is what we’re looking at right now – a duplicate of Valentino’s cellphone, with messages going all the way back to 2017.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steven Rascon:\u003c/b> Oh, incoming. Incoming, outgoing\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mm-hmm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We’ve gotten hundreds of documents through public record requests. But they’re all steeped in official language, and some are so redacted they barely make sense. What Valentino’s phone promises is both so much more intimate and so much more telling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> What is that? Holy shit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> About what it was like to work at New Folsom, but also about who Val was.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> [sings] Super dog, super dog.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> A guy who sings to his dog.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> This is about Daisy the super dog\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr & Jr:\u003c/b> See you on the other side.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> All right, let’s go.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Lean back. Look behind you\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Zip lines with his dad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr: \u003c/b>This way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr: \u003c/b>Woo-hoo\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> A man who was loved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Hello, my love, um, I’m gonna see you after work. Also, I’m-I’m gonna try to get off early so we can do something.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> And we can see his text messages with the guys he worked with at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small: \u003c/b>Woah. It’s all of them, all the–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey:\u003c/b> Oh, all right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Yeah, these are the group texts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> And one message jumps out at us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Interesting. When’s the date on that one?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steven Rascon:\u003c/b> Okay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> It’s on the day, the day he died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Steven Rascon:\u003c/b> Oh, he texted Steele the day he died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Wow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/b>I think it’s from Steele.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Oh it’s from Steele.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Sergeant Kevin Steele, the Bruce Willis-looking, former military guy who was kind of a mentor to Valentino. Just hours before Valentino died, in October 2020, the sergeant reaches out with this cryptic message.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> “I think you already know I did not set up the course, but I am running the race. Steele.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Valentino Texts back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> “Awesome, I just hope that I am not mentioned at all to anyone, not even to those who know my involvement. Not even among people I trust. Iwish that for everyone on this side of the race, my name is left out of everything.” So, they’re talking in some kind of code, right? “I did not set up the course, but I am running the race.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> But since both of these men have died, we’re going to have to figure out what these texts mean on our own.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Theme music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> As we sift through Valentino’s phone, his photos and videos, voice memos, and notes, along with the documents we’ve gotten from the prison, we’re hoping to find answers. What was Valentino going through? What would lead him to turn on his team? And what was the race he and Steele were running? And we’re also looking to understand the choices made by people in positions of power that he reached out to for help, people who were supposed to act and didn’t. I’m Sukey Lewis. This is \u003ci>On Our Watch,\u003c/i> Season 2: New Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> You can read this so you get to know more about him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> What he was going through… but don’t-don’t copy this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Okay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr: \u003c/b>Yeah, or use it maybe– I mean, you can like, uh–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We’d started looking into Valentino’s story to see if the death of this whistleblower was connected to all those cases we’d found showing off the charts’ use of force at New Folsom. But Val Senior was already way ahead of us in investigating his son’s death. So every few weeks, my co-reporter, Julie, would meet up with Val Senior to get more of the evidence he’d collected and she’d share what we were finding with him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small: \u003c/b>So we’ve started a database of the guard’s names and then different allegations against them. And then-\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Building this relationship with Val Senior has been tricky. He’s grieving and he feels like he was burned by other people who said they’d look into his son’s death and then dropped it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr: \u003c/b>Oh, I just-I just want this to work both ways–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small: \u003c/b>Right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Right?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Okay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I need to know what you’re doing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Okay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> That’s all I’ve ever asked. I might even– I-I– nobody even knows we’re having these meetings other than my wife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He says he’s not trying to swear our reporting, and it doesn’t seem like he is, but it does feel like he’s still testing us to see how serious we are about this investigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> You go through stuff and you decide, right? I don’t want to paint a picture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I never have.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Okay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I’m not gonna bullshit nobody and, uh, ruin anyone’s lives. I just want-I just want the truth told, that– that’s all I’m doing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small: \u003c/b>Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> That’s what we want too, but after years of working as reporters, Julie and I both know the truth can be a really complicated thing. Take the harassment Valentino experienced from the squad. As we go through Valentino’s phone, we can see that he was called ugly names. But we can also see that Valentino sometimes used offensive language too, calling his gaming friend a homophobic slur or sending a GIF of a swinging penis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These guys, ’cause they’re all guys on these text threads, work in a prison. Their conversations are dark and their jokes are not usually kind.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Dramatic music] \u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But there’s also a particular edge of nastiness to some of the other guys’ texts that feels different than Valentino’s off-color joking. One of our producers agreed to read some of them so you can hear what was being said. Heads up, it’s vulgar, but we’ve bleeped the slurs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Producer: \u003c/b>“Is that the jizz from A Facility? Drink up. In your mouth, you f––. Tell your lady I said hi. You f––. Send a picture of your girl’s ass.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/b>Those messages are all from this one guy, Daniel Garland. And Valentino doesn’t usually take the bait, but there is this one time where you can see he just snaps. It starts with Valentino texting the group something totally innocuous: how to log in to a new HR system for vacation requests. He’s just being helpful. And Garland writes back-\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Producer:\u003c/b> Who gives a fuck f––?!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> That’s when Valentino loses it and says, “Go fuck yourself, you dumb shit.” And this is what Garland does in response. He sends this weird video to the group, and it’s of a guy who’s probably in his early 20s, in a black and red sweatshirt at what looks like the gym talking straight into the camera.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Garland’s Son:\u003c/b> If you ever get outta the pocket again I’m gonna slap your fat ass.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> You ever get out of pocket again I’m gonna slap your fat ass. That was a flat-out threat. And when he got to work, uh, they laughed at him. They laughed about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> The guy saying he was gonna slap Valentino was actually Garland’s son. For Valentino, this was the last straw. Garland had been insulting him since he joined the squad about a year earlier. CDCR does have a no-tolerance policy against discrimination and harassment, which these text messages fell outside the lines of. In an email, an attorney for Garland and some of the other officers in those text threads stated that her clients never bullied, hazed, or harassed Officer Rodriguez while he worked at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said the officers coped with their stressful and violent workplace in different ways, but that they “Genuinely cared for and supported each other.” When Valentino first got that video from Garland’s son, he told his dad it wasn’t a big deal. But he told other people it really bothered him. It was clear he couldn’t take much more of this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> In the back of my head, I kept thinking all the time, “Well, the warden knows who he is. He’s gonna take care of him. There’s people that’ll take care of him. That’s-that’s not the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Droning music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Just after the new year, January 2020, Valentino had a lot going on. He was pissed off at the team about the Garland incident and he was stressed about that gruesome stabbing that happened in the day room. The one with the video that he showed his dad, Valentino was still working on writing his reports for that. He’d worked so hard to get here, achieved his dream of being an investigator. But now all he could think about was quitting. He wrote this note into his phone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> It’s entitled, “Reasons to Leave. Harassment, disrespect.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr: \u003c/b>“Disrespect, threats, whistleblower violations.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “Whistleblower violations.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr: \u003c/b>“Voted off team.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “Keep your mouth shut, or you’ll be fired. You do stupid work.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> “You do stupid work, they do important shit.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Just so you know, in his text messages, Valentino complains that the person telling him to stay quiet and demeaning his work was his boss, the new head of the unit, a guy named Sergeant David Anderson. Anderson was also on some of the terrible text threads, so it doesn’t look like Valentino felt like he could turn to him to step in. Anderson did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Valentino’s reasons go on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> “Depressed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “No money, bad health.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I’ll work for Dad. Be happy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Be happy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Around the same time that he wrote that note, he also texted a friend that he was getting out soon. He had a plan to stick around for a few months and then switch to a part-time position where he could work a few shifts and still get benefits. But a couple of weeks later, his plans to try and stick it out fell apart.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I remember him coming home and telling me that he broke down to the assistant warden.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> That’s Mimy Rodriguez, Valentino’s wife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> And he was sobbing and he had told her how he felt about things and he felt just like everything was kind of closing in on him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> She tells Julie and me that Valentino had a really rough day at work. The person he fell apart in front of was Gena Jones, the chief deputy warden of the prison. She was in charge of the squad, the investigative services unit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> And I remember sitting on the couch with him and him saying, “I left work. I left, and it’s gone. I’m not gonna be there anymore. I broke down to the assistant warden.” And I guess he opened up to her about everything that was going on. I remember this very clearly. He said, “This is my identity.” He’s like, “I feel like I’ve given up on everything. I feel like I gave up on my job.” And I was like, “No, you didn’t give up. Valentino, you’re doing this for you.” He’s like, “No, I gave up. This is who I am, and I-I don’t know who I am anymore.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy says something else happened in this meeting too. She says Valentino made some serious allegations about his fellow officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> That officers could have been planting drugs on inmates, could have been planting drugs on, uh, other officers. And I know that he was very nervous to talk to anybody because he didn’t want anyone to retaliate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy’s memory of this incident is all we have to go on, but this is important because from what we’ve been able to figure out, this would be the first time Valentino told higher-ups in charge of the investigative services unit that the squad, the very officers investigating crimes in the prison, might be committing serious misconduct. Mimy says at the time, she didn’t fully consider the implications of that—what kind of obligation to report or investigate that Valentino’s allegations might have triggered for Jones. But now she does.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I do believe that at that time, she had a right to say something or at least reported, mentioned something, write it down, document it, if anything, but from what I understand, nothing was even documented, which I find very interesting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> To be clear, Mimy says, Valentino also didn’t wanna make an official report. There’s an unwritten code among correctional officers: never tell on each other. But as a supervisor, Jones did have an explicit obligation to act immediately to stop the harassment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I remember specifically saying, “Valentino, if-if-if these people are bothering you and hurting you, you need to report that.” But he was– he didn’t want it to go back to him. He didn’t want it to get traced back that he had said anything about the team or that, um, any type of retaliation could have happened to him or his work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Now, everyone’s memory is imperfect and Mimy wasn’t in this meeting with Jones, so we don’t know for sure what he told her the day he broke down. But we did hear that this happened from another officer who didn’t wanna go on the record, but he confirmed that he’d also heard that Valentino had made these allegations to Jones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We asked CDCR if Jones had been questioned about this incident or her knowledge of discriminatory behavior in the unit, but the agency declined to comment. We asked for an interview with Jones, but a CDCR spokeswoman declined stating that wardens can’t talk about personnel matters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Driving music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The only action we know for sure the chief deputy warden took was to put Valentino out on medical leave for stress. That worker’s compensation claim was tied to an incident that happened years earlier, back in 2017, where Valentino wound up in the hospital.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Captain:\u003c/b> Hey Rodriguez, just calling to see how you’re doing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> A captain left this voicemail on his phone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Captain:\u003c/b> Good job toughing it out yesterday. But man, you need to take it easy. If, uh- if that really is a concussion, enjoy your time. Hopefully, uh, you catch up on any Netflix that you’re behind on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He wasn’t in the squad yet. He was still just a regular officer. And one day after yard time, they were lining up the incarcerated people to search them and escort them back to their cells. Among them was this one guy named Amon Morrison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> Hello?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Hi, is this Amon?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> It’s Amon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Amon, sorry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> I actually tracked him down, a prison in Corcoran in central California. The call was really bad quality, but he says he had an illegal phone on him that day. So when they were lining him up to search him and take him back to his cell, he got paranoid and he ran.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> I had the phone, I got paranoid, and they’re like here. I’m like, “Man, I’m good.” And then, you know, I ran- where I was gonna go, I had no idea. I wasn’t even, you know what I’m saying? Like where I’m gonna go?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Of course, this is a prison. There’s nowhere to go. Valentino tried to tackle him and they both hit the wall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> We both ran into the wall– when we both ran into the wall, I heard his head hit, well I hit my head like- like with a loud noise. It was like a “clunk,” like a–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> “Clunk,” he says their heads hit the wall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> I heard another like “clunk,” and it sounded like it could have been his head or whatever it was. I don’t know. I didn’t know the cause of it, but then I fell to the ground.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He fell on the ground. But Morrison and Valentino’s versions of this story are different. Valentino’s report, which we found a draft of on his phone, says that Morrison hit him with his elbow, knocking his head into the wall. Morrison says he never hit Valentino. He just panicked and ran. Still, he was charged with battery and assault.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> And what– ’cause I know you were charged with assault with a deadly weapon, right? Like what was the deadly weapon?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> [laughs] I’m the deadly weapon. [laughs] I swear it’s like a game I like. I don’t, there is no deadly weapon!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We simply don’t know what exactly took place. But we do know Valentino went to the hospital with a concussion and that his report became the basis for criminal charges against Morrison, charges he’s still fighting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> All right, bye.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Amon Morrison:\u003c/b> All right, have a good day. Bye.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> At first, the incident didn’t seem like that big of a deal to Valentino. Over text message, he sounds upbeat and he tells a friend that he’s been prescribed some medication for his injuries. “They gave me Norcos though, and Valium,” he texted. “Whoop whoop.” Norco contains the opioid Hydrocodone. Eventually, a psychologist diagnosed Valentino with anxiety and depression, and at some point he started having panic attacks. Looking at his medical records, his symptoms weren’t all because of this one altercation, though. He also witnessed terrible things at New Folsom—homicides and beatings. And along with the rejection and alienation he felt from his team, it seems like this created a powerful and traumatic feedback loop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In January 2020, just before Valentino decided to leave the prison for stress, something else happened. One day Mimy came home from work and the house was completely dark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He was just sick. Like it was the kind of sickness I’ve never seen. It didn’t look like the flu because he didn’t- he wasn’t throwing up the way a flu would make you throw up. But he was sweating and he was attempting to throw up and he was crying and he was upset. And I got scared and I didn’t know what was going on. And I told him we should go to the doctor. But he said, “No, it’s fine.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> The next day he wasn’t any better.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I look at him and I go, Valentino, what’s going on? You’re- I’ve never seen you like this. Tell me what’s going on. What finally made him open up to me is I said, “It looks like you have something to tell me, but you just don’t wanna tell me.” And then he just told me, “I’ve been struggling with something.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He was in withdrawal. Like a lot of people affected by the opioid epidemic, Valentino had become dependent on pain pills. He’d dealt with this before, years earlier when he was in college. He called his parents for help and they got him into rehab. He told Mimy this time he felt like he could stop using on his own.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> And my goal was like, “Okay, what can we do to get past this? This– you bringing this up to me, okay, great, how can we do this? Well, we have to go to therapy. We have to do these things.” At one point I was like, “Well, rehab?” Because I know that’s common, right? He was like, “No, it’s not that bad,” or “No, it’s not to that extent.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> In hindsight, after everything that happened, Mimy says she wishes she’d done things differently.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I wish I would’ve reached out to his parents ’cause he-he told me not to say anything, but I just wanted him to know that he can trust me and that I loved him and we were gonna get past this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy kept her word to Valentino. And though he was privately struggling, he presented a different face to most of his friends and family. His parents, Val Sr. and Erma, say they had no idea this was going on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Upbeat music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They were happy he was out of the prison and even better, he was coming to work with them at the family pool business.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> When he quit over there, I just felt like I had him all to myself. He was coming here and working all the time with me and his brother, and, um, was always happy. He worked really hard. He was very thorough. My customers loved him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 1:\u003c/b> Hi, Valentino. You were out here and gave us a estimate to resurface our pool.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 2:\u003c/b> Hi, Valentino.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 3:\u003c/b> Hey, Valentino.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 4:\u003c/b> Hey, Valentino.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 5:\u003c/b> Just checking in to see if you were able to send off the quote for us for a pool replastering.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 6:\u003c/b> I got the bid, I think I’d like to go with you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Customer 7:\u003c/b> Your family finished our pool on Tuesday, it looks great.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Val Senior’s grandfather had gotten into the pool business years earlier and Val Sr. carried it on, creating generation pool plastering. Valentino’s mom, Erma, co-owns the business and largely runs the administrative side of things, and his younger brother, Gregory, is a skilled tradesman in plastering and pool construction. Val Sr. says Valentino’s specialty was sales.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> When he’d come in the office, sometimes he’d tell me what he did all day at work and I would- I would joke with him and tell him to turn around and I’d pat him on the back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Valentino loved getting his dad’s approval.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And he was just like, “Oh, that feels good, dad.” [laughter] I said, “All right.” [laughs] Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Then COVID-19 hit and there was the statewide shutdown. The pandemic was scary and things were uncertain, of course, but Val Senior remembers it as this golden time that he got to spend with his kids. None of them had anywhere else to go. Valentino would come over and they’d just hang out in the backyard and swim in the pool. Val Sr. says it was on one of these warm summer afternoons in 2020, Valentino was over at the house and they were barbecuing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> My world was just turning perfectly. Everything was just going good and we were swimming in the backyard and, you know, eating and just laughing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> But then he noticed he hadn’t seen Valentino for a couple of hours.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And I says, “Where-where’s– where the hell is Val at?” And he’s in front, he’s on the phone with the prison. I says, “What the hell do they want? He left that job.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Valentino had been out of the prison for a few months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> So I walked out to the front and he was talking and talking, and I just looked at him and moments later, he-he came in the backyard and I said, “What-what’d the prison want?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> It was Sergeant Kevin Steele, his old mentor, who was still working in the investigative services unit at New Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> He goes, “Oh man, dad,” and he told me about the Aguilar homicide. The video he showed me-\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> The one he showed him at the Christmas party—of the man, Luis Giovanny Aguilar, being stabbed while he was shackled in the day room.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> It was, according to Kevin, was actually orchestrated by officers to get rid of that inmate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> What Valentino was telling his dad was that this guy, Sergeant Steele, had found evidence that officers had played a role in that brutal murder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> He said, “Kevin, unveiled this, uncovered this, and now those guys over there at the prison, they-they don’t like him too much because he’s-he’s turning in this information, this-this evidence.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Clearly, Steele was making a really big allegation that officers set up a man to be murdered in prison. CDCR said it cannot comment on this case, and CDCR officials have denied these allegations in court filings. However, multiple sources have told us the FBI is investigating the incident and the prison is still facing a federal civil rights lawsuit from Aguilar’s family. We’re gonna talk to the people that Steele talked to and share the evidence we’ve uncovered in a later episode. We really wish we knew what Valentino knew about this incident and if this call from Steele was the first he’d heard of allegations about officers’ involvement in the killing, but we just don’t. It’s a crucial question because Val Senior would come to believe that his son’s death may not have been an accident—that his son was targeted at least in part for what he knew about this incident. To date, we have not uncovered any evidence that Valentino was purposely killed. But in order to help Val Senior understand what happened to his son, we also needed to understand how he came to believe this. At the time, Val Sr. says Valentino downplayed his role in the incident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Are you gonna be in trouble for that? And he goes, “No, dad, I-I wasn’t there. I just did what they told me to do and wrote it the way they told me to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> If Valentino did know something was off from the beginning, it’s not reflected in the reports that we’ve seen, which were leaked by a confidential source. In these documents, Valentino writes that Luis Giovanny Aguilar was in a prison gang and that he was killed by rival gang members. Aguilar’s family disputes this version of events. Valentino doesn’t write anything about guards being behind the murder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I just stayed in my own lane and just continued on with my day and my own life. That’s Val’s world. Uh, he’s got it handled. The state of California’s got it handled. The warden’s got it handled. All that’s being taken care of… and it wasn’t- it wasn’t taken care of.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Dramatic music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Val Senior says they never talked about the homicide again and he thought his son was doing fine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He was doing really well for his dad, but I can tell that as much as he loved working for his father- ’cause he did, he loved his dad. He wanted– he missed his job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> At home, Mimy could tell Valentino was not fine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He wasn’t at the prison physically, but mentally he was still there. He was still talking to people from the prison. He was still reaching out to people- people from the prison were reaching out to him, telling him what was going on within the prison. He-he had not at all let that go.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy tells my reporting partner, Julie, that Valentino’s health at this time wasn’t good. His doctors were concerned about his blood pressure and he’d gained a lot of weight. She says he was also getting increasingly paranoid and frightened. He would rarely leave the house and even at home, he’d set up elaborate security devices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He was nervous about anybody coming to the house. At one point, he had put things at the door, so if someone opened it you can hear the door open. He also– like he had a gun and he would sleep with it just to make sure. And I’m like, “What? Who’s coming?” And I would ask him, like, “Is everything okay? You know, who’s– who are you nervous about coming? What is going on?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Would he ever answer that question?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> No. He would just tell me not to worry.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> She did worry. But she also saw that he was taking steps to get help: seeing a therapist, taking medication, and trying to eat healthier.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I just kept reassuring him like, “Just let– let’s let this year pass. We’re almost there. Just breathe.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Upbeat music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy was trying everything she could, and she thought maybe if they finally made things official, it could jumpstart their future together and they could leave behind the things that were holding him back. They’d been engaged for over two years now, but had put their wedding on hold because of COVID-19 restrictions. As the summer of 2020 went on, it looked like things might be opening up again and they decided to go for it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> We ended up just saying, eff it, we’re just gonna- we’re just gonna get married.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Even if they couldn’t have a huge gathering inside, they could have the reception at the family business on the patio and grassy lawn next to the warehouse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> They have a little– they have like an outside venue. They have a little patio, they have a little patch of grass. Like it’s a- it’s a really nice little spot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> They organize the wedding in a month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Full-size render… movies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Okay, could we go back to the chats for a second?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> As we look through Valentino’s phone from this time period, September, 2020, we can see it’s all a flurry of invitations: getting the taco guy to cater, a bachelor party near Lake Tahoe… But then we find a long text exchange that’s got a very different tone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Uh, this is the beginning of the conversation with Strohmaier. This is shorter, but, um–\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Brandon Strohmaier is a Sergeant Valentino knew from the ISU squad, but from a different division. Importantly, Strohmaier worked in internal affairs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> He tells him that he’s gonna get married. He is, you know, moving on and he’s just started therapy. And Strohmaier says, “It sounds great. You left a place that isn’t good for everyone, and I think you made a good decision that will benefit you in the future. Congrats on the marriage.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> In response, Valentino launches into all the stuff he’s kept in about his boss, Sergeant David Anderson.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “Yeah, bro. I wasn’t happy. I wasn’t respected, and I was being fucked with like crazy by Anderson and the guys. Some unbelievable shit. Threatening to be fired with my job dangling in front of me daily, couldn’t get help, and had expectations placed on me way higher than everyone else. I kept it all to myself and tried to power through it, but at the end, it was too much. And it wasn’t worth losing my fiance or maybe even someday my life over.” Oh God.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mmm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> This text thread goes on for pages. Valentino tells Strohmaier the homophobic slurs that Daniel Garland would call him and about how another guy named Marcus Jordan would also use the “N” word and call Black incarcerated people monkeys. And Valentino tells Strohmaier these guys would say explicit and demeaning things about Mimy too. That she was, “Sucking and fucking other men,” and repeat anti-Black, and misogynist stereotypes.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “I hated it, man. I loved the work. I loved the investigations. I loved winning. But I hate being in that office.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He tells Strohmaier how Anderson threatened him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “If you say anything or open your mouth, I’ll fucking replace you like that.” Snap finger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Again, Anderson has not responded to requests for comment. Over text, Strohmaier says he wishes he knew all this was going on. “I put zero blame on you,” Valentino texts back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “I’ll say this, though. That team is broken. There is shit they do, say, or don’t do that could cause everyone from the warden down to get the boot. It’s my fault for not standing up to begin with. I sold my pride for the job, and it wasn’t worth it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> But he ends on a positive note.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> “My life’s good now, man. I’m a lot happier. My relationship is 1,000 times better than before. She’s happier. My family is happier. They had been worrying about me for a while. I’m moving forward.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We check out the date on these messages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> That’s 9/19/2020. So a month before– a month, and a day before he’s dead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> In her email, the lawyer for Jordan, Garland, and two other officers denied that her clients harassed Valentino. And she also said there are, “No allegations or findings that any conduct by my clients in any way contributed to Officer Rodriguez’s death.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Emcee:\u003c/b> So it is my privilege to introduce to you Mr. And Mrs. Valentino and Irma Rodriguez. You may kiss the bride. Un beso.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> On a hot day in early October, Valentino and Mimy, whose given name is actually Irma, just like his mom, got married.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I wore this big white ball gown with– it was– it had a cream undertone, and then it had, like white lace and it sparkled. It was- it was really nice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Her long veil covered the dais steps in the cathedral in downtown Sacramento.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> The church was beautiful. I mean, so many people showed up. My parents, were- they both walked me down the aisle, and then at the end of the aisle, I got to say, you know, I got to see his parents, and it was just nice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy and Valentino rode to the reception in one of Val Sr.’s classic cars, a ’64 Impala.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Emcee:\u003c/b> Ladies and gentlemen, it is an honor for me to introduce Irma and Valentino’s first dance as husband and wife.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Song: \u003c/b>I would need a million words\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If I tried to define\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All the things you mean to me, yeah\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For you, I’d die a thousand lives\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Our song was 17 by Pink Sweats. So I just wanted to commemorate how this song was us being young and in love. And I was gonna love him until the very end.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Song:\u003c/b> Special kind of energy\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>‘Cause love is born when hearts collide\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Every time you touch me\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You remind me that I’m still alive\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He wrote me a letter the morning of our wedding and same thing, just I love you. And it was- it was beautiful. But the speech was amazing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Song: \u003c/b>So promise you’ll never change\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And I’ll always be the same\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> Check, check. I want to thank everyone for coming tonight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> In this video of their wedding reception, Valentino holds Mimy at his left aside.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> I have a great partner in life. I couldn’t ask for anything different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> His arm wrapped around her, he’s wearing a burgundy shirt and a black vest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> You know, this-this whole wedding, I felt it strange that I wasn’t nervous or I wasn’t dreading the day. I was excited and I wanted it to happen. Uh, and it clicked with me when I was standing up there on the altar today that I’m right where I’m supposed to be in life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy leans her head into his shoulder. She’s changed out of the white gown into a dress covered in black lace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> I love you, Erma.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I love you too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> You are truly the love of my life. I’m excited to spend the rest of my life with you. I can’t wait to make babies, and see where the future goes. [cheering]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> He hands her the mic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> You know, I– when I first met Val, I loved him. I’m going to be honest with every single one of you and just as my sister said she thought it was crazy but honestly I didn’t. I wake up every day and I look at him and I just– I don’t want to look at anyone else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> I told her on our third date, which was our third day knowing each other, that I loved her. So that’s how that’s how much I knew.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Yeah, he’s crazy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Mimy thanks everyone including family members who came all the way from Mexico.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> [Spanish language]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Valentino thanks Mimy’s family, and he thanks her friends for keeping her company when he couldn’t be there. And he toasts his parents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Jr:\u003c/b> It’s one of the first memories I have with my dad is us go– walking into a movie theater on a rainy day. A man taking off his jacket, holding it over his date’s head. And my dad stopped and said, “No matter what you do in life, I want that you to be a man like that, that cherishes your woman.” Please, have a good rest of the night. We’ll party until we run out of money for the DJ or we run out of alcohol. Cheers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> It was a perfect day. For a long time he was so stuck on the prison, and I think for that day specifically, it just kind of brought him into a place of, like, “I am getting married. I’m moving forward with my life.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> But less than two weeks after his wedding day, on October 15th, Valentino went back to New Folsom to meet with the warden, the man who’s the head of the whole prison, Jeff Lynch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He told me that he went to go talk to the warden about all the corruption that was going on within the prison, at least within the officers that he was working with.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Dramatic music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Strohmaier, that internal affairs sergeant, had forwarded that long text thread between him and Valentino with all the names and the slurs straight to the warden. Now, Valentino was in the warden’s office, telling him in person about the harassment he’d received.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He told me that he had told the warden about this one sergeant. I believe he was the sergeant of that team, how he put his hands around his neck. And he said, “I can make it look like an accident.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> We only have Mimy’s account of this specific allegation. But we do know that Valentino talked about threats from Sergeant Anderson and members with the squad. Documents and recorded testimony Warden Lynch later gave about this meeting largely corroborate Mimy’s account of what was discussed. Valentino told the warden that ISU officers planted contraband on incarcerated people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He spoke to the warden for some time, so I’m assuming there was a lot more said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> CDCR did not respond to questions about this meeting and said the warden can’t comment on personnel matters. As Valentino was leaving the prison, he texted the internal affairs Sergeant Strohmaier, “Let me know how things turn out. Also, I’m not telling Steele or anyone I was up there.” “10/4,” Strohmaier responded. When Valentino got back home, Mimy says he seemed lighter, like a big weight had been lifted off his chest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He felt confident that the warden was gonna help.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> Mhmm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He was happy coming home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> And that evening after the prison, Valentino texted his dad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Uh, October the 15th. And, um, he just texted me out of the blue, “I love you, pop.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Val Sr. texted him back, “I love you too, kiddo.” Val senior says his son mentioned the meeting to him too. He says he told the warden everything.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And when he emphasized everything, he’d always say everything.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> What Valentino meant by “everything,” we still don’t know. One thing we really wanted to know is did Valentino talk to the warden about the murder of Luis Giovanny Aguilar. But so far, none of the documents or testimony we’ve been able to get address this, and Mimy and Val Sr. say they don’t know. We do know that after the meeting, the warden had asked Valentino to write up all his allegations into an official report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/b> He was asked to write a memo, but he didn’t do it. He should have done it. But he never got a chance to write the memo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Six days later, on October 21st, 2020, Mimy came home from having dinner with her girlfriends and found Valentino slumped over in the bathroom and called 911.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>911 ER:\u003c/b> Edward 20. Edward 25.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>911 Dispatch:\u003c/b> 20.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>911 ER:\u003c/b> They’re saying this male is unconscious. We’re giving CPR instructions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>911 Dispatch: \u003c/b>Copy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> It was around nine o’clock at night, Val Sr. remembers. He was already in bed, watching TV after a long day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> The phone rings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> It’s his other son, Gregory. A friend had heard something on the police scanner and texted him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I call my dad and I go, “Hey, uh, we need to go down to Val’s house.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And he just says, “Dad, there’s something going on at Val’s.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Goes, “What am I supposed to do?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I didn’t feel panic or anything, I just stayed really quiet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I go, “Dad, just pick me up. Let’s go.” He goes, “Okay.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> “Yeah, let’s-let’s go over there.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> We get there and, um-\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And then an ambulance was leaving with the lights off. So I remember feeling relieved, like, “Oh, good, nobody got hurt.” So I started to pull up. It was really dark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> We get out and there’s a cop that meets us at the end of the driveway.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I asked, “Is Val here?” He says, “My sergeant will come on and talk to you.” So Greg says, “Come on man, tell us something.” He kind of grins.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> My dad asked where Val was, and the cop used a term like he was dead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Just says he’s deceased.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Right away, my dad just fell to the ground and I was in shock. You know, I just couldn’t believe it. Uh, when I say I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, it was literally I could not believe it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Val Sr. thought his son’s body must have been in that ambulance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> Uh, I just started to think, “I need to tell my wife.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> I go, “Hey, just go home to mom.” I go, “I’ll stay here.” And I was there for about an hour by myself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And I walked in and my wife was on the couch sitting on her legs, and she looked at me and she’s, “What happened?” And I-I just told her, “He died.” I didn’t know how else to say it. I remember standing there. She passed out. She woke up and she was crying, “Where is he? Let’s go see him at the hospital. Is he still alive?” And then I realized, I don’t even know where he’s at. And, uh, the phone rang, it was Greg, and he says, “Dad.” I go, “Yeah.” “Val’s here. He’s in the house.” I can’t remember who the heck was driving, but we drove.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> My mom and dad and my sisters pulled up to the house and my mom took off running in the house and-\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> And there he was on the floor with his arms stretched out. And, uh, he was all purple. I just- I just looked at him, you know, and she jumped on him right away and started holding him, crying, saying, “He’s cold, you know, wake up, Val.” She was telling me to wake him up. I had to reach underneath her arms and-and pull her out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Gregory Rodriguez:\u003c/b> Finally, she gets up and they take off.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> On the way out, I looked at the cop and I says, “I-I want a full toxicology report.” And he says, “Oh, yeah.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Eventually, they all went home and Valentino’s body was taken to the coroner so they could do an autopsy and start doing those tests. The coroner’s report notes that the house is still full of wrapped and unwrapped gifts from the couple’s wedding. Valentino’s mom has difficulty speaking about that night. It’s almost too much for her to put into words. And after they went home, she called his phone three times. She gave us permission to play one of the messages she left for him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Erma Rodriguez:\u003c/b> “Val, you can come back. I know you can. Please. Please. Please, come back. Please.” [crying]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> After Valentino’s death, calls of condolence came in and people stopped by the shop, but there was one call in particular that Val Sr. kept waiting for.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> It didn’t ring like-like it never happened. And I says, “Man, this is really weird. It’s like, I haven’t got a phone call from the prison?” I was under this stupid impression that the warden would call me and say, “Hey, you know, I’m sorry about your son. Um, he was a good man. We’re gonna make sure we’re gonna find out.” You know, nothing. It was just-just complete silence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> The warden never called.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Theme music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> Coming up next time, Val Sr. reaches out to a source inside New Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Valentino Rodriguez, Sr:\u003c/b> I text him and I asked him, “Are you still running the race?” He said, “What race?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CDCR Agent:\u003c/b> You are hereby directed to cease all communication with any and all employees of California State Prison Sacramento regarding Correctional Officer Valentino Rodriguez.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Julie Small:\u003c/b> The allegation is about ordering murders are-are very shocking. To have a correctional officer, a high-ranking sergeant in an investigative unit, releasing this kind of, uh, detailed report about misconduct, illegal activity, even murder. I don’t Know of another time that that’s happened.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>[Credits music]\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/b> You’re listening to On Our Watch Season Two: New Folsom from KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you have any tips or feedback about the series, you can email us at: onourwatch@kqed.org. You can also leave us a review in Apple podcasts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The series is reported by me, Sukey Lewis, and Julie Small. It’s edited by Victoria Mauleon. It’s produced and scored by Steven Rascón and Chris Egusa. Sound design and mixing by Tarek Fouda. Jen Chien is KQED’s director of podcasts and she executive produced the series. Meticulous fact checking by Mark Betancourt. Additional research for this episode by Cayla Mihalovich, Kathleen Quinn, and Laura Fitzgerald—students in the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism, whose chair David Barstow provided valuable support to the whole series.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Special thanks to Rahsaan Thomas of Ear Hustle, Sandhya Dirks of NPR and KQED Health Correspondent April Dembosky.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Original music by Ramtin Arablouei, including our theme song. Additional music from APM Music and Audio Network.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Funding for On Our Watch is provided in part by Arnold Ventures and the California Endowment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And thanks to KQED’s Otis R. Taylor Jr., Managing Editor of News and Enterprise, Ethan Tovan-Lindsey our Vice President of News, and chief content officer Holly Kernan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Thanks for listening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>"
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">View the full episode transcript.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Soon after correctional officer Valentino Rodriguez starts working at New Folsom prison, he gets caught up in a bad incident. An incarcerated man ends up in the hospital with horrific injuries, and the prison starts an investigation. Valentino feels pressured to back up his fellow officers’ version of the story, even though he thinks it might not be the truth. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Then he gets an opportunity he’s dreamed of — to join an elite unit investigating crimes in the prison.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC7715585512\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Resources\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you are currently in crisis, you can dial 988 [U.S.] to reach the National Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.samhsa.gov/find-help/national-helpline\">SAMHSA National Help Line\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://988lifeline.org/\">988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://www.nami.org/help\">NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) Helpline\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://www.hhs.gov/programs/prevention-and-wellness/mental-health-substance-abuse/index.html\">US Health and Human Services\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://warmline.org/warmdir.html\">Warmline Directory\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://journalism.berkeley.edu/programs/mj/investigative-reporting/\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Investigative Reporting Program\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism was a key partner in making Season 2 of On Our Watch. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The records obtained for this project are part of the\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://projects.scpr.org/california-reporting-project/\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> California Reporting Project\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, a coalition of news organizations in California. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Narrator: \u003c/strong>This is a series investigating some of the difficult things that happened to the people who live and work inside California’s prisons. So we wanted to give you a heads up that this episode touches on intense topics including substance use, state violence, and self-harm. If you need support, we’ve got links to resources in the episode description. The story begins with a death that is intense and upsetting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I park my car and I walk in the house and he’s not on the couch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>On October 21st, 2020, Mimy Rodriguez came home from having dinner with her friends and called out to her husband, Valentino Rodriguez.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>So I go Val, Val where are you? And all the lights were on in the house. And I go into the kitchen, he’s not in the kitchen. So I go into our bedroom and he’s not in our bedroom. And I knew something was wrong. And, I go, Val? Val where are you? And I run into the bathroom and he’s just, he’s on his knees. He’s on his knees with his head up against the wall, hunched over. And I just scream. And I had my Airpods in. So I go Siri, call 911. So Siri calls 911.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>20:45, 26 seconds, October 21, 2020. \u003cem>[phone dialing sounds]\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez\u003c/strong>: [inaudible] Wake up baby, I love you. I love you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>911, what is your emergency.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/strong> [inaudible]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>Ma’am you have to give her the address, again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/strong> On the call, she’s like hello and I go, please– like please help me. I’m scared. I don’t know what to do. This has happened, he’s dead, please.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>Please tell me what happened.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And I’m screaming and I’m going to grab him. And I pull him back, and I put his head back and he has vomit coming out of his mouth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The 911 operator tells Mimy to perform CPR on him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio:\u003c/strong> Hard and fast, twice per second. Okay, we want to make sure the chest comes up all the way in between pumps. Ok, we’re gonna do this 600 times until help can take over. We’re going to count together. Okay? 1234. One. Two. Three. Four.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino’s hands were purple and he wasn’t breathing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>Is that front door open, are they’re going to be able to get in to you? [Mimy inaudible] It is open? Okay. Keep going, keep doing the chest compressions. Is anybody else in the house with you? Keep going…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>Eventually the police came. I don’t know how fast. I think like two minutes, or three. But she kept telling me she’s like, they’re outside.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>Great job just hang in there, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, they’re parking right now, they’re almost to you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And I was like, just open the door. Just come inside, please. Like seven officers ran in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>Please!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And I was I was like, I’m in the bathroom. Help me. And I said, save him, please save him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The police pulled her out of the house and had her sit in the back of a squad car. They told her they needed to ask her some questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>The officer that was trying to talk to me was this lady, and she, she’s like, how? What happened? She goes, what do you, how did this happen? I was like, I don’t know, but it’s his job. And I just kept saying, it’s his job. This is all because of his job. She goes, where does he work? And I’m like, he works at CDCR.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>CDCR, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>\u003cem>[sobbing]\u003c/em> It’s this stupid job. It just, it just overtook his life, his thoughts, everything that like he stood for.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>[THEME MUSIC]\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong> \u003c/strong>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Correctional officer Valentino Rodriguez was 30 years old when he died. He’d worked for the department for about five years. Like a lot of officers, that time changed him, especially the time he spent inside the walls of this one prison, New Folsom. This is a story about that place, about broken promises and unwritten rules, and who gets hurt when the system that promises to keep us safe is bent on protecting itself. I’m Sukey Lewis. This is On Our watch, Season Two: New Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>GPS:\u003c/strong> Go past these lights. Then at the next set. Turn left. Stay in the second lane…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>A little more than two years after Officer Valentino Rodriguez died, in December 2022, our reporting team went to go see his family.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>GPS:\u003c/strong> Half a mile. Turn right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>We’re driving from the Bay Area through rice paddies and apple orchards to West Sacramento, a city on the outskirts of the state capital.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Everything about this case just raises questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>That’s my co-reporter, Julie Small. The official cause of Valentino’s death was fentanyl intoxication. But his family, and especially his father, Val Sr, still aren’t satisfied with how it was investigated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Maybe the answers are benign, but because they’re unanswered, I think, you know. Yeah. Makes you think the worst or it certainly, Val keeps going over and over in his head, Val Sr, trying to tie up the loose ends.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/strong> We also think there might be more to the story of Valentino’s death because he was a whistleblower. He’d reported corruption and abuse by his fellow officers just days before he died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>But they said no signs of…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>No signs of foul play.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Julie’s been talking to Val Sr for the past few months. It’s taken a while to gain his trust. Today, Steven Rascón, our producer, is along to record.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Steven Rascón: \u003c/strong>So today’s, like, an icebreaker?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>I think so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>It’s my first chance to meet Valentino’s parents, Valentino Rodriguez Sr. And his wife, Erma.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Steven Rascón: \u003c/strong>This one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small:\u003c/strong> Are you rolling?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cem>[greeting sounds]\u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Inside, the walls are covered with photos. They’ve got a good-looking family. Five grandchildren, at the time. And their four adult kids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And one thing about them, all four of them, just sat there and talked, made fun of each other, and laughed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>The kids were really close.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>In a couple weeks the family’s planning to get together. But of course, one of them will be missing: Valentino. It’ll be their third Christmas without him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I was in the fog for a good year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>It’s a different fog, now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>For his dad, Valentino’s death started him on this search to find answers–from the police, the FBI, the prison. He wants to understand what happened to his son and why, and who’s responsible. But instead of finding answers, Val Sr just keeps finding more questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>This thing is just all tangled. I’m just trying to untangle it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Now, Val Senior says he feels like a stereotype out of a true crime series on TV. The grieving parent on a quest for justice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>And here I am, in the driver’s seat. And uh, I couldn’t do it any other way. But I never wanted to be that person on TV. Right? Just consumed with it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Yeah. Would you, be able to tell us, like, your favorite story of your son?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>Him? With him? There’s a lot. We have four kids, and they’re all completely different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino was their second child and the oldest boy. As we sit around the dining room table, Erma pulls out some of the stuff she saved over the years: his first communion prayer book, a newspaper clipping from when he made student of the week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I remember his third grade teacher said he was a very good writer. She told him one day he was going to be a writer, and she couldn’t wait to hear his stories because he used to like to write. I still have all those, with little pictures…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Erma points out Valentino in a Little League team photo. He looks about 11 or 12. She says he wasn’t any good at baseball.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And he wasn’t very good at soccer either. And I had all four kids playing, so it was like every Saturday I’m driving around all over Sacramento taking them. And I tell him one day, why do you run around with your eyes closed? He’s like, I would pretend I was an airplane flying in the air. \u003cem>[laughter]\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>I remember when I used to watch him go wrestle. He’d always lose. But, after he was done, he’d be talking to the guy that beat him up. Yeah. Being friendly\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez:\u003c/strong>Yeah. He’d be talking to them… \u003cem>[laughing]\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>They tell us this was typical Valentino. Goofy, dreamy, smart, eager to turn enemies into friends. After college, when he told them he was going to train to be a correctional officer, his parents were kind of surprised. They weren’t a law enforcement family. But he’d have job security and good benefits. Val Senior says he remembers the day his son graduated from the academy. It was May 1st, 2015, and he looked out over this ocean of young faces. His son was among the about 200 cadets sworn in that day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Academy Ceremony: \u003c/strong>Raise your right hand and repeat after me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>This is tape from a more recent graduation, reciting the same oath Valentino took.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Academy Ceremony: \u003c/strong>I, state your name, recognize the badge of my office. As a symbol of public faith.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Photos from that day show Valentino in his Class A uniform– creases sharp, his hair neatly combed. They promise to protect the innocent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Academy Ceremony: \u003c/strong>Dedicating myself before all present…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>To be honest. And to hold each other accountable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Academy Ceremony: \u003c/strong>Congratulations, and welcome to the family. \u003cem>[applause]\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>One of Valentino’s first assignments was working on death row at San Quentin State Prison, the oldest prison in California. He’d often carpool to work with a bunch of other correctional officers. And on the way back, they’d get dropped off at In-N-Out Burger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I was a cashier, and he’d come in, in his little green suit. He’s so cute, and his little boots.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>That’s Mimy again, talking to my colleague Julie. She calls him cute, but Valentino was not a little man. He was five foot seven and at least 200 pounds, clean shaven, with dark hair and big brown eyes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>So his order was a three by three ketchup only, no salt. With a cheese fry no salt, and then a large 7Up. So I knew his order from the moment… because, of course, you know, the cute guy comes in. I’m going to memorize his order!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Mimy recognized Valentino from a party she’d gone to at his house, thrown by his brother Greg.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I was like, oh, how are you? And he’s like, good. And I think in his mind he’s like, who is this girl? I know your brother! And he’s like, what? And he was just, hecka weirded out. And in my head it’s going great, right? But he started coming to In-N-Out more often, and I would give him free burgers or shakes, when my manager wasn’t looking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>And they started messaging on Facebook.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And he’s like, hey, I haven’t seen you. Like, did you switch jobs? And I’m like, oh, this boy texted me, or this boy messaged me. And I was like, hello, yes, hi! It was just me being all excited. He was a kid at heart, very playful.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>They’d play video games together and watch movies, and they liked introducing each other to new things: food, music or art… This one time they went out to a sip and paint night at a local spot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/strong> He was kind of nervous. I think he just, it was a new thing for him. But we had gone to a paint night with one of my coworkers, and, we went on a double date and he painted this really nice picture. It was supposed to be of a pelican at the end of a bridge, but he changed it. And it’s a painting of him and his dad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The scene is of the two of them from behind– a boy and his father, sitting side by side with their fishing poles in the water. Wispy white clouds over the horizon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And he gave it to his dad after we got back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Mimi says they fell hard for each other, and just two months after they started dating, her roommate moved out and she needed to find a new place to live.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I was going to move into my brother’s house, but he was like, no, you should move in with me. And I’m like, no, this is kind of soon. And he’s like, come on, think about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino’s mom had helped him find a cute little house just about five miles away from their place in West Sacramento. Mimy moved in. And it was right around this time that Valentino got what he saw as a big break, an opportunity to work in a different prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He specifically chose Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The official name of New Folsom is California State Prison, Sacramento, or CSP SAC. It’s called New Folsom because it was built back in the 80s, next to the old Folsom Prison that was made famous by country singer Johnny Cash.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Johnny Cash: \u003c/strong>Okay. Hello, I’m Johnny Cash.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He wrote a song called Folsom Prison Blues and then later recorded this performance live at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Johnny Cash:\u003c/strong> I hear the train coming, it’s rolling round the bed, and I ain’t seen the sunshine, since I don’t know when.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>You can actually see the guard towers of Old Folsom from New Folsom Prison. They’ve got a medieval castle kind of look to them. New Folsom, on the other hand, where Valentino was transferring to, has a more industrial, utilitarian look. A lot of razor wire and gray concrete. It’s a high security prison that the state set up to accommodate people with risky medical conditions and mental health needs. It also houses active gang members and people who’ve been convicted of some of the most serious crimes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He said he wanted to go there because it was the most…He said it was the most dangerous prison in California. But he described it as there was just a lot of, activity there with officers, with inmates, and he just wanted to be in there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>There are a lot of infamous prisons in this country, and a fair number here in California. There’s San Quentin with its death row, the state’s first supermax, Pelican Bay. Corcoran, where in the 90s, officers allegedly set up gladiator style fights between rival gangs and then shot incarcerated people to stop the fights. But as we dug through a bunch of data and public records, we realized in the past decade, New Folsom has been the most violent prison in the state, and that violence is committed by people who are locked up, and officers. We found that in the six years after 2014, New Folsom officers used serious force, meaning they either badly injured someone or used deadly force, at a rate three times higher than any other prison in the state. This was stunning to us. CDCR declined our multiple requests to comment on this finding. I’ve done quite a bit of reporting on prisons, and Julie’s been reporting on prisons for even longer. New Folsom just wasn’t on our radar in the same way. We’ll dig into those numbers more later. But for now, it’s important to know that with just a year of experience as a correctional officer, this is the environment Valentino was walking into. Mimy says he was looking forward to it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He was excited to go into this prison. He was excited for the work. He was excited for what he was going to learn.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He wanted to be an investigator in this elite squad called the ISU or the Investigative Services Unit. A prison is like its own city, and the ISU squad are like the police force of the prison. They’ve got a K-9 unit, a gang investigation unit, a prosecution division, and one for internal affairs to look into complaints of excessive force or allegations of officer corruption. Walking through New Folsom, the squad stood out. They had special black and green patches on their uniforms. And unlike regular officers, they could bring their cell phones into work. They could also go anywhere in the prison they wanted—total access. Valentino’s goal was to earn his patch and get into that squad. But first he had to pay his dues.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>[break]\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Officer Valentino Rodriguez’s first assignment was working in the prison’s psychiatric unit, guarding one of the most vulnerable and difficult parts of the population: people with severe mental illnesses. I’ve talked to a number of people incarcerated in this unit, and it sounds like a really tough place to be. It can be very loud and chaotic. Sometimes the people in this unit are angry and confrontational, while others are simply terrified or heavily medicated. And officers like Valentino are required to get training in how to prevent incarcerated people from hurting each other and themselves. Valentino had been working at New Folsom and in this unit for just a few months when he got caught up in a really bad incident that Val Senior says was a turning point for him. An incarcerated man ended up in the hospital with broken bones and injuries to his face and head. So investigators started looking into how the man got those injuries. We were able to get the tapes and paperwork for that incident. Just to note, we noticed a lot of inconsistencies in what people say happened. The incarcerated man’s story changes a bit. One officer contradicts himself, and other officers have slightly different versions of the incident. You’ll also hear some places where the department has redacted the audio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent\u003c/strong>: So what we’re going to talk about is on the 12th of August, Friday, you were involved in an incident which occurred. REDACTED your cell? Where you were at before?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C\u003c/strong>: Yes, sir.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>They’re looking into this incarcerated man’s allegations that officers caused his injuries, and then lied about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent:\u003c/strong> …you made the allegation, “While trying to hang myself, the COs came in and smashed my face into the wall.” Can you tell me about that? What you mean?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>Well, the whole story?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Because of some sensitive details about his mental health, we decided not to use this man’s name. I’m just going to call him by the initial of his last name, C. So C tells the investigators that it all started because of the meds he was taking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C:\u003c/strong> I was having a hard time on medication. When I have a hard time on medication I have side effects of committing suicide.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>First C says he put his head in the toilet in his cell to try and drown himself. And then C told a passing officer that he was feeling suicidal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C:\u003c/strong> He put uh, a sheet, like a suicide sheet…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He says the officer handed him a sheet with a noose already tied in it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>…he threw it into my cell, he said, hang yourself. So I tried to hang myself in front of him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Officers have to follow really strict rules to prevent suicides. They have to check on people in their cells every 30 minutes. When someone says they’re suicidal, officers are supposed to call mental health services right away, and that person might even get moved to a different unit or checked into a hospital. To be clear, handing someone a noose would totally violate what officers are meant to do in this situation. No officers admitted giving him a noose. A responding officer tells investigators he was doing his rounds and saw C with the sheet already tied around his neck.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Officer: \u003c/strong>At that time, I opened the food port, gave him multiple orders to stop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>When C doesn’t respond, the officer says he sprays him with pepper spray.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Officer\u003c/strong>\u003cstrong>:\u003c/strong> My intent was to have, to save his life from—stopping him, from actually choking himself, from killing himself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/strong> An officer gets C to come to the door to put handcuffs on him, and he’s shackled by his feet and behind his back. And then they escort him to what’s called a decontamination cell. It’s basically a cage the size of a phone booth that they can spray a hose into to wash the pepper spray off him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>And they just, boom! They just pushed me in there, and I hit my face against the back of the cell. I went like that, boom…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>This injury, that’s right there across your nose?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>[inaudible] Well I hit my head and the face, like that? Boom. And then my eye and then my face and then my neck.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>But the officers who were escorting him tell it differently.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Officer: \u003c/strong>He just kept trying to pull away. So I tightened my grip and, counseled him to not, not pull away from myself…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The officer says C broke away from them and lunged toward the shower.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Officer: \u003c/strong>And then he ended up tripping over the, there’s a lip on that shower, tripping over the bottom lip, smashing in the back of the shower. And then I immediately closed the shower, locked it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Again, C denies this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Were you resisting at all?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>I wasn’t resisting at all!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent:\u003c/strong> You were just walking calmly?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>I was walking calmly, yeah. I mean, I didn’t get the injuries from trying to hang myself. I got the injuries from him pushing me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>So to recap, according to C, he was suicidal. An officer gave him a noose, pepper sprayed him and he was forcibly thrown into a cage and injured really badly. The version officers tell is that C already had the noose. They pepper sprayed him to save his life, and he got hurt— first when he fell from his bunk, and then again when he pulled away from them and tripped face-first into the shower cage. The last account of events I’m going to walk you through is Valentino’s, because he was one of the officers who responded that day. Here he is introducing himself on tape to an investigator with the Internal Affairs Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>Valentino Rodriguez, correctional officer, California Department of Corrections. Yeah. Sacramento State Prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The agent tells Valentino he’s here as a witness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Can you give me your account of that incident?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>Heard on the radio announcement that there was a, inmate, hanging inmate, attempted hanging in two block, in D section.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino says he put on his gloves and rushed to the cell.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>It was apparent that he was sprayed with OC, OC pepper spray because he had, you know, spitting up mucus and a little bit of blood on his face from, from being sprayed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>As the two officers took C to hose off, they walked him past Valentino, who says he saw a little bump on C’s forehead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Could you see blood on his clothing?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>I don’t remember. I don’t remember if I could at time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Can you now?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>No.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>So C goes to the shower cage with really no major injuries that Valentino could see.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>At what point did you observe an injury on him?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>When the water was turned off and I walked up to the cage to open it up. I observed, some injuries to the top of his head and across his face, I think. I believe it was across the face.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Okay. Can you tell me about, describe those injuries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>They were two gashes, like, large, large gashes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino was asked to photograph C’s injuries and then take him to get medical attention. We got those pictures that he took. The man’s face is partially blacked out, but you can see a five-inch gash across his forehead, and his cheek is split open from his nose to below his cheekbone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Is there anything else you’d like to tell me which you have not already discussed during this interview? Before I turn off the recorder, I want to remind you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>It’s a big deal any time an officer gets pulled into an investigation, even just as a witness. Because lying is a fire-able offense. We know Valentino told the people closest to him about this incident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>I remember that when it happened, he was so scared for weeks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>When we got this recording through a public records request to CDCR, it was one of the things we really wanted to share with Val Senior.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>You want to hear it?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>My co-reporter Julie Small sat down with him and pressed play on the recording.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>It is December 9th, 2016.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Val Senior had never heard this interview with his son before.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>Yeah, he had a bump, about an inch above his eye.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Okay, do you know which eye?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>I can’t recall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>\u003cem>[to Val Sr]\u003c/em> You’re making a face? Do you think that he’s telling the truth there?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>I think, because I know my son—he has a really good memory, is really detail-orientated. And for him not to remember which side the cut was on, and certain things, is just, to me… he sounds like he’s worried right there, scared.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino told him that what happened during the incident was different than what those officers wrote in their reports and told investigators. But he said he felt like he had to go along with their story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>You should have seen his face when he’d come over. That broke my heart, man, because he had a job…And he told me, Dad, you have to, you have to tell the same story because you’re on a team. Yeah. And if you don’t, then you’re the odd man out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Mimy told us something similar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He was told, like, hey, you know, this is what we’re writing. And it’s important that all of us have the same story, and it’s important for all of us to be on the same page. And he told me how they never really specifically said, you must do it this way. You must write it this, you must do it that. It was more of like, this is what we are doing and this is how we’re going to do it. And this is what’s important for our team, so we can all be on the same page. He felt a lot of pressure, just cause he didn’t want to lose his job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>CDCR did not respond to specific questions about this incident. A spokesperson did write in an email that the agency takes all allegations of employee misconduct seriously, and there is a new process for making sure complaints are, quote, “properly, fairly and thoroughly reviewed.” The spokesperson also pointed out that there is a new system of fixed and body cameras at New Folsom. So, we don’t know exactly what the truth is about this incident. What we do know is that C was severely injured. Medical reports show he received 27 stitches. His nose was broken, and his spine was fractured in three places. Ultimately, those in charge believed the officer’s story that C fractured his back when he slipped and fell off his bunk and injured his face and head when he lunged away from officers and landed on the metal rails of the decontamination shower. And that’s the story that Valentino chose to go along with, even though he told his father it wasn’t true. This wouldn’t be the last time Valentino felt compromised by his job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>[break]\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Mimy Rodriguez told my colleague Julie and me that working in the psychiatric unit really took a toll on Valentino.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He would talk about how draining it was, and he would come home drained.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>What did that look like to you?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/strong> I mean, he would just drag his feet. He would drag his feet, come in and he didn’t want to eat. He would shower and just go to sleep. I mean, he was just quiet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He worked double shifts so he could get more days off in a row to recharge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>That’s when he would talk more about work. And be like, Yeah, like, you know, it was a little stressful, and I’m dealing with this or I’m talking about this, but, you know, I’m happy to go in. And he was always very enthusiastic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>About two and a half years after he’d gotten to New Folsom, late 2018, Valentino’s hard work looked like it was paying off. Remember the squad, that detective unit Valentino was aiming for? An officer there went on leave for PTSD, and there was a vacancy on the team. One of the supervisors who knew Valentino thought he’d be good at the job and gave him the chance to fill in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He was really excited for that, but he didn’t think he was going to get that opportunity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He’d made the squad. Working in the Security and Investigations unit, but on a temporary basis. To get the position permanently, he’d have to impress the right people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He’s like, yes, of course, like, I’ll do it. I mean, he was ready.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino called to let his parents know he got promoted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>He called his mom first, and she told me that Val got a promotion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He told them it was a really good position, one that a lot of other people wanted, and that he was the youngest on the team.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>I asked him, how’s your, how was your first day? And he goes, it’s a bunch of older guys, Dad, that have been there. He called them OGs. I said, well, how did it go? He goes, they asked, who the fuck are you?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>So, from the very beginning, there was tension on the team. Some of the people he worked with felt like he’d skipped the line, that he hadn’t done enough to prove himself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>There was one time where he had asked me to make little cheesecakes. There’s a little mini pie cheesecakes that I would make, and I made a bunch for the team and like nobody had them, nobody ate them. And they would just tell him like, no, we don’t want this or we don’t want that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>At first he tried to earn their acceptance by just working really hard, trying to prove that he was up to the job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez\u003c/strong>: He just continued to just put his head down and work, and I think that’s what really bothered him, that he would just try to do the right thing, and it just didn’t seem like it was enough.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino was making busts and working cases, but to some of his coworkers, this might have made him seem like even more of a threat because higher ups were noticing his work. Valentino was getting a reputation for being a diligent investigator, thorough, and for writing really good reports. This was a big deal because paperwork, reports, are hugely important in prison. With 115,000 people incarcerated in the state’s prisons at the time, these reports are how the agency kept track of everybody. Officers need to document everything: gang affiliations, medical needs, disability status, history of suicide, fights with staff and so on. And these reports are also the basis for disciplinary action, like sending someone to solitary confinement or charging them with a new crime. These reports hold a lot of power, and it is a crime for an officer to falsify an official report. Valentino wanted to keep moving up in the system and expanding his skills as an investigator. On the weekends when he wasn’t working, he’d pay out of pocket to go to these training events and seminars. And during these trips, he became friends with a guy named Sergeant Kevin Steele. Steele passed away in 2021, so we couldn’t interview him, but Val Senior came to know him well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong> He was about 5’ 7”… my age, maybe a little bit older, he was in good shape. You know, he shaved his head and stood straight up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Picture a Bruce Willis type in his 50s, with intense bright blue eyes. He was a military veteran and a straight shooter. Sergeant Steele also worked in the ISU. He was senior to Valentino, but he was in a different division. He was in the prosecution division. It was his job to prepare cases for the district attorney to bring criminal charges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>He was very good at speaking and writing. Very passionate about his job, and loyal. He was very, very important to that prison for a good reason.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The two officers really respected each other. Both of them were kind of law enforcement nerds committed to going the extra mile. Valentino would testify in court for Steele’s cases. All that extra training meant he was a great expert witness. And Steele became one of the few people Valentino trusted—a mentor, and someone he called regularly for advice about criminal case protocol or how to handle evidence. Things with the other guys in his division, however, were getting worse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Sometimes he would text the guys for help and they’d have their own group text and they would like, they wouldn’t—they didn’t want to help him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Some of these group texts are pretty awful. They mock his weight and call him half-patch to remind him he’s still just a temporary member of the squad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Are these things that you saw after he died? Only after?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Mm-hm. He never, he never said, look Dad, look what they’re sending. He just never…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>But these messages would escalate even further before they stopped. The brotherhood, the family that Valentino had been promised at his academy graduation, was nowhere to be found.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>And he used to go in on weekends to, to work, because some of the team wasn’t there to harass him. Nobody was calling him names or anything or intimidate him anyway. So he liked going there on Saturdays. I know that, he told me. He used to go to work in the mornings, and then he told me he would go into the restroom to vomit because he felt so much anxiety.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>An attorney for these officers declined our request to interview her clients. But she said that any allegations that any of them bullied, hazed or harassed Valentino are false. Val Senior says he wouldn’t understand until much later, the full scope of what his son was going through, or of the things he was being asked to do in the name of this team. But he did notice a change come over his son. He wasn’t sleeping, and he gained 60 pounds over the course of the year he was in the ISU squad. Sometimes when they were hanging out, he’d get this blank look on his face.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>I could tell that he was starting to build this mental mechanism where he knew how to turn things off. You know, because I used to see him stare into space, you know, and then he’d snap out of it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>And this distance was coming between Valentino and Mimy too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>What really bothered me about his job was that he was never home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>They were planning to get married and have kids, but more and more she felt like Valentino was always gone. There were the overtime shifts he had to work and the milestones in their life together were passing by without him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I understood that it was his job and it was a requirement. But what would frustrate me is that when I would ask him, like, why coudn’t you make it? Or why couldn’t you this. He would say, well, I asked for help and no one came to help me. And I would tell him, Valentino, we’re your family. Like, we love you. You know, if something happens to you, that job is just going to replace you. But how—we can’t replace you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>She remembers one holiday, maybe Thanksgiving, where she went to his family’s house for dinner.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I remember just sitting there waiting for him in his grandma’s house. Just waiting. He couldn’t show up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Once again, Valentino had to stay late working at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>Then it like, it just broke my heart because I just felt alone. I felt really lonely. His family—very nice. I mean, don’t get me wrong, very kind people, but—I don’t want to sit next to his grandma, per se, when I can just sit next to him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>It was in the midst of these pressures—Valentino was overworked, the holidays were happening, and he felt ostracized by his team—that something major happened at the prison. Val Senior says he was at the family Christmas party. Everyone was having a good time, eating and drinking. They had a game of white elephant going and they were all laughing a lot. Valentino showed up late, straight from work around 10:00 at night, and as soon as he walked in the door, Val Senior knew something was wrong.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>And I could just see his face, just like something really bothering him. I seen that look on his face before, but it was really intense.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Val Senior asked him what was going on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>And that’s when he took his phone out and he showed me the video.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The scene that Val Senior saw on his son’s cell phone was incredibly violent. A video taken by surveillance cameras in one of the most high-security housing units in New Folsom. The camera angle is from inside the control booth, which looks out on two tiers of cells. Right in front of the booth there’s an open area on the ground floor called a dayroom. In this dayroom, there are these metal desks in a semicircle with clear dividers in between them. In the video, Val Senior saw a man shackled to one of these chairs with two other guys standing over him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>This guy, this kid’s being stabbed over and over and over, and he literally would shrug your shoulders and cover his neck when they were trying to stab him in the neck. And then they would go back down on the chest, and then he would try to cover his chest by concaving his chest inward, and then they’d go back to his neck and it was just back and forth. So finally the kid threw himself on the floor, and they proceeded to just stab him—to the point to where the knives were literally hitting the ground, because every time they pulled up, his body would go up with it\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The man on the floor was now lifeless. Val senior watched as two attackers painted his blood across their faces. But Valentino wanted his dad to notice something else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>He had said, lookit, dad, the guy in the tower is not even aiming, and they’re using rubber bullets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino was pointing out to his dad that the officer in the control booth didn’t use his rifle to immediately stop the deadly threat. He fired his less lethal weapon that shoots rounds made out of hard foam, and he fired it way too late.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>He goes, he’s supposed to use live rounds. I tried not to emphasize or talk about or look at it. I just wanted to go on to my little Christmas party. So I told him, you know, to put that thing away. [inaudible] And he just, like, did what he does, he snapped out of it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>But that wasn’t all. Valentino was also instructed to write up a particular type of confidential report for statewide gang investigators. The report was supposed to lay out how the killing was tied to a dispute between rival gangs. A lot of questions would later be raised about that report and who was really behind the murder. CDCR said it cannot comment on the case because it’s part of an active investigation. Val Senior wonders about this murder, too. His son was found dead by fentanyl intoxication less than a year after this Christmas party, and he was one of the people who suspected there was something really wrong about what happened in that dayroom at New Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>[sounds of things put down on a table]\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>You have all of the laptop to follow along? I guess. How are we gonna do this?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>In Val Senior’s office, at his swimming pool construction company in Sacramento, hanging on the wall, he’s got that picture that Valentino painted of the two of them sitting side by side on the edge of the dock, fishing. Sometimes he says he can still feel his son close to him, by his side.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>He’s holding my hand. He just wants me to find, find peace. And, I find parts of peace, but not completely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>When Valentino was a kid and Val Senior would come home from work, he says his son would run up and pull on the sleeve of his shirt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Dad, Dad, Dad, Dad… But, I just feel him tugging still, you know? Yeah. I owe that to him. And I’m going to go as far as I can. And then in the end, if nothing, there’s nothing—I tried. Right? I’ll find my answers when my time comes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Since his son’s death, Val Senior has been pulled into a new role. Now he’s become the investigator.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>…shows where they got moved to, where is it at, it’s different…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>As our little reporting team—Julie, Steven and I—crowd around the computer in his office Val Senior shows us the evidence he’s collected about the killing of that guy in the dayroom, a 29-year-old man named Luis Giovanny Aguilar. He’s still trying to understand how and if that murder connects to his son’s death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>There was another…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Where did this come from?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Just people were sending me stuff. Look at they’re…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Your secret source?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>All these different sources…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>It’s stuff from his confidential sources who work inside New Folsom. Val Senior drags and drops the folders on his computer, one by one, onto the hard drive that we’ve brought for just this purpose.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>We’ll do our best to try and keep you informed about our process.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Is this one of the bigger stories you’ve done with podcast? Or one of the most confusing or difficult?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Yeah, yeah. I mean, it’s a very, it’s a very complex story. But at the same time, I think it’s really like, a really important story. Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>I tell him we’re looking into this because his son’s story is part of something even larger. Since 2019, when a new transparency law went into effect here in California, Julie and I have been trying to get a clear picture of what the consequences are for correctional officers who use excessive force in prison, lie on their reports, or discriminate against their colleagues. That’s been a black box for decades, hidden by laws that were lobbied for by correctional officer and police unions. Now, we’ve gotten hundreds and hundreds of documents. Some of them are related to troubling use of force incidents, like the tapes you heard earlier. And as we went through them, we discovered that a really high number of these incidents had taken place at New Folsom. When we heard there was an officer who was blowing the whistle on misconduct there and then died, we knew we had to see if there was a connection, and the answer to that question could be among the evidence Val Senior was loading onto our hard drive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>What you’re offering, by what you have, or the content that you have, the text messages, combined with all the records that we’ve requested, we’ll be able to see into the prisons and how they function in a way that really hasn’t been done much…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Or ever. These records were completely secret. And we are the first people to analyze them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>As we walk out of his office… \u003cem>[sounds of leaving, saying bye]\u003c/em> Val Senior hands us back the hard drive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>But, you know, lemme know what else comes up…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>[Closing Theme Music]\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Coming up next time, Valentino reaches a breaking point at work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>That was a flat-out threat. And when he got to work, they laughed at him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I remember this very clearly. He said, this is my identity. He’s like, I feel like I’ve given up on everything.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>And someone else starts looking into the murder in the dayroom and finding clues. Clues that point the finger not just at the two men with knives, but also at New Folsom itself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>When’s the date on that one? Okay, that’s the day he died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Steven Rascón: \u003c/strong>Oh, he texted Steele the day he died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Wow…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>That’s from Steele.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>You’re listening to On Our Watch Season Two, New Folsom from KQED. If you have any tips or feedback about the series, you can email us at on our watch at KQED.org. You can also leave us a review in Apple Podcasts. The series is reported by me, Sukey Lewis, and Julie Small. It’s edited by Victoria Mauleon. It’s produced and scored by Steven Rascón and Chris Agusta. Sound design and mixing by Tarek Fouda. Jen Chien is KQED’s director of podcasts, and she executive produced the series. Meticulous fact checking by Mark Betancourt. Additional research by Cayla Mihalovich and Kathleen Quinn, students in the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism. Special thanks to Rahsaan Thomas of Ear Hustle, Sandhya Dirks of NPR, KQED health correspondent April Dembosky. And to our in-house counsel, Rebecca Hopkins. Original music by Ramtin Arablouei, including our theme song. Additional music from Cameron Fraser, APM Music and Audio Network. We got tremendous support from David Barstow, chair of the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism, and graduate students Julietta Bisharyan, William Jenkins, Armon Owlia, Vera Watt, and Junyao Yang.Thanks also to UC Berkeley’s Jeremy Rue and Amanda Glazer for their data analysis. The internal records highlighted in this podcast were obtained as part of the California Reporting Project. Funding for On Our Watch is provided in part by Arnold Ventures and the California Endowment. Thank you to our managing editor of News and Enterprise, Otis R. Taylor Junior, Ethan Toven-Lindsey, our vice president of news, and KQED chief content officer Holly Kernan. Thanks for listening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"title": "1. Welcome to the Family | S2: New Folsom | KQED",
"description": "Soon after correctional officer Valentino Rodriguez starts working at New Folsom prison, he gets caught up in a bad incident. An incarcerated man ends up in the hospital with horrific injuries, and the prison starts an investigation. Valentino feels pressured to back up his fellow officers' version of the story, even though he thinks it might not be the truth. Then he gets an opportunity he's dreamed of — to join an elite unit investigating crimes in the prison.",
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"socialDescription": "Soon after correctional officer Valentino Rodriguez starts working at New Folsom prison, he gets caught up in a bad incident. An incarcerated man ends up in the hospital with horrific injuries, and the prison starts an investigation. Valentino feels pressured to back up his fellow officers' version of the story, even though he thinks it might not be the truth. Then he gets an opportunity he's dreamed of — to join an elite unit investigating crimes in the prison.",
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"headline": "1. Welcome to the Family | S2: New Folsom",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">View the full episode transcript.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Soon after correctional officer Valentino Rodriguez starts working at New Folsom prison, he gets caught up in a bad incident. An incarcerated man ends up in the hospital with horrific injuries, and the prison starts an investigation. Valentino feels pressured to back up his fellow officers’ version of the story, even though he thinks it might not be the truth. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Then he gets an opportunity he’s dreamed of — to join an elite unit investigating crimes in the prison.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC7715585512\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Resources\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you are currently in crisis, you can dial 988 [U.S.] to reach the National Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.samhsa.gov/find-help/national-helpline\">SAMHSA National Help Line\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://988lifeline.org/\">988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://www.nami.org/help\">NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) Helpline\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://www.hhs.gov/programs/prevention-and-wellness/mental-health-substance-abuse/index.html\">US Health and Human Services\u003c/a>\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://warmline.org/warmdir.html\">Warmline Directory\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://journalism.berkeley.edu/programs/mj/investigative-reporting/\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Investigative Reporting Program\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism was a key partner in making Season 2 of On Our Watch. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The records obtained for this project are part of the\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003ca href=\"https://projects.scpr.org/california-reporting-project/\">\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> California Reporting Project\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, a coalition of news organizations in California. \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Narrator: \u003c/strong>This is a series investigating some of the difficult things that happened to the people who live and work inside California’s prisons. So we wanted to give you a heads up that this episode touches on intense topics including substance use, state violence, and self-harm. If you need support, we’ve got links to resources in the episode description. The story begins with a death that is intense and upsetting.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I park my car and I walk in the house and he’s not on the couch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>On October 21st, 2020, Mimy Rodriguez came home from having dinner with her friends and called out to her husband, Valentino Rodriguez.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>So I go Val, Val where are you? And all the lights were on in the house. And I go into the kitchen, he’s not in the kitchen. So I go into our bedroom and he’s not in our bedroom. And I knew something was wrong. And, I go, Val? Val where are you? And I run into the bathroom and he’s just, he’s on his knees. He’s on his knees with his head up against the wall, hunched over. And I just scream. And I had my Airpods in. So I go Siri, call 911. So Siri calls 911.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>20:45, 26 seconds, October 21, 2020. \u003cem>[phone dialing sounds]\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez\u003c/strong>: [inaudible] Wake up baby, I love you. I love you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>911, what is your emergency.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/strong> [inaudible]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>Ma’am you have to give her the address, again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/strong> On the call, she’s like hello and I go, please– like please help me. I’m scared. I don’t know what to do. This has happened, he’s dead, please.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>Please tell me what happened.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And I’m screaming and I’m going to grab him. And I pull him back, and I put his head back and he has vomit coming out of his mouth.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The 911 operator tells Mimy to perform CPR on him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio:\u003c/strong> Hard and fast, twice per second. Okay, we want to make sure the chest comes up all the way in between pumps. Ok, we’re gonna do this 600 times until help can take over. We’re going to count together. Okay? 1234. One. Two. Three. Four.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino’s hands were purple and he wasn’t breathing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>Is that front door open, are they’re going to be able to get in to you? [Mimy inaudible] It is open? Okay. Keep going, keep doing the chest compressions. Is anybody else in the house with you? Keep going…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>Eventually the police came. I don’t know how fast. I think like two minutes, or three. But she kept telling me she’s like, they’re outside.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>Great job just hang in there, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, they’re parking right now, they’re almost to you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And I was like, just open the door. Just come inside, please. Like seven officers ran in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>911 Audio: \u003c/strong>Please!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And I was I was like, I’m in the bathroom. Help me. And I said, save him, please save him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The police pulled her out of the house and had her sit in the back of a squad car. They told her they needed to ask her some questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>The officer that was trying to talk to me was this lady, and she, she’s like, how? What happened? She goes, what do you, how did this happen? I was like, I don’t know, but it’s his job. And I just kept saying, it’s his job. This is all because of his job. She goes, where does he work? And I’m like, he works at CDCR.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>CDCR, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>\u003cem>[sobbing]\u003c/em> It’s this stupid job. It just, it just overtook his life, his thoughts, everything that like he stood for.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>[THEME MUSIC]\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong> \u003c/strong>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Correctional officer Valentino Rodriguez was 30 years old when he died. He’d worked for the department for about five years. Like a lot of officers, that time changed him, especially the time he spent inside the walls of this one prison, New Folsom. This is a story about that place, about broken promises and unwritten rules, and who gets hurt when the system that promises to keep us safe is bent on protecting itself. I’m Sukey Lewis. This is On Our watch, Season Two: New Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>GPS:\u003c/strong> Go past these lights. Then at the next set. Turn left. Stay in the second lane…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>A little more than two years after Officer Valentino Rodriguez died, in December 2022, our reporting team went to go see his family.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>GPS:\u003c/strong> Half a mile. Turn right.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>We’re driving from the Bay Area through rice paddies and apple orchards to West Sacramento, a city on the outskirts of the state capital.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Everything about this case just raises questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>That’s my co-reporter, Julie Small. The official cause of Valentino’s death was fentanyl intoxication. But his family, and especially his father, Val Sr, still aren’t satisfied with how it was investigated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Maybe the answers are benign, but because they’re unanswered, I think, you know. Yeah. Makes you think the worst or it certainly, Val keeps going over and over in his head, Val Sr, trying to tie up the loose ends.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/strong> We also think there might be more to the story of Valentino’s death because he was a whistleblower. He’d reported corruption and abuse by his fellow officers just days before he died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>But they said no signs of…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>No signs of foul play.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Julie’s been talking to Val Sr for the past few months. It’s taken a while to gain his trust. Today, Steven Rascón, our producer, is along to record.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Steven Rascón: \u003c/strong>So today’s, like, an icebreaker?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>I think so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>It’s my first chance to meet Valentino’s parents, Valentino Rodriguez Sr. And his wife, Erma.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Steven Rascón: \u003c/strong>This one.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small:\u003c/strong> Are you rolling?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cem>[greeting sounds]\u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Inside, the walls are covered with photos. They’ve got a good-looking family. Five grandchildren, at the time. And their four adult kids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And one thing about them, all four of them, just sat there and talked, made fun of each other, and laughed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>The kids were really close.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>In a couple weeks the family’s planning to get together. But of course, one of them will be missing: Valentino. It’ll be their third Christmas without him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I was in the fog for a good year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>It’s a different fog, now.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>For his dad, Valentino’s death started him on this search to find answers–from the police, the FBI, the prison. He wants to understand what happened to his son and why, and who’s responsible. But instead of finding answers, Val Sr just keeps finding more questions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>This thing is just all tangled. I’m just trying to untangle it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Now, Val Senior says he feels like a stereotype out of a true crime series on TV. The grieving parent on a quest for justice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>And here I am, in the driver’s seat. And uh, I couldn’t do it any other way. But I never wanted to be that person on TV. Right? Just consumed with it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Yeah. Would you, be able to tell us, like, your favorite story of your son?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>Him? With him? There’s a lot. We have four kids, and they’re all completely different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino was their second child and the oldest boy. As we sit around the dining room table, Erma pulls out some of the stuff she saved over the years: his first communion prayer book, a newspaper clipping from when he made student of the week.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I remember his third grade teacher said he was a very good writer. She told him one day he was going to be a writer, and she couldn’t wait to hear his stories because he used to like to write. I still have all those, with little pictures…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Erma points out Valentino in a Little League team photo. He looks about 11 or 12. She says he wasn’t any good at baseball.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And he wasn’t very good at soccer either. And I had all four kids playing, so it was like every Saturday I’m driving around all over Sacramento taking them. And I tell him one day, why do you run around with your eyes closed? He’s like, I would pretend I was an airplane flying in the air. \u003cem>[laughter]\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>I remember when I used to watch him go wrestle. He’d always lose. But, after he was done, he’d be talking to the guy that beat him up. Yeah. Being friendly\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Erma Rodriguez:\u003c/strong>Yeah. He’d be talking to them… \u003cem>[laughing]\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>They tell us this was typical Valentino. Goofy, dreamy, smart, eager to turn enemies into friends. After college, when he told them he was going to train to be a correctional officer, his parents were kind of surprised. They weren’t a law enforcement family. But he’d have job security and good benefits. Val Senior says he remembers the day his son graduated from the academy. It was May 1st, 2015, and he looked out over this ocean of young faces. His son was among the about 200 cadets sworn in that day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Academy Ceremony: \u003c/strong>Raise your right hand and repeat after me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>This is tape from a more recent graduation, reciting the same oath Valentino took.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Academy Ceremony: \u003c/strong>I, state your name, recognize the badge of my office. As a symbol of public faith.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Photos from that day show Valentino in his Class A uniform– creases sharp, his hair neatly combed. They promise to protect the innocent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Academy Ceremony: \u003c/strong>Dedicating myself before all present…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>To be honest. And to hold each other accountable.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Academy Ceremony: \u003c/strong>Congratulations, and welcome to the family. \u003cem>[applause]\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>One of Valentino’s first assignments was working on death row at San Quentin State Prison, the oldest prison in California. He’d often carpool to work with a bunch of other correctional officers. And on the way back, they’d get dropped off at In-N-Out Burger.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I was a cashier, and he’d come in, in his little green suit. He’s so cute, and his little boots.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>That’s Mimy again, talking to my colleague Julie. She calls him cute, but Valentino was not a little man. He was five foot seven and at least 200 pounds, clean shaven, with dark hair and big brown eyes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>So his order was a three by three ketchup only, no salt. With a cheese fry no salt, and then a large 7Up. So I knew his order from the moment… because, of course, you know, the cute guy comes in. I’m going to memorize his order!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Mimy recognized Valentino from a party she’d gone to at his house, thrown by his brother Greg.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I was like, oh, how are you? And he’s like, good. And I think in his mind he’s like, who is this girl? I know your brother! And he’s like, what? And he was just, hecka weirded out. And in my head it’s going great, right? But he started coming to In-N-Out more often, and I would give him free burgers or shakes, when my manager wasn’t looking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>And they started messaging on Facebook.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And he’s like, hey, I haven’t seen you. Like, did you switch jobs? And I’m like, oh, this boy texted me, or this boy messaged me. And I was like, hello, yes, hi! It was just me being all excited. He was a kid at heart, very playful.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>They’d play video games together and watch movies, and they liked introducing each other to new things: food, music or art… This one time they went out to a sip and paint night at a local spot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/strong> He was kind of nervous. I think he just, it was a new thing for him. But we had gone to a paint night with one of my coworkers, and, we went on a double date and he painted this really nice picture. It was supposed to be of a pelican at the end of a bridge, but he changed it. And it’s a painting of him and his dad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The scene is of the two of them from behind– a boy and his father, sitting side by side with their fishing poles in the water. Wispy white clouds over the horizon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>And he gave it to his dad after we got back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Mimi says they fell hard for each other, and just two months after they started dating, her roommate moved out and she needed to find a new place to live.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I was going to move into my brother’s house, but he was like, no, you should move in with me. And I’m like, no, this is kind of soon. And he’s like, come on, think about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino’s mom had helped him find a cute little house just about five miles away from their place in West Sacramento. Mimy moved in. And it was right around this time that Valentino got what he saw as a big break, an opportunity to work in a different prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He specifically chose Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The official name of New Folsom is California State Prison, Sacramento, or CSP SAC. It’s called New Folsom because it was built back in the 80s, next to the old Folsom Prison that was made famous by country singer Johnny Cash.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Johnny Cash: \u003c/strong>Okay. Hello, I’m Johnny Cash.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He wrote a song called Folsom Prison Blues and then later recorded this performance live at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Johnny Cash:\u003c/strong> I hear the train coming, it’s rolling round the bed, and I ain’t seen the sunshine, since I don’t know when.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>You can actually see the guard towers of Old Folsom from New Folsom Prison. They’ve got a medieval castle kind of look to them. New Folsom, on the other hand, where Valentino was transferring to, has a more industrial, utilitarian look. A lot of razor wire and gray concrete. It’s a high security prison that the state set up to accommodate people with risky medical conditions and mental health needs. It also houses active gang members and people who’ve been convicted of some of the most serious crimes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He said he wanted to go there because it was the most…He said it was the most dangerous prison in California. But he described it as there was just a lot of, activity there with officers, with inmates, and he just wanted to be in there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>There are a lot of infamous prisons in this country, and a fair number here in California. There’s San Quentin with its death row, the state’s first supermax, Pelican Bay. Corcoran, where in the 90s, officers allegedly set up gladiator style fights between rival gangs and then shot incarcerated people to stop the fights. But as we dug through a bunch of data and public records, we realized in the past decade, New Folsom has been the most violent prison in the state, and that violence is committed by people who are locked up, and officers. We found that in the six years after 2014, New Folsom officers used serious force, meaning they either badly injured someone or used deadly force, at a rate three times higher than any other prison in the state. This was stunning to us. CDCR declined our multiple requests to comment on this finding. I’ve done quite a bit of reporting on prisons, and Julie’s been reporting on prisons for even longer. New Folsom just wasn’t on our radar in the same way. We’ll dig into those numbers more later. But for now, it’s important to know that with just a year of experience as a correctional officer, this is the environment Valentino was walking into. Mimy says he was looking forward to it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He was excited to go into this prison. He was excited for the work. He was excited for what he was going to learn.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He wanted to be an investigator in this elite squad called the ISU or the Investigative Services Unit. A prison is like its own city, and the ISU squad are like the police force of the prison. They’ve got a K-9 unit, a gang investigation unit, a prosecution division, and one for internal affairs to look into complaints of excessive force or allegations of officer corruption. Walking through New Folsom, the squad stood out. They had special black and green patches on their uniforms. And unlike regular officers, they could bring their cell phones into work. They could also go anywhere in the prison they wanted—total access. Valentino’s goal was to earn his patch and get into that squad. But first he had to pay his dues.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>[break]\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Officer Valentino Rodriguez’s first assignment was working in the prison’s psychiatric unit, guarding one of the most vulnerable and difficult parts of the population: people with severe mental illnesses. I’ve talked to a number of people incarcerated in this unit, and it sounds like a really tough place to be. It can be very loud and chaotic. Sometimes the people in this unit are angry and confrontational, while others are simply terrified or heavily medicated. And officers like Valentino are required to get training in how to prevent incarcerated people from hurting each other and themselves. Valentino had been working at New Folsom and in this unit for just a few months when he got caught up in a really bad incident that Val Senior says was a turning point for him. An incarcerated man ended up in the hospital with broken bones and injuries to his face and head. So investigators started looking into how the man got those injuries. We were able to get the tapes and paperwork for that incident. Just to note, we noticed a lot of inconsistencies in what people say happened. The incarcerated man’s story changes a bit. One officer contradicts himself, and other officers have slightly different versions of the incident. You’ll also hear some places where the department has redacted the audio.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent\u003c/strong>: So what we’re going to talk about is on the 12th of August, Friday, you were involved in an incident which occurred. REDACTED your cell? Where you were at before?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C\u003c/strong>: Yes, sir.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>They’re looking into this incarcerated man’s allegations that officers caused his injuries, and then lied about it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent:\u003c/strong> …you made the allegation, “While trying to hang myself, the COs came in and smashed my face into the wall.” Can you tell me about that? What you mean?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>Well, the whole story?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Because of some sensitive details about his mental health, we decided not to use this man’s name. I’m just going to call him by the initial of his last name, C. So C tells the investigators that it all started because of the meds he was taking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C:\u003c/strong> I was having a hard time on medication. When I have a hard time on medication I have side effects of committing suicide.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>First C says he put his head in the toilet in his cell to try and drown himself. And then C told a passing officer that he was feeling suicidal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C:\u003c/strong> He put uh, a sheet, like a suicide sheet…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He says the officer handed him a sheet with a noose already tied in it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>…he threw it into my cell, he said, hang yourself. So I tried to hang myself in front of him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Officers have to follow really strict rules to prevent suicides. They have to check on people in their cells every 30 minutes. When someone says they’re suicidal, officers are supposed to call mental health services right away, and that person might even get moved to a different unit or checked into a hospital. To be clear, handing someone a noose would totally violate what officers are meant to do in this situation. No officers admitted giving him a noose. A responding officer tells investigators he was doing his rounds and saw C with the sheet already tied around his neck.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Officer: \u003c/strong>At that time, I opened the food port, gave him multiple orders to stop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>When C doesn’t respond, the officer says he sprays him with pepper spray.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Officer\u003c/strong>\u003cstrong>:\u003c/strong> My intent was to have, to save his life from—stopping him, from actually choking himself, from killing himself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis:\u003c/strong> An officer gets C to come to the door to put handcuffs on him, and he’s shackled by his feet and behind his back. And then they escort him to what’s called a decontamination cell. It’s basically a cage the size of a phone booth that they can spray a hose into to wash the pepper spray off him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>And they just, boom! They just pushed me in there, and I hit my face against the back of the cell. I went like that, boom…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>This injury, that’s right there across your nose?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>[inaudible] Well I hit my head and the face, like that? Boom. And then my eye and then my face and then my neck.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>But the officers who were escorting him tell it differently.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Officer: \u003c/strong>He just kept trying to pull away. So I tightened my grip and, counseled him to not, not pull away from myself…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The officer says C broke away from them and lunged toward the shower.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Officer: \u003c/strong>And then he ended up tripping over the, there’s a lip on that shower, tripping over the bottom lip, smashing in the back of the shower. And then I immediately closed the shower, locked it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Again, C denies this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Were you resisting at all?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>I wasn’t resisting at all!\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent:\u003c/strong> You were just walking calmly?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>C: \u003c/strong>I was walking calmly, yeah. I mean, I didn’t get the injuries from trying to hang myself. I got the injuries from him pushing me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>So to recap, according to C, he was suicidal. An officer gave him a noose, pepper sprayed him and he was forcibly thrown into a cage and injured really badly. The version officers tell is that C already had the noose. They pepper sprayed him to save his life, and he got hurt— first when he fell from his bunk, and then again when he pulled away from them and tripped face-first into the shower cage. The last account of events I’m going to walk you through is Valentino’s, because he was one of the officers who responded that day. Here he is introducing himself on tape to an investigator with the Internal Affairs Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>Valentino Rodriguez, correctional officer, California Department of Corrections. Yeah. Sacramento State Prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The agent tells Valentino he’s here as a witness.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Can you give me your account of that incident?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>Heard on the radio announcement that there was a, inmate, hanging inmate, attempted hanging in two block, in D section.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino says he put on his gloves and rushed to the cell.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>It was apparent that he was sprayed with OC, OC pepper spray because he had, you know, spitting up mucus and a little bit of blood on his face from, from being sprayed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>As the two officers took C to hose off, they walked him past Valentino, who says he saw a little bump on C’s forehead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Could you see blood on his clothing?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>I don’t remember. I don’t remember if I could at time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Can you now?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>No.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>So C goes to the shower cage with really no major injuries that Valentino could see.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>At what point did you observe an injury on him?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>When the water was turned off and I walked up to the cage to open it up. I observed, some injuries to the top of his head and across his face, I think. I believe it was across the face.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Okay. Can you tell me about, describe those injuries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>They were two gashes, like, large, large gashes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino was asked to photograph C’s injuries and then take him to get medical attention. We got those pictures that he took. The man’s face is partially blacked out, but you can see a five-inch gash across his forehead, and his cheek is split open from his nose to below his cheekbone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Is there anything else you’d like to tell me which you have not already discussed during this interview? Before I turn off the recorder, I want to remind you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>It’s a big deal any time an officer gets pulled into an investigation, even just as a witness. Because lying is a fire-able offense. We know Valentino told the people closest to him about this incident.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>I remember that when it happened, he was so scared for weeks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>When we got this recording through a public records request to CDCR, it was one of the things we really wanted to share with Val Senior.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>You want to hear it?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>My co-reporter Julie Small sat down with him and pressed play on the recording.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>It is December 9th, 2016.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Val Senior had never heard this interview with his son before.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>Yeah, he had a bump, about an inch above his eye.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IA Agent: \u003c/strong>Okay, do you know which eye?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Jr.: \u003c/strong>I can’t recall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>\u003cem>[to Val Sr]\u003c/em> You’re making a face? Do you think that he’s telling the truth there?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>I think, because I know my son—he has a really good memory, is really detail-orientated. And for him not to remember which side the cut was on, and certain things, is just, to me… he sounds like he’s worried right there, scared.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino told him that what happened during the incident was different than what those officers wrote in their reports and told investigators. But he said he felt like he had to go along with their story.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>You should have seen his face when he’d come over. That broke my heart, man, because he had a job…And he told me, Dad, you have to, you have to tell the same story because you’re on a team. Yeah. And if you don’t, then you’re the odd man out.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Mimy told us something similar.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He was told, like, hey, you know, this is what we’re writing. And it’s important that all of us have the same story, and it’s important for all of us to be on the same page. And he told me how they never really specifically said, you must do it this way. You must write it this, you must do it that. It was more of like, this is what we are doing and this is how we’re going to do it. And this is what’s important for our team, so we can all be on the same page. He felt a lot of pressure, just cause he didn’t want to lose his job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>CDCR did not respond to specific questions about this incident. A spokesperson did write in an email that the agency takes all allegations of employee misconduct seriously, and there is a new process for making sure complaints are, quote, “properly, fairly and thoroughly reviewed.” The spokesperson also pointed out that there is a new system of fixed and body cameras at New Folsom. So, we don’t know exactly what the truth is about this incident. What we do know is that C was severely injured. Medical reports show he received 27 stitches. His nose was broken, and his spine was fractured in three places. Ultimately, those in charge believed the officer’s story that C fractured his back when he slipped and fell off his bunk and injured his face and head when he lunged away from officers and landed on the metal rails of the decontamination shower. And that’s the story that Valentino chose to go along with, even though he told his father it wasn’t true. This wouldn’t be the last time Valentino felt compromised by his job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>[break]\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Mimy Rodriguez told my colleague Julie and me that working in the psychiatric unit really took a toll on Valentino.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He would talk about how draining it was, and he would come home drained.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>What did that look like to you?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez:\u003c/strong> I mean, he would just drag his feet. He would drag his feet, come in and he didn’t want to eat. He would shower and just go to sleep. I mean, he was just quiet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He worked double shifts so he could get more days off in a row to recharge.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>That’s when he would talk more about work. And be like, Yeah, like, you know, it was a little stressful, and I’m dealing with this or I’m talking about this, but, you know, I’m happy to go in. And he was always very enthusiastic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>About two and a half years after he’d gotten to New Folsom, late 2018, Valentino’s hard work looked like it was paying off. Remember the squad, that detective unit Valentino was aiming for? An officer there went on leave for PTSD, and there was a vacancy on the team. One of the supervisors who knew Valentino thought he’d be good at the job and gave him the chance to fill in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He was really excited for that, but he didn’t think he was going to get that opportunity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He’d made the squad. Working in the Security and Investigations unit, but on a temporary basis. To get the position permanently, he’d have to impress the right people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>He’s like, yes, of course, like, I’ll do it. I mean, he was ready.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino called to let his parents know he got promoted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>He called his mom first, and she told me that Val got a promotion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>He told them it was a really good position, one that a lot of other people wanted, and that he was the youngest on the team.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>I asked him, how’s your, how was your first day? And he goes, it’s a bunch of older guys, Dad, that have been there. He called them OGs. I said, well, how did it go? He goes, they asked, who the fuck are you?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>So, from the very beginning, there was tension on the team. Some of the people he worked with felt like he’d skipped the line, that he hadn’t done enough to prove himself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>There was one time where he had asked me to make little cheesecakes. There’s a little mini pie cheesecakes that I would make, and I made a bunch for the team and like nobody had them, nobody ate them. And they would just tell him like, no, we don’t want this or we don’t want that.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>At first he tried to earn their acceptance by just working really hard, trying to prove that he was up to the job.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez\u003c/strong>: He just continued to just put his head down and work, and I think that’s what really bothered him, that he would just try to do the right thing, and it just didn’t seem like it was enough.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino was making busts and working cases, but to some of his coworkers, this might have made him seem like even more of a threat because higher ups were noticing his work. Valentino was getting a reputation for being a diligent investigator, thorough, and for writing really good reports. This was a big deal because paperwork, reports, are hugely important in prison. With 115,000 people incarcerated in the state’s prisons at the time, these reports are how the agency kept track of everybody. Officers need to document everything: gang affiliations, medical needs, disability status, history of suicide, fights with staff and so on. And these reports are also the basis for disciplinary action, like sending someone to solitary confinement or charging them with a new crime. These reports hold a lot of power, and it is a crime for an officer to falsify an official report. Valentino wanted to keep moving up in the system and expanding his skills as an investigator. On the weekends when he wasn’t working, he’d pay out of pocket to go to these training events and seminars. And during these trips, he became friends with a guy named Sergeant Kevin Steele. Steele passed away in 2021, so we couldn’t interview him, but Val Senior came to know him well.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong> He was about 5’ 7”… my age, maybe a little bit older, he was in good shape. You know, he shaved his head and stood straight up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Picture a Bruce Willis type in his 50s, with intense bright blue eyes. He was a military veteran and a straight shooter. Sergeant Steele also worked in the ISU. He was senior to Valentino, but he was in a different division. He was in the prosecution division. It was his job to prepare cases for the district attorney to bring criminal charges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>He was very good at speaking and writing. Very passionate about his job, and loyal. He was very, very important to that prison for a good reason.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The two officers really respected each other. Both of them were kind of law enforcement nerds committed to going the extra mile. Valentino would testify in court for Steele’s cases. All that extra training meant he was a great expert witness. And Steele became one of the few people Valentino trusted—a mentor, and someone he called regularly for advice about criminal case protocol or how to handle evidence. Things with the other guys in his division, however, were getting worse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Sometimes he would text the guys for help and they’d have their own group text and they would like, they wouldn’t—they didn’t want to help him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Some of these group texts are pretty awful. They mock his weight and call him half-patch to remind him he’s still just a temporary member of the squad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Are these things that you saw after he died? Only after?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Mm-hm. He never, he never said, look Dad, look what they’re sending. He just never…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>But these messages would escalate even further before they stopped. The brotherhood, the family that Valentino had been promised at his academy graduation, was nowhere to be found.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>And he used to go in on weekends to, to work, because some of the team wasn’t there to harass him. Nobody was calling him names or anything or intimidate him anyway. So he liked going there on Saturdays. I know that, he told me. He used to go to work in the mornings, and then he told me he would go into the restroom to vomit because he felt so much anxiety.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>An attorney for these officers declined our request to interview her clients. But she said that any allegations that any of them bullied, hazed or harassed Valentino are false. Val Senior says he wouldn’t understand until much later, the full scope of what his son was going through, or of the things he was being asked to do in the name of this team. But he did notice a change come over his son. He wasn’t sleeping, and he gained 60 pounds over the course of the year he was in the ISU squad. Sometimes when they were hanging out, he’d get this blank look on his face.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>I could tell that he was starting to build this mental mechanism where he knew how to turn things off. You know, because I used to see him stare into space, you know, and then he’d snap out of it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>And this distance was coming between Valentino and Mimy too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>What really bothered me about his job was that he was never home.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>They were planning to get married and have kids, but more and more she felt like Valentino was always gone. There were the overtime shifts he had to work and the milestones in their life together were passing by without him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I understood that it was his job and it was a requirement. But what would frustrate me is that when I would ask him, like, why coudn’t you make it? Or why couldn’t you this. He would say, well, I asked for help and no one came to help me. And I would tell him, Valentino, we’re your family. Like, we love you. You know, if something happens to you, that job is just going to replace you. But how—we can’t replace you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>She remembers one holiday, maybe Thanksgiving, where she went to his family’s house for dinner.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I remember just sitting there waiting for him in his grandma’s house. Just waiting. He couldn’t show up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Once again, Valentino had to stay late working at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>Then it like, it just broke my heart because I just felt alone. I felt really lonely. His family—very nice. I mean, don’t get me wrong, very kind people, but—I don’t want to sit next to his grandma, per se, when I can just sit next to him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>It was in the midst of these pressures—Valentino was overworked, the holidays were happening, and he felt ostracized by his team—that something major happened at the prison. Val Senior says he was at the family Christmas party. Everyone was having a good time, eating and drinking. They had a game of white elephant going and they were all laughing a lot. Valentino showed up late, straight from work around 10:00 at night, and as soon as he walked in the door, Val Senior knew something was wrong.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>And I could just see his face, just like something really bothering him. I seen that look on his face before, but it was really intense.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Val Senior asked him what was going on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>And that’s when he took his phone out and he showed me the video.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The scene that Val Senior saw on his son’s cell phone was incredibly violent. A video taken by surveillance cameras in one of the most high-security housing units in New Folsom. The camera angle is from inside the control booth, which looks out on two tiers of cells. Right in front of the booth there’s an open area on the ground floor called a dayroom. In this dayroom, there are these metal desks in a semicircle with clear dividers in between them. In the video, Val Senior saw a man shackled to one of these chairs with two other guys standing over him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>This guy, this kid’s being stabbed over and over and over, and he literally would shrug your shoulders and cover his neck when they were trying to stab him in the neck. And then they would go back down on the chest, and then he would try to cover his chest by concaving his chest inward, and then they’d go back to his neck and it was just back and forth. So finally the kid threw himself on the floor, and they proceeded to just stab him—to the point to where the knives were literally hitting the ground, because every time they pulled up, his body would go up with it\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>The man on the floor was now lifeless. Val senior watched as two attackers painted his blood across their faces. But Valentino wanted his dad to notice something else.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>He had said, lookit, dad, the guy in the tower is not even aiming, and they’re using rubber bullets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Valentino was pointing out to his dad that the officer in the control booth didn’t use his rifle to immediately stop the deadly threat. He fired his less lethal weapon that shoots rounds made out of hard foam, and he fired it way too late.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>He goes, he’s supposed to use live rounds. I tried not to emphasize or talk about or look at it. I just wanted to go on to my little Christmas party. So I told him, you know, to put that thing away. [inaudible] And he just, like, did what he does, he snapped out of it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>But that wasn’t all. Valentino was also instructed to write up a particular type of confidential report for statewide gang investigators. The report was supposed to lay out how the killing was tied to a dispute between rival gangs. A lot of questions would later be raised about that report and who was really behind the murder. CDCR said it cannot comment on the case because it’s part of an active investigation. Val Senior wonders about this murder, too. His son was found dead by fentanyl intoxication less than a year after this Christmas party, and he was one of the people who suspected there was something really wrong about what happened in that dayroom at New Folsom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>[sounds of things put down on a table]\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>You have all of the laptop to follow along? I guess. How are we gonna do this?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>In Val Senior’s office, at his swimming pool construction company in Sacramento, hanging on the wall, he’s got that picture that Valentino painted of the two of them sitting side by side on the edge of the dock, fishing. Sometimes he says he can still feel his son close to him, by his side.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>He’s holding my hand. He just wants me to find, find peace. And, I find parts of peace, but not completely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>When Valentino was a kid and Val Senior would come home from work, he says his son would run up and pull on the sleeve of his shirt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Dad, Dad, Dad, Dad… But, I just feel him tugging still, you know? Yeah. I owe that to him. And I’m going to go as far as I can. And then in the end, if nothing, there’s nothing—I tried. Right? I’ll find my answers when my time comes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Since his son’s death, Val Senior has been pulled into a new role. Now he’s become the investigator.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>…shows where they got moved to, where is it at, it’s different…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>As our little reporting team—Julie, Steven and I—crowd around the computer in his office Val Senior shows us the evidence he’s collected about the killing of that guy in the dayroom, a 29-year-old man named Luis Giovanny Aguilar. He’s still trying to understand how and if that murder connects to his son’s death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>There was another…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Where did this come from?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Just people were sending me stuff. Look at they’re…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Your secret source?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>All these different sources…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>It’s stuff from his confidential sources who work inside New Folsom. Val Senior drags and drops the folders on his computer, one by one, onto the hard drive that we’ve brought for just this purpose.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>We’ll do our best to try and keep you informed about our process.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>Is this one of the bigger stories you’ve done with podcast? Or one of the most confusing or difficult?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Yeah, yeah. I mean, it’s a very, it’s a very complex story. But at the same time, I think it’s really like, a really important story. Yeah.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>I tell him we’re looking into this because his son’s story is part of something even larger. Since 2019, when a new transparency law went into effect here in California, Julie and I have been trying to get a clear picture of what the consequences are for correctional officers who use excessive force in prison, lie on their reports, or discriminate against their colleagues. That’s been a black box for decades, hidden by laws that were lobbied for by correctional officer and police unions. Now, we’ve gotten hundreds and hundreds of documents. Some of them are related to troubling use of force incidents, like the tapes you heard earlier. And as we went through them, we discovered that a really high number of these incidents had taken place at New Folsom. When we heard there was an officer who was blowing the whistle on misconduct there and then died, we knew we had to see if there was a connection, and the answer to that question could be among the evidence Val Senior was loading onto our hard drive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>What you’re offering, by what you have, or the content that you have, the text messages, combined with all the records that we’ve requested, we’ll be able to see into the prisons and how they function in a way that really hasn’t been done much…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Or ever. These records were completely secret. And we are the first people to analyze them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>As we walk out of his office… \u003cem>[sounds of leaving, saying bye]\u003c/em> Val Senior hands us back the hard drive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>But, you know, lemme know what else comes up…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>[Closing Theme Music]\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>Coming up next time, Valentino reaches a breaking point at work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Valentino Rodriguez Sr.: \u003c/strong>That was a flat-out threat. And when he got to work, they laughed at him.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Mimy Rodriguez: \u003c/strong>I remember this very clearly. He said, this is my identity. He’s like, I feel like I’ve given up on everything.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>And someone else starts looking into the murder in the dayroom and finding clues. Clues that point the finger not just at the two men with knives, but also at New Folsom itself.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>When’s the date on that one? Okay, that’s the day he died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Steven Rascón: \u003c/strong>Oh, he texted Steele the day he died.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Julie Small: \u003c/strong>Wow…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>That’s from Steele.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Sukey Lewis: \u003c/strong>You’re listening to On Our Watch Season Two, New Folsom from KQED. If you have any tips or feedback about the series, you can email us at on our watch at KQED.org. You can also leave us a review in Apple Podcasts. The series is reported by me, Sukey Lewis, and Julie Small. It’s edited by Victoria Mauleon. It’s produced and scored by Steven Rascón and Chris Agusta. Sound design and mixing by Tarek Fouda. Jen Chien is KQED’s director of podcasts, and she executive produced the series. Meticulous fact checking by Mark Betancourt. Additional research by Cayla Mihalovich and Kathleen Quinn, students in the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism. Special thanks to Rahsaan Thomas of Ear Hustle, Sandhya Dirks of NPR, KQED health correspondent April Dembosky. And to our in-house counsel, Rebecca Hopkins. Original music by Ramtin Arablouei, including our theme song. Additional music from Cameron Fraser, APM Music and Audio Network. We got tremendous support from David Barstow, chair of the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism, and graduate students Julietta Bisharyan, William Jenkins, Armon Owlia, Vera Watt, and Junyao Yang.Thanks also to UC Berkeley’s Jeremy Rue and Amanda Glazer for their data analysis. The internal records highlighted in this podcast were obtained as part of the California Reporting Project. Funding for On Our Watch is provided in part by Arnold Ventures and the California Endowment. Thank you to our managing editor of News and Enterprise, Otis R. Taylor Junior, Ethan Toven-Lindsey, our vice president of news, and KQED chief content officer Holly Kernan. Thanks for listening.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>"
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"title": "Fate of Infamous Dublin Women's Prison Now in Hands of Federal Judge",
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"content": "\u003cp>A federal district judge is “highly doubtful” she will \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11971511/judge-considers-federal-oversight-for-dublin-womens-prison-notorious-for-sexual-abuse\">order an independent monitor\u003c/a> to oversee a notorious East Bay women’s prison despite numerous allegations of misconduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s according to District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, who recently held an evidentiary hearing to determine whether to order major changes at the notorious Federal Correctional Institution (FCI) Dublin, where incarcerated plaintiffs\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11971786/theres-no-support-incarcerated-survivors-testify-in-east-bay-womens-prison-court-hearing,\"> say they have been victims of sexual abuse and retaliation\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gonzalez Rogers was active throughout the five-day hearing in Oakland that concluded earlier this week, asking hard questions of both prison administrators and the incarcerated women accusing staff of misconduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The judge issued several orders to prison officials to improve conditions at the low-security federal facility and even required two top administrators to review and reflect on the women’s testimony. But she nevertheless seemed unconvinced that the plaintiffs’ legal argument was strong enough to require further federal oversight of the embattled institution.[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation= \"S.L., an incarcerated person at FCI Dublin\"]‘I can’t leave my room without feeling a sense of fear. The officers are so mean and make very degrading comments. I’ve been reporting and saying things and seeking help. But it’s not getting any better.”[/pullquote]“Whether it requires the massive relief you’re asking for is highly doubtful,” Gonzalez Rogers told attorneys for the plaintiffs after the hearing on Tuesday. She ordered both sides to submit briefs within the next few weeks and said she would decide after reviewing them whether to require any additional changes at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The hearing is the latest step in a broader potential \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11958308/dublin-womens-prison-faces-class-action-lawsuit-over-sexual-abuse-scandal\">class-action lawsuit\u003c/a> filed in August 2023 on behalf of eight women currently incarcerated at the East Bay prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That lawsuit alleges that the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) has been aware of the problems at FCI Dublin — which has become known as the “rape club” — for decades and that the issues there are systemic, not just the fault of some “bad apples,” as government attorneys have argued. In addition to third-party oversight of the prison — known as appointing a “special master” — plaintiffs’ attorneys are also demanding a jury trial and damages for emotional and physical abuse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In recent years, about 45 inmates at the roughly 700-person women’s prison have filed charges of sexual misconduct, and at least \u003ca href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/8-correctional-officers-now-charged-with-sex-abuse-at-fci-dublin-7-found-guilty\">seven correctional \u003c/a>staff have already been convicted or pleaded guilty of abuse, including its \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11934639/ex-warden-of-dublin-womens-prison-convicted-of-sexually-abusing-inmates\">former warden\u003c/a> and chaplain in 2022.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s left the culture of the prison “in shambles,” as Patrick Deveney, the new associate warden, put it. Trust at the facility has completely eroded, according to multiple staff members and incarcerated women who testified at the recent court hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I saw a group of staff that were reeling from what had transpired. Staff felt hurt, angry, confused, completely failed by the previous administration,” Alison Mulcahy, the prison’s chief psychologist, said in court this week. “Individuals in our custody survived a lot of horrific things. There was a lot of mistrust and distrust. It was very adversarial.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But several of the nine prison employees who testified at the hearing said things are improving. The new administration said they have made it easier to report abuse, including setting up a new legal phone line that incarcerated women can use to contact lawyers more easily.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even so, multiple women currently incarcerated at the prison testified that they have experienced ongoing retaliation from officers when they report abuse and said they have avoided reporting various instances of misconduct, fearing repercussions, like losing access to the commissary, jobs and phone or visitor time.[aside label=\"more on FCI Dublin\" tag=\"dublin-prison\"]Many incarcerated women who testified also said that after reporting abuse, they were denied appropriate medical care. Multiple women said they had been suicidal or attempted suicide, and despite notifying staff, could not get crucial medications and mental health care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can’t leave my room without feeling a sense of fear. The officers are so mean and make very degrading comments,’” a woman identified as S.L., who is currently incarcerated at the prison, told the judge this week. “I’ve been reporting and saying things and seeking help. But it’s not getting any better.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another currently incarcerated woman, identified as C.A.H., testified in Spanish that after she reported being raped by a correctional officer, she was disciplined, threatened with solitary confinement, and denied her epilepsy medication. She said she is now having two to three seizures a week and suffering injuries and memory loss.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mulcahy, the psychologist, came on staff in the fall of 2022, shortly after the warden, chaplain and several staff were found guilty of sexually abusing inmates. She said problems with medical and mental health care are largely due to understaffing and that several therapy groups in the prison currently have hundreds of people on their waitlists.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I would love to run more groups and be fully staffed,” Mulcahy said. She added that some psychiatric medications that some incarcerated women may have received during previous confinements at state institutions are not permitted under federal prison policy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Monte Wilson, the prison health services administrator, also testified about understaffing at the prison, noting that it is currently short two physicians and three mid-level health providers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s caused distrust in the medical process,” Wilson said in court on Monday, adding that there are only two physicians at the facility — for the more than 700 women incarcerated there. Witnesses testified that it can sometimes take up to 90 days to get even routine appointments with specialists, including oncologists, for cancer treatment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Judge Gonzalez Rogers expressed concern about the way guards treated some suicidal women. She also grilled prison officials over their use of solitary confinement after hearing several incarcerated women describe how it had been used as a retaliatory measure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prison officials denied that allegation, arguing that they had resorted to solitary confinement in certain instances for safety reasons due to the lack of intermediate-level housing for those who needed protection from the general population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Let me tell you something. You’re going to have to figure it out, because I’m not going to tolerate it,” the judge told the associate warden, referring to the use of solitary confinement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A number of women who testified also described other degrading forms of retaliation that occurred after meeting with their attorneys, like being strip-searched by guards and being watched as they went to the bathroom. While administrators said these practices are a matter of policy, the women said they were enforced against them selectively and only began happening in the last month as they were preparing for this hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“All these atrocities that are taking place in retaliation, it is wrong,” said Robin Lucas, who survived sexual assault while incarcerated at FCI Dublin 30 years ago. Lucas was at the courthouse in support of survivors who had come forward to speak. “You’re here to pay your debt to society. If you did something wrong, you go to prison to do your time. That’s it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>A federal district judge is “highly doubtful” she will \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11971511/judge-considers-federal-oversight-for-dublin-womens-prison-notorious-for-sexual-abuse\">order an independent monitor\u003c/a> to oversee a notorious East Bay women’s prison despite numerous allegations of misconduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s according to District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, who recently held an evidentiary hearing to determine whether to order major changes at the notorious Federal Correctional Institution (FCI) Dublin, where incarcerated plaintiffs\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11971786/theres-no-support-incarcerated-survivors-testify-in-east-bay-womens-prison-court-hearing,\"> say they have been victims of sexual abuse and retaliation\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gonzalez Rogers was active throughout the five-day hearing in Oakland that concluded earlier this week, asking hard questions of both prison administrators and the incarcerated women accusing staff of misconduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The judge issued several orders to prison officials to improve conditions at the low-security federal facility and even required two top administrators to review and reflect on the women’s testimony. But she nevertheless seemed unconvinced that the plaintiffs’ legal argument was strong enough to require further federal oversight of the embattled institution.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“Whether it requires the massive relief you’re asking for is highly doubtful,” Gonzalez Rogers told attorneys for the plaintiffs after the hearing on Tuesday. She ordered both sides to submit briefs within the next few weeks and said she would decide after reviewing them whether to require any additional changes at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The hearing is the latest step in a broader potential \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11958308/dublin-womens-prison-faces-class-action-lawsuit-over-sexual-abuse-scandal\">class-action lawsuit\u003c/a> filed in August 2023 on behalf of eight women currently incarcerated at the East Bay prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That lawsuit alleges that the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) has been aware of the problems at FCI Dublin — which has become known as the “rape club” — for decades and that the issues there are systemic, not just the fault of some “bad apples,” as government attorneys have argued. In addition to third-party oversight of the prison — known as appointing a “special master” — plaintiffs’ attorneys are also demanding a jury trial and damages for emotional and physical abuse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In recent years, about 45 inmates at the roughly 700-person women’s prison have filed charges of sexual misconduct, and at least \u003ca href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/8-correctional-officers-now-charged-with-sex-abuse-at-fci-dublin-7-found-guilty\">seven correctional \u003c/a>staff have already been convicted or pleaded guilty of abuse, including its \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11934639/ex-warden-of-dublin-womens-prison-convicted-of-sexually-abusing-inmates\">former warden\u003c/a> and chaplain in 2022.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s left the culture of the prison “in shambles,” as Patrick Deveney, the new associate warden, put it. Trust at the facility has completely eroded, according to multiple staff members and incarcerated women who testified at the recent court hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I saw a group of staff that were reeling from what had transpired. Staff felt hurt, angry, confused, completely failed by the previous administration,” Alison Mulcahy, the prison’s chief psychologist, said in court this week. “Individuals in our custody survived a lot of horrific things. There was a lot of mistrust and distrust. It was very adversarial.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But several of the nine prison employees who testified at the hearing said things are improving. The new administration said they have made it easier to report abuse, including setting up a new legal phone line that incarcerated women can use to contact lawyers more easily.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even so, multiple women currently incarcerated at the prison testified that they have experienced ongoing retaliation from officers when they report abuse and said they have avoided reporting various instances of misconduct, fearing repercussions, like losing access to the commissary, jobs and phone or visitor time.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Many incarcerated women who testified also said that after reporting abuse, they were denied appropriate medical care. Multiple women said they had been suicidal or attempted suicide, and despite notifying staff, could not get crucial medications and mental health care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can’t leave my room without feeling a sense of fear. The officers are so mean and make very degrading comments,’” a woman identified as S.L., who is currently incarcerated at the prison, told the judge this week. “I’ve been reporting and saying things and seeking help. But it’s not getting any better.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another currently incarcerated woman, identified as C.A.H., testified in Spanish that after she reported being raped by a correctional officer, she was disciplined, threatened with solitary confinement, and denied her epilepsy medication. She said she is now having two to three seizures a week and suffering injuries and memory loss.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mulcahy, the psychologist, came on staff in the fall of 2022, shortly after the warden, chaplain and several staff were found guilty of sexually abusing inmates. She said problems with medical and mental health care are largely due to understaffing and that several therapy groups in the prison currently have hundreds of people on their waitlists.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I would love to run more groups and be fully staffed,” Mulcahy said. She added that some psychiatric medications that some incarcerated women may have received during previous confinements at state institutions are not permitted under federal prison policy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Monte Wilson, the prison health services administrator, also testified about understaffing at the prison, noting that it is currently short two physicians and three mid-level health providers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s caused distrust in the medical process,” Wilson said in court on Monday, adding that there are only two physicians at the facility — for the more than 700 women incarcerated there. Witnesses testified that it can sometimes take up to 90 days to get even routine appointments with specialists, including oncologists, for cancer treatment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Judge Gonzalez Rogers expressed concern about the way guards treated some suicidal women. She also grilled prison officials over their use of solitary confinement after hearing several incarcerated women describe how it had been used as a retaliatory measure.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prison officials denied that allegation, arguing that they had resorted to solitary confinement in certain instances for safety reasons due to the lack of intermediate-level housing for those who needed protection from the general population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Let me tell you something. You’re going to have to figure it out, because I’m not going to tolerate it,” the judge told the associate warden, referring to the use of solitary confinement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A number of women who testified also described other degrading forms of retaliation that occurred after meeting with their attorneys, like being strip-searched by guards and being watched as they went to the bathroom. While administrators said these practices are a matter of policy, the women said they were enforced against them selectively and only began happening in the last month as they were preparing for this hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“All these atrocities that are taking place in retaliation, it is wrong,” said Robin Lucas, who survived sexual assault while incarcerated at FCI Dublin 30 years ago. Lucas was at the courthouse in support of survivors who had come forward to speak. “You’re here to pay your debt to society. If you did something wrong, you go to prison to do your time. That’s it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Survivors of sexual abuse at a federal East Bay women’s prison said inappropriate conduct and retaliation persist, multiple women incarcerated at the facility told a federal judge on Friday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Federal Correctional Institution Dublin faces 45 civil lawsuits for sexual abuse and retaliation from people currently and formerly incarcerated at the prison. \u003ca href=\"https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndca/pr/two-more-dublin-federal-correctional-officers-plead-guilty-sexually-abusing-multiple\">Eight FCI Dublin correctional officers\u003c/a>, including the former warden, have been charged already. A federal judge is now considering whether to order changes at FCI Dublin, including requiring an external monitor. [pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"K.D., an incarcerated survivor at FCI Dublin prison\"]‘I should be able to go tell someone when it makes me feel uncomfortable, and I was extremely punished for this.’[/pullquote]This week, currently incarcerated individuals testified before U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers that they have difficulty accessing medical and mental health care and face retaliation if they report staff misconduct.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s no support to be sought out,” said K.D., who is currently incarcerated at the lower-security Dublin camp facility, during a public hearing on Friday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>K.D., whose full name was not used for privacy reasons, described an incident in September when a female guard allegedly “aggressively” patted her down and touched her breasts in a way that made her feel “violated.” K.D. reported the incident to the Department of Justice and then spoke to the psychologist on-site.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“She told me I could feel safe telling her and that it would not get back to my unit team, and it immediately got back to my unit team,” K.D. said. After the report, K.D. said officers took away her phone, email privileges and visitation rights, as well as access to the commissary.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I should be able to go tell someone when it makes me feel uncomfortable, and I was extremely punished for this,” said K.D., adding that she didn’t appeal the restrictions out of fear of further retaliation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The court previously found that multiple women were sent to the isolation unit after reporting sexual violence. Prison officials this week said that the response was intended to protect the women who were put in the segregated unit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11971807\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11971807 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279.jpg\" alt=\"Men in women in business attire stand outside a federal courthouse building and speak into a microphone at a press conference.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Plaintiff attorney Oren Nimni (right), survivor Robin Lucas (second to right), and advocates with the California Coalition for Women Prisoners (left) speak in support of women incarcerated at FCI Dublin outside an Oakland federal courthouse on Friday, Jan. 5, 2024. \u003ccite>(Sydney Johnson/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In August 2023, eight survivors of sexual abuse at FCI Dublin, along with the California Coalition for Women Prisoners, filed a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11958308/dublin-womens-prison-faces-class-action-lawsuit-over-sexual-abuse-scandal\">class-action lawsuit\u003c/a> against the Bureau of Prisons, FCI Dublin Officials and individual officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The plaintiffs are represented by firms Rights Behind Bars, the California Collaborative for Immigrant Justice and Rosen Bien Galvan & Grunfeld LLP. [pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Roberta, an incarcerated survivor at FCI Dublin prison\"]‘The repercussions for those of us who are left behind are real. For all that has happened — we are paying for it now.’[/pullquote]This week, Judge Gonzalez Rogers heard testimony from FCI Dublin staff and people incarcerated at the facility about whether abusive conditions have continued.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She is now considering whether to order temporary changes at the prison to address unsafe conditions that incarcerated survivors and their advocates said have festered due to a lack of independent oversight. That could include bringing in a third-party monitor, called a special master, to monitor progress at the facility — a first in the U.S. Bureau of Prisons history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Survivors and advocates are also pushing for better off-site medical care, improved access to legal counsel and release for sexual assault survivors who are still behind bars. [aside label='More on Law and Justice' tag='womens-prison']Other incarcerated individuals at FCI Dublin said correctional officers have strip-searched them after reporting staff misconduct as punishment for coming forward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The way things are right now is not good, and somebody has to do something because the people in charge there are not,” said Roberta, who is currently incarcerated at the FCI Dublin prison. Roberta’s last name was not used for privacy reasons. “The repercussions for those of us who are left behind are real. For all that has happened — we are paying for it now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Beth Reese, the chief of internal affairs, testified on Thursday that strip searches after visits are a matter of policy. She said her investigators would not entertain cases of officers simply following policy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Government attorneys originally planned to put four incarcerated people on the stand to defend the conditions at the prison. But only two ended up being transferred to the court on Thursday. One changed her mind, and one testified.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The sole individual who testified in support of the government said she had no complaints about the current conditions at the facility. She participates in programs and classes — and also revived her spiritual practice with the chaplain. She said she received prompt medical care for her high blood pressure and encountered no obstacles calling her lawyer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She also said other incarcerated individuals tried to intimidate her about testifying for the government, saying her name was on a “snitch list.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This week, the government also brought forward associate warden Patrick Deveney, who testified that “the institution was in shambles” when he arrived at FCI Dublin 18 months ago. Morale was low, communication was bad, and the culture was among the worst he had seen. [pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"K.D., an incarcerated survivor at FCI Dublin prison\"]‘There are too many people scared to speak out. … women should not have to suffer like this.’[/pullquote]But, he claimed things are turning around. Deveney said that the facility has increased staffing and training. Allegations of sexual misconduct have gone up since Deveney was brought on, which he said is a good thing because more women believe they will be heard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Most people incarcerated at the facility who testified this week said that’s not their experience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>K.D. said she’s seen at least four instances of sexual abuse by three different officers over the past year at her facility, even though several officials have been convicted and left the prison. But, she said she now fears retaliation and didn’t report the other incidents she witnessed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are too many people scared to speak out. I’ve been in other prisons, and it’s not this way. Staff there covers up for each other and bully us,” K.D. said on Friday in court. “My daughter did not want me to [testify in court]. She thinks I’m risking being away from her for longer to do this. But I think it’s the right thing to do, and women should not have to suffer like this.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED reporter \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/author/adembosky\">April Dembosky\u003c/a> contributed to this story. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“She told me I could feel safe telling her and that it would not get back to my unit team, and it immediately got back to my unit team,” K.D. said. After the report, K.D. said officers took away her phone, email privileges and visitation rights, as well as access to the commissary.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I should be able to go tell someone when it makes me feel uncomfortable, and I was extremely punished for this,” said K.D., adding that she didn’t appeal the restrictions out of fear of further retaliation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The court previously found that multiple women were sent to the isolation unit after reporting sexual violence. Prison officials this week said that the response was intended to protect the women who were put in the segregated unit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11971807\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11971807 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279.jpg\" alt=\"Men in women in business attire stand outside a federal courthouse building and speak into a microphone at a press conference.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/IMG_5279-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Plaintiff attorney Oren Nimni (right), survivor Robin Lucas (second to right), and advocates with the California Coalition for Women Prisoners (left) speak in support of women incarcerated at FCI Dublin outside an Oakland federal courthouse on Friday, Jan. 5, 2024. \u003ccite>(Sydney Johnson/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In August 2023, eight survivors of sexual abuse at FCI Dublin, along with the California Coalition for Women Prisoners, filed a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11958308/dublin-womens-prison-faces-class-action-lawsuit-over-sexual-abuse-scandal\">class-action lawsuit\u003c/a> against the Bureau of Prisons, FCI Dublin Officials and individual officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The plaintiffs are represented by firms Rights Behind Bars, the California Collaborative for Immigrant Justice and Rosen Bien Galvan & Grunfeld LLP. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Other incarcerated individuals at FCI Dublin said correctional officers have strip-searched them after reporting staff misconduct as punishment for coming forward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The way things are right now is not good, and somebody has to do something because the people in charge there are not,” said Roberta, who is currently incarcerated at the FCI Dublin prison. Roberta’s last name was not used for privacy reasons. “The repercussions for those of us who are left behind are real. For all that has happened — we are paying for it now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Beth Reese, the chief of internal affairs, testified on Thursday that strip searches after visits are a matter of policy. She said her investigators would not entertain cases of officers simply following policy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Government attorneys originally planned to put four incarcerated people on the stand to defend the conditions at the prison. But only two ended up being transferred to the court on Thursday. One changed her mind, and one testified.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The sole individual who testified in support of the government said she had no complaints about the current conditions at the facility. She participates in programs and classes — and also revived her spiritual practice with the chaplain. She said she received prompt medical care for her high blood pressure and encountered no obstacles calling her lawyer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She also said other incarcerated individuals tried to intimidate her about testifying for the government, saying her name was on a “snitch list.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This week, the government also brought forward associate warden Patrick Deveney, who testified that “the institution was in shambles” when he arrived at FCI Dublin 18 months ago. Morale was low, communication was bad, and the culture was among the worst he had seen. \u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>But, he claimed things are turning around. Deveney said that the facility has increased staffing and training. Allegations of sexual misconduct have gone up since Deveney was brought on, which he said is a good thing because more women believe they will be heard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Most people incarcerated at the facility who testified this week said that’s not their experience.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>K.D. said she’s seen at least four instances of sexual abuse by three different officers over the past year at her facility, even though several officials have been convicted and left the prison. But, she said she now fears retaliation and didn’t report the other incidents she witnessed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are too many people scared to speak out. I’ve been in other prisons, and it’s not this way. Staff there covers up for each other and bully us,” K.D. said on Friday in court. “My daughter did not want me to [testify in court]. She thinks I’m risking being away from her for longer to do this. But I think it’s the right thing to do, and women should not have to suffer like this.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED reporter \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/author/adembosky\">April Dembosky\u003c/a> contributed to this story. \u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "california-prisons-fail-to-uphold-transgender-rights-despite-state-law",
"title": "California Prisons Fail to Uphold Transgender Rights Despite State Law",
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"headTitle": "California Prisons Fail to Uphold Transgender Rights Despite State Law | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>Warning: There are descriptions of physical and sexual violence in this piece. Also, where legal names and chosen names differ, we’re using chosen names.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[dropcap]S[/dropcap]yiaah Skylit had been stuck in solitary confinement at a maximum-security men’s prison for months when, in the fall of 2020, she got the news that gave her hope: Gov. Gavin Newsom had signed the \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB132\">Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Authored by state Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), the law requires California prison staff to use the chosen pronouns of incarcerated people who are intersex or identify as nonbinary or transgender, as Skylit does.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It allows those incarcerated people to \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdcr.ca.gov/prea/sb-132-faqs/\">select a gender preference for the guards who search them\u003c/a>. Most significantly, it mandates that prison officials, under most circumstances, honor requests to be housed at the type of facility — male or female — that aligns with the incarcerated person’s gender identity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For six years, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation bounced Skylit from one men’s prison to another. At each, safety proved elusive. By 2020, she was isolated in a cell for her own protection after brutal attacks by people she was incarcerated with and, \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23991903-syiaahkvsp2ndamendedcomplaint2022-03-03\">a lawsuit alleges (PDF)\u003c/a>, by guards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The prospect of serving out her remaining sentence in a women’s facility seemed nothing short of a miracle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For me, what it felt like was a sanctuary,” she said in one of several dozen interviews with KQED over the course of a year. “A place to be who you were meant to be without any retaliation, without any violence, without any judgment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Decades have passed since simply \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11917624/how-a-young-gay-man-survived-one-of-the-darkest-eras-in-california-queer-history\">being LGBTQ+ was considered a crime and a mental illness\u003c/a>. But bias and marginalization still lead to high rates of criminalization, especially for \u003ca href=\"https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/resources/NTDS_Report.pdf\">Black trans women (PDF)\u003c/a> like Skylit. Once incarcerated, harsh prison conditions take a serious toll on mental health.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://cpb-us-e2.wpmucdn.com/sites.uci.edu/dist/0/1149/files/2013/06/BulletinVol2Issue2.pdf\">Studies (PDF)\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/usts/USTS%20Full%20Report%20-%20FINAL%201.6.17.pdf\">surveys (PDF)\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/pdca15.pdf\">federal data (PDF)\u003c/a> show that trans women held in men’s prisons are sexually and physically assaulted at rates as much as 13 times higher than cisgender men. When they report assaults or fears for their safety, they’re often met with \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23991938-tni-coalition-letter-to-governor-newsom-71723pdf-2\">staff retaliation (PDF)\u003c/a>. It’s not uncommon for trans women to harm themselves — just to get to the safety of a prison mental health bed. Skylit had lived that, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Syiaah Skylit, transgender woman in California prison\"]‘For me, what it felt like was a sanctuary. A place to be who you were meant to be without any retaliation, without any violence, without any judgment.’[/pullquote]The Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act promised an end to those nightmares.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No more having to hide in fear,” Skylit said. “No more having to be quiet about who I really am. I was excited. I couldn’t wait.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This story is a result of a year-long investigation into the effectiveness of the legislation that aimed to reduce the trauma of transgender women in California’s prisons. KQED’s reporters interviewed a dozen incarcerated people and reviewed data along with several hundred pages of prison grievances, disciplinary records and legal filings. The reporting revealed that trans women like Skylit and many others transferred to a women’s prison under the new law have not found the sanctuary they were seeking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For Skylit, the nightmares have only gotten worse.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Living with secrets\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Skylit grew up in Compton. When she was 5, she and her siblings entered the foster care system after their mother suffered a mental health break. When Skylit was 14, her mother died by apparent suicide, and the following year, she said, “I tried to kill myself by running in front of a moving train.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She was physically uninjured but sent to a psychiatric hospital. It wouldn’t be the last time she’d tried to take her own life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11964099\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11964099\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED-800x949.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"949\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED-800x949.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED-1020x1210.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED-160x190.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED-1295x1536.jpg 1295w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED.jpg 1686w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">In August 2020, as Syiaah Skylit sat in solitary confinement at Kern Valley State Prison for her own protection, transgender advocates launched a Change.org campaign urging clemency for her. She helped with the design of the artwork. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Syiaah Skylit, Micah Bazant and Freddie Francis)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Skylit is a slight 5 feet, 5 inches tall with a big, dimpled smile. As a teen and living as a boy, she was bullied for being a flashy dresser, for the way she carried herself. She experimented with a gay relationship, but it left her feeling “confused.” The adults in her life were religious and viewed LGBTQ+ people as sinners. Her brothers were gang members. She did what they asked of her, she said, because “I didn’t want to look weak.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I couldn’t come out and be myself around people like my family and my friends that I grew up with,” Skylit said. “I grew up in a hard-ass neighborhood. That ain’t about to fly.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, she harbored a secret she never shared with her brothers, one even she didn’t fully comprehend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I would dress up. I would put makeup on. All I understood as a person was, ‘Hey, I like this,’” she said. “So if I like this, why is it so bad? Am I a bad person?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A stint in juvenile detention didn’t stop Skylit from setting her sights on a bright future. She finished high school on time, enrolled in community college, worked multiple jobs and, for a while, paid her rent. But anxiety, depression and drug use interrupted her stability. She’d already been homeless once when, facing eviction in 2012, she and a friend robbed a convenience store in San Bernardino County. It yielded little, so they robbed a Los Angeles County jewelry store — and got caught.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At 22, Skylit was facing criminal trials in both counties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Syiaah Skylit, transgender woman in California prison\"]‘I couldn’t come out and be myself around people like my family and my friends that I grew up with. I grew up in a hard-ass neighborhood. That ain’t about to fly.’[/pullquote]Her first stop was a San Bernardino County jail, where she came out as gay to get to the relative safety of what was then called the “alternative lifestyles tank.” According to a \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23999484-syiaah2015sanbernardinocolawsuit\">class-action lawsuit (DOC)\u003c/a>, the conditions were distressing: discrimination by staff and denial of basic services. Skylit, under her legal name, was among the named plaintiffs. A settlement led to \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24002812-sanbernardinoinjunctiverelief\">significant reforms (DOC)\u003c/a>. It was in that jail, she said, where she first learned to advocate for her rights, even in the face of retaliation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s also where she first encountered openly transgender women and was blown away by their courage and joyful confidence. In their midst, Skylit said, she at last felt free of judgment, open to self-acceptance. Her next stop — a stint in the segregated LGBTQ+ tank at the Los Angeles County jail — only reinforced those feelings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s when I got a taste of all the ‘T’ and I was just living it,” she said of the ‘T’ for Transgender in the alphabet soup of LGBTQ+. “It was like discovering myself.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She was sentenced to 16 years in prison. It may seem paradoxical, but incarceration gave Skylit breathing room to explore her gender identity. In court, she apologized to her robbery victims. Then, she made a promise to herself to use “every second, every minute” of her time inside “to really find out who I am. I mean, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that I felt I had.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit entered California’s prison system for men in December 2015. Soon, she chose her new name. “Syiaah” is an acronym — sexy, young, intelligent, ambitious, authentic and heroic. She picked “Sky” as “an inspiration to reach higher limits.” And “lit” is a nod to her hip-hop Compton roots “to be vibrant, live.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Put it together, it’s ‘I keep the sky lit’,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In keeping with the up-to-date \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24002874-ama-medical-spectrum-of-gender-d-295312\">medical (DOC)\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.psychiatry.org/psychiatrists/diversity/education/transgender-and-gender-nonconforming-patients\">psychiatric\u003c/a> understanding of gender identity, the Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act doesn’t require incarcerated people to be on hormone replacement therapy or to be interested in gender-affirming surgeries to be transferred to housing that aligns with their sense of safety. During Skylit’s early years in prison, that wasn’t the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11957664 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/110822-KernValleyPrison-LV_CM_04-1020x680.jpg']The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation \u003cem>did\u003c/em> consider such transfer requests. The federal Prison Rape Elimination Act had since 2012 \u003ca href=\"https://www.prearesourcecenter.org/frequently-asked-questions/does-policy-houses-transgender-or-intersex-inmates-based-exclusively\">forbidden\u003c/a> the department from housing prisoners based solely on external genital anatomy. But the CDCR did it on a case-by-case basis, and the tiny number granted all happened to be for trans women who’d had gender-affirming genital surgery.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not everybody wants that. Gender identity and gender transition are deeply personal. Skylit’s records show she declared her transgender identity on a special CDCR form about a year after arrival — and soon after started \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24018578-skylit-2019-housing-complaint\">asking to be transferred to a women’s prison (DOC)\u003c/a>. That went nowhere. So Skylit worked to stay true to her transition, even as she was funneled through a series of men’s prisons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When I tapped into it, despite the long time I was facing, I was happy,” she said. “But that happiness turned into survival real fast.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Met by violence\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Almost immediately, Skylit’s gender identity and small stature made her a target. On several occasions, she said, correctional officers placed her in cells with large men who specifically requested her and then pressured her for sex. When she filed grievances in an attempt to switch cells or responded to physical assaults by fighting, she said, staff responded with Rule Violation Reports, known as RVRs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The more I would push back,” she said, “the more they would attack me with RVRs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, Skylit pressed on. She requested hormone replacement therapy, and by the time those treatments started, in 2018, she’d been moved to Mule Creek State Prison near the small Sierra foothills town of Ione. It’s one of a dozen or so facilities in the state designated as “transgender hubs.” That means, medical and mental services for trans prisoners are concentrated there, as are prison commissary items unavailable elsewhere, such as sports bras and makeup for trans women, and boxer shorts for trans men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit could finally stop MacGyvering her fashion looks. She could style her hair, wear makeup and earrings. On the prison yard, she said she found a sense of belonging with her trans sisters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We were out there,” she said. “Having fun, protecting each other.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But even at men’s prisons designated as transgender hubs, trans women were mixed with cisgender men in common areas and their assigned cells. The truer Skylit felt to herself, she said, the greater the danger she experienced.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Yeah, it’s OK to come out and you got a nice little outfit on, but guess what you just did?” she said. “You just called attention to yourself and now you have certain people who are making sexual advances towards you, and some of them don’t stop.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of her trans sisters exchanged sex for safety. But even that was no guarantee of safety. Skylit wept while recounting how a close friend staggered out of her cell “with a huge gash in her skull, busted lip, trying to get out of the room that she placed herself in because she wanted to be \u003cem>herself\u003c/em>. And she couldn’t complain to the officers, because they’re not gonna do anything.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Syiaah Skylit, transgender woman in California prison\"]‘Either I’m gonna be who I wanna be or I’m gonna end up dead. Girl, I can’t be dead and be myself at the same time.’[/pullquote]So Skylit found herself facing a soul-crushing choice between her safety and her identity. Skylit drew a line against assault. That meant more fights and more disciplinary write-ups. The hormone treatments caused muscle weakness, so she made another compromise. She began stopping and starting the medications depending on the danger she was facing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Either I’m gonna be who I wanna be or I’m gonna end up dead,” she said. “Girl, I can’t be dead and be myself at the same time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a survival strategy it made sense, but abruptly going on and off hormones brings on acute mood swings. It also heightens \u003ca href=\"https://www.psychiatry.org/psychiatrists/diversity/education/transgender-and-gender-nonconforming-patients/gender-dysphoria-diagnosis\">gender dysphoria\u003c/a>, a mental health diagnosis associated with distress a person can feel at being a gender other than the one assigned at birth. Skylit had experienced that for most of her life, as she hid her true gender identity, and it caused depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Skylit juggled these stressors, prison officials transferred her again — this time to Kern Valley State Prison, a maximum-security facility in the Central Valley town of Delano that houses some of the state’s most violent offenders. Among them, transgender advocates \u003ca href=\"https://prisonhealth.news/2021/10/29/lgbtq-prison-testimonies-dakota-rose-in-california/\">note\u003c/a>, are gang members known to target LGBTQ+ people in prisons. That’s where she \u003ca href=\"https://sfbayview.com/2021/05/trans-woman-seeks-release-from-cdcr-custody-after-attacks/\">hit a new low\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Skylit and a \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23991903-syiaahkvsp2ndamendedcomplaint2022-03-03\">lawsuit filed on her behalf (DOC),\u003c/a> she was assaulted twice by incarcerated men and witnessed gruesome attacks on two other trans women. Terrified, she says she asked to speak to a sergeant about her safety concerns. Instead, she alleges, two officers followed her into her cell. One pulled down her pants, ran a baton along her bottom and threatened to rape her with it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And I’m just sitting there like this can’t be real,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11954055 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/06/230626-CALIFORNIA-PRISONERS-AP-RP-KQED-1020x735.jpg']That night, she drank from a bottle of laundry detergent in a desperate attempt to get sent to a mental health crisis unit. An officer stripped her of her clothes and left her lying naked in her cell next to the empty bottle. The next day, an officer pepper sprayed her at close range. Others beat her with batons. CDCR does not comment on active litigation. In legal filings, the named officers have denied wrongdoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Finally, Skylit said, a sergeant agreed to isolate her for her protection. That’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.vera.org/news/violence-torture-and-isolation-what-its-like-to-be-trans-in-prison\">a common fate for trans women\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s sad to be thankful for complete solitary confinement, isolation,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She would stay there for seven months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit had sought help from various attorneys. One responded. Jen Orthwein is a forensic psychologist who once treated transgender clients behind prison walls. They later co-founded a queer-owned law firm to challenge the harsh conditions they’d witnessed. Orthwein worked with other transgender advocates to launch a \u003ca href=\"https://www.change.org/p/gavin-newsom-call-for-the-immediate-release-of-syiaah-skylit-from-cdcr-custody-blacktranslivesmatter?utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=custom_url&recruited_by_id=cc830240-3ea3-11e9-a4df-e5579d49cec9\">petition\u003c/a> for clemency on Skylit’s behalf.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, with colored pencils and paper, Skylit got to work crafting a series of illustrated \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24018571-its-a-colorful-world-by-syiaah-skylit\">children’s books (DOC)\u003c/a> featuring gender-non-conforming characters. Among them is a rainbow-colored kid named Unique, who is fully embraced by loving parents but bullied on the playground for delighting in toys conventionally meant for both boys and girls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The project helped Skylit reimagine her traumatic past. She also hoped her books might make their way into the world and change the mindset of young readers “to where they’re not growing into hatred, but actually out of it.” She finished two, got started on a third. And that’s where she was when Orthewin gave her the good news. The Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act was state law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11964104\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11964104\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"Scans of two pages of drawing and text from a hand written book.\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED.jpg 2000w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Excerpts from ‘It’s a Colorful World.’ \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Syiaah Skylit)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It was like a prayer had been answered,” Skylit said. “Like, ‘This is it!’ This is going to be the beginning of Syiaah Skylit at her best, at completely being herself.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>New perils\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Wiener’s bill was years in the making, and he’s quick to note that top CDCR officials were on board. They welcomed advocates to join a working group to brainstorm solutions to unsafe conditions and sought input directly from incarcerated transgender people. The Office of Inspector General detailed in \u003ca href=\"https://www.oig.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Special-Review-Incarcerated-Transgender-Nonbinary-Intersex-Individuals.pdf\">a 2020 report (PDF)\u003c/a> the painful responses to those surveys.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Laws in \u003ca href=\"https://www.acluct.org/en/know-your-rights/know-your-rights-trans-people-who-are-incarcerated-connecticut\">Connecticut\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23991974-952-management-of-gender-diverse-and-intersex-inmates-final-version\">Rhode Island (DOC)\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://lgbtqbar.org/bar-news/tiproject/ma/\">Massachusetts\u003c/a> call for similar reforms, while \u003ca href=\"https://www.aclu-nj.org/en/press-releases/settlement-nj-civil-rights-suit-promises-necessary-reform-affirming-transgender\">New Jersey\u003c/a> has made comparable policy changes in response to litigation. But advocates who helped craft California’s law say it is the most expansive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wiener said in an interview that he knew at the start that the magnitude of changes mandated by the law required patience and that it would take time to implement. More recently, though, he’s grown deeply concerned about the way his legislation has played out on the ground. Because, he said, even with senior CDCR management on board, “the culture in the individual prisons is just so challenging that it doesn’t translate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11964100\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11964100\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-800x539.jpg\" alt='A group of people, most wearing the same uniform of blue shirts and pants, stand together holding signs and joined by a person wearing a suit helping to hold a banner reading \"trans lives matter.\"' width=\"800\" height=\"539\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-800x539.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-1020x687.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-160x108.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-1536x1035.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-1920x1294.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED.jpg 2000w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) attends CDCR’s first Transgender Remembrance Day in 2019, organized jointly by trans and cisgender incarcerated people. Wiener had already authored the bill that would become the Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act, with buy-in from top CDCR officials. \u003ccite>(California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Officials chose the Central California Women’s Facility, or CCWF, in Chowchilla as the prison where all the trans women would go first. It’s a facility with a \u003ca href=\"https://prisonlaw.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/16.08.18-Prison-Law-Office-report-on-CCWF.pdf\">troubled history (PDF)\u003c/a> when it comes to staff accountability.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of a dozen CCWF prisoners interviewed by KQED, all said they heard correctional staff express hostility to the new law even before the transfers began, warning the cisgender population that fakers and sexual predators were heading their way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tasha Brown, a cisgender woman, said she heard guards say, “The doors were going to be open for people to come in to violate us, to rape us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tomas Green, a transgender man, said he heard guards “telling women here that the trans women were men and that they were gonna get raped.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11936438 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/12/1920px-CentralCaliforniaWomensFacility-1020x816.jpeg']Alexanne Danis, a cisgender woman, said she heard a lieutenant openly state that the transfers “don’t belong here, that they have to leave.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Officers and fellow cisgender incarcerated people, Danis said, also spoke about driving the new transfers out, “saying that they were gonna stage stuff and that they were gonna make it sound worse than it was if anything did happen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Michelle Calvin was one of the first transgender women to arrive at CCWF. She helped work on Wiener’s legislation and has since transferred to the lower-security California Institution for Women. She heard the characterizations by staff that trans women were “gonna come over here and rape y’all and beat y’all up and take y’all stuff.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The power to reverse the law, she heard officers tell incarcerated people, rested in their hands: “Take your house back. Take your prison back.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Advocates who helped craft the law were well aware of this toxic environment. They say they pressed officials to allow them to hold a town hall at the women’s prison to defuse these narratives before the transfers began. It never happened.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, the trans women who began arriving in the first half of 2021 had no idea what they were stepping into.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Orthwein, Skylit’s attorney, was part of the working group that informed the new law and said key CDCR decisions around implementation proved harmful. The new arrivals were held in segregation for their first month. There, they were issued new prison identification numbers beginning with a distinctive two-letter combination. Instead of “some semblance of privacy about their transgender status,” which advocates had pressed for, this immediately outed them, feeding hostility and rejection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CCWF houses people in dorms, as many as eight to a room. Without exception, the trans women interviewed by KQED said they have been refused entry to dorms by prisoners who viewed them as “men.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Skylit’s first day in the general population, in mid-July 2021, guards started writing her up for minor violations. Within a month, she was in solitary confinement, accused of having a consensual relationship with her cisgender female bunkmate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sex is against prison rules systemwide, but every CCWF prisoner interviewed for this piece said it’s extremely common, especially in women’s prisons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Tomas Green, transgender man in California prison\"]‘At the end of the day, we’re humans. I’m not saying every relationship in here is just peachy perfect, no. You have a lot of relationships in here that are toxic — fight, argue. But that’s life in the free world.’[/pullquote]“Yes, you’re not supposed to have sex but it happens. It’s natural and there’s nothing that’s gonna stop it from happening,” said Giovanni Gonzales, a transgender man who runs a group to educate peers about gender identity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Relationships form quickly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At the end of the day, we’re humans,” Green said. “I’m not saying every relationship in here is just peachy perfect, no. You have a lot of relationships in here that are toxic — fight, argue. But that’s life in the free world.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, while sex and intimacy may be universal, punishment is not.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gonzales and Green said staff often turn a blind eye to cisgender women who couple up, especially if they express their gender in stereotypically feminine ways. If a transgender man is caught being amorous, they said, a rule violation is more likely. As for the trans women who were just arriving at CCWF, a harsher set of unwritten rules seemed to apply.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One cisgender couple in Skylit’s dorm had been having regular sex without consequence, she said. As Skylit was handcuffed and written up for her relationship, she asked an officer why she was going to isolation and the bunkmate wasn’t. He replied, “Because you’re a man and she’s a woman.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At a hearing to discuss her situation, records show that Acting Warden Michael Pallares told her he would push to send her back to men’s prison. She claimed he was hostile, “calling me a predator, saying that I’m preying on women.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In men’s prison, Skylit had lived in constant fear of sexual assault. Now \u003cem>she \u003c/em>was cast as a sexual predator. Her disciplinary paperwork relied on “confidential sources” to suggest she was faking her status because she “displays very masculine behavior when with the inmate population.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In isolation, according to grievances and a government claim filed by Orthwein, Skylit’s gender identity was undermined. She had trouble accessing her hormones and was denied a razor for 40 days straight. She grew a full beard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People screaming at me, yelling at me, calling me a man, and I need to go back to the men’s prison,” she said. “‘Look at the hair on yo’ face.’ [I was] pleading, pleading, pleading, ‘Please give me a razor, please give me a razor,’ and denied every time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A psychologist misgendered Skylit in a report, yet \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24018435-psychologist-note-razors-clothing\">noted (DOC)\u003c/a> that an extended stay in isolation would likely increase her mental health symptoms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the months that followed, Skylit was sent multiple times to a mental health unit for being suicidal. She was bumped up to a more intensive level of mental health care. Yet she remained in solitary confinement for eight months. Then, without explanation, Pallares released her to the general population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her freedom wouldn’t last.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘What did you all do to our homegirl?’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Skylit’s time in isolation had taken a toll. On the yard, she said she made enemies when she responded to threats and harassment with aggressive posturing and language. She said she tried not to engage, hanging out and playing cards every day with a couple of other trans women and one cisgender woman who was sweet on her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We would hold hands,” she said. “We would hug, we would kiss.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prison officials aren’t supposed to penalize trans women more harshly for breaking rules that cisgender prisoners also break, like the one forbidding any behavior that could lead to sex. But the atmosphere around these relationships, interviews and records reveal, was tense and complex.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While some cisgender women feared or lashed out at the new arrivals, others were eager to partner with them. Of a half-dozen transgender women at CCWF who were interviewed by KQED, the five who have not had gender-affirming genital surgery, said they’ve been subject to sexual advances.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11955680 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/07/GettyImages-180517172-1020x680.jpg']Meanwhile, \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24016207-mossgroup-sb132-cdcr-assessment-report\">a report (DOC)\u003c/a> on the implementation of the new law commissioned by CDCR found that a “sexualized environment, including being sexually pressured or pursued,” was among the reasons given by transgender women who voluntarily returned to men’s prison. Other reasons included “hostile reception from staff or incarcerated individuals,” “false allegations to be removed from room” and “issues with getting hygiene items, such as razors.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In men’s prison, Skylit said, consensual sex generally went unpunished. That made it hard for her to imagine just how much the bond with her new “bestie” would cost her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On May 19, 2022, Skylit and her friends were on the yard drinking prison-made wine, disciplinary records show. Skylit and her girlfriend were kissing. A few minutes after Skylit went to use the porta-potty, she said, the girlfriend followed her in and started throwing up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit said she was holding her hair back when Calvin, one of the trans friends she played cards with, let her know a guard was approaching. Skylit stepped out and asked a couple of other people to check on the girlfriend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They “opened the door and they say, ‘What did you all do to our homegirl? We don’t know what you two doing, we don’t know what’s going on over here,’” Skylit recounted. “And I said, ‘We just been drinking and she was in the thing throwing up.’ But now, it’s a commotion. It’s a crowd coming up.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Skylit and two other witnesses, the girlfriend came out, and the guard scolded them. “She was like, ‘I’m OK bestie, I love you so much,’ and I hugged her and I walked away.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rumors about a rape started circulating. Skylit said she heard it “from like one or two people. It wasn’t \u003cem>big\u003c/em> until the next day.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Syiaah Skylit, transgender woman in California prison\"]‘They were surrounding me and pushing me and spitting on me and swinging at me.’[/pullquote]By then, a fictional narrative had taken shape: In those few moments inside the porta-potty, Skylit had committed rape, while Calvin stood guard. To be clear, prison officials never accused her of rape or sexual assault. The girlfriend told them — and KQED — that it never happened. Still, the rumors proved to be Skylit’s undoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That next day, according to Skylit and five witnesses, as she was returning from a mental health appointment, she was roughed up on the yard by 12 to 15 incarcerated people who called her “nothing but a rapist.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They were surrounding me and pushing me and spitting on me and swinging at me,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED obtained video of the incident through a public records request. There’s no audio, but the grainy image shows Skylit, who had a pass to be on the yard, doing an about-face as a group of incarcerated people in civilian clothes approached her. One appears to throw liquid at her. A few shove and punch her. She gets agitated. At one point, it’s clear that she’s yelling. But she mostly keeps her arms crossed. She never hits back. Still, she is the only one punished.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://youtu.be/nS5qpi-NXfE\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>As Syiaah Skylit, wearing a long-sleeved white shirt under her prison blues, walked through the yard at Central California Women’s Facility in May 2022, she was accosted by incarcerated people who accused her of being a rapist. Courtesy of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She’d been out of solitary confinement for just four weeks. She went right back in — and she hasn’t come out in more than a year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A sergeant who, the video shows, does not walk out to the yard until Skylit is handcuffed, wrote her \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24018553-referring-to-sexual-intercourse-through-rape\">rule violation report (DOC)\u003c/a>. He states that he heard her yell, “I’m gonna f- you bitches,” and a few variations on that theme. Then, using her legal name, he adds an editorial aside: “It should be known that when [Skylit] mentioned f-, [Skylit] was referring to sexual intercourse through rape.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CCWF initially accused Skylit of “threatening the life of a prisoner,” and referred her to the local district attorney for felony prosecution. It didn’t stick. Ultimately, her writeup was reduced to “behavior which could lead to violence.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Syiaah Skylit, transgender woman in California prison\"]‘It’s sad to be thankful for complete solitary confinement, isolation.’[/pullquote]In her defense, Skylit pointed to the video as evidence that she wasn’t the aggressor and that others had committed violence against \u003cem>her.\u003c/em> Records show that the senior hearing officer called the video “irrelevant.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CDCR does not comment on specific incarcerated people. Asked to respond to the behavior of the sergeant, it said state regulations forbid discrimination by staff and grant incarcerated people the right to be treated “respectfully, impartially, and fairly by all employees.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit was far from alone in experiencing false allegations. Of the trans women at CCWF interviewed by KQED, each said they had been similarly targeted by others who were incarcerated and even by staff. Most were sent to solitary confinement pending investigations. Some were already there when they said they were framed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fancy Lipsey, records show, spent seven months in isolation after she was physically assaulted by other incarcerated people. As soon as she got out, a cisgender woman “went over to the officers and told them that I touched her vagina and her breasts in the dayroom.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They reviewed the video on the spot “and saw that I was nowhere near this woman.” Still, they told Lipsey they were taking her back to solitary confinement. That’s when she cut her wrists, ending up on suicide watch instead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Calvin said she was punished after a roommate “went up to the program office and said I supposedly choked” another cisgender woman in their dorm in the middle of the night. The allegation came days after the alleged assault, which no one witnessed or reported at the time. Calvin said it took months to clear her name.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tremayne Carroll, a trans woman who uses a wheelchair, said that after she rebuffed sexual advances from a cisgender woman, that woman yelled to guards that Carroll had sexually assaulted her. When that went nowhere, the woman changed her story and said the two had had consensual sex.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Freddy Fox, an intersex prisoner who identifies as a trans woman and goes by “Foxy,” said she landed in solitary confinement after being assaulted. Alone in her cell in the weeks that followed, she was verbally harassed and accused of sexual impropriety.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They would allege that I had exposed myself, then I’d have to go to the cameras to show that I did not expose myself,” Foxy said. The officers would then reduce the write-up to a lesser violation, she said, “but it’s still a sexual misconduct! That was the go-to thing in 2021 when we first arrived.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘Porta-potty rapist’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Skylit’s case stands out in one crucial way: The false rape allegation went viral. Her chosen and legal names ended up all \u003ca href=\"https://reduxx.info/exclusive-female-inmate-reports-rape-occurred-in-california-womens-prison/\">over the internet.\u003c/a> One outlet called her the perpetrator of a “\u003ca href=\"https://justthenews.com/government/courts-law/alleged-port-potty-rape-throws-harsh-glare-california-coed-prison-law-after\">port-a-potty rape\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s because, as soon as the Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act went into effect, an anti-trans organization called the Women’s Liberation Front started working to roll it back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In November 2021, it filed \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22276203-chandlervcdcrcomplaint\">a lawsuit (DOC)\u003c/a> in federal court alleging the law violates the constitutional rights of cisgender women by forcing them to be housed with trans women who still have male genitalia. Simply having them there, the pending suit alleges, “substantially” increases the risk “of sexual harassment, sexual assault, rape, and physical violence, and to psychological fear of such harms.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Women’s Liberation Front was looking for a villain. The rumors about Skylit fit its narrative perfectly. Even though there were no eyewitnesses, no prison investigation and a girlfriend who \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22276218-43-3-asia-davis-declaration\">said the rape never happened (DOC)\u003c/a>, attorneys for the organization gathered hearsay declarations. The attorney handed them over to anti-trans websites and \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22276220-decl-of-plaintiff-supporter-mimi-lee-alleging-rape-of-ad-in-opposition-to-dismissal-033113109979\">attached them to a motion in the legal docket (DOC)\u003c/a>, making the declarations public record.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the tier in solitary confinement, the taunts of “porta-potty rapist” have been endless.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label='More on LGBTQI+ Rights' tag='transgender-rights']“I tell people, stop calling me that,” Skylit said. “Then, I’m a problem because I say things like, ‘Well, if I’m a rapist, then you a rapist,’ and then it’s like, ‘Oh, now he’s a threat, he’s arguing, he’s aggressive.’ I’m in a cage. By myself.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit said cisgender incarcerated people have threatened to stab her, even chop off her penis. They’ve done it in front of officers without consequence. Yet just about every time she has erupted with verbal threats, she is written up. Prison officials have used the outbursts, and the enemies she’s made, as justification to keep her in solitary confinement, labeling her a “threat to the management and security of the institution.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some prisoners in solitary confinement — what CDCR calls restricted housing — are allowed cellmates for company. Skylit has had to cell alone. Some are allowed onto an open yard. But Skylit was designated a potential threat to others, so she has had to exercise in a cage that’s about 12-by-8 feet, often surrounded by other incarcerated people who insult her. When she attends her mental health groups, she is among those who must sit in a cage the size of a telephone booth called a “therapeutic module.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Multiple \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6987940/\">studies \u003c/a>confirm how damaging long-term solitary confinement is to mental health. So it’s no surprise that Skylit has struggled. Records show she has harmed herself on several occasions, once punching the wall until her hand bled. After that incident, for a few weeks in August 2022, she was medicated against her will with high doses of antipsychotic drugs. Too drugged to mount a defense, she was found guilty of multiple rule violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A judge determined the prison violated her civil rights by force-medicating her. For Skylit, it was an important victory. But the whole experience eroded her faith in the prison mental health system. As the months ticked by, she went off all her medications — not just the hormones, but also the ones that treat depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Shattered trust\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>It’s important to note that many cisgender incarcerated people at CCWF with histories of sexual victimization were truly scared of the newly arriving transgender women. Some still are. The fear-mongering from staff and outside anti-trans groups has not helped. But those fears appear to be unfounded.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED requested discipline data from CCWF. In the two years after the new law took effect, staff did not issue a single rule violation for physical or sexual violence to the trans women who came over from men’s prisons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, write-ups for violence were common in the rest of the prison population, including for fighting, assault and battery on prisoners and staff, and even inciting a riot. The data also show that the new arrivals under the law were six times more likely than other CCWF prisoners to be punished for behavior that could lead to consensual sex.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As it happens, there was a violent predator at CCWF. Allegedly, there was more than one and they weren’t transgender women. They were cisgender men, employees of the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In May 2023, as Skylit struggled to hold onto herself in her solitary cell, she heard the news that Gregory Rodriguez, a longtime guard at CCWF, was facing a 96-count criminal complaint for allegedly sexually assaulting more than a dozen incarcerated women over the course of years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’d been allowed to retire in August 2022 while under investigation. In addition to those charges, six women filed lawsuits under Jane Roe or Jane Doe pseudonyms against Rodriguez in federal court, contending he lured them to a suite of offices where there are no cameras and forcibly raped them. One of these alleged assaults took place on May 20, 2022, the same day that the crowd surrounded Skylit and called \u003cem>her\u003c/em> a rapist.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CDCR \u003ca href=\"https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/crime/article280162624.html\">settled those suits\u003c/a> earlier this month for $3.7 million. More lawsuits have been filed alleging sexual assaults by CCWF employees. Four of the named victims are transgender women, Skylit among them. Her \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24018568-skylitsexabusecomplaintaug14_2023\">lawsuit (DOC)\u003c/a> contends that Rodriguez and Pallares, the warden who called her a predator, each demanded sexual favors from her in the spring of 2022 “for the purpose of humiliating, degrading and demeaning” her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For him to have me come into that room, it’s just so dirty,” Skylit said. “I feel dirty.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pallares was demoted in January after the Rodriguez scandal broke. Currently, an associate warden at Pleasant Valley State Prison, he declined comment. Prison officials wouldn’t say whether Pallares was under investigation. But in a statement, officials said CDCR investigates all sexual assault allegations, and “resolutely condemns any staff member who violates their oath and shatters the trust of the public.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Syiaah Skylit, transgender woman in California prison\"]‘I don’t even understand who I am anymore. I’m full of anger. Hatred, ooh, hatred is huge for me right now. I’m lost, I’m completely lost.’[/pullquote]The totality of Skylit’s experience has left \u003cem>her \u003c/em>shattered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They come to my door every day asking me if I want to take my hormones. No, I don’t want to take no hormones,” she told KQED in March after 10 months of isolation. “I don’t even understand who I am anymore. I’m full of anger. Hatred, ooh, hatred is huge for me right now. I’m lost, I’m completely lost.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Spending more than two years in solitary confinement means she hasn’t had access to the kind of programming that would earn her good-time credits and earlier release, like school, work and vocational training. She has never laid a finger on another prisoner or an officer, but her disciplinary write-ups have nevertheless added more than a year to her original 16-year sentence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prison officials are again recommending that Skylit be returned to a men’s prison. It requires a hearing that’s already been postponed for 17 months. She’s flip-flopped on whether to go back voluntarily. Being stuck in a box is destroying her, she said, and getting back into the general population may help her get out sooner. But with being falsely labeled a rapist, she’s terrified.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They will kill me,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If she does end up back in men’s prison, she shared in an emotional phone call, she plans to keep her gender identity secret. To prepare for the possibility, she started working out so she could fight for her life. She sold her earrings. And she cut off all her hair. She’d been growing it out for more than eight years, ever since those trans women in county jail lit a fire inside her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Making herself “bald-headed” as she said, was a painful act of surrender.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit also threw away the trans-friendly children’s books she’d worked so hard to bring to life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I told myself, I’m not gonna get emotional or emo with this stuff no more,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A path forward\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>California’s law was meant to protect transgender women, but the culture at CCWF and rising anti-trans fervor all over the country have exposed them to new traumas. Implementation has been slow. A \u003ca href=\"https://www.oig.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Special-Review-No.-22-01.pdf\">report (PDF)\u003c/a> issued in late August by the current inspector general noted a “significant backlog” in transfer requests.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of nearly 400 incarcerated people who’ve requested housing transfers under the law — the vast majority transgender women asking to move to women’s prison — more than 300 are still waiting for a committee to hear their case. Many live in daily fear of sexual and physical assault, said A.D. Lewis, an attorney who runs Trans Beyond Bars, a project for the Berkeley-based Prison Law Office.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A transgender man, Lewis regularly communicates with trans-incarcerated people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The three dozen or so trans women who made it to CCWF — most during the first six months of implementation — are the vanguard. Many, like Skylit, have suffered. A small number have been transferred to the California Institution for Women, a lower security prison in San Bernardino County, where they say conditions are slightly better.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Jen Orthwein, forensic psychologist, co-founder of Medina Orthwein LLP\"]‘These systems are so built to destroy people, and if they survive and get out, they’re not better and they’re often much worse.’[/pullquote]In a statement, CDCR said it is working to implement some of the changes \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24016207-mossgroup-sb132-cdcr-assessment-report\">recommended by outside consultants (DOC)\u003c/a> earlier this year and is committed to providing “a safe, humane, respectful and rehabilitative environment for all incarcerated people, including the transgender, non-binary and intersex community.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Advocates acknowledge that the cycles of harm continue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Instead of respecting trans people’s self-determination and prioritizing their safety, as the law requires,” Lewis said, correctional staff and other incarcerated people have used it “to put a target on trans peoples’ back.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Shortly after prison officials received KQED’s questions for this story in September, CCWF revoked all phone privileges for Skylit and others in solitary confinement. In an email to KQED after the initial publication of this story, a CDCR official said the revocation of phone privileges was a policy change ending what had been a temporary, more liberal phone privileges policy instituted in the early days of the COVID pandemic. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit’s attorney worries about the impact of the trauma on her future.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These systems are so built to destroy people, and if they survive and get out, they’re not better and they’re often much worse,” Orthwein said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a letter sent in July 2023 to Newsom, nearly two-dozen advocacy and legal organizations pressing for better treatment for transgender, nonbinary and intersex prisoners \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23991938-tni-coalition-letter-to-governor-newsom-71723pdf-2\">urged clemency (DOC)\u003c/a> for those who have experienced harm in prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wiener, meanwhile, expressed deep frustration with the pace of implementation. In response to KQED’s findings, he said he was “horrified to hear how trans women are being treated in women’s prison, both by the prisons and by other inmates. The fact that they’re being treated harshly and slandered, called rapists when they’re not, it’s terrifying and we’re not going to just let this go.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Lee Romney is a longtime journalist who spent 23 years at the \u003c/em>Los Angeles Times\u003cem>. Jennifer Johnson is a former career public defender who helped launch San Francisco’s Behavioral Health Court. This reporting, supported by the Fund for Investigative Journalism and the California Health Care Foundation, is part of a forthcoming podcast they’re co-creating. Called \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.novemberinmysoul.com/\">\u003cem>November In My Soul\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>, it explores the way bias makes its way into our intertwined mental health and criminal legal systems.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story has been updated.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Warning: There are descriptions of physical and sexual violence in this piece. Also, where legal names and chosen names differ, we’re using chosen names.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__dropcapShortcode__dropcap\">S\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>yiaah Skylit had been stuck in solitary confinement at a maximum-security men’s prison for months when, in the fall of 2020, she got the news that gave her hope: Gov. Gavin Newsom had signed the \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB132\">Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Authored by state Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), the law requires California prison staff to use the chosen pronouns of incarcerated people who are intersex or identify as nonbinary or transgender, as Skylit does.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It allows those incarcerated people to \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdcr.ca.gov/prea/sb-132-faqs/\">select a gender preference for the guards who search them\u003c/a>. Most significantly, it mandates that prison officials, under most circumstances, honor requests to be housed at the type of facility — male or female — that aligns with the incarcerated person’s gender identity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For six years, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation bounced Skylit from one men’s prison to another. At each, safety proved elusive. By 2020, she was isolated in a cell for her own protection after brutal attacks by people she was incarcerated with and, \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23991903-syiaahkvsp2ndamendedcomplaint2022-03-03\">a lawsuit alleges (PDF)\u003c/a>, by guards.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The prospect of serving out her remaining sentence in a women’s facility seemed nothing short of a miracle.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For me, what it felt like was a sanctuary,” she said in one of several dozen interviews with KQED over the course of a year. “A place to be who you were meant to be without any retaliation, without any violence, without any judgment.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Decades have passed since simply \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11917624/how-a-young-gay-man-survived-one-of-the-darkest-eras-in-california-queer-history\">being LGBTQ+ was considered a crime and a mental illness\u003c/a>. But bias and marginalization still lead to high rates of criminalization, especially for \u003ca href=\"https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/resources/NTDS_Report.pdf\">Black trans women (PDF)\u003c/a> like Skylit. Once incarcerated, harsh prison conditions take a serious toll on mental health.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://cpb-us-e2.wpmucdn.com/sites.uci.edu/dist/0/1149/files/2013/06/BulletinVol2Issue2.pdf\">Studies (PDF)\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://transequality.org/sites/default/files/docs/usts/USTS%20Full%20Report%20-%20FINAL%201.6.17.pdf\">surveys (PDF)\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/pdca15.pdf\">federal data (PDF)\u003c/a> show that trans women held in men’s prisons are sexually and physically assaulted at rates as much as 13 times higher than cisgender men. When they report assaults or fears for their safety, they’re often met with \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23991938-tni-coalition-letter-to-governor-newsom-71723pdf-2\">staff retaliation (PDF)\u003c/a>. It’s not uncommon for trans women to harm themselves — just to get to the safety of a prison mental health bed. Skylit had lived that, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act promised an end to those nightmares.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No more having to hide in fear,” Skylit said. “No more having to be quiet about who I really am. I was excited. I couldn’t wait.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This story is a result of a year-long investigation into the effectiveness of the legislation that aimed to reduce the trauma of transgender women in California’s prisons. KQED’s reporters interviewed a dozen incarcerated people and reviewed data along with several hundred pages of prison grievances, disciplinary records and legal filings. The reporting revealed that trans women like Skylit and many others transferred to a women’s prison under the new law have not found the sanctuary they were seeking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For Skylit, the nightmares have only gotten worse.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Living with secrets\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Skylit grew up in Compton. When she was 5, she and her siblings entered the foster care system after their mother suffered a mental health break. When Skylit was 14, her mother died by apparent suicide, and the following year, she said, “I tried to kill myself by running in front of a moving train.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She was physically uninjured but sent to a psychiatric hospital. It wouldn’t be the last time she’d tried to take her own life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11964099\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11964099\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED-800x949.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"949\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED-800x949.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED-1020x1210.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED-160x190.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED-1295x1536.jpg 1295w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/Free-Syiaah-social-KQED.jpg 1686w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">In August 2020, as Syiaah Skylit sat in solitary confinement at Kern Valley State Prison for her own protection, transgender advocates launched a Change.org campaign urging clemency for her. She helped with the design of the artwork. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Syiaah Skylit, Micah Bazant and Freddie Francis)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Skylit is a slight 5 feet, 5 inches tall with a big, dimpled smile. As a teen and living as a boy, she was bullied for being a flashy dresser, for the way she carried herself. She experimented with a gay relationship, but it left her feeling “confused.” The adults in her life were religious and viewed LGBTQ+ people as sinners. Her brothers were gang members. She did what they asked of her, she said, because “I didn’t want to look weak.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I couldn’t come out and be myself around people like my family and my friends that I grew up with,” Skylit said. “I grew up in a hard-ass neighborhood. That ain’t about to fly.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, she harbored a secret she never shared with her brothers, one even she didn’t fully comprehend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I would dress up. I would put makeup on. All I understood as a person was, ‘Hey, I like this,’” she said. “So if I like this, why is it so bad? Am I a bad person?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A stint in juvenile detention didn’t stop Skylit from setting her sights on a bright future. She finished high school on time, enrolled in community college, worked multiple jobs and, for a while, paid her rent. But anxiety, depression and drug use interrupted her stability. She’d already been homeless once when, facing eviction in 2012, she and a friend robbed a convenience store in San Bernardino County. It yielded little, so they robbed a Los Angeles County jewelry store — and got caught.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At 22, Skylit was facing criminal trials in both counties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Her first stop was a San Bernardino County jail, where she came out as gay to get to the relative safety of what was then called the “alternative lifestyles tank.” According to a \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23999484-syiaah2015sanbernardinocolawsuit\">class-action lawsuit (DOC)\u003c/a>, the conditions were distressing: discrimination by staff and denial of basic services. Skylit, under her legal name, was among the named plaintiffs. A settlement led to \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24002812-sanbernardinoinjunctiverelief\">significant reforms (DOC)\u003c/a>. It was in that jail, she said, where she first learned to advocate for her rights, even in the face of retaliation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s also where she first encountered openly transgender women and was blown away by their courage and joyful confidence. In their midst, Skylit said, she at last felt free of judgment, open to self-acceptance. Her next stop — a stint in the segregated LGBTQ+ tank at the Los Angeles County jail — only reinforced those feelings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s when I got a taste of all the ‘T’ and I was just living it,” she said of the ‘T’ for Transgender in the alphabet soup of LGBTQ+. “It was like discovering myself.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She was sentenced to 16 years in prison. It may seem paradoxical, but incarceration gave Skylit breathing room to explore her gender identity. In court, she apologized to her robbery victims. Then, she made a promise to herself to use “every second, every minute” of her time inside “to really find out who I am. I mean, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that I felt I had.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit entered California’s prison system for men in December 2015. Soon, she chose her new name. “Syiaah” is an acronym — sexy, young, intelligent, ambitious, authentic and heroic. She picked “Sky” as “an inspiration to reach higher limits.” And “lit” is a nod to her hip-hop Compton roots “to be vibrant, live.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Put it together, it’s ‘I keep the sky lit’,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In keeping with the up-to-date \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24002874-ama-medical-spectrum-of-gender-d-295312\">medical (DOC)\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.psychiatry.org/psychiatrists/diversity/education/transgender-and-gender-nonconforming-patients\">psychiatric\u003c/a> understanding of gender identity, the Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act doesn’t require incarcerated people to be on hormone replacement therapy or to be interested in gender-affirming surgeries to be transferred to housing that aligns with their sense of safety. During Skylit’s early years in prison, that wasn’t the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation \u003cem>did\u003c/em> consider such transfer requests. The federal Prison Rape Elimination Act had since 2012 \u003ca href=\"https://www.prearesourcecenter.org/frequently-asked-questions/does-policy-houses-transgender-or-intersex-inmates-based-exclusively\">forbidden\u003c/a> the department from housing prisoners based solely on external genital anatomy. But the CDCR did it on a case-by-case basis, and the tiny number granted all happened to be for trans women who’d had gender-affirming genital surgery.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Not everybody wants that. Gender identity and gender transition are deeply personal. Skylit’s records show she declared her transgender identity on a special CDCR form about a year after arrival — and soon after started \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24018578-skylit-2019-housing-complaint\">asking to be transferred to a women’s prison (DOC)\u003c/a>. That went nowhere. So Skylit worked to stay true to her transition, even as she was funneled through a series of men’s prisons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When I tapped into it, despite the long time I was facing, I was happy,” she said. “But that happiness turned into survival real fast.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Met by violence\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Almost immediately, Skylit’s gender identity and small stature made her a target. On several occasions, she said, correctional officers placed her in cells with large men who specifically requested her and then pressured her for sex. When she filed grievances in an attempt to switch cells or responded to physical assaults by fighting, she said, staff responded with Rule Violation Reports, known as RVRs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The more I would push back,” she said, “the more they would attack me with RVRs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, Skylit pressed on. She requested hormone replacement therapy, and by the time those treatments started, in 2018, she’d been moved to Mule Creek State Prison near the small Sierra foothills town of Ione. It’s one of a dozen or so facilities in the state designated as “transgender hubs.” That means, medical and mental services for trans prisoners are concentrated there, as are prison commissary items unavailable elsewhere, such as sports bras and makeup for trans women, and boxer shorts for trans men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit could finally stop MacGyvering her fashion looks. She could style her hair, wear makeup and earrings. On the prison yard, she said she found a sense of belonging with her trans sisters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We were out there,” she said. “Having fun, protecting each other.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But even at men’s prisons designated as transgender hubs, trans women were mixed with cisgender men in common areas and their assigned cells. The truer Skylit felt to herself, she said, the greater the danger she experienced.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Yeah, it’s OK to come out and you got a nice little outfit on, but guess what you just did?” she said. “You just called attention to yourself and now you have certain people who are making sexual advances towards you, and some of them don’t stop.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of her trans sisters exchanged sex for safety. But even that was no guarantee of safety. Skylit wept while recounting how a close friend staggered out of her cell “with a huge gash in her skull, busted lip, trying to get out of the room that she placed herself in because she wanted to be \u003cem>herself\u003c/em>. And she couldn’t complain to the officers, because they’re not gonna do anything.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>So Skylit found herself facing a soul-crushing choice between her safety and her identity. Skylit drew a line against assault. That meant more fights and more disciplinary write-ups. The hormone treatments caused muscle weakness, so she made another compromise. She began stopping and starting the medications depending on the danger she was facing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Either I’m gonna be who I wanna be or I’m gonna end up dead,” she said. “Girl, I can’t be dead and be myself at the same time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a survival strategy it made sense, but abruptly going on and off hormones brings on acute mood swings. It also heightens \u003ca href=\"https://www.psychiatry.org/psychiatrists/diversity/education/transgender-and-gender-nonconforming-patients/gender-dysphoria-diagnosis\">gender dysphoria\u003c/a>, a mental health diagnosis associated with distress a person can feel at being a gender other than the one assigned at birth. Skylit had experienced that for most of her life, as she hid her true gender identity, and it caused depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Skylit juggled these stressors, prison officials transferred her again — this time to Kern Valley State Prison, a maximum-security facility in the Central Valley town of Delano that houses some of the state’s most violent offenders. Among them, transgender advocates \u003ca href=\"https://prisonhealth.news/2021/10/29/lgbtq-prison-testimonies-dakota-rose-in-california/\">note\u003c/a>, are gang members known to target LGBTQ+ people in prisons. That’s where she \u003ca href=\"https://sfbayview.com/2021/05/trans-woman-seeks-release-from-cdcr-custody-after-attacks/\">hit a new low\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Skylit and a \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23991903-syiaahkvsp2ndamendedcomplaint2022-03-03\">lawsuit filed on her behalf (DOC),\u003c/a> she was assaulted twice by incarcerated men and witnessed gruesome attacks on two other trans women. Terrified, she says she asked to speak to a sergeant about her safety concerns. Instead, she alleges, two officers followed her into her cell. One pulled down her pants, ran a baton along her bottom and threatened to rape her with it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And I’m just sitting there like this can’t be real,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>That night, she drank from a bottle of laundry detergent in a desperate attempt to get sent to a mental health crisis unit. An officer stripped her of her clothes and left her lying naked in her cell next to the empty bottle. The next day, an officer pepper sprayed her at close range. Others beat her with batons. CDCR does not comment on active litigation. In legal filings, the named officers have denied wrongdoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Finally, Skylit said, a sergeant agreed to isolate her for her protection. That’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.vera.org/news/violence-torture-and-isolation-what-its-like-to-be-trans-in-prison\">a common fate for trans women\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s sad to be thankful for complete solitary confinement, isolation,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She would stay there for seven months.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit had sought help from various attorneys. One responded. Jen Orthwein is a forensic psychologist who once treated transgender clients behind prison walls. They later co-founded a queer-owned law firm to challenge the harsh conditions they’d witnessed. Orthwein worked with other transgender advocates to launch a \u003ca href=\"https://www.change.org/p/gavin-newsom-call-for-the-immediate-release-of-syiaah-skylit-from-cdcr-custody-blacktranslivesmatter?utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=custom_url&recruited_by_id=cc830240-3ea3-11e9-a4df-e5579d49cec9\">petition\u003c/a> for clemency on Skylit’s behalf.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, with colored pencils and paper, Skylit got to work crafting a series of illustrated \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24018571-its-a-colorful-world-by-syiaah-skylit\">children’s books (DOC)\u003c/a> featuring gender-non-conforming characters. Among them is a rainbow-colored kid named Unique, who is fully embraced by loving parents but bullied on the playground for delighting in toys conventionally meant for both boys and girls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The project helped Skylit reimagine her traumatic past. She also hoped her books might make their way into the world and change the mindset of young readers “to where they’re not growing into hatred, but actually out of it.” She finished two, got started on a third. And that’s where she was when Orthewin gave her the good news. The Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act was state law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11964104\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11964104\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"Scans of two pages of drawing and text from a hand written book.\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/231011-ITS-A-COLORFUL-WORLD-2-KQED.jpg 2000w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Excerpts from ‘It’s a Colorful World.’ \u003ccite>(Courtesy of Syiaah Skylit)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It was like a prayer had been answered,” Skylit said. “Like, ‘This is it!’ This is going to be the beginning of Syiaah Skylit at her best, at completely being herself.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>New perils\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Wiener’s bill was years in the making, and he’s quick to note that top CDCR officials were on board. They welcomed advocates to join a working group to brainstorm solutions to unsafe conditions and sought input directly from incarcerated transgender people. The Office of Inspector General detailed in \u003ca href=\"https://www.oig.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Special-Review-Incarcerated-Transgender-Nonbinary-Intersex-Individuals.pdf\">a 2020 report (PDF)\u003c/a> the painful responses to those surveys.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Laws in \u003ca href=\"https://www.acluct.org/en/know-your-rights/know-your-rights-trans-people-who-are-incarcerated-connecticut\">Connecticut\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23991974-952-management-of-gender-diverse-and-intersex-inmates-final-version\">Rhode Island (DOC)\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://lgbtqbar.org/bar-news/tiproject/ma/\">Massachusetts\u003c/a> call for similar reforms, while \u003ca href=\"https://www.aclu-nj.org/en/press-releases/settlement-nj-civil-rights-suit-promises-necessary-reform-affirming-transgender\">New Jersey\u003c/a> has made comparable policy changes in response to litigation. But advocates who helped craft California’s law say it is the most expansive.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wiener said in an interview that he knew at the start that the magnitude of changes mandated by the law required patience and that it would take time to implement. More recently, though, he’s grown deeply concerned about the way his legislation has played out on the ground. Because, he said, even with senior CDCR management on board, “the culture in the individual prisons is just so challenging that it doesn’t translate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11964100\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11964100\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-800x539.jpg\" alt='A group of people, most wearing the same uniform of blue shirts and pants, stand together holding signs and joined by a person wearing a suit helping to hold a banner reading \"trans lives matter.\"' width=\"800\" height=\"539\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-800x539.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-1020x687.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-160x108.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-1536x1035.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED-1920x1294.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/10/SenWienerAtSanQuentinTransRemembranceDay-2019-KQED.jpg 2000w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) attends CDCR’s first Transgender Remembrance Day in 2019, organized jointly by trans and cisgender incarcerated people. Wiener had already authored the bill that would become the Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act, with buy-in from top CDCR officials. \u003ccite>(California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Officials chose the Central California Women’s Facility, or CCWF, in Chowchilla as the prison where all the trans women would go first. It’s a facility with a \u003ca href=\"https://prisonlaw.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/16.08.18-Prison-Law-Office-report-on-CCWF.pdf\">troubled history (PDF)\u003c/a> when it comes to staff accountability.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of a dozen CCWF prisoners interviewed by KQED, all said they heard correctional staff express hostility to the new law even before the transfers began, warning the cisgender population that fakers and sexual predators were heading their way.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tasha Brown, a cisgender woman, said she heard guards say, “The doors were going to be open for people to come in to violate us, to rape us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tomas Green, a transgender man, said he heard guards “telling women here that the trans women were men and that they were gonna get raped.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Alexanne Danis, a cisgender woman, said she heard a lieutenant openly state that the transfers “don’t belong here, that they have to leave.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Officers and fellow cisgender incarcerated people, Danis said, also spoke about driving the new transfers out, “saying that they were gonna stage stuff and that they were gonna make it sound worse than it was if anything did happen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Michelle Calvin was one of the first transgender women to arrive at CCWF. She helped work on Wiener’s legislation and has since transferred to the lower-security California Institution for Women. She heard the characterizations by staff that trans women were “gonna come over here and rape y’all and beat y’all up and take y’all stuff.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The power to reverse the law, she heard officers tell incarcerated people, rested in their hands: “Take your house back. Take your prison back.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Advocates who helped craft the law were well aware of this toxic environment. They say they pressed officials to allow them to hold a town hall at the women’s prison to defuse these narratives before the transfers began. It never happened.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, the trans women who began arriving in the first half of 2021 had no idea what they were stepping into.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Orthwein, Skylit’s attorney, was part of the working group that informed the new law and said key CDCR decisions around implementation proved harmful. The new arrivals were held in segregation for their first month. There, they were issued new prison identification numbers beginning with a distinctive two-letter combination. Instead of “some semblance of privacy about their transgender status,” which advocates had pressed for, this immediately outed them, feeding hostility and rejection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CCWF houses people in dorms, as many as eight to a room. Without exception, the trans women interviewed by KQED said they have been refused entry to dorms by prisoners who viewed them as “men.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Skylit’s first day in the general population, in mid-July 2021, guards started writing her up for minor violations. Within a month, she was in solitary confinement, accused of having a consensual relationship with her cisgender female bunkmate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sex is against prison rules systemwide, but every CCWF prisoner interviewed for this piece said it’s extremely common, especially in women’s prisons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘At the end of the day, we’re humans. I’m not saying every relationship in here is just peachy perfect, no. You have a lot of relationships in here that are toxic — fight, argue. But that’s life in the free world.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“Yes, you’re not supposed to have sex but it happens. It’s natural and there’s nothing that’s gonna stop it from happening,” said Giovanni Gonzales, a transgender man who runs a group to educate peers about gender identity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Relationships form quickly.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At the end of the day, we’re humans,” Green said. “I’m not saying every relationship in here is just peachy perfect, no. You have a lot of relationships in here that are toxic — fight, argue. But that’s life in the free world.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, while sex and intimacy may be universal, punishment is not.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gonzales and Green said staff often turn a blind eye to cisgender women who couple up, especially if they express their gender in stereotypically feminine ways. If a transgender man is caught being amorous, they said, a rule violation is more likely. As for the trans women who were just arriving at CCWF, a harsher set of unwritten rules seemed to apply.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One cisgender couple in Skylit’s dorm had been having regular sex without consequence, she said. As Skylit was handcuffed and written up for her relationship, she asked an officer why she was going to isolation and the bunkmate wasn’t. He replied, “Because you’re a man and she’s a woman.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At a hearing to discuss her situation, records show that Acting Warden Michael Pallares told her he would push to send her back to men’s prison. She claimed he was hostile, “calling me a predator, saying that I’m preying on women.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In men’s prison, Skylit had lived in constant fear of sexual assault. Now \u003cem>she \u003c/em>was cast as a sexual predator. Her disciplinary paperwork relied on “confidential sources” to suggest she was faking her status because she “displays very masculine behavior when with the inmate population.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In isolation, according to grievances and a government claim filed by Orthwein, Skylit’s gender identity was undermined. She had trouble accessing her hormones and was denied a razor for 40 days straight. She grew a full beard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People screaming at me, yelling at me, calling me a man, and I need to go back to the men’s prison,” she said. “‘Look at the hair on yo’ face.’ [I was] pleading, pleading, pleading, ‘Please give me a razor, please give me a razor,’ and denied every time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A psychologist misgendered Skylit in a report, yet \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24018435-psychologist-note-razors-clothing\">noted (DOC)\u003c/a> that an extended stay in isolation would likely increase her mental health symptoms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the months that followed, Skylit was sent multiple times to a mental health unit for being suicidal. She was bumped up to a more intensive level of mental health care. Yet she remained in solitary confinement for eight months. Then, without explanation, Pallares released her to the general population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her freedom wouldn’t last.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘What did you all do to our homegirl?’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Skylit’s time in isolation had taken a toll. On the yard, she said she made enemies when she responded to threats and harassment with aggressive posturing and language. She said she tried not to engage, hanging out and playing cards every day with a couple of other trans women and one cisgender woman who was sweet on her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We would hold hands,” she said. “We would hug, we would kiss.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prison officials aren’t supposed to penalize trans women more harshly for breaking rules that cisgender prisoners also break, like the one forbidding any behavior that could lead to sex. But the atmosphere around these relationships, interviews and records reveal, was tense and complex.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While some cisgender women feared or lashed out at the new arrivals, others were eager to partner with them. Of a half-dozen transgender women at CCWF who were interviewed by KQED, the five who have not had gender-affirming genital surgery, said they’ve been subject to sexual advances.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Meanwhile, \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24016207-mossgroup-sb132-cdcr-assessment-report\">a report (DOC)\u003c/a> on the implementation of the new law commissioned by CDCR found that a “sexualized environment, including being sexually pressured or pursued,” was among the reasons given by transgender women who voluntarily returned to men’s prison. Other reasons included “hostile reception from staff or incarcerated individuals,” “false allegations to be removed from room” and “issues with getting hygiene items, such as razors.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In men’s prison, Skylit said, consensual sex generally went unpunished. That made it hard for her to imagine just how much the bond with her new “bestie” would cost her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On May 19, 2022, Skylit and her friends were on the yard drinking prison-made wine, disciplinary records show. Skylit and her girlfriend were kissing. A few minutes after Skylit went to use the porta-potty, she said, the girlfriend followed her in and started throwing up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit said she was holding her hair back when Calvin, one of the trans friends she played cards with, let her know a guard was approaching. Skylit stepped out and asked a couple of other people to check on the girlfriend.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They “opened the door and they say, ‘What did you all do to our homegirl? We don’t know what you two doing, we don’t know what’s going on over here,’” Skylit recounted. “And I said, ‘We just been drinking and she was in the thing throwing up.’ But now, it’s a commotion. It’s a crowd coming up.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Skylit and two other witnesses, the girlfriend came out, and the guard scolded them. “She was like, ‘I’m OK bestie, I love you so much,’ and I hugged her and I walked away.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rumors about a rape started circulating. Skylit said she heard it “from like one or two people. It wasn’t \u003cem>big\u003c/em> until the next day.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘They were surrounding me and pushing me and spitting on me and swinging at me.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>By then, a fictional narrative had taken shape: In those few moments inside the porta-potty, Skylit had committed rape, while Calvin stood guard. To be clear, prison officials never accused her of rape or sexual assault. The girlfriend told them — and KQED — that it never happened. Still, the rumors proved to be Skylit’s undoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That next day, according to Skylit and five witnesses, as she was returning from a mental health appointment, she was roughed up on the yard by 12 to 15 incarcerated people who called her “nothing but a rapist.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They were surrounding me and pushing me and spitting on me and swinging at me,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED obtained video of the incident through a public records request. There’s no audio, but the grainy image shows Skylit, who had a pass to be on the yard, doing an about-face as a group of incarcerated people in civilian clothes approached her. One appears to throw liquid at her. A few shove and punch her. She gets agitated. At one point, it’s clear that she’s yelling. But she mostly keeps her arms crossed. She never hits back. Still, she is the only one punished.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/nS5qpi-NXfE'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/nS5qpi-NXfE'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>As Syiaah Skylit, wearing a long-sleeved white shirt under her prison blues, walked through the yard at Central California Women’s Facility in May 2022, she was accosted by incarcerated people who accused her of being a rapist. Courtesy of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She’d been out of solitary confinement for just four weeks. She went right back in — and she hasn’t come out in more than a year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A sergeant who, the video shows, does not walk out to the yard until Skylit is handcuffed, wrote her \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24018553-referring-to-sexual-intercourse-through-rape\">rule violation report (DOC)\u003c/a>. He states that he heard her yell, “I’m gonna f- you bitches,” and a few variations on that theme. Then, using her legal name, he adds an editorial aside: “It should be known that when [Skylit] mentioned f-, [Skylit] was referring to sexual intercourse through rape.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CCWF initially accused Skylit of “threatening the life of a prisoner,” and referred her to the local district attorney for felony prosecution. It didn’t stick. Ultimately, her writeup was reduced to “behavior which could lead to violence.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>In her defense, Skylit pointed to the video as evidence that she wasn’t the aggressor and that others had committed violence against \u003cem>her.\u003c/em> Records show that the senior hearing officer called the video “irrelevant.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CDCR does not comment on specific incarcerated people. Asked to respond to the behavior of the sergeant, it said state regulations forbid discrimination by staff and grant incarcerated people the right to be treated “respectfully, impartially, and fairly by all employees.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit was far from alone in experiencing false allegations. Of the trans women at CCWF interviewed by KQED, each said they had been similarly targeted by others who were incarcerated and even by staff. Most were sent to solitary confinement pending investigations. Some were already there when they said they were framed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fancy Lipsey, records show, spent seven months in isolation after she was physically assaulted by other incarcerated people. As soon as she got out, a cisgender woman “went over to the officers and told them that I touched her vagina and her breasts in the dayroom.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They reviewed the video on the spot “and saw that I was nowhere near this woman.” Still, they told Lipsey they were taking her back to solitary confinement. That’s when she cut her wrists, ending up on suicide watch instead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Calvin said she was punished after a roommate “went up to the program office and said I supposedly choked” another cisgender woman in their dorm in the middle of the night. The allegation came days after the alleged assault, which no one witnessed or reported at the time. Calvin said it took months to clear her name.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tremayne Carroll, a trans woman who uses a wheelchair, said that after she rebuffed sexual advances from a cisgender woman, that woman yelled to guards that Carroll had sexually assaulted her. When that went nowhere, the woman changed her story and said the two had had consensual sex.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Freddy Fox, an intersex prisoner who identifies as a trans woman and goes by “Foxy,” said she landed in solitary confinement after being assaulted. Alone in her cell in the weeks that followed, she was verbally harassed and accused of sexual impropriety.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They would allege that I had exposed myself, then I’d have to go to the cameras to show that I did not expose myself,” Foxy said. The officers would then reduce the write-up to a lesser violation, she said, “but it’s still a sexual misconduct! That was the go-to thing in 2021 when we first arrived.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘Porta-potty rapist’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Skylit’s case stands out in one crucial way: The false rape allegation went viral. Her chosen and legal names ended up all \u003ca href=\"https://reduxx.info/exclusive-female-inmate-reports-rape-occurred-in-california-womens-prison/\">over the internet.\u003c/a> One outlet called her the perpetrator of a “\u003ca href=\"https://justthenews.com/government/courts-law/alleged-port-potty-rape-throws-harsh-glare-california-coed-prison-law-after\">port-a-potty rape\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s because, as soon as the Transgender Respect, Agency and Dignity Act went into effect, an anti-trans organization called the Women’s Liberation Front started working to roll it back.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In November 2021, it filed \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22276203-chandlervcdcrcomplaint\">a lawsuit (DOC)\u003c/a> in federal court alleging the law violates the constitutional rights of cisgender women by forcing them to be housed with trans women who still have male genitalia. Simply having them there, the pending suit alleges, “substantially” increases the risk “of sexual harassment, sexual assault, rape, and physical violence, and to psychological fear of such harms.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Women’s Liberation Front was looking for a villain. The rumors about Skylit fit its narrative perfectly. Even though there were no eyewitnesses, no prison investigation and a girlfriend who \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22276218-43-3-asia-davis-declaration\">said the rape never happened (DOC)\u003c/a>, attorneys for the organization gathered hearsay declarations. The attorney handed them over to anti-trans websites and \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22276220-decl-of-plaintiff-supporter-mimi-lee-alleging-rape-of-ad-in-opposition-to-dismissal-033113109979\">attached them to a motion in the legal docket (DOC)\u003c/a>, making the declarations public record.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the tier in solitary confinement, the taunts of “porta-potty rapist” have been endless.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“I tell people, stop calling me that,” Skylit said. “Then, I’m a problem because I say things like, ‘Well, if I’m a rapist, then you a rapist,’ and then it’s like, ‘Oh, now he’s a threat, he’s arguing, he’s aggressive.’ I’m in a cage. By myself.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit said cisgender incarcerated people have threatened to stab her, even chop off her penis. They’ve done it in front of officers without consequence. Yet just about every time she has erupted with verbal threats, she is written up. Prison officials have used the outbursts, and the enemies she’s made, as justification to keep her in solitary confinement, labeling her a “threat to the management and security of the institution.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some prisoners in solitary confinement — what CDCR calls restricted housing — are allowed cellmates for company. Skylit has had to cell alone. Some are allowed onto an open yard. But Skylit was designated a potential threat to others, so she has had to exercise in a cage that’s about 12-by-8 feet, often surrounded by other incarcerated people who insult her. When she attends her mental health groups, she is among those who must sit in a cage the size of a telephone booth called a “therapeutic module.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Multiple \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6987940/\">studies \u003c/a>confirm how damaging long-term solitary confinement is to mental health. So it’s no surprise that Skylit has struggled. Records show she has harmed herself on several occasions, once punching the wall until her hand bled. After that incident, for a few weeks in August 2022, she was medicated against her will with high doses of antipsychotic drugs. Too drugged to mount a defense, she was found guilty of multiple rule violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A judge determined the prison violated her civil rights by force-medicating her. For Skylit, it was an important victory. But the whole experience eroded her faith in the prison mental health system. As the months ticked by, she went off all her medications — not just the hormones, but also the ones that treat depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Shattered trust\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>It’s important to note that many cisgender incarcerated people at CCWF with histories of sexual victimization were truly scared of the newly arriving transgender women. Some still are. The fear-mongering from staff and outside anti-trans groups has not helped. But those fears appear to be unfounded.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED requested discipline data from CCWF. In the two years after the new law took effect, staff did not issue a single rule violation for physical or sexual violence to the trans women who came over from men’s prisons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, write-ups for violence were common in the rest of the prison population, including for fighting, assault and battery on prisoners and staff, and even inciting a riot. The data also show that the new arrivals under the law were six times more likely than other CCWF prisoners to be punished for behavior that could lead to consensual sex.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As it happens, there was a violent predator at CCWF. Allegedly, there was more than one and they weren’t transgender women. They were cisgender men, employees of the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In May 2023, as Skylit struggled to hold onto herself in her solitary cell, she heard the news that Gregory Rodriguez, a longtime guard at CCWF, was facing a 96-count criminal complaint for allegedly sexually assaulting more than a dozen incarcerated women over the course of years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He’d been allowed to retire in August 2022 while under investigation. In addition to those charges, six women filed lawsuits under Jane Roe or Jane Doe pseudonyms against Rodriguez in federal court, contending he lured them to a suite of offices where there are no cameras and forcibly raped them. One of these alleged assaults took place on May 20, 2022, the same day that the crowd surrounded Skylit and called \u003cem>her\u003c/em> a rapist.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CDCR \u003ca href=\"https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/crime/article280162624.html\">settled those suits\u003c/a> earlier this month for $3.7 million. More lawsuits have been filed alleging sexual assaults by CCWF employees. Four of the named victims are transgender women, Skylit among them. Her \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24018568-skylitsexabusecomplaintaug14_2023\">lawsuit (DOC)\u003c/a> contends that Rodriguez and Pallares, the warden who called her a predator, each demanded sexual favors from her in the spring of 2022 “for the purpose of humiliating, degrading and demeaning” her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For him to have me come into that room, it’s just so dirty,” Skylit said. “I feel dirty.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pallares was demoted in January after the Rodriguez scandal broke. Currently, an associate warden at Pleasant Valley State Prison, he declined comment. Prison officials wouldn’t say whether Pallares was under investigation. But in a statement, officials said CDCR investigates all sexual assault allegations, and “resolutely condemns any staff member who violates their oath and shatters the trust of the public.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘I don’t even understand who I am anymore. I’m full of anger. Hatred, ooh, hatred is huge for me right now. I’m lost, I’m completely lost.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The totality of Skylit’s experience has left \u003cem>her \u003c/em>shattered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They come to my door every day asking me if I want to take my hormones. No, I don’t want to take no hormones,” she told KQED in March after 10 months of isolation. “I don’t even understand who I am anymore. I’m full of anger. Hatred, ooh, hatred is huge for me right now. I’m lost, I’m completely lost.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Spending more than two years in solitary confinement means she hasn’t had access to the kind of programming that would earn her good-time credits and earlier release, like school, work and vocational training. She has never laid a finger on another prisoner or an officer, but her disciplinary write-ups have nevertheless added more than a year to her original 16-year sentence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prison officials are again recommending that Skylit be returned to a men’s prison. It requires a hearing that’s already been postponed for 17 months. She’s flip-flopped on whether to go back voluntarily. Being stuck in a box is destroying her, she said, and getting back into the general population may help her get out sooner. But with being falsely labeled a rapist, she’s terrified.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They will kill me,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If she does end up back in men’s prison, she shared in an emotional phone call, she plans to keep her gender identity secret. To prepare for the possibility, she started working out so she could fight for her life. She sold her earrings. And she cut off all her hair. She’d been growing it out for more than eight years, ever since those trans women in county jail lit a fire inside her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Making herself “bald-headed” as she said, was a painful act of surrender.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit also threw away the trans-friendly children’s books she’d worked so hard to bring to life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I told myself, I’m not gonna get emotional or emo with this stuff no more,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>A path forward\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>California’s law was meant to protect transgender women, but the culture at CCWF and rising anti-trans fervor all over the country have exposed them to new traumas. Implementation has been slow. A \u003ca href=\"https://www.oig.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Special-Review-No.-22-01.pdf\">report (PDF)\u003c/a> issued in late August by the current inspector general noted a “significant backlog” in transfer requests.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Of nearly 400 incarcerated people who’ve requested housing transfers under the law — the vast majority transgender women asking to move to women’s prison — more than 300 are still waiting for a committee to hear their case. Many live in daily fear of sexual and physical assault, said A.D. Lewis, an attorney who runs Trans Beyond Bars, a project for the Berkeley-based Prison Law Office.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A transgender man, Lewis regularly communicates with trans-incarcerated people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The three dozen or so trans women who made it to CCWF — most during the first six months of implementation — are the vanguard. Many, like Skylit, have suffered. A small number have been transferred to the California Institution for Women, a lower security prison in San Bernardino County, where they say conditions are slightly better.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘These systems are so built to destroy people, and if they survive and get out, they’re not better and they’re often much worse.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>In a statement, CDCR said it is working to implement some of the changes \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24016207-mossgroup-sb132-cdcr-assessment-report\">recommended by outside consultants (DOC)\u003c/a> earlier this year and is committed to providing “a safe, humane, respectful and rehabilitative environment for all incarcerated people, including the transgender, non-binary and intersex community.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Advocates acknowledge that the cycles of harm continue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Instead of respecting trans people’s self-determination and prioritizing their safety, as the law requires,” Lewis said, correctional staff and other incarcerated people have used it “to put a target on trans peoples’ back.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Shortly after prison officials received KQED’s questions for this story in September, CCWF revoked all phone privileges for Skylit and others in solitary confinement. In an email to KQED after the initial publication of this story, a CDCR official said the revocation of phone privileges was a policy change ending what had been a temporary, more liberal phone privileges policy instituted in the early days of the COVID pandemic. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Skylit’s attorney worries about the impact of the trauma on her future.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These systems are so built to destroy people, and if they survive and get out, they’re not better and they’re often much worse,” Orthwein said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a letter sent in July 2023 to Newsom, nearly two-dozen advocacy and legal organizations pressing for better treatment for transgender, nonbinary and intersex prisoners \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23991938-tni-coalition-letter-to-governor-newsom-71723pdf-2\">urged clemency (DOC)\u003c/a> for those who have experienced harm in prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wiener, meanwhile, expressed deep frustration with the pace of implementation. In response to KQED’s findings, he said he was “horrified to hear how trans women are being treated in women’s prison, both by the prisons and by other inmates. The fact that they’re being treated harshly and slandered, called rapists when they’re not, it’s terrifying and we’re not going to just let this go.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Lee Romney is a longtime journalist who spent 23 years at the \u003c/em>Los Angeles Times\u003cem>. Jennifer Johnson is a former career public defender who helped launch San Francisco’s Behavioral Health Court. This reporting, supported by the Fund for Investigative Journalism and the California Health Care Foundation, is part of a forthcoming podcast they’re co-creating. Called \u003c/em>\u003ca href=\"https://www.novemberinmysoul.com/\">\u003cem>November In My Soul\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003cem>, it explores the way bias makes its way into our intertwined mental health and criminal legal systems.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story has been updated.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "How to Avoid Car Break-Ins in the Bay Area: Expert Tips to Reduce Risk",
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"content": "\u003cp>It’s the fear that looms large over every person who drives a vehicle in the San Francisco Bay Area. You leave your car — perhaps only for a few minutes — \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959477/car-break-ins-bay-area-glass-repair-what-to-do\">and return to a smashed window and your important belongings gone\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Auto break-ins, \u003ca href=\"https://kmel.iheart.com/featured/g-biz/content/2022-10-27-this-is-what-it-looks-like-when-your-car-has-been-bipped-too-many-times/\">unofficially referred to as “getting bipped” by many in the Bay Area\u003c/a>, are frustratingly common in the region — so common that KQED has already published \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959477/car-break-ins-bay-area-glass-repair-what-to-do\">a step-by-step guide to what to do if your car is broken into\u003c/a>.[aside postID=\"news_11959477\" hero=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/081723-CAR-BREAK-IN-BIPPED-AV-KQED-1020x680.jpg\"]And now, in the second of our two-part series on coping with car break-ins, we’re looking at possible strategies for reducing your chances of getting bipped in the Bay Area. But let’s get one thing out of the way first. …\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>You can do everything ‘right’ and still get bipped\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Unfortunately, a person can do \u003cem>everything\u003c/em> they can to reduce their risk of a break-in, and still suffer one in the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The amount of “smash and grab” break-ins that happen all over the Bay Area — many times in very busy places in broad daylight — show that bipping doesn’t just happen in dark alleyways or to careless drivers. Nor do break-ins only happen to newer or expensive-looking cars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Opportunistic thieves can still target people who purposefully park in well-lit, crowded areas and who strip their cars of anything that looks remotely valuable in an attempt to foil a break-in. And break-ins happen to people who’ve lived in the Bay Area all their lives as well as first-time tourists. Sometimes, all your effort just doesn’t pay off — and it’s not your fault.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not ‘if’, it’s ‘when’ you’ll get your car broken into if you live in the Bay Area,” said Ladan Sobhani, co-owner of Berkeley repair shop Auto Glass Express. Sobhani spoke to KQED to share advice on how to prevent getting bipped and she has also written \u003ca href=\"https://bayareaautoglassexpress.com/6-tips-on-preventing-auto-break-ins/\">a list of tips to reduce your risks of a break-in\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sobhani estimates that “somewhere between 50% to 25%” of the work her shop does is related to auto break-ins. “As a South Berkeley resident who has experienced her share of break-ins,” she writes in \u003ca href=\"https://bayareaautoglassexpress.com/6-tips-on-preventing-auto-break-ins/\">her list of tips\u003c/a>, “I know that no matter how careful you are you can still be a victim of car vandalism.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that doesn’t mean you can’t still try. And we hope the following tips might help you even lower your risks.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Be on guard in the areas — and tourist hotspots — most at risk for break-ins\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Some cities and neighborhoods see more auto break-ins than others — and San Francisco has become particularly notorious among tourists and residents alike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The San Francisco Standard reported that from July 2022 to July 2023, \u003ca href=\"https://sfstandard.com/2023/07/17/san-francisco-car-break-in-epicenter-north-beach-tourists/\">there were 2,432 thefts from vehicles in the city’s North Beach neighborhood alone\u003c/a> — a 51% rise from the same 2018–2019 time period. The city’s Japantown neighborhood registered the second-highest number of break-ins, followed by the Presidio. You can also check out the \u003cem>San Francisco Chronicle\u003c/em>’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/sf-car-breakins/\">SF Car Break-In Tracker tool\u003c/a>, which shows the number of bips in any given neighborhood with data going as far back as 2018.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Be especially wary around SFO or OAK airports — or on the way\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Car thieves are especially vigilant around airports, says Sobhani, because they know that cars stopping in this vicinity may contain luggage headed to or from a flight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So if you’re catching a flight, she urges you to be particularly careful stopping off and leaving your car at coffee shops or fast food restaurants closest to the airport. “People get broken into there multiple times a day,” said Sobhani. Back in March, NBC Bay Area reported \u003ca href=\"https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/east-bay/oakland-car-break-ins/3195436/\">the story of a couple who suffered two break-ins on the same day\u003c/a>, in the same parking lot of an In-N-Out near Oakland International Airport.\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"#tellus\">Tell us: What else do you need an explainer on right now?\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Even if you’re not close to the airport, but you’re on the way there, stay vigilant in tourist areas and local beauty spots where you or your visitors might be stopping off on the way to the airport. Marina Greenwood, a Marina resident of five years, told KQED that break-ins near the Palace of Fine Arts, where tourists often stop for one last picture before heading out of the city, were commonplace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had a tourist come to my house asking if we have video surveillance because all of their passports have been stolen, and they’re on their way to the airport,” said Greenwood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959822\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11959822\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"The rear window of a car that is completely shattered.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Even if you just leave behind a bag in your car that is completely empty, that bag could still be a reason for a thief to break your windows. \u003ccite>(ayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>Never leave electronics in your car — even if you think they’re hidden\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>One strategy used by many Bay Area residents is hiding important electronics somewhere inside the car where they are out of sight — but leaving anything in your car unattended still runs the risk of being stolen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both journalists and industry experts point out that \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/bluetooth-car-break-in-18257966.php\">thieves targeting cars now have access to technology that can detect Bluetooth devices in your car\u003c/a>, even if they’re hidden way out of sight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2019, \u003ca href=\"https://www.wired.com/story/bluetooth-scanner-car-thefts/\">\u003cem>WIRED\u003c/em> magazine looked into this phenomenon and talked to security firm founder Jake Williams\u003c/a>, who said some devices emit a Bluetooth signal even when in sleep mode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A lot of that has to do with power savings; it depends on what sleep mode different laptops go into when the lid is closed,” Williams told \u003cem>WIRED\u003c/em>. “But I have little doubt that some thieves are using Bluetooth scanners to target devices. It’s trivial to use one, so it’s not like technical knowledge is a limiting factor.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, car security researcher Tim Strazzere also told \u003cem>WIRED\u003c/em> that he’s more likely to attribute such electronic thefts to a thief’s eyesight rather than their technology. “If I’m sitting in a parking lot and going to break into a car,” said Strazzere, “and I see someone get out of their car and put something in their trunk, then walk away, would I bother checking my iPhone to see if a Bluetooth beacon is beaconing from that trunk?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No. I’m going to smash the window two seconds after they’re out of view, take the bag, walk away, and look at it when I’m out of sight again. Save the time, go fast, grab everything.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Why run the risk and leave any electronics in your car at all?\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Pay attention to what you leave in view — and don’t\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>So you’ve taken out all your expensive electronics from your car. Should that cover you?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sadly not. Auto shop owner Sobhani says you shouldn’t assume that thieves will only be tempted by expensive-looking stuff. In her \u003ca href=\"https://bayareaautoglassexpress.com/6-tips-on-preventing-auto-break-ins/\">list of tips for reducing your risks of a break-in\u003c/a>, Sobhani writes how “a bag with stinky gym clothes cost one customer the expensive back glass on her Prius,” and warns that a bag on display with nothing of value inside it is still a bag that a thief will deem worth breaking your window for.[aside label='More Guides from KQED' tag='audience-news']At a press conference held at San Francisco’s Palace of Fine Arts — a particular hotspot for bipping — on Aug. 24, SFPD Chief Bill Scott also warned against leaving luggage in your car, “even for a minute.” Many visitors (and residents chaperoning visitors) will leave their car for a moment to snap a photo, “and they get back and they [were] 50 yards away, and their stuff is gone.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is not about victim shaming at all,” he said, “this is about just being smart. … when there’s nothing there, it makes it harder for crooks to do what they do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Leaving aux cables and other jacks on display can also signal to thieves that an electronic device could be close by in the car, Sobhani warns — even if it isn’t.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you have a hatchback or station wagon, Sobhani advises you to keep your cargo cover open (or you can remove the cover entirely), and the trunk visibly empty. That’s because “one of the most commonly broken windows” she sees in her industry is the small quarter glass on hatchbacks, which thieves will break to be able to pull down a car’s back seat and see what’s in the cargo area.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Assume you and your car are being watched\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Often, people will “go out of their way” to lock a purse and a bag in their trunk before leaving their car, says Sobhani — not realizing that someone was watching them do just this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Even if you don’t see anyone around (the suspicious look behind you doesn’t help), you should assume that someone with nefarious intentions saw you stash that purse in the trunk,” writes Sobhani, who also mentions that she’s seen this happen to hikers visiting spots like the Berkeley Marina, Tilden Park and other East Bay Regional Parks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And don’t assume that just because you’re leaving your car for just a minute or two that this isn’t enough time for a thief to strike, and make off with your stuff. It absolutely is.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959823\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11959823\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"Shattered glass from a car window covers a street sidewalk. There are two electric scooters parked nearby.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Broken car-window-glass pieces are seen by a curb at San Francisco’s Alamo Square on June 16, 2023. Experts also warn that some thieves keep track of what vehicle owners place in their trunk after they park. ‘You should assume that someone with nefarious intentions saw you stash that purse in the trunk,’ writes car-shop owner Ladan Sobhani. \u003ccite>(Photo by Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>Don’t let any ‘anti-theft’ measures make your car itself more steal-able\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Start asking around how folks in the Bay Area try to protect their own car from a robbery, and you might hear things like leaving your windows rolled down or car doors deliberately unlocked — in the hope that a thief might choose to rifle through an open car without breaking a window.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Janet Ruiz, director of strategic communications at the \u003ca href=\"https://www.iii.org/\">Insurance Information Institute\u003c/a>, warns that, leaving your car essentially open could also just increase the likelihood that your car might get outright stolen instead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You really want to protect your car from being stolen,” said Ruiz who also recommends installing a car alarm “and maybe even cameras outside your home that point to your car, as well as keeping your doors and windows locked.” If you have a garage, she says, you’re better off parking your car inside that space — or in a well-lit area in front of your home, if you don’t have a garage.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What is law enforcement doing to reduce car break-ins?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At an Aug. 24 press conference held at San Francisco’s Palace of Fine Arts, police Chief Bill Scott shared that his department plans to increase the number of police officers — both in uniform and plain clothes — across the city to deter break-ins and catch thieves in the act. Popular sightseeing spots like Alamo Square, Lombard Street and Fisherman’s Wharf will now have more of what he referred to as “tourism deployment” of on-duty officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What new strategies will SFPD employ to counter thieves? Scott made it clear that he wasn’t “going to go into a whole lot of details, because by design we want the people who are breaking into cars to be caught.”[aside postID=\"news_11954507\" hero=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/06/RS66630_GettyImages-1369841386-qut-1020x680.jpg\"]But he did mention that the department will be using “bait cars” owned by SFPD that contain police property in order to catch burglars “Our best chance of making this problem get better is catching people, because these are very, very difficult crimes to solve,” said Scott.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scott also encouraged residents who have been victims of a break-in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959477/car-break-ins-bay-area-glass-repair-what-to-do\">to report what happened to the police\u003c/a>. Doing so gives authorities “an idea of where to put our resources,” he said. “We can’t solve problems that we don’t know about.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And despite the presence of police officers in the area, the \u003cem>San Francisco Chronicle\u003c/em> reported that \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/car-break-ins-san-francisco-tourism-police-18328516.php\">a tourist’s rental car was broken into just around the corner from where the SFPD conference was held\u003c/a> — moments before officials were due to speak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman and Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez contributed (\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/FitzTheReporter/status/1680715754872934400\">after the latter’s car got bipped\u003c/a> — sorry Joe!) to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"tellus\">\u003c/a>Tell us: What else do you need information about?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At KQED News, we know that it can sometimes be hard to track down the answers to navigate life in the Bay Area in 2023. We’ve published \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/coronavirus-resources-and-explainers\">clear, practical explainers and guides about COVID\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11936674/how-to-prepare-for-this-weeks-atmospheric-river-storm-sandbags-emergency-kits-and-more\">how to cope with intense winter weather\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11821950/how-to-safely-attend-a-protest-in-the-bay-area\">how to exercise your right to protest safely\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So tell us: What do you need to know more about? Tell us, and you could see your question answered online or on social media. What you submit will make our reporting stronger, and help us decide what to cover here on our site, and on KQED Public Radio, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[hearken id=\"10483\" src=\"https://modules.wearehearken.com/kqed/embed/10483.js\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp> \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "The Bay Area, along with the rest of California, has seen a spike in car break-ins, also known as 'bipping.' Here are some strategies to hopefully reduce the risk of this happening to you.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>It’s the fear that looms large over every person who drives a vehicle in the San Francisco Bay Area. You leave your car — perhaps only for a few minutes — \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959477/car-break-ins-bay-area-glass-repair-what-to-do\">and return to a smashed window and your important belongings gone\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Auto break-ins, \u003ca href=\"https://kmel.iheart.com/featured/g-biz/content/2022-10-27-this-is-what-it-looks-like-when-your-car-has-been-bipped-too-many-times/\">unofficially referred to as “getting bipped” by many in the Bay Area\u003c/a>, are frustratingly common in the region — so common that KQED has already published \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959477/car-break-ins-bay-area-glass-repair-what-to-do\">a step-by-step guide to what to do if your car is broken into\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>And now, in the second of our two-part series on coping with car break-ins, we’re looking at possible strategies for reducing your chances of getting bipped in the Bay Area. But let’s get one thing out of the way first. …\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>You can do everything ‘right’ and still get bipped\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Unfortunately, a person can do \u003cem>everything\u003c/em> they can to reduce their risk of a break-in, and still suffer one in the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The amount of “smash and grab” break-ins that happen all over the Bay Area — many times in very busy places in broad daylight — show that bipping doesn’t just happen in dark alleyways or to careless drivers. Nor do break-ins only happen to newer or expensive-looking cars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Opportunistic thieves can still target people who purposefully park in well-lit, crowded areas and who strip their cars of anything that looks remotely valuable in an attempt to foil a break-in. And break-ins happen to people who’ve lived in the Bay Area all their lives as well as first-time tourists. Sometimes, all your effort just doesn’t pay off — and it’s not your fault.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not ‘if’, it’s ‘when’ you’ll get your car broken into if you live in the Bay Area,” said Ladan Sobhani, co-owner of Berkeley repair shop Auto Glass Express. Sobhani spoke to KQED to share advice on how to prevent getting bipped and she has also written \u003ca href=\"https://bayareaautoglassexpress.com/6-tips-on-preventing-auto-break-ins/\">a list of tips to reduce your risks of a break-in\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sobhani estimates that “somewhere between 50% to 25%” of the work her shop does is related to auto break-ins. “As a South Berkeley resident who has experienced her share of break-ins,” she writes in \u003ca href=\"https://bayareaautoglassexpress.com/6-tips-on-preventing-auto-break-ins/\">her list of tips\u003c/a>, “I know that no matter how careful you are you can still be a victim of car vandalism.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But that doesn’t mean you can’t still try. And we hope the following tips might help you even lower your risks.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Be on guard in the areas — and tourist hotspots — most at risk for break-ins\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Some cities and neighborhoods see more auto break-ins than others — and San Francisco has become particularly notorious among tourists and residents alike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The San Francisco Standard reported that from July 2022 to July 2023, \u003ca href=\"https://sfstandard.com/2023/07/17/san-francisco-car-break-in-epicenter-north-beach-tourists/\">there were 2,432 thefts from vehicles in the city’s North Beach neighborhood alone\u003c/a> — a 51% rise from the same 2018–2019 time period. The city’s Japantown neighborhood registered the second-highest number of break-ins, followed by the Presidio. You can also check out the \u003cem>San Francisco Chronicle\u003c/em>’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/sf-car-breakins/\">SF Car Break-In Tracker tool\u003c/a>, which shows the number of bips in any given neighborhood with data going as far back as 2018.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Be especially wary around SFO or OAK airports — or on the way\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Car thieves are especially vigilant around airports, says Sobhani, because they know that cars stopping in this vicinity may contain luggage headed to or from a flight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So if you’re catching a flight, she urges you to be particularly careful stopping off and leaving your car at coffee shops or fast food restaurants closest to the airport. “People get broken into there multiple times a day,” said Sobhani. Back in March, NBC Bay Area reported \u003ca href=\"https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/east-bay/oakland-car-break-ins/3195436/\">the story of a couple who suffered two break-ins on the same day\u003c/a>, in the same parking lot of an In-N-Out near Oakland International Airport.\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"#tellus\">Tell us: What else do you need an explainer on right now?\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Even if you’re not close to the airport, but you’re on the way there, stay vigilant in tourist areas and local beauty spots where you or your visitors might be stopping off on the way to the airport. Marina Greenwood, a Marina resident of five years, told KQED that break-ins near the Palace of Fine Arts, where tourists often stop for one last picture before heading out of the city, were commonplace.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had a tourist come to my house asking if we have video surveillance because all of their passports have been stolen, and they’re on their way to the airport,” said Greenwood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959822\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11959822\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"The rear window of a car that is completely shattered.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Even if you just leave behind a bag in your car that is completely empty, that bag could still be a reason for a thief to break your windows. \u003ccite>(ayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>Never leave electronics in your car — even if you think they’re hidden\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>One strategy used by many Bay Area residents is hiding important electronics somewhere inside the car where they are out of sight — but leaving anything in your car unattended still runs the risk of being stolen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both journalists and industry experts point out that \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/bluetooth-car-break-in-18257966.php\">thieves targeting cars now have access to technology that can detect Bluetooth devices in your car\u003c/a>, even if they’re hidden way out of sight.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2019, \u003ca href=\"https://www.wired.com/story/bluetooth-scanner-car-thefts/\">\u003cem>WIRED\u003c/em> magazine looked into this phenomenon and talked to security firm founder Jake Williams\u003c/a>, who said some devices emit a Bluetooth signal even when in sleep mode.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A lot of that has to do with power savings; it depends on what sleep mode different laptops go into when the lid is closed,” Williams told \u003cem>WIRED\u003c/em>. “But I have little doubt that some thieves are using Bluetooth scanners to target devices. It’s trivial to use one, so it’s not like technical knowledge is a limiting factor.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, car security researcher Tim Strazzere also told \u003cem>WIRED\u003c/em> that he’s more likely to attribute such electronic thefts to a thief’s eyesight rather than their technology. “If I’m sitting in a parking lot and going to break into a car,” said Strazzere, “and I see someone get out of their car and put something in their trunk, then walk away, would I bother checking my iPhone to see if a Bluetooth beacon is beaconing from that trunk?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No. I’m going to smash the window two seconds after they’re out of view, take the bag, walk away, and look at it when I’m out of sight again. Save the time, go fast, grab everything.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Why run the risk and leave any electronics in your car at all?\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Pay attention to what you leave in view — and don’t\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>So you’ve taken out all your expensive electronics from your car. Should that cover you?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Sadly not. Auto shop owner Sobhani says you shouldn’t assume that thieves will only be tempted by expensive-looking stuff. In her \u003ca href=\"https://bayareaautoglassexpress.com/6-tips-on-preventing-auto-break-ins/\">list of tips for reducing your risks of a break-in\u003c/a>, Sobhani writes how “a bag with stinky gym clothes cost one customer the expensive back glass on her Prius,” and warns that a bag on display with nothing of value inside it is still a bag that a thief will deem worth breaking your window for.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>At a press conference held at San Francisco’s Palace of Fine Arts — a particular hotspot for bipping — on Aug. 24, SFPD Chief Bill Scott also warned against leaving luggage in your car, “even for a minute.” Many visitors (and residents chaperoning visitors) will leave their car for a moment to snap a photo, “and they get back and they [were] 50 yards away, and their stuff is gone.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is not about victim shaming at all,” he said, “this is about just being smart. … when there’s nothing there, it makes it harder for crooks to do what they do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Leaving aux cables and other jacks on display can also signal to thieves that an electronic device could be close by in the car, Sobhani warns — even if it isn’t.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you have a hatchback or station wagon, Sobhani advises you to keep your cargo cover open (or you can remove the cover entirely), and the trunk visibly empty. That’s because “one of the most commonly broken windows” she sees in her industry is the small quarter glass on hatchbacks, which thieves will break to be able to pull down a car’s back seat and see what’s in the cargo area.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Assume you and your car are being watched\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Often, people will “go out of their way” to lock a purse and a bag in their trunk before leaving their car, says Sobhani — not realizing that someone was watching them do just this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Even if you don’t see anyone around (the suspicious look behind you doesn’t help), you should assume that someone with nefarious intentions saw you stash that purse in the trunk,” writes Sobhani, who also mentions that she’s seen this happen to hikers visiting spots like the Berkeley Marina, Tilden Park and other East Bay Regional Parks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And don’t assume that just because you’re leaving your car for just a minute or two that this isn’t enough time for a thief to strike, and make off with your stuff. It absolutely is.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959823\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11959823\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"Shattered glass from a car window covers a street sidewalk. There are two electric scooters parked nearby.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762975-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Broken car-window-glass pieces are seen by a curb at San Francisco’s Alamo Square on June 16, 2023. Experts also warn that some thieves keep track of what vehicle owners place in their trunk after they park. ‘You should assume that someone with nefarious intentions saw you stash that purse in the trunk,’ writes car-shop owner Ladan Sobhani. \u003ccite>(Photo by Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>Don’t let any ‘anti-theft’ measures make your car itself more steal-able\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Start asking around how folks in the Bay Area try to protect their own car from a robbery, and you might hear things like leaving your windows rolled down or car doors deliberately unlocked — in the hope that a thief might choose to rifle through an open car without breaking a window.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Janet Ruiz, director of strategic communications at the \u003ca href=\"https://www.iii.org/\">Insurance Information Institute\u003c/a>, warns that, leaving your car essentially open could also just increase the likelihood that your car might get outright stolen instead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You really want to protect your car from being stolen,” said Ruiz who also recommends installing a car alarm “and maybe even cameras outside your home that point to your car, as well as keeping your doors and windows locked.” If you have a garage, she says, you’re better off parking your car inside that space — or in a well-lit area in front of your home, if you don’t have a garage.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What is law enforcement doing to reduce car break-ins?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At an Aug. 24 press conference held at San Francisco’s Palace of Fine Arts, police Chief Bill Scott shared that his department plans to increase the number of police officers — both in uniform and plain clothes — across the city to deter break-ins and catch thieves in the act. Popular sightseeing spots like Alamo Square, Lombard Street and Fisherman’s Wharf will now have more of what he referred to as “tourism deployment” of on-duty officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What new strategies will SFPD employ to counter thieves? Scott made it clear that he wasn’t “going to go into a whole lot of details, because by design we want the people who are breaking into cars to be caught.”\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>But he did mention that the department will be using “bait cars” owned by SFPD that contain police property in order to catch burglars “Our best chance of making this problem get better is catching people, because these are very, very difficult crimes to solve,” said Scott.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Scott also encouraged residents who have been victims of a break-in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959477/car-break-ins-bay-area-glass-repair-what-to-do\">to report what happened to the police\u003c/a>. Doing so gives authorities “an idea of where to put our resources,” he said. “We can’t solve problems that we don’t know about.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And despite the presence of police officers in the area, the \u003cem>San Francisco Chronicle\u003c/em> reported that \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/car-break-ins-san-francisco-tourism-police-18328516.php\">a tourist’s rental car was broken into just around the corner from where the SFPD conference was held\u003c/a> — moments before officials were due to speak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman and Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez contributed (\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/FitzTheReporter/status/1680715754872934400\">after the latter’s car got bipped\u003c/a> — sorry Joe!) to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"tellus\">\u003c/a>Tell us: What else do you need information about?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At KQED News, we know that it can sometimes be hard to track down the answers to navigate life in the Bay Area in 2023. We’ve published \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/coronavirus-resources-and-explainers\">clear, practical explainers and guides about COVID\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11936674/how-to-prepare-for-this-weeks-atmospheric-river-storm-sandbags-emergency-kits-and-more\">how to cope with intense winter weather\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11821950/how-to-safely-attend-a-protest-in-the-bay-area\">how to exercise your right to protest safely\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So tell us: What do you need to know more about? Tell us, and you could see your question answered online or on social media. What you submit will make our reporting stronger, and help us decide what to cover here on our site, and on KQED Public Radio, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "How to Handle Car Break-Ins and Bay Area Glass Repair",
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"content": "\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#now\">\u003cstrong>Jump to: My car was \u003cem>just\u003c/em> broken into. What should I do right now?\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>If you’ve lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for any period of time, and you’ve never had your car broken into, you can count yourself among the lucky few.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At this point, having your car windows smashed by thieves looking for items to steal feels like a queasy rite of passage for residents. \u003ca href=\"https://kmel.iheart.com/featured/g-biz/content/2022-10-27-this-is-what-it-looks-like-when-your-car-has-been-bipped-too-many-times/\">You might have also heard it unofficially called “bipping.”\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I would say somewhere between 50% to 25% of our volume is auto break-ins,” says Ladan Sobhani, the co-owner of Berkeley repair shop Auto Glass Express. In her experience, “it’s not ‘if’, it’s ‘when’ you’ll get your car broken into if you live in the Bay Area.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And what if you don’t lose any personal belongings? A car break-in will still leave you stuck with broken windows, which could end up being quite expensive depending on your insurance and the level of your deductible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We spoke to auto repair professional Sobhani as well as Janet Ruiz, Director of Strategic Communications at the \u003ca href=\"https://www.iii.org/\">Insurance Information Institute\u003c/a>, about what you need to know about having your car broken into in the Bay Area. So keep reading for advice on:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#now\">\u003cstrong>What to do at the scene of the break-in\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#insurance\">\u003cstrong>How to file an insurance claim\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#driving\">\u003cstrong>Driving around with a broken window\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#replacement\">\u003cstrong>How to find replacement glass ASAP\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#costs\">\u003cstrong>Strategies to potentially reduce repair costs\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>And if you’re looking for strategies to potentially reduce your chances of getting bipped again, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959799/how-to-avoid-a-car-break-in-bay-area\">we also have a guide with some tips that could help keep your car safe\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What to do immediately after a car break-in\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003ca id=\"now\">\u003c/a>At the scene: Take photos of the damage.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You may feel angry or frustrated when you come back to your car and see it’s been broken into. Even if you discover nothing was taken from your car, this experience can feel extremely violating — whether it’s your first or your third break-in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As much as you’re able, put aside your emotions temporarily, swing into action and start taking photos of your car with your cell phone. Taking photos of your car, says Ruiz from the Insurance Information Institute, is “the first thing you should do whenever you have a loss,” for insurance purposes.[aside postID=\"news_11959799\" hero=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258763135-1920x1280.jpg\"]Take as many clear photos of the damage as you can, including from outside the car and inside it too. If it’s dark, make sure to turn on your camera phone’s flash. If your hands are shaking — break-ins can be jarring, especially if it’s your first time — take a pause to calm yourself or ask someone else to take photos for you. You don’t want blurry, unclear photos for your insurance claim.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tempered glass used in car windows usually shatters in a way that doesn’t create jagged, sharp pieces, so your risks of getting cut are low.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After you’ve taken photos, don’t stress too much about sweeping up all the broken glass from your back seat, as a glass repair shop will almost certainly be able to vacuum this glass up for you. Of course, if you need to transport passengers back home in your back seat — or have a car seat for a kid back there — you may want to do some brushing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Whatever you do, just be careful when using any automatic or manual window controls after a break-in. You can accidentally dislodge and spread around even more broken glass doing this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959511\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11959511\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"A street in San Francisco lined with Victorian homes and cars. The camera is angled from a lower angle to focus on shards of shattered glass on the floor.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Broken car-window-glass pieces are seen by a curb in Alamo Square on June 16, 2023. Tempered glass used in car windows usually shatters in a way that doesn’t create jagged, sharp pieces, so your risks of getting cut are low. \u003ccite>(Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>At the scene: Has your stuff been dumped nearby?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If your bags were snatched from your back seat or trunk, there’s a chance that the thieves may have rifled through them and then dumped anything they didn’t deem of value.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you feel safe doing so, take a look on the street near your car and on streets nearby — particularly paying attention around bushes, hedges, trash cans and dumpsters — to see if any of your bags or items have been tossed there. It’s not guaranteed, but it’s worth a shot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"#tellus\">Tell us: What else do you need an explainer on right now?\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Some people in the Bay Area \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/crime/article/san-francisco-car-break-ins-18273219.php\">make it their mission to unofficially reunite owners with their stolen items\u003c/a> when they find them on the street, like Andrea Carla Michaels of \u003ca href=\"https://lostandfoundsanfranciscocom.godaddysites.com/\">LostandFoundSanFrancisco.com.\u003c/a> You could also check sites like Nextdoor.com, local Facebook groups and subreddits like r/sanfrancisco, r/oakland and r/bayarea to see if anyone has found your stuff and wants to help you reunite with it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>At the scene or after: File a police report.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If the thieves are long gone, and you aren’t injured, should you still file a police report? Yes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For one thing, your insurer may require you to have a police report on hand in order to process your claim. Bay Area officials are also encouraging residents to report these crimes. Doing so gives authorities “an idea of where to put our resources,” said San Francisco Police Department Chief Bill Scott at a press conference held on Aug. 24. “We can’t solve problems that we don’t know about.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can usually file a police report one of several ways:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>Call the police non-emergency line (do not call 911 to file a police report).\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>File a police report online — and make sure you save a copy for your records.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Call 3-1-1.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Remember: If you live in a different city, you should report the crime to the police department in the city in which the break-in occurred, not the one you live in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can also go in-person to a police station to file a report. In San Francisco, you can also ask station officers to check your vehicle for fingerprints. “Please have your car fingerprinted. Sometimes we get evidence,” said SFPD Chief Scott. “It’s hard, but sometimes we do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959701\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11959701\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"An urban park surrounded by cars. One of them has a rear window smashed. A police car is parked nearby.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">If your car is broken into while you’re visiting a city, remember to file a police report in the city where the theft happened. If you are going to file an insurance claim for the broken glass or your stolen goods, you will most likely have to provide your insurer with a police report. \u003ccite>(Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>After: Think if any stolen items could compromise your personal safety or identity.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If documents containing any personal details were stolen, you could be at a higher risk for identity theft. The California Attorney General’s website \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/idtheft/facts/top-ten\">has details on how to monitor your credit for free\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If any credit or debit cards were among items stolen from your car, contact your bank immediately to have them canceled. You may also be prompted to list this theft on your police report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If your house keys, entry keycards or garage opener to your building were stolen in a car break-in, you might strongly consider having the locks changed or those keycards wiped. This is especially important if thieves also took anything that would let them know your address, such as your insurance cards or vehicle registration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>After: If you had items stolen, start tracking down proof you owned them.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Insurance companies usually won’t just take your word on which items were stolen from your car. You’ll need to prove you actually bought them, with something like a receipt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Unless you’re \u003cem>incredibly\u003c/em> organized, you might not have a drawer back at home full of receipts for every item of value you’ve ever purchased in your life. The Insurance Information Institute’s Ruiz recommends that you look through your checking account or your credit card statements, which will provide a record of the purchase. You can then take a screenshot of the transaction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One tip for the future, says Ruiz, is to make time to do what she calls a “home inventory”: Walk around your home one day and snap photos or videos of everything you own. “Open doors, open closets — go in your garage,” she recommends and particularly focus on getting photos of all your electronics. If you have expensive stereo equipment fitted \u003cem>in\u003c/em> your car, you should photograph that too. These photos will act as a timestamped record you actually owned these items.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003ca id=\"driving\">\u003c/a>After: Driving your car with a broken window until you get repairs.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Driving with a broken car window only becomes illegal, \u003ca href=\"https://casetext.com/statute/california-codes/california-vehicle-code/division-12-equipment-of-vehicles/chapter-4-windshields-and-mirrors/section-26710-unlawful-operation-of-motor-vehicle-when-windshield-or-rear-window-in-defective-condition#:~:text=2023%20Legislative%20Session.-,Section%2026710%20%2D%20Unlawful%20operation%20of%20motor%20vehicle%20when%20windshield%20or,to%20the%20front%20or%20rear.\">according to Section 26710 of California’s Vehicle Code\u003c/a>, “when the windshield or rear window is in such a defective condition as to impair the driver’s vision either to the front or rear.” Thieves are usually likely to break your back side windows for their convenience and speed.[pullquote size='medium' align='right']Remember: After a break-in, be careful using your car’s window controls. You can accidentally dislodge and spread around broken glass doing this.[/pullquote]A repair shop will likely be able to seal up your broken car windows with “crash wrap,” a temporary adhesive film, says auto repair professional Sobhani — especially if you need to wait a little while on new glass.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But if you can’t get to a repair shop quickly and want to seal up the window yourself with film, a trash bag or cardboard, Sobhani recommends that you use blue painter’s tape — not duct tape or packing tape, “because that can really damage the paint on the car.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959510\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11959510 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"A person uses a vacuum to sweep pieces of broken glass from the interior of a car. This is happening inside a car shop.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">When you first call your insurance provider to report the break-in, you’ll probably get a recommendation of where to get repairs. However, you are not required to choose the default repair service your insurer suggests — it’s your right, under the law. \u003ccite>(Michael Macor/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>Working with your insurance company to get your car windows fixed after a break-in\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003ca id=\"insurance\">\u003c/a>First, know what your policy covers.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After your car gets broken into, there are two types of insurance claims that you could file:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>A claim for damages to your car, which is handled by your \u003cstrong>auto insurance\u003c/strong>.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>A claim for any items stolen from your car in the break-in — that goes to your \u003cstrong>homeowner’s or renter’s insurance\u003c/strong>, if you have one.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>As for what your policy actually covers, you’ll need to run that with your insurance provider, either by reading your policy itself or contacting your insurance agent. For example, Ruiz from the Insurance Information Institute says that some auto policies will offer broken glass repair as an “extra coverage” (also known as an add-on or endorsement on your policy) so you don’t have to pay a deductible for that specific service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Basically, get in touch with your insurance provider as soon as possible after a break-in, to establish your policy details and kick off the process of getting your car fixed up. Who pays for what and how that happens will come later.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Know what your deductible is, and how it works.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The deductible on your policy is a minimum — a dollar amount that you’ll have to pay yourself, with no reimbursement, before your insurer will start paying anything.[aside label='Stay Prepared with KQED Guides' tag='audience-news']An example: Let’s say the deductible on your auto insurance policy is $500. Once you’ve got a quote for repair work after a break-in, those repairs will cost $700. This does not mean your insurer will pay $500 toward these repairs. Instead, this means that if you claim on your insurance for this repair, \u003cem>you’ll\u003c/em> have to pay $500 and your insurer will only pay $200.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yes — in this situation you will have to cover the majority of the costs, even though you pay into your auto insurance plan every month for the exact purpose of covering damages to your car.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At her auto repair shop in Berkeley, Sobhani oftenly hears a misconception from customers: Many believe that the deductible is a yearly threshold. But the truth is that you have to cover the deductible every time you make a new claim on your insurance. “It’s not like, ‘Oh, you paid $500 so far this year and so now the next five auto repairs, glass repairs, are free,” said Sobhani. “It is per incident.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Remember: Policies that are cheap to pay for each month (the premium) will nearly always have a high deductible — and conversely, policies with a higher monthly premium usually come with a lower deductible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>What about my personal items that were stolen?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Renters’ insurance does cover stolen items from your vehicle,” said Ruiz from the Insurance Information Institute. This is when it will be very helpful to have any documentation you have that confirms you purchased the items that were stolen during the break-in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some insurers may apply limits on how much they will cover for each personal item you lost. An item might have cost you $500 new, but your insurance policy may only cover that kind of item up to a certain dollar amount. These limits apply to items like electronics, jewelry, furs and cash, says Ruiz.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959672\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11959672\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"A car is parked next to a park. The rear window of the car has been smashed.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A car with a broken window is seen in San Francisco’s Alamo Square on June 16, 2023. Thieves are usually likely to break your back side windows for their convenience and speed. \u003ccite>(Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003ca id=\"costs\">\u003c/a>Get a quote for the cost of repairing your car windows.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In California, the law says that you can choose whichever repair shop you want to do your car’s glass or body repairs. The upside of this is that you can shop around to find the best price. The downside is: You have to spend time shopping around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When you first call your insurance provider to report the break-in, you’ll probably get a recommendation of where to get repairs. However, you are not required to choose the default repair service your insurer suggests — whether you’re dissuaded by bad reviews, the price, \u003ca href=\"#replacement\">how long it’ll take for a particular service to source your glass\u003c/a> or you already have a relationship with a local glass-repair shop. (Or really, whatever reason you like — it’s your right, under the law.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To find a local glass-repair shop and get their quote for your repair work, start by asking around for recommendations or reading reviews online on pages like Yelp or YourMechanic.[pullquote size='medium' align='right']Keep in mind: The make and age of your car can impact how much you have to pay or wait for repairs.[/pullquote]You may hear that certain repair shops are “in network” with an insurer. This usually means that this shop frequently works with that insurer to honor insurance claims, has experience in working directly with insurers on processing costs, or is otherwise considered a “partner” with an insurer. Regardless, in California you can still choose whichever repair shop you want to do your glass repairs after a break-in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One possible reason a repair shop may not take your insurance is if an insurer’s reimbursement rates are just too low to cover any work done by that shop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Make a decision on whether to claim on your insurance or not.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once you’ve got a cost estimate for glass repairs, keep in mind just how high your deductible will be.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If your deductible is $600, but the repairs will cost $620, this means that your insurance would only pay only $20 even if you made a claim. In these types of situations, where the deductible is overwhelmingly bigger than what your policy will cover, consider what’s more practical for you: dealing with your insurer, or paying for all the expenses yourself out of pocket.[pullquote size='medium' align='right']Remember: Policies that are cheap to pay for each month will nearly always have a high deductible.[/pullquote]If you’re suffering multiple break-ins in a year, and each time your deductible is so high as to keep you from claiming on your insurance, you may consider revising your policy details to lower your deductible amount. Unfortunately, this will almost certainly mean higher premiums.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Ruiz from the Insurance Information Institute, two things can happen if you make multiple claims on your auto or homeowner’s insurance: “Your premiums could go up,” she said, or this could otherwise “signal the insurer that you’re not managing your parking of your vehicle, where you park, your security, etcetera.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Insurance claims after a car break-in: Who pays upfront?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With some insurance claims, the glass repair shop you choose will be able to bill your insurer for the cost of repairs directly — meaning that, aside from your deductible, you don’t pay anything upfront. This is where the issue of whether you’ve chosen a repair shop that’s “in network” with your insurer may become relevant. This option may prevent you having to pay more up-front, but could potentially take more time, if a shop has to go back-and-forth with your insurer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With other claims, some customers will pay all costs out of pocket and then work with their insurer afterwards to get reimbursed. This option could mean repairs getting done faster — potentially — but mean far more up-front costs for you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Be sure to ask your insurer how payment will be handled for your claim, so you don’t get any surprises or an unexpected bill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003ca id=\"replacement\">\u003c/a>Be prepared to wait for your glass repairs.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If getting your car fixed up as soon as possible is a matter of urgency — for example, because you need your car for work — you may decide to factor in how quickly a shop could repair your glass alongside the issue of cost.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And depending on what kind of car you have, you could be waiting \u003cem>a while\u003c/em>. Sobhani says that in particular, “the rear windows on the Hyundai and Kia are the ones that have been hardest to get” recently — something she says is in large part \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/hyundai-kia-tiktok-theft-stolen-8e0a353d24be0e7bce36e34c5e4dac51\">due to a security flaw in those brands that makes stealing them easier\u003c/a>. She also notes that in her experience with customers with brand new cars, the carmakers are “saving what’s available” for cars on the production line. On the other end of the spectrum, “really old cars” can be tough to quickly source glass for, said Sobhani.[aside postID=\"news_11954507\" hero=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/06/RS66630_GettyImages-1369841386-qut-1020x680.jpg\"]Being willing to have your car window repaired with \u003cem>used\u003c/em> glass — rather than new — could also potentially reduce the time it takes to get your vehicle fixed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you have to wait for a glass order, your repair shop may offer to hold onto your car for you until then. “Some of those people choose to just leave their cars here since we have a secure garage,” said Sobhani.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If being without your car for several days is not an option, the repair shop will likely be able to seal your car window up with crash wrap. Remember: If you opt to seal up your window yourself, \u003cem>don’t\u003c/em> use duct tape or packing tape, which can damage your car paint.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman and Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez contributed (\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/FitzTheReporter/status/1680715754872934400\">after the latter’s car got bipped\u003c/a> — sorry Joe!) to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"tellus\">\u003c/a>Tell us: What else do you need information about?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At KQED News, we know that it can sometimes be hard to track down the answers to navigate life in the Bay Area in 2023. We’ve published \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/coronavirus-resources-and-explainers\">clear, practical explainers and guides about COVID\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11936674/how-to-prepare-for-this-weeks-atmospheric-river-storm-sandbags-emergency-kits-and-more\">how to cope with intense winter weather\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11821950/how-to-safely-attend-a-protest-in-the-bay-area\">how to exercise your right to protest safely\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So tell us: What do you need to know more about? Tell us, and you could see your question answered online or on social media. What you submit will make our reporting stronger, and help us decide what to cover here on our site, and on KQED Public Radio, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[hearken id=\"10483\" src=\"https://modules.wearehearken.com/kqed/embed/10483.js\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Thieves breaking your car windows — also known as 'bipping' — has become very common in the San Francisco Bay Area and other parts of California. Experts share what to do if this happens to you.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#now\">\u003cstrong>Jump to: My car was \u003cem>just\u003c/em> broken into. What should I do right now?\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>If you’ve lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for any period of time, and you’ve never had your car broken into, you can count yourself among the lucky few.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At this point, having your car windows smashed by thieves looking for items to steal feels like a queasy rite of passage for residents. \u003ca href=\"https://kmel.iheart.com/featured/g-biz/content/2022-10-27-this-is-what-it-looks-like-when-your-car-has-been-bipped-too-many-times/\">You might have also heard it unofficially called “bipping.”\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I would say somewhere between 50% to 25% of our volume is auto break-ins,” says Ladan Sobhani, the co-owner of Berkeley repair shop Auto Glass Express. In her experience, “it’s not ‘if’, it’s ‘when’ you’ll get your car broken into if you live in the Bay Area.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And what if you don’t lose any personal belongings? A car break-in will still leave you stuck with broken windows, which could end up being quite expensive depending on your insurance and the level of your deductible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We spoke to auto repair professional Sobhani as well as Janet Ruiz, Director of Strategic Communications at the \u003ca href=\"https://www.iii.org/\">Insurance Information Institute\u003c/a>, about what you need to know about having your car broken into in the Bay Area. So keep reading for advice on:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#now\">\u003cstrong>What to do at the scene of the break-in\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#insurance\">\u003cstrong>How to file an insurance claim\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#driving\">\u003cstrong>Driving around with a broken window\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#replacement\">\u003cstrong>How to find replacement glass ASAP\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#costs\">\u003cstrong>Strategies to potentially reduce repair costs\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>And if you’re looking for strategies to potentially reduce your chances of getting bipped again, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11959799/how-to-avoid-a-car-break-in-bay-area\">we also have a guide with some tips that could help keep your car safe\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What to do immediately after a car break-in\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003ca id=\"now\">\u003c/a>At the scene: Take photos of the damage.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You may feel angry or frustrated when you come back to your car and see it’s been broken into. Even if you discover nothing was taken from your car, this experience can feel extremely violating — whether it’s your first or your third break-in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As much as you’re able, put aside your emotions temporarily, swing into action and start taking photos of your car with your cell phone. Taking photos of your car, says Ruiz from the Insurance Information Institute, is “the first thing you should do whenever you have a loss,” for insurance purposes.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Take as many clear photos of the damage as you can, including from outside the car and inside it too. If it’s dark, make sure to turn on your camera phone’s flash. If your hands are shaking — break-ins can be jarring, especially if it’s your first time — take a pause to calm yourself or ask someone else to take photos for you. You don’t want blurry, unclear photos for your insurance claim.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tempered glass used in car windows usually shatters in a way that doesn’t create jagged, sharp pieces, so your risks of getting cut are low.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After you’ve taken photos, don’t stress too much about sweeping up all the broken glass from your back seat, as a glass repair shop will almost certainly be able to vacuum this glass up for you. Of course, if you need to transport passengers back home in your back seat — or have a car seat for a kid back there — you may want to do some brushing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Whatever you do, just be careful when using any automatic or manual window controls after a break-in. You can accidentally dislodge and spread around even more broken glass doing this.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959511\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11959511\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"A street in San Francisco lined with Victorian homes and cars. The camera is angled from a lower angle to focus on shards of shattered glass on the floor.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762922-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Broken car-window-glass pieces are seen by a curb in Alamo Square on June 16, 2023. Tempered glass used in car windows usually shatters in a way that doesn’t create jagged, sharp pieces, so your risks of getting cut are low. \u003ccite>(Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>At the scene: Has your stuff been dumped nearby?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If your bags were snatched from your back seat or trunk, there’s a chance that the thieves may have rifled through them and then dumped anything they didn’t deem of value.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you feel safe doing so, take a look on the street near your car and on streets nearby — particularly paying attention around bushes, hedges, trash cans and dumpsters — to see if any of your bags or items have been tossed there. It’s not guaranteed, but it’s worth a shot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"#tellus\">Tell us: What else do you need an explainer on right now?\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Some people in the Bay Area \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/crime/article/san-francisco-car-break-ins-18273219.php\">make it their mission to unofficially reunite owners with their stolen items\u003c/a> when they find them on the street, like Andrea Carla Michaels of \u003ca href=\"https://lostandfoundsanfranciscocom.godaddysites.com/\">LostandFoundSanFrancisco.com.\u003c/a> You could also check sites like Nextdoor.com, local Facebook groups and subreddits like r/sanfrancisco, r/oakland and r/bayarea to see if anyone has found your stuff and wants to help you reunite with it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>At the scene or after: File a police report.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If the thieves are long gone, and you aren’t injured, should you still file a police report? Yes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For one thing, your insurer may require you to have a police report on hand in order to process your claim. Bay Area officials are also encouraging residents to report these crimes. Doing so gives authorities “an idea of where to put our resources,” said San Francisco Police Department Chief Bill Scott at a press conference held on Aug. 24. “We can’t solve problems that we don’t know about.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can usually file a police report one of several ways:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>Call the police non-emergency line (do not call 911 to file a police report).\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>File a police report online — and make sure you save a copy for your records.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>Call 3-1-1.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Remember: If you live in a different city, you should report the crime to the police department in the city in which the break-in occurred, not the one you live in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can also go in-person to a police station to file a report. In San Francisco, you can also ask station officers to check your vehicle for fingerprints. “Please have your car fingerprinted. Sometimes we get evidence,” said SFPD Chief Scott. “It’s hard, but sometimes we do.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959701\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11959701\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"An urban park surrounded by cars. One of them has a rear window smashed. A police car is parked nearby.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1604388955-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">If your car is broken into while you’re visiting a city, remember to file a police report in the city where the theft happened. If you are going to file an insurance claim for the broken glass or your stolen goods, you will most likely have to provide your insurer with a police report. \u003ccite>(Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>After: Think if any stolen items could compromise your personal safety or identity.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If documents containing any personal details were stolen, you could be at a higher risk for identity theft. The California Attorney General’s website \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/idtheft/facts/top-ten\">has details on how to monitor your credit for free\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If any credit or debit cards were among items stolen from your car, contact your bank immediately to have them canceled. You may also be prompted to list this theft on your police report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If your house keys, entry keycards or garage opener to your building were stolen in a car break-in, you might strongly consider having the locks changed or those keycards wiped. This is especially important if thieves also took anything that would let them know your address, such as your insurance cards or vehicle registration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>After: If you had items stolen, start tracking down proof you owned them.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Insurance companies usually won’t just take your word on which items were stolen from your car. You’ll need to prove you actually bought them, with something like a receipt.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Unless you’re \u003cem>incredibly\u003c/em> organized, you might not have a drawer back at home full of receipts for every item of value you’ve ever purchased in your life. The Insurance Information Institute’s Ruiz recommends that you look through your checking account or your credit card statements, which will provide a record of the purchase. You can then take a screenshot of the transaction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One tip for the future, says Ruiz, is to make time to do what she calls a “home inventory”: Walk around your home one day and snap photos or videos of everything you own. “Open doors, open closets — go in your garage,” she recommends and particularly focus on getting photos of all your electronics. If you have expensive stereo equipment fitted \u003cem>in\u003c/em> your car, you should photograph that too. These photos will act as a timestamped record you actually owned these items.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003ca id=\"driving\">\u003c/a>After: Driving your car with a broken window until you get repairs.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Driving with a broken car window only becomes illegal, \u003ca href=\"https://casetext.com/statute/california-codes/california-vehicle-code/division-12-equipment-of-vehicles/chapter-4-windshields-and-mirrors/section-26710-unlawful-operation-of-motor-vehicle-when-windshield-or-rear-window-in-defective-condition#:~:text=2023%20Legislative%20Session.-,Section%2026710%20%2D%20Unlawful%20operation%20of%20motor%20vehicle%20when%20windshield%20or,to%20the%20front%20or%20rear.\">according to Section 26710 of California’s Vehicle Code\u003c/a>, “when the windshield or rear window is in such a defective condition as to impair the driver’s vision either to the front or rear.” Thieves are usually likely to break your back side windows for their convenience and speed.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "Remember: After a break-in, be careful using your car’s window controls. You can accidentally dislodge and spread around broken glass doing this.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>A repair shop will likely be able to seal up your broken car windows with “crash wrap,” a temporary adhesive film, says auto repair professional Sobhani — especially if you need to wait a little while on new glass.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But if you can’t get to a repair shop quickly and want to seal up the window yourself with film, a trash bag or cardboard, Sobhani recommends that you use blue painter’s tape — not duct tape or packing tape, “because that can really damage the paint on the car.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959510\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11959510 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"A person uses a vacuum to sweep pieces of broken glass from the interior of a car. This is happening inside a car shop.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1298891986-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">When you first call your insurance provider to report the break-in, you’ll probably get a recommendation of where to get repairs. However, you are not required to choose the default repair service your insurer suggests — it’s your right, under the law. \u003ccite>(Michael Macor/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>Working with your insurance company to get your car windows fixed after a break-in\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003ca id=\"insurance\">\u003c/a>First, know what your policy covers.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After your car gets broken into, there are two types of insurance claims that you could file:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>A claim for damages to your car, which is handled by your \u003cstrong>auto insurance\u003c/strong>.\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>A claim for any items stolen from your car in the break-in — that goes to your \u003cstrong>homeowner’s or renter’s insurance\u003c/strong>, if you have one.\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>As for what your policy actually covers, you’ll need to run that with your insurance provider, either by reading your policy itself or contacting your insurance agent. For example, Ruiz from the Insurance Information Institute says that some auto policies will offer broken glass repair as an “extra coverage” (also known as an add-on or endorsement on your policy) so you don’t have to pay a deductible for that specific service.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Basically, get in touch with your insurance provider as soon as possible after a break-in, to establish your policy details and kick off the process of getting your car fixed up. Who pays for what and how that happens will come later.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Know what your deductible is, and how it works.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The deductible on your policy is a minimum — a dollar amount that you’ll have to pay yourself, with no reimbursement, before your insurer will start paying anything.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>An example: Let’s say the deductible on your auto insurance policy is $500. Once you’ve got a quote for repair work after a break-in, those repairs will cost $700. This does not mean your insurer will pay $500 toward these repairs. Instead, this means that if you claim on your insurance for this repair, \u003cem>you’ll\u003c/em> have to pay $500 and your insurer will only pay $200.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yes — in this situation you will have to cover the majority of the costs, even though you pay into your auto insurance plan every month for the exact purpose of covering damages to your car.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At her auto repair shop in Berkeley, Sobhani oftenly hears a misconception from customers: Many believe that the deductible is a yearly threshold. But the truth is that you have to cover the deductible every time you make a new claim on your insurance. “It’s not like, ‘Oh, you paid $500 so far this year and so now the next five auto repairs, glass repairs, are free,” said Sobhani. “It is per incident.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Remember: Policies that are cheap to pay for each month (the premium) will nearly always have a high deductible — and conversely, policies with a higher monthly premium usually come with a lower deductible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>What about my personal items that were stolen?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Renters’ insurance does cover stolen items from your vehicle,” said Ruiz from the Insurance Information Institute. This is when it will be very helpful to have any documentation you have that confirms you purchased the items that were stolen during the break-in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some insurers may apply limits on how much they will cover for each personal item you lost. An item might have cost you $500 new, but your insurance policy may only cover that kind of item up to a certain dollar amount. These limits apply to items like electronics, jewelry, furs and cash, says Ruiz.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959672\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11959672\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"A car is parked next to a park. The rear window of the car has been smashed.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/GettyImages-1258762861-1-1920x1280.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A car with a broken window is seen in San Francisco’s Alamo Square on June 16, 2023. Thieves are usually likely to break your back side windows for their convenience and speed. \u003ccite>(Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003ca id=\"costs\">\u003c/a>Get a quote for the cost of repairing your car windows.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In California, the law says that you can choose whichever repair shop you want to do your car’s glass or body repairs. The upside of this is that you can shop around to find the best price. The downside is: You have to spend time shopping around.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When you first call your insurance provider to report the break-in, you’ll probably get a recommendation of where to get repairs. However, you are not required to choose the default repair service your insurer suggests — whether you’re dissuaded by bad reviews, the price, \u003ca href=\"#replacement\">how long it’ll take for a particular service to source your glass\u003c/a> or you already have a relationship with a local glass-repair shop. (Or really, whatever reason you like — it’s your right, under the law.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To find a local glass-repair shop and get their quote for your repair work, start by asking around for recommendations or reading reviews online on pages like Yelp or YourMechanic.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "Keep in mind: The make and age of your car can impact how much you have to pay or wait for repairs.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>You may hear that certain repair shops are “in network” with an insurer. This usually means that this shop frequently works with that insurer to honor insurance claims, has experience in working directly with insurers on processing costs, or is otherwise considered a “partner” with an insurer. Regardless, in California you can still choose whichever repair shop you want to do your glass repairs after a break-in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One possible reason a repair shop may not take your insurance is if an insurer’s reimbursement rates are just too low to cover any work done by that shop.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Make a decision on whether to claim on your insurance or not.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once you’ve got a cost estimate for glass repairs, keep in mind just how high your deductible will be.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If your deductible is $600, but the repairs will cost $620, this means that your insurance would only pay only $20 even if you made a claim. In these types of situations, where the deductible is overwhelmingly bigger than what your policy will cover, consider what’s more practical for you: dealing with your insurer, or paying for all the expenses yourself out of pocket.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>If you’re suffering multiple break-ins in a year, and each time your deductible is so high as to keep you from claiming on your insurance, you may consider revising your policy details to lower your deductible amount. Unfortunately, this will almost certainly mean higher premiums.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to Ruiz from the Insurance Information Institute, two things can happen if you make multiple claims on your auto or homeowner’s insurance: “Your premiums could go up,” she said, or this could otherwise “signal the insurer that you’re not managing your parking of your vehicle, where you park, your security, etcetera.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Insurance claims after a car break-in: Who pays upfront?\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With some insurance claims, the glass repair shop you choose will be able to bill your insurer for the cost of repairs directly — meaning that, aside from your deductible, you don’t pay anything upfront. This is where the issue of whether you’ve chosen a repair shop that’s “in network” with your insurer may become relevant. This option may prevent you having to pay more up-front, but could potentially take more time, if a shop has to go back-and-forth with your insurer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With other claims, some customers will pay all costs out of pocket and then work with their insurer afterwards to get reimbursed. This option could mean repairs getting done faster — potentially — but mean far more up-front costs for you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Be sure to ask your insurer how payment will be handled for your claim, so you don’t get any surprises or an unexpected bill.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003ca id=\"replacement\">\u003c/a>Be prepared to wait for your glass repairs.\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If getting your car fixed up as soon as possible is a matter of urgency — for example, because you need your car for work — you may decide to factor in how quickly a shop could repair your glass alongside the issue of cost.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And depending on what kind of car you have, you could be waiting \u003cem>a while\u003c/em>. Sobhani says that in particular, “the rear windows on the Hyundai and Kia are the ones that have been hardest to get” recently — something she says is in large part \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/hyundai-kia-tiktok-theft-stolen-8e0a353d24be0e7bce36e34c5e4dac51\">due to a security flaw in those brands that makes stealing them easier\u003c/a>. She also notes that in her experience with customers with brand new cars, the carmakers are “saving what’s available” for cars on the production line. On the other end of the spectrum, “really old cars” can be tough to quickly source glass for, said Sobhani.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Being willing to have your car window repaired with \u003cem>used\u003c/em> glass — rather than new — could also potentially reduce the time it takes to get your vehicle fixed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If you have to wait for a glass order, your repair shop may offer to hold onto your car for you until then. “Some of those people choose to just leave their cars here since we have a secure garage,” said Sobhani.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If being without your car for several days is not an option, the repair shop will likely be able to seal your car window up with crash wrap. Remember: If you opt to seal up your window yourself, \u003cem>don’t\u003c/em> use duct tape or packing tape, which can damage your car paint.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman and Joe Fitzgerald Rodriguez contributed (\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/FitzTheReporter/status/1680715754872934400\">after the latter’s car got bipped\u003c/a> — sorry Joe!) to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"tellus\">\u003c/a>Tell us: What else do you need information about?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At KQED News, we know that it can sometimes be hard to track down the answers to navigate life in the Bay Area in 2023. We’ve published \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/coronavirus-resources-and-explainers\">clear, practical explainers and guides about COVID\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11936674/how-to-prepare-for-this-weeks-atmospheric-river-storm-sandbags-emergency-kits-and-more\">how to cope with intense winter weather\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11821950/how-to-safely-attend-a-protest-in-the-bay-area\">how to exercise your right to protest safely\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So tell us: What do you need to know more about? Tell us, and you could see your question answered online or on social media. What you submit will make our reporting stronger, and help us decide what to cover here on our site, and on KQED Public Radio, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>In the last days of June, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11954612/u-s-supreme-court-strikes-down-affirmative-action-barring-california-private-universities-from-considering-race-in-admissions\">the Supreme Court struck down affirmative action\u003c/a>, opened the door to LGBTQ+ discrimination and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11954741/supreme-court-student-loan-decision-how-affects-you\">outlawed the Biden administration’s plan to forgive student loans\u003c/a>. These are monumental rulings that directly affect people of color, queer folks, prospective college students and the 43 million Americans with federal student loans — leaving many devastated and fearful for the future.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/explaining-the-supreme-court\">our series explaining this summer’s Supreme Court decisions\u003c/a>, we’re unpacking how these rulings will affect you — and what can be done now. This explainer focuses on the case 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis — which saw the court rule in favor of a web designer who refused to make wedding websites for gay couples — and what it could mean for discrimination against LGBTQ+ folks in the United States.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED gathered legal and judicial insight on this ruling at a panel hosted at Manny’s, a community space in San Francisco. On this panel were:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.keker.com/Lawyers/courtney-j-liss\">Courtney Liss\u003c/a>, associate at San Francisco law firm Keker, Van Nest and Peters\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.keker.com/Lawyers/Harris-Cody\">Cody Harris\u003c/a>, partner at Keker, Van Nest and Peters\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.uchastings.edu/people/matt-coles/\">Matthew Coles\u003c/a>, professor of practice at UC Law San Francisco (formerly UC Hastings)\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>What was the Supreme Court’s decision about LGBTQ+ discrimination?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In a defeat for gay rights, the Supreme Court’s conservative majority ruled in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis that a Christian graphic artist who designs wedding websites can refuse to work with same-sex couples.\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#tellus\">\u003cstrong>Tell us: What else do you need information about right now?\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Justice Sonia Sotomayor, one of the court’s liberal justices, wrote in a dissent that the decision’s effect is to “mark gays and lesbians for second-class status” and that the ruling opens the door to further discrimination. \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/06/30/1182121291/colorado-supreme-court-same-sex-marriage-decision\">Read more about the case from NPR\u003c/a> or read \u003ca href=\"https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-476_c185.pdf\">the Supreme Court’s ruling (PDF)\u003c/a> for yourself.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What will change for queer people in the US after this case?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>This ruling has opened the door for LGBTQ+ people to be discriminated against when requesting services from certain professionals, says UC Law San Francisco’s Coles, specifically in situations involving the use of words or the creation of images and films.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Why? Smith \u003ca href=\"https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-476_c185.pdf\">framed her website services as “expressive in nature” (PDF)\u003c/a> because she designed them to be customized, original and intended “to communicate a particular message.” Consequently, other professionals operating what could be termed an “expressive business” could use this ruling to deny service to LGBTQ+ people as well.[aside label='Unpacking the Recent Supreme Court Decisions' tag='explaining-the-supreme-court']Coles’ advice to folks in the community? “Find out in advance whether this business has said that it doesn’t want to serve [queer people],” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Practically, the website case now means that someone like Lorie Smith, the Colorado graphic designer, can refuse service to LGBTQ+ folks “without fear of government sanction on them,” said Harris of Keker, Van Nest and Peters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Harris adds that hate speech laws as most people think of them — those that would make it a crime to say something hateful — don’t really exist. Hate speech is “awful and odious, and it makes me angry,” he said, “but it’s constitutional.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>How was this case even won?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Lorie Smith, the web designer involved in the case, was challenging her home state of Colorado’s public accommodations law — the type of law that, in most states, bars discrimination based on sexual orientation. Her claim was that the state was unconstitutionally forcing her to create a message she opposes because she can’t deny service to same-sex couples. The Supreme Court sided with Smith, ruling that forcing her to create websites for queer couples would violate her free speech rights under the Constitution’s First Amendment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Smith should have lost her case on several fronts, said Coles — just one being that her website work “is commercial speech,” and not personal expression (free speech), because Smith “was being paid to write words for somebody else.” And it’s well-established, says Coles, that commercial speech is not as protected as other forms of speech.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The court ignored this analysis of the First Amendment in its ruling, says Coles. A majority of the justices, he adds, believe that if Smith created websites for same-sex couples, she would be forced to use words to celebrate things she does not want to celebrate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Responding to \u003ca href=\"https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/supreme-court-web-designer-fake-case-b2370226.html\">lingering questions over the legitimacy of this case\u003c/a> — namely, whether the web designer in question had ever really been asked to design a site for a gay wedding — Coles said he didn’t think it’s “a fake case.” The real question, he said, is whether the designer has taken steps to “start working on websites or not — and the answer is yes. She made a pretty decent showing in the court that she’d done a lot of research. She had models together.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Notions of this being a “fake case” get away from the point, says Liss, of Van Nest and Peters. She stresses that this case is “an important door,” one that this court has chosen to open and go through by taking up the case in the first place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11955692\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11955692\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/07/GettyImages-972695008-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"A rainbow flag hangs over a government building.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">San Francisco-based attorney Courtney Liss advises businesses to make it very clear that they \u003cem>do\u003c/em> want to provide services to LGBTQ+ communities, with signs and clear website notices. ‘I personally do not want to go anywhere where I’m not welcome,’ she said. \u003ccite>(JasonDoiy/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>What could the long-term ramifications of this case be?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Coles says that what surprised him about the Supreme Court’s decision was that it did not draw upon the clause in the Constitution that protects people’s right to practice their religion. Instead, the ruling draws upon the free speech clause, “because [Lorie Smith] was involved in expressive conduct.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Coles believes that the Court’s conservative justices disagree on how to interpret the free exercise-of-religion clause. But he cautions that there may come a day when the conservative justices privilege religious exemptions in their rulings. “And that religious exception to nondiscrimination laws is not going to be limited to expressive businesses,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Run through the list of everything that we’ve managed to cover with our civil rights laws,” Coles said, referring to protections for race, religion, gender and disability. By itself, he said, 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis is “not going to completely eviscerate discrimination laws,” but he believes it “portends something in the future, which is a good deal worse.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>How can you voice your opposition to this ruling?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The Supreme Court’s recent raft of rulings against LGBTQ+ rights, affirmative action and student loan forgiveness has drawn vehement criticism sharply focused on the Court’s conservative supermajority. For example, in speaking out against the student loan decision, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11954741/supreme-court-student-loan-decision-how-affects-you\">U.S Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) called the body a “corrupt, right-wing court.”\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Criticism of the court’s rulings has also come from within, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor saying that the website designer ruling saw the Supreme Court “taking steps backward.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Today is a sad day in American constitutional law and in the lives of LGBT people,” she added. “The immediate, symbolic effect of the decision is to mark gays and lesbians for second-class status.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label='More Guides from KQED' tag='kqed-guides']Coles notes that at the end of the student loan decision, Justice Elena Kagan’s dissent features a “very pointed dialogue” that strongly criticizes the Supreme Court for what she sees as violations of the separation of powers in their ruling — and that Justice John Roberts’ reply bristles at the suggestion that the court is not legitimate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So I think they’re beginning to get sensitive to the notion that there’s a wide, ever-growing public belief that some of what they’re doing is not legitimate,” said Coles of the conservative justices. “It’s really important if you think what they’re doing is not legitimate, to keep voicing that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Liss urged people to “call your congresspeople and your other elected representatives” to express that, if so. You might also feel like this “legitimacy crisis” is sharpened, she says, by “\u003ca href=\"https://www.propublica.org/article/clarence-thomas-scotus-undisclosed-luxury-travel-gifts-crow\">the lack of standards that the Supreme Court holds themselves to in terms of accepting gifts\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On an everyday scale, Liss advises businesses to make it very clear that they \u003cem>do\u003c/em> want to provide services to LGBTQ+ communities, with signs and clear website notices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I personally do not want to go anywhere where I’m not welcome,” said Liss. “I don’t want to give a single dollar to someone who wouldn’t be excited to take my very gay dollar.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story contains reporting from The Associated Press.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"tellus\">\u003c/a>Tell us: What else do you need information about?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At KQED News, we know that it can sometimes be hard to track down the answers to navigate life in the Bay Area in 2023. We’ve published \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/coronavirus-resources-and-explainers\">clear, practical explainers and guides about COVID\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11936674/how-to-prepare-for-this-weeks-atmospheric-river-storm-sandbags-emergency-kits-and-more\">how to cope with intense winter weather\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11821950/how-to-safely-attend-a-protest-in-the-bay-area\">how to exercise your right to protest safely\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So tell us: What do you need to know more about? Tell us, and you could see your question answered online or on social media. What you submit will make our reporting stronger, and help us decide what to cover here on our site, and on KQED Public Radio, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[hearken id=\"10483\" src=\"https://modules.wearehearken.com/kqed/embed/10483.js\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>In the last days of June, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11954612/u-s-supreme-court-strikes-down-affirmative-action-barring-california-private-universities-from-considering-race-in-admissions\">the Supreme Court struck down affirmative action\u003c/a>, opened the door to LGBTQ+ discrimination and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11954741/supreme-court-student-loan-decision-how-affects-you\">outlawed the Biden administration’s plan to forgive student loans\u003c/a>. These are monumental rulings that directly affect people of color, queer folks, prospective college students and the 43 million Americans with federal student loans — leaving many devastated and fearful for the future.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/explaining-the-supreme-court\">our series explaining this summer’s Supreme Court decisions\u003c/a>, we’re unpacking how these rulings will affect you — and what can be done now. This explainer focuses on the case 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis — which saw the court rule in favor of a web designer who refused to make wedding websites for gay couples — and what it could mean for discrimination against LGBTQ+ folks in the United States.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED gathered legal and judicial insight on this ruling at a panel hosted at Manny’s, a community space in San Francisco. On this panel were:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.keker.com/Lawyers/courtney-j-liss\">Courtney Liss\u003c/a>, associate at San Francisco law firm Keker, Van Nest and Peters\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.keker.com/Lawyers/Harris-Cody\">Cody Harris\u003c/a>, partner at Keker, Van Nest and Peters\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.uchastings.edu/people/matt-coles/\">Matthew Coles\u003c/a>, professor of practice at UC Law San Francisco (formerly UC Hastings)\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2>What was the Supreme Court’s decision about LGBTQ+ discrimination?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>In a defeat for gay rights, the Supreme Court’s conservative majority ruled in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis that a Christian graphic artist who designs wedding websites can refuse to work with same-sex couples.\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"#tellus\">\u003cstrong>Tell us: What else do you need information about right now?\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003cp>Justice Sonia Sotomayor, one of the court’s liberal justices, wrote in a dissent that the decision’s effect is to “mark gays and lesbians for second-class status” and that the ruling opens the door to further discrimination. \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2023/06/30/1182121291/colorado-supreme-court-same-sex-marriage-decision\">Read more about the case from NPR\u003c/a> or read \u003ca href=\"https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-476_c185.pdf\">the Supreme Court’s ruling (PDF)\u003c/a> for yourself.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>What will change for queer people in the US after this case?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>This ruling has opened the door for LGBTQ+ people to be discriminated against when requesting services from certain professionals, says UC Law San Francisco’s Coles, specifically in situations involving the use of words or the creation of images and films.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Why? Smith \u003ca href=\"https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-476_c185.pdf\">framed her website services as “expressive in nature” (PDF)\u003c/a> because she designed them to be customized, original and intended “to communicate a particular message.” Consequently, other professionals operating what could be termed an “expressive business” could use this ruling to deny service to LGBTQ+ people as well.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Coles’ advice to folks in the community? “Find out in advance whether this business has said that it doesn’t want to serve [queer people],” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Practically, the website case now means that someone like Lorie Smith, the Colorado graphic designer, can refuse service to LGBTQ+ folks “without fear of government sanction on them,” said Harris of Keker, Van Nest and Peters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Harris adds that hate speech laws as most people think of them — those that would make it a crime to say something hateful — don’t really exist. Hate speech is “awful and odious, and it makes me angry,” he said, “but it’s constitutional.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>How was this case even won?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Lorie Smith, the web designer involved in the case, was challenging her home state of Colorado’s public accommodations law — the type of law that, in most states, bars discrimination based on sexual orientation. Her claim was that the state was unconstitutionally forcing her to create a message she opposes because she can’t deny service to same-sex couples. The Supreme Court sided with Smith, ruling that forcing her to create websites for queer couples would violate her free speech rights under the Constitution’s First Amendment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Smith should have lost her case on several fronts, said Coles — just one being that her website work “is commercial speech,” and not personal expression (free speech), because Smith “was being paid to write words for somebody else.” And it’s well-established, says Coles, that commercial speech is not as protected as other forms of speech.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The court ignored this analysis of the First Amendment in its ruling, says Coles. A majority of the justices, he adds, believe that if Smith created websites for same-sex couples, she would be forced to use words to celebrate things she does not want to celebrate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Responding to \u003ca href=\"https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/supreme-court-web-designer-fake-case-b2370226.html\">lingering questions over the legitimacy of this case\u003c/a> — namely, whether the web designer in question had ever really been asked to design a site for a gay wedding — Coles said he didn’t think it’s “a fake case.” The real question, he said, is whether the designer has taken steps to “start working on websites or not — and the answer is yes. She made a pretty decent showing in the court that she’d done a lot of research. She had models together.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Notions of this being a “fake case” get away from the point, says Liss, of Van Nest and Peters. She stresses that this case is “an important door,” one that this court has chosen to open and go through by taking up the case in the first place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11955692\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11955692\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/07/GettyImages-972695008-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"A rainbow flag hangs over a government building.\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">San Francisco-based attorney Courtney Liss advises businesses to make it very clear that they \u003cem>do\u003c/em> want to provide services to LGBTQ+ communities, with signs and clear website notices. ‘I personally do not want to go anywhere where I’m not welcome,’ she said. \u003ccite>(JasonDoiy/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>What could the long-term ramifications of this case be?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Coles says that what surprised him about the Supreme Court’s decision was that it did not draw upon the clause in the Constitution that protects people’s right to practice their religion. Instead, the ruling draws upon the free speech clause, “because [Lorie Smith] was involved in expressive conduct.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Coles believes that the Court’s conservative justices disagree on how to interpret the free exercise-of-religion clause. But he cautions that there may come a day when the conservative justices privilege religious exemptions in their rulings. “And that religious exception to nondiscrimination laws is not going to be limited to expressive businesses,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Run through the list of everything that we’ve managed to cover with our civil rights laws,” Coles said, referring to protections for race, religion, gender and disability. By itself, he said, 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis is “not going to completely eviscerate discrimination laws,” but he believes it “portends something in the future, which is a good deal worse.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>How can you voice your opposition to this ruling?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The Supreme Court’s recent raft of rulings against LGBTQ+ rights, affirmative action and student loan forgiveness has drawn vehement criticism sharply focused on the Court’s conservative supermajority. For example, in speaking out against the student loan decision, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11954741/supreme-court-student-loan-decision-how-affects-you\">U.S Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) called the body a “corrupt, right-wing court.”\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Criticism of the court’s rulings has also come from within, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor saying that the website designer ruling saw the Supreme Court “taking steps backward.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Today is a sad day in American constitutional law and in the lives of LGBT people,” she added. “The immediate, symbolic effect of the decision is to mark gays and lesbians for second-class status.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Coles notes that at the end of the student loan decision, Justice Elena Kagan’s dissent features a “very pointed dialogue” that strongly criticizes the Supreme Court for what she sees as violations of the separation of powers in their ruling — and that Justice John Roberts’ reply bristles at the suggestion that the court is not legitimate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So I think they’re beginning to get sensitive to the notion that there’s a wide, ever-growing public belief that some of what they’re doing is not legitimate,” said Coles of the conservative justices. “It’s really important if you think what they’re doing is not legitimate, to keep voicing that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Liss urged people to “call your congresspeople and your other elected representatives” to express that, if so. You might also feel like this “legitimacy crisis” is sharpened, she says, by “\u003ca href=\"https://www.propublica.org/article/clarence-thomas-scotus-undisclosed-luxury-travel-gifts-crow\">the lack of standards that the Supreme Court holds themselves to in terms of accepting gifts\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On an everyday scale, Liss advises businesses to make it very clear that they \u003cem>do\u003c/em> want to provide services to LGBTQ+ communities, with signs and clear website notices.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I personally do not want to go anywhere where I’m not welcome,” said Liss. “I don’t want to give a single dollar to someone who wouldn’t be excited to take my very gay dollar.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story contains reporting from The Associated Press.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca id=\"tellus\">\u003c/a>Tell us: What else do you need information about?\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>At KQED News, we know that it can sometimes be hard to track down the answers to navigate life in the Bay Area in 2023. We’ve published \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/coronavirus-resources-and-explainers\">clear, practical explainers and guides about COVID\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11936674/how-to-prepare-for-this-weeks-atmospheric-river-storm-sandbags-emergency-kits-and-more\">how to cope with intense winter weather\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11821950/how-to-safely-attend-a-protest-in-the-bay-area\">how to exercise your right to protest safely\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So tell us: What do you need to know more about? Tell us, and you could see your question answered online or on social media. What you submit will make our reporting stronger, and help us decide what to cover here on our site, and on KQED Public Radio, too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"#correction\">This story contains a correction.\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More than 11 million arrest and conviction records have been wiped clean in the first six months of the implementation of a new California law, marking the largest expungement over that time period in the country’s history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The mass expungement follows the years-long effort by lawmakers and voters dating back to 2016 — when marijuana was legalized in the state — to clear certain criminal records and open up employment and housing opportunities for Californians.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“After someone has completed their sentence and paid their debts, we cannot continue to allow old legal records to create barriers to opportunity that destabilize families, undermine our economy, and worsen racial injustices,” Assemblymember Phil Ting (D-San Francisco) \u003ca href=\"https://safeandjust.org/news/millions-of-old-conviction-and-arrest-records-have-been-expunged-under-unprecedented-state-law-doj-says/\">said in a press statement\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ting authored \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200AB1076\">AB 1076\u003c/a>, a 2019 law which requires the state’s Dept. of Justice to review and automatically clear certain non-serious offense records for people who already completed their sentence or diversion program, or if their arrest did not lead to a conviction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Expungements of records under the law began a year ago. Between July 1 and Dec. 31, 2022, more than 8.4 million arrests that never resulted in a conviction were cleared from Californians’ records, according to the \u003ca href=\"https://data-openjustice.doj.ca.gov/sites/default/files/dataset/2023-06/arr-mandated-stats.pdf\">latest relief data from the DOJ (PDF)\u003c/a>. More than 2.6 million conviction records were also expunged during the same time period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have over 58 million records that represent 6 to 7 million people in California that just weren’t getting their records expunged,” Jay Jordan, CEO of the Alliance for Safety and Justice, a public safety advocacy organization, told KQED. “As a result, they couldn’t find good-paying jobs, they couldn’t get apartments, and they couldn’t do things like coach their kid’s Little League teams.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2016, \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201720180AB64\">California voters approved Proposition 64\u003c/a>, which legalized cannabis and required the state to expunge prior cannabis-related records that were no longer considered criminal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But while cannabis sales and businesses were quick to boom after legalization, expungement for prior convictions was slow because the process largely fell on individuals to do the work of determining whether they are eligible and bringing their case up for review.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Individuals who wanted to expunge an arrest or a completed sentence from their record typically would have to go to court, fill out a CR-180 form to apply for dismissal, pay around $125, coordinate with the district attorney’s office, then be granted a court date for when their case could be reviewed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People didn’t have the time or money to do it,” said Jordan. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Assemblymember Phil Ting (D-San Francisco)\"]‘California laws that prevent people living with a past conviction or arrest record from positively contributing to our communities make us all less safe.’[/pullquote]In 2018, under former Gov. Jerry Brown, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11688824/california-measure-would-expunge-many-marijuana-related-crimes\">the state approved AB 1793\u003c/a> to help speed up the process by automating it and requiring courts to identify all eligible cannabis-related records and seal them, removing the onus to do so from affected people who may not even know they are eligible. Rollout of AB 1793 was uneven, however, and many local agencies delayed the process as the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted court proceedings across the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To get the effort moving again, in 2019, Ting’s bill automated expungements for eligible arrests and convictions and expanded eligibility to every misdemeanor – not just those related to cannabis – so long as the arrest didn’t result in a prison sentence and if the person completed their sentence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The DOJ, along with the nonprofit Code for America, created an automated system that started expunging records on July 1, 2022. That will now continue on a rolling basis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11803065\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11803065\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/02/RS6157_002-1.jpg\" alt=\"An Asian man in a suit and tie speaks from behind a dais with a California emblem.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/02/RS6157_002-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/02/RS6157_002-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/02/RS6157_002-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/02/RS6157_002-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Assemblymember Phil Ting (D-San Francisco) at a community meeting about language access and the Affordable Care Act on Aug. 14, 2013. \u003ccite>(Deborah Svoboda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Specifically for cannabis-related sentences, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed AB 1706 in Sept. 2022, which required counties and courts to seal eligible cannabis-related records if they had not been challenged by March 2023. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Area counties such as San Francisco, San Mateo and Sonoma had sealed nearly all of those records that were found to be eligible as of April 6, 2023, \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/system/files/media/ab1706-legreport-06012023.pdf\">according to a June report from the DOJ (PDF)\u003c/a>. Others, like Contra Costa and Alameda counties, have a higher proportion of cases to get through.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The DOJ report showed a racial equity gap among people who are relieved from their past cannabis-related arrests or sentences under AB 1706. More white men have been both found eligible and granted relief, compared with Hispanic, Black, Asian or other racial groups, according to the DOJ report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In addition, lawmakers in 2022 passed another bill, \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB731\">SB 731\u003c/a>, which creates a pathway to sealing records for a much wider range of criminal convictions beyond cannabis, excluding sex offenses. Under that bill, a person can apply to seal their records within four years of completing a sentence, as long as they don’t have a new arrest. Some agencies like schools and police, however, can still access the criminal history, but it would not show up in regular background checks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“California laws that prevent people living with a past conviction or arrest record from positively contributing to our communities make us all less safe,” Ting said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story includes reporting by KQED’s Billy Cruz.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca id=\"correction\">\u003c/a>July 10: An earlier version of this story conflated AB 1076 with AB 1706. This story has been edited to correct the inaccuracy.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"#correction\">This story contains a correction.\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More than 11 million arrest and conviction records have been wiped clean in the first six months of the implementation of a new California law, marking the largest expungement over that time period in the country’s history.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The mass expungement follows the years-long effort by lawmakers and voters dating back to 2016 — when marijuana was legalized in the state — to clear certain criminal records and open up employment and housing opportunities for Californians.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“After someone has completed their sentence and paid their debts, we cannot continue to allow old legal records to create barriers to opportunity that destabilize families, undermine our economy, and worsen racial injustices,” Assemblymember Phil Ting (D-San Francisco) \u003ca href=\"https://safeandjust.org/news/millions-of-old-conviction-and-arrest-records-have-been-expunged-under-unprecedented-state-law-doj-says/\">said in a press statement\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ting authored \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200AB1076\">AB 1076\u003c/a>, a 2019 law which requires the state’s Dept. of Justice to review and automatically clear certain non-serious offense records for people who already completed their sentence or diversion program, or if their arrest did not lead to a conviction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Expungements of records under the law began a year ago. Between July 1 and Dec. 31, 2022, more than 8.4 million arrests that never resulted in a conviction were cleared from Californians’ records, according to the \u003ca href=\"https://data-openjustice.doj.ca.gov/sites/default/files/dataset/2023-06/arr-mandated-stats.pdf\">latest relief data from the DOJ (PDF)\u003c/a>. More than 2.6 million conviction records were also expunged during the same time period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have over 58 million records that represent 6 to 7 million people in California that just weren’t getting their records expunged,” Jay Jordan, CEO of the Alliance for Safety and Justice, a public safety advocacy organization, told KQED. “As a result, they couldn’t find good-paying jobs, they couldn’t get apartments, and they couldn’t do things like coach their kid’s Little League teams.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>In 2018, under former Gov. Jerry Brown, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11688824/california-measure-would-expunge-many-marijuana-related-crimes\">the state approved AB 1793\u003c/a> to help speed up the process by automating it and requiring courts to identify all eligible cannabis-related records and seal them, removing the onus to do so from affected people who may not even know they are eligible. Rollout of AB 1793 was uneven, however, and many local agencies delayed the process as the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted court proceedings across the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To get the effort moving again, in 2019, Ting’s bill automated expungements for eligible arrests and convictions and expanded eligibility to every misdemeanor – not just those related to cannabis – so long as the arrest didn’t result in a prison sentence and if the person completed their sentence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The DOJ, along with the nonprofit Code for America, created an automated system that started expunging records on July 1, 2022. That will now continue on a rolling basis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11803065\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11803065\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/02/RS6157_002-1.jpg\" alt=\"An Asian man in a suit and tie speaks from behind a dais with a California emblem.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/02/RS6157_002-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/02/RS6157_002-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/02/RS6157_002-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/02/RS6157_002-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Assemblymember Phil Ting (D-San Francisco) at a community meeting about language access and the Affordable Care Act on Aug. 14, 2013. \u003ccite>(Deborah Svoboda/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Specifically for cannabis-related sentences, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed AB 1706 in Sept. 2022, which required counties and courts to seal eligible cannabis-related records if they had not been challenged by March 2023. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bay Area counties such as San Francisco, San Mateo and Sonoma had sealed nearly all of those records that were found to be eligible as of April 6, 2023, \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/system/files/media/ab1706-legreport-06012023.pdf\">according to a June report from the DOJ (PDF)\u003c/a>. Others, like Contra Costa and Alameda counties, have a higher proportion of cases to get through.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The DOJ report showed a racial equity gap among people who are relieved from their past cannabis-related arrests or sentences under AB 1706. More white men have been both found eligible and granted relief, compared with Hispanic, Black, Asian or other racial groups, according to the DOJ report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In addition, lawmakers in 2022 passed another bill, \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB731\">SB 731\u003c/a>, which creates a pathway to sealing records for a much wider range of criminal convictions beyond cannabis, excluding sex offenses. Under that bill, a person can apply to seal their records within four years of completing a sentence, as long as they don’t have a new arrest. Some agencies like schools and police, however, can still access the criminal history, but it would not show up in regular background checks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“California laws that prevent people living with a past conviction or arrest record from positively contributing to our communities make us all less safe,” Ting said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story includes reporting by KQED’s Billy Cruz.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca id=\"correction\">\u003c/a>July 10: An earlier version of this story conflated AB 1076 with AB 1706. This story has been edited to correct the inaccuracy.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Newsom Taps California Highway Patrol, National Guard to Fight San Francisco’s Fentanyl Crisis",
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"content": "\u003cp>A new team of officers from the California Highway Patrol and the California National Guard will step in to train and assist San Francisco Police in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11947448/there-to-save-a-life-san-francisco-bars-fight-fentanyl-overdoses-with-narcan\">disrupting fentanyl\u003c/a> dealing and trafficking, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Friday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The mobilization comes as overdose rates in the city have increased 41% across \u003ca href=\"https://sf.gov/sites/default/files/2023-04/2023%2004_OCME%20Overdose%20Report_0.pdf\">the first three months of this year (PDF)\u003c/a> compared with \u003ca href=\"https://sf.gov/sites/default/files/2023-03/2022_OCME%20Overdose%20Report_0.pdf\">the same time period in 2022 (PDF)\u003c/a>, when the city was operating a supervised consumption site. Trained staff at \u003ca href=\"https://sf.gov/data/reducing-fatal-and-non-fatal-overdoses-tenderloin#overdoses-reversed-at-the-tenderloin-center\">the facility reversed 333 overdoses in 11 months\u003c/a> before the facility closed, according to city data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Those who traffic drugs, guns, and human beings are not welcome in our communities,” said Newsom in a press release. “That’s why we’re launching this operation. This is not about criminalizing people struggling with substance use — this is about taking down the prominent poison peddlers and their connected crime rings that prey on the most vulnerable, and harm our residents. While it’s true that San Francisco is safer than many cities its size, we cannot let rampant crime continue.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11948099\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11948099\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A photo of a politician in a navy blue suit with navy and white tie, stands speaking from a podium with the U.S. and California state flags behind him.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Gov. Gavin Newsom announced on Friday, April 28, 2023, that a new team of officers from the California Highway Patrol and the California National Guard will step in to train and assist San Francisco police in disrupting fentanyl dealing and trafficking. \u003ccite>(Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Starting May 1, CHP officers will help investigate opioid trafficking cases and train local police in identifying intoxicated drivers, city officials said on Friday. The effort will have a particular focus on the Tenderloin neighborhood, where the majority of overdose deaths have occurred this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Additional CHP units will also patrol hot spots for drug dealing in the city “as workload allows,” according to the press release about the plan. So far, 75 CHP officers have been stationed in the San Francisco area, CHP Commissioner Sean Duryee told reporters at a press conference on Friday. He said he expects that number to increase to 84 in the coming weeks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, 14 members of the California National Guard (Cal Guard) will work remotely with SFPD on non-patrol operations such as improving administrative systems and responses to drug-related crime.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since January, San Francisco police have made more than 300 arrests for possession with intent to sell and seized 150% more fentanyl in the first three months of 2023 compared to 2022, according to the mayor’s office. On Tuesday, District Attorney Brooke Jenkins announced multiple charges against a 23-year-old arrested for carrying 11 pounds of fentanyl, an opioid about 50 times more potent than heroin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fentanyl has been involved in the vast majority of recent overdose deaths in San Francisco, data from the Office of the Medical Examiner shows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Officials on Friday did not state what the long-term plan for the intervention would entail, but seemed aware of how \u003ca href=\"https://sfstandard.com/politics/city-hall/analysis-political-history-haunts-mayor-breed-as-she-attempts-another-tenderloin-cleanup/\">similar crackdown efforts\u003c/a> in the neighborhood in the past and even \u003ca href=\"https://sfstandard.com/criminal-justice/da-jenkins-threatens-drug-dealers-with-more-jail-time-harsher-penalties-as-sf-fentanyl-crackdown-expands/\">more recently\u003c/a> have \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/drug-overdose-deaths-2023-17904060.php#:~:text=Quarterly%20accidental%20overdose%20deaths%20in%20San%20Francisco&text=Deaths%20reached%20a%20peak%20of,in%20Quarter%201%20of%202023.&text=Fentanyl%2Drelated-,The%20numbers%20are%20preliminary%20and%20subject%20to,more%20death%20investigations%20are%20completed.\">not shown success at slowing down sales, public drug use or overdose deaths\u003c/a> in the long run.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label='More Stories on Fentanyl' tag='fentanyl']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When we deploy large amounts of officers, the problem tends to go away while we are there,” said San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott. “The last thing we want to do is clean the streets up for a week, a month, then everyone goes back to what they were doing again.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Department of Justice and the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office, both of which have called for tougher enforcement around drug dealing as public scrutiny over the overdose crisis mounts, are also supportive of the plan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The fentanyl crisis is impacting our residents, workers, and businesses, and it requires all of us working together to disrupt the flow of drugs in San Francisco while also making sure we have treatment for those struggling with addiction,” San Francisco Mayor London Breed said in a press release.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This will send a strong message to those who are perpetrating these crimes,” she later said at Friday’s press conference.[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"San Francisco Mayor London Breed\"]‘The fentanyl crisis is impacting our residents, workers, and businesses, and it requires all of us working together to disrupt the flow of drugs in San Francisco while also making sure we have treatment for those struggling with addiction.’[/pullquote]The proclamation Friday was reminiscent of Breed’s bold claim in 2021 that the city would crack down on the “bulls— that has destroyed our city,” which she said in \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/mayor-london-breed-declares-state-of-emergency-in-san-franciscos-troubled-tenderloin/\">announcing an emergency plan\u003c/a> to address the drug and overdose crisis in the Tenderloin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That effort brought together multiple city agencies to ramp up enforcement of dealing, clear sidewalks and offer new public health responses to drug use such as opening what became a supervised consumption site called the Tenderloin Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The facility closed at the end of 2022, a few months after Newsom vetoed legislation that would have allowed San Francisco, Los Angeles and Oakland to pilot safe consumption sites. Breed said the plan was only meant to be temporary and, on Friday, added the center “didn’t quite work out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11948101\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11948101\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut.jpg\" alt='A blue and yellow sign reads, \"Tenderloin Linkage Center Entrance.\"' width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Residents wait in line to get into the Tenderloin Linkage Center (also known as the Tenderloin Center), a now-defunct safe consumption site in San Francisco, on Feb. 8, 2022. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>After the closing of the Tenderloin Center and the emergency plan’s winding down, overdose rates have again increased in 2023, data from the Office of the Medical Examiner shows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, public safety advocates applauded the governor’s decision to increase law enforcement around the issue, at a time when the \u003ca href=\"https://missionlocal.org/2023/03/police-staffing-crisis-san-francisco/\">San Francisco Police Department is struggling\u003c/a> to recruit and retain a full workforce.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Just the mere presence of our officers we believe will help deter and disrupt criminal activity,” Duryee said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Newsom said that his plan “will not seek to criminalize those struggling with substance use and instead focus on disrupting the supply fueling the fentanyl crisis by holding drug suppliers and traffickers accountable,” according to a press release on the plan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But addiction experts and advocates for people who use drugs say the move could nonetheless have unintended consequences, and negatively affect people who struggle with addiction and lack access to housing, health care or other support systems.[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Dan Ciccarone, professor, UCSF\"]‘The outcome they want is to disturb the fentanyl supply. But usually these events are short-lived, and when they go away, the drug supply rebounds.’[/pullquote]“The outcome they want is to disturb the fentanyl supply. But usually these events are short-lived, and when they go away, the drug supply rebounds,” said Dan Ciccarone, professor and expert in addiction at UCSF. “When that happens, people die. People reduce their tolerance during the prohibition and go back to normal use when the supply rebounds and overdose rates shoot up.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reporters on Friday asked Breed whether she shared concerns from some community members that the federal support and stricter law enforcement approach could replicate some of the devastation of the war on drugs, which \u003ca href=\"https://ldi.upenn.edu/our-work/research-updates/the-war-on-drugs-as-structural-racism/\">fueled overrepresentation\u003c/a> of Black and Latino people imprisoned for drug-related crimes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have more concerns about the number of people who are dying of drug overdoses and the families and people struggling in their neighborhoods,” Breed responded. “I want the streets to be safe … and part of that includes all of the great programs we are doing, but there has to be accountability attached to this.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>A new team of officers from the California Highway Patrol and the California National Guard will step in to train and assist San Francisco Police in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11947448/there-to-save-a-life-san-francisco-bars-fight-fentanyl-overdoses-with-narcan\">disrupting fentanyl\u003c/a> dealing and trafficking, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Friday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The mobilization comes as overdose rates in the city have increased 41% across \u003ca href=\"https://sf.gov/sites/default/files/2023-04/2023%2004_OCME%20Overdose%20Report_0.pdf\">the first three months of this year (PDF)\u003c/a> compared with \u003ca href=\"https://sf.gov/sites/default/files/2023-03/2022_OCME%20Overdose%20Report_0.pdf\">the same time period in 2022 (PDF)\u003c/a>, when the city was operating a supervised consumption site. Trained staff at \u003ca href=\"https://sf.gov/data/reducing-fatal-and-non-fatal-overdoses-tenderloin#overdoses-reversed-at-the-tenderloin-center\">the facility reversed 333 overdoses in 11 months\u003c/a> before the facility closed, according to city data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Those who traffic drugs, guns, and human beings are not welcome in our communities,” said Newsom in a press release. “That’s why we’re launching this operation. This is not about criminalizing people struggling with substance use — this is about taking down the prominent poison peddlers and their connected crime rings that prey on the most vulnerable, and harm our residents. While it’s true that San Francisco is safer than many cities its size, we cannot let rampant crime continue.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11948099\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11948099\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A photo of a politician in a navy blue suit with navy and white tie, stands speaking from a podium with the U.S. and California state flags behind him.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS31296_GettyImages-968048630-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Gov. Gavin Newsom announced on Friday, April 28, 2023, that a new team of officers from the California Highway Patrol and the California National Guard will step in to train and assist San Francisco police in disrupting fentanyl dealing and trafficking. \u003ccite>(Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Starting May 1, CHP officers will help investigate opioid trafficking cases and train local police in identifying intoxicated drivers, city officials said on Friday. The effort will have a particular focus on the Tenderloin neighborhood, where the majority of overdose deaths have occurred this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Additional CHP units will also patrol hot spots for drug dealing in the city “as workload allows,” according to the press release about the plan. So far, 75 CHP officers have been stationed in the San Francisco area, CHP Commissioner Sean Duryee told reporters at a press conference on Friday. He said he expects that number to increase to 84 in the coming weeks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, 14 members of the California National Guard (Cal Guard) will work remotely with SFPD on non-patrol operations such as improving administrative systems and responses to drug-related crime.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since January, San Francisco police have made more than 300 arrests for possession with intent to sell and seized 150% more fentanyl in the first three months of 2023 compared to 2022, according to the mayor’s office. On Tuesday, District Attorney Brooke Jenkins announced multiple charges against a 23-year-old arrested for carrying 11 pounds of fentanyl, an opioid about 50 times more potent than heroin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fentanyl has been involved in the vast majority of recent overdose deaths in San Francisco, data from the Office of the Medical Examiner shows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Officials on Friday did not state what the long-term plan for the intervention would entail, but seemed aware of how \u003ca href=\"https://sfstandard.com/politics/city-hall/analysis-political-history-haunts-mayor-breed-as-she-attempts-another-tenderloin-cleanup/\">similar crackdown efforts\u003c/a> in the neighborhood in the past and even \u003ca href=\"https://sfstandard.com/criminal-justice/da-jenkins-threatens-drug-dealers-with-more-jail-time-harsher-penalties-as-sf-fentanyl-crackdown-expands/\">more recently\u003c/a> have \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/drug-overdose-deaths-2023-17904060.php#:~:text=Quarterly%20accidental%20overdose%20deaths%20in%20San%20Francisco&text=Deaths%20reached%20a%20peak%20of,in%20Quarter%201%20of%202023.&text=Fentanyl%2Drelated-,The%20numbers%20are%20preliminary%20and%20subject%20to,more%20death%20investigations%20are%20completed.\">not shown success at slowing down sales, public drug use or overdose deaths\u003c/a> in the long run.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When we deploy large amounts of officers, the problem tends to go away while we are there,” said San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott. “The last thing we want to do is clean the streets up for a week, a month, then everyone goes back to what they were doing again.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Department of Justice and the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office, both of which have called for tougher enforcement around drug dealing as public scrutiny over the overdose crisis mounts, are also supportive of the plan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The fentanyl crisis is impacting our residents, workers, and businesses, and it requires all of us working together to disrupt the flow of drugs in San Francisco while also making sure we have treatment for those struggling with addiction,” San Francisco Mayor London Breed said in a press release.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This will send a strong message to those who are perpetrating these crimes,” she later said at Friday’s press conference.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘The fentanyl crisis is impacting our residents, workers, and businesses, and it requires all of us working together to disrupt the flow of drugs in San Francisco while also making sure we have treatment for those struggling with addiction.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The proclamation Friday was reminiscent of Breed’s bold claim in 2021 that the city would crack down on the “bulls— that has destroyed our city,” which she said in \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/mayor-london-breed-declares-state-of-emergency-in-san-franciscos-troubled-tenderloin/\">announcing an emergency plan\u003c/a> to address the drug and overdose crisis in the Tenderloin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That effort brought together multiple city agencies to ramp up enforcement of dealing, clear sidewalks and offer new public health responses to drug use such as opening what became a supervised consumption site called the Tenderloin Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The facility closed at the end of 2022, a few months after Newsom vetoed legislation that would have allowed San Francisco, Los Angeles and Oakland to pilot safe consumption sites. Breed said the plan was only meant to be temporary and, on Friday, added the center “didn’t quite work out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11948101\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11948101\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut.jpg\" alt='A blue and yellow sign reads, \"Tenderloin Linkage Center Entrance.\"' width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS53605_010_SanFrancisco_TLLinkageCenter_02082022-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Residents wait in line to get into the Tenderloin Linkage Center (also known as the Tenderloin Center), a now-defunct safe consumption site in San Francisco, on Feb. 8, 2022. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>After the closing of the Tenderloin Center and the emergency plan’s winding down, overdose rates have again increased in 2023, data from the Office of the Medical Examiner shows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, public safety advocates applauded the governor’s decision to increase law enforcement around the issue, at a time when the \u003ca href=\"https://missionlocal.org/2023/03/police-staffing-crisis-san-francisco/\">San Francisco Police Department is struggling\u003c/a> to recruit and retain a full workforce.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Just the mere presence of our officers we believe will help deter and disrupt criminal activity,” Duryee said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Newsom said that his plan “will not seek to criminalize those struggling with substance use and instead focus on disrupting the supply fueling the fentanyl crisis by holding drug suppliers and traffickers accountable,” according to a press release on the plan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But addiction experts and advocates for people who use drugs say the move could nonetheless have unintended consequences, and negatively affect people who struggle with addiction and lack access to housing, health care or other support systems.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘The outcome they want is to disturb the fentanyl supply. But usually these events are short-lived, and when they go away, the drug supply rebounds.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“The outcome they want is to disturb the fentanyl supply. But usually these events are short-lived, and when they go away, the drug supply rebounds,” said Dan Ciccarone, professor and expert in addiction at UCSF. “When that happens, people die. People reduce their tolerance during the prohibition and go back to normal use when the supply rebounds and overdose rates shoot up.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Reporters on Friday asked Breed whether she shared concerns from some community members that the federal support and stricter law enforcement approach could replicate some of the devastation of the war on drugs, which \u003ca href=\"https://ldi.upenn.edu/our-work/research-updates/the-war-on-drugs-as-structural-racism/\">fueled overrepresentation\u003c/a> of Black and Latino people imprisoned for drug-related crimes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have more concerns about the number of people who are dying of drug overdoses and the families and people struggling in their neighborhoods,” Breed responded. “I want the streets to be safe … and part of that includes all of the great programs we are doing, but there has to be accountability attached to this.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"title": "Judge Delays SF DA's Move to Dismiss Homicide Case Against Officer Who Killed Keita O'Neil",
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"headTitle": "Judge Delays SF DA’s Move to Dismiss Homicide Case Against Officer Who Killed Keita O’Neil | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>A judge on Wednesday delayed a motion from San Francisco’s district attorney to dismiss the historic prosecution of a city police officer charged with shooting and killing a carjacking suspect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The one-week delay is intended to give California Attorney General Rob Bonta additional time to determine whether to pursue the case against the officer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label=\"related coverage\" tag=\"keita-oneil\"]“My hope is that the attorney general will give this case fresh eyes,” said San Francisco County Superior Court Judge Loretta Giorgi at a hearing on Wednesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If Bonta does not pursue the case or request an extension by March 7, charges against Christopher Samayoa, a former San Francisco police officer, will officially be dismissed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The delay comes in response to San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins’ move last month to dismiss charges against Samayoa, who killed Keita O’Neil during a police chase in December 2017, after O’Neil allegedly stole a California Lottery van.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Samayoa, who was in his fourth day of a field training program, is shown on body camera firing his weapon through the window of his patrol car and hitting O’Neil, a 42-year-old Black man, as he tried to escape on foot. Samayoa was subsequently fired.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nearly three years after the incident, Chesa Boudin, Jenkins’ predecessor who was recalled from office last summer, charged Samayoa with multiple counts of manslaughter and assault, marking the first homicide prosecution in San Francisco history against a police officer for an on-duty killing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a Feb. 8 letter to Bonta, Jenkins argued that Boudin wrongly pursued manslaughter charges against Samayoa for “political reasons and not in the interest of justice.” She said her office had also “discovered an internal conflict in the case that impacts our ability to handle the matter,” referring to opposing statements from the attorney in Boudin’s office who initially handled the case and the DA investigator who signed the arrest warrant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The judge announced her decision to delay the dismissal after hearing a heartfelt plea from O’Neil’s aunt, April Green, who told reporters she hopes to meet with Bonta during the stay order.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11942244\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11942244 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg\" alt=\"A middle-aged woman with light, freckled skin and short dark hair is seated in a wheelchair holding a microphone, next to a photo of a Black man with long black locs. The woman wears a beige leather jacket and a patterned matching blouse, with gold earrings and a necklace.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">April Green, aunt of Keita O’Neil, speaks at a rally for her nephew outside the Hall of Justice in San Francisco on March 1, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/ KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“My family has been through so much. My sister suffers every day. She lost her child,” Green said, noting that O’Neil’s mother has dementia. “All we need is some time. My nephew’s case is still alive. It’s still breathing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Separate from the pending criminal case, the city of San Francisco in 2021 paid O’Neil’s family $2.5 million to settle a civil lawsuit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Green’s attorney also sent Bonta a letter last month, asking his office to take over the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both letters — from Jenkins and Green — cite Assembly Bill 1506, which puts all officer-involved shootings resulting in the death of an unarmed person within the purview of the state Department of Justice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement on Wednesday, Jenkins said she respects the court’s decision to give Bonta’s office more time to review the case, noting her staff had already transferred the entire file to them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are not opposing that decision. We understand the complexity of this case … and welcome their independent review,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A fair prosecution of this case from our office is not possible because the facts and laws do not support prosecution,” Jenkins added. “The prior administration’s desire to make history blinded them; they chose to press on for personal political gain. They went to extraordinary lengths to ‘find a path,’ where there was none.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Outside the courthouse, dozens of community members gathered to protest the dismissal with signs and chants in support of O’Neil and his family.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The idea that the district attorney’s office is going to effectively immunize every San Francisco police officer for anything they do up to and including murder is outrageous, and folks are right to be out here protesting in the street,” said San Francisco Supervisor Dean Preston, who joined protesters on Wednesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11942282\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11942282 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg\" alt=\"Protesters holding signs march on the street behind an 'SFPD' barricade. It is a sunny day and their shadows are long beside them.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Demonstrators march outside San Francisco’s Hall of Justice on March 1, 2023, protesting the district attorney’s effort to dismiss charges against the police officer who killed Keita O’Neil in 2017. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>At his confirmation hearing in 2021, Bonta pledged to ramp up police accountability and chart a new path for reform, in a shift from his predecessor, Xavier Becerra, who largely avoided prosecuting police officers charged with shooting unarmed civilians.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A Black man was murdered. And he’s caught up in a political football,” Green said at Wednesday’s rally outside the courthouse. “This is my nephew, but it’s also about the future of how our Black and Brown men interact with police.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a response letter sent this week to Green and Jenkins, Bonta pushed back on the district attorney’s conflict-of-interest assertion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That some personnel within the District Attorney’s office may have different opinions about the case does not give rise to a recusal conflict mandating the Attorney General assume responsibility for the prosecution,” Bonta said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "The court's six-day stay buys California's attorney general more time to decide whether to pursue the historic case, the city's first homicide prosecution of an on-duty officer.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>A judge on Wednesday delayed a motion from San Francisco’s district attorney to dismiss the historic prosecution of a city police officer charged with shooting and killing a carjacking suspect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The one-week delay is intended to give California Attorney General Rob Bonta additional time to determine whether to pursue the case against the officer.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“My hope is that the attorney general will give this case fresh eyes,” said San Francisco County Superior Court Judge Loretta Giorgi at a hearing on Wednesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If Bonta does not pursue the case or request an extension by March 7, charges against Christopher Samayoa, a former San Francisco police officer, will officially be dismissed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The delay comes in response to San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins’ move last month to dismiss charges against Samayoa, who killed Keita O’Neil during a police chase in December 2017, after O’Neil allegedly stole a California Lottery van.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Samayoa, who was in his fourth day of a field training program, is shown on body camera firing his weapon through the window of his patrol car and hitting O’Neil, a 42-year-old Black man, as he tried to escape on foot. Samayoa was subsequently fired.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nearly three years after the incident, Chesa Boudin, Jenkins’ predecessor who was recalled from office last summer, charged Samayoa with multiple counts of manslaughter and assault, marking the first homicide prosecution in San Francisco history against a police officer for an on-duty killing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a Feb. 8 letter to Bonta, Jenkins argued that Boudin wrongly pursued manslaughter charges against Samayoa for “political reasons and not in the interest of justice.” She said her office had also “discovered an internal conflict in the case that impacts our ability to handle the matter,” referring to opposing statements from the attorney in Boudin’s office who initially handled the case and the DA investigator who signed the arrest warrant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The judge announced her decision to delay the dismissal after hearing a heartfelt plea from O’Neil’s aunt, April Green, who told reporters she hopes to meet with Bonta during the stay order.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11942244\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11942244 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg\" alt=\"A middle-aged woman with light, freckled skin and short dark hair is seated in a wheelchair holding a microphone, next to a photo of a Black man with long black locs. The woman wears a beige leather jacket and a patterned matching blouse, with gold earrings and a necklace.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/014_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">April Green, aunt of Keita O’Neil, speaks at a rally for her nephew outside the Hall of Justice in San Francisco on March 1, 2023. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/ KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“My family has been through so much. My sister suffers every day. She lost her child,” Green said, noting that O’Neil’s mother has dementia. “All we need is some time. My nephew’s case is still alive. It’s still breathing.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Separate from the pending criminal case, the city of San Francisco in 2021 paid O’Neil’s family $2.5 million to settle a civil lawsuit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Green’s attorney also sent Bonta a letter last month, asking his office to take over the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Both letters — from Jenkins and Green — cite Assembly Bill 1506, which puts all officer-involved shootings resulting in the death of an unarmed person within the purview of the state Department of Justice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement on Wednesday, Jenkins said she respects the court’s decision to give Bonta’s office more time to review the case, noting her staff had already transferred the entire file to them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are not opposing that decision. We understand the complexity of this case … and welcome their independent review,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A fair prosecution of this case from our office is not possible because the facts and laws do not support prosecution,” Jenkins added. “The prior administration’s desire to make history blinded them; they chose to press on for personal political gain. They went to extraordinary lengths to ‘find a path,’ where there was none.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Outside the courthouse, dozens of community members gathered to protest the dismissal with signs and chants in support of O’Neil and his family.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The idea that the district attorney’s office is going to effectively immunize every San Francisco police officer for anything they do up to and including murder is outrageous, and folks are right to be out here protesting in the street,” said San Francisco Supervisor Dean Preston, who joined protesters on Wednesday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11942282\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11942282 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg\" alt=\"Protesters holding signs march on the street behind an 'SFPD' barricade. It is a sunny day and their shadows are long beside them.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/03/025_KQED_KeitaONeilRallySF_03012023-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Demonstrators march outside San Francisco’s Hall of Justice on March 1, 2023, protesting the district attorney’s effort to dismiss charges against the police officer who killed Keita O’Neil in 2017. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>At his confirmation hearing in 2021, Bonta pledged to ramp up police accountability and chart a new path for reform, in a shift from his predecessor, Xavier Becerra, who largely avoided prosecuting police officers charged with shooting unarmed civilians.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A Black man was murdered. And he’s caught up in a political football,” Green said at Wednesday’s rally outside the courthouse. “This is my nephew, but it’s also about the future of how our Black and Brown men interact with police.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a response letter sent this week to Green and Jenkins, Bonta pushed back on the district attorney’s conflict-of-interest assertion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That some personnel within the District Attorney’s office may have different opinions about the case does not give rise to a recusal conflict mandating the Attorney General assume responsibility for the prosecution,” Bonta said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"info": "The Political Mind of Jerry Brown brings listeners the wisdom of the former Governor, Mayor, and presidential candidate. Scott Shafer interviewed Brown for more than 40 hours, covering the former governor's life and half-century in the political game – and Brown has some lessons he'd like to share. ",
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"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
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"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
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},
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"title": "Rightnowish",
"tagline": "Art is where you find it",
"info": "Rightnowish digs into life in the Bay Area right now… ish. Journalist Pendarvis Harshaw takes us to galleries painted on the sides of liquor stores in West Oakland. We'll dance in warehouses in the Bayview, make smoothies with kids in South Berkeley, and listen to classical music in a 1984 Cutlass Supreme in Richmond. Every week, Pen talks to movers and shakers about how the Bay Area shapes what they create, and how they shape the place we call home.",
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"soldout": {
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"title": "SOLD OUT: Rethinking Housing in America",
"tagline": "A new future for housing",
"info": "Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America",
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"tagline": "True-life supernatural stories",
"info": "",
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