Prison Puzzle Pieces 3. Dave Basham
ifs ands or buts about it; whoever hired this person ought to be fired. I was vocal about this, and no big shot could deny it. We all felt the same way.
Following is the letter I wrote:
Doofus reported to me over 5 minutes after the other OJT officer reported to me. I directed him to report to cell 860 where Officer Old Timer was packing a cell. I pointed to the cell and said, "See that cell with the door open. There is an officer in that cell, report to him." He started to walk away and then asked where it was. I repeated what I had just told him. (One thing I neglected to put in this letter was that I had to keep directing him from my location with hand signals and hollering directions to him until he arrived at that cell.)
Doofus did count with Officer Old Timer. He counted a cell to be empty where there was an offender. Officer Old Timer had to recheck to find the error. While I was at the door post, Doofus and the other OJT officer were leaving the unit. I had asked Doofus his name previously and got the correct spelling from him. I had not yet asked the other man his name, so I asked him. He informed me. Doofus then gave me his name again. In the very limited contact I had with Doofus, I found him extremely inattentive.
LYING GLORY HOUNDS
Two white inmates attacked a black inmate. They were all thrown in the box for a day. By the looks of the two white guys, the smaller black guy kicked their butts.
We shook down all of the cells on the front half of the flag where the two white guys’ cells were, in order so that it didn’t look like we were singling them out. I found a bubble pack of pills in one of their cells and Glory Hound found some loose pills in a tea box. These were not his pills, so we confiscated them.
Before we were through with this cell, the other white guy started tearing up papers and flushing them down the toilet. I cuffed him up and took him out of his cell. I found a letter among his papers and an additional 15 in his trash that incriminated him as the one who instigated and planned the hit on the smaller black inmate, among other things. I had to write up a report on this to help verify Glory Hound's report. Glory Hound's report stated that he found everything, which was incorrect. When writing reports, they are to be 100% factual. That is how I wrote up my report. I made mine as brief as possible so it wouldn’t contradict Glory Hound's too much. The evidence would speak for itself in the hearings. Glory Hound had instigated the search, but I’m not writing inaccurate statements just because he had more time in than I did.
When shaking down a cell with another officer, I frequently let the other officer take credit for the find, if they were a good officer. If I saw something, I would not touch it. I would direct the other officer to it. I knew I would retire before my seniority would allow me to be promoted. So, if solving something could help that officer in the long run, great.
Glory Hound was not one of those good officers.
REPULSIVE
There was a female officer that I'll refer to as Officer Repulsive, due to the lazy person having a repulsive attitude. She was working in an area of the prison where inmates were supposed to report to her. It is pertinent to this story that you know she was also a lesbian. She had drawn the interest of Clueless who was a male officer. He knew she wasn’t interested in guy parts, but he pursued her anyway. He didn’t wear glasses, but maybe he should’ve. I believe that with better eyesight, he would not have been pursuing her. There was a time where in his warped mind, he felt he could snag this catch or is it catch this snag. Whatever the case, he put pink panties on her car under a windshield wiper. Word spread of this real fast, so he had to back off in his pursuit for awhile.
Anyway, she would call wanting me to shag people out of the unit. I’d tell her that was up to the officer controlling the movement. She was chastising me for people not reporting to her. I can’t force them, I can lock them up if she wants to write a report, but I can’t make them go on their pass. She was telling me that I had to write a report each time an inmate did not report. I told her that was her responsibility and to not try to pawn her job off onto me. Eventually, it was necesssary to hang up on her. She kept calling until I finally told her to shove it up her ass. She stopped calling then. Later, I found out that she complained to the Watch Commander, but he knew what she was like and blew her off.
MISS BERZERK
A female employee of the institution that was responsible for handling inmates being released called me and told me to have some inmates report to the turnkey. I told her that I had nothing on it. She demanded that I get them to the turnkey and told me that I better do it now. I informed her that count tells me when offenders are leaving, where to send them and when to send them there.
She kept telling me that I better listen to her orders. I informed her that she was not one of the people that I take orders from.
There was one guy that she wanted me to send to her that she didn’t even have the correct name for. She told me that I better get him out of the unit right now. I hung up.
She called back totally enraged. She was enraged before and now she was even more enraged, so I felt totally enraged must be between enraged and berserk.
She informed me that she was married to an officer that works in the prison. I guess she thought that made her more important. It just made me feel sorry for that officer. She told me that I must be new or else I would know that. I informed her that I wasn’t new, that I knew who she was married to and that was his problem and not mine.
She asked for my name. This is what people do when they try to intimidate you into doing what they want you to do. It is a threat to report you. I told her my name and spelled it out nice and slowly for her. I encouraged her to report me for doing my job properly. I just don’t release an inmate because a voice on the phone tells me to.
I informed her that if she had filled out all of her paper work properly and contacted all of the right people that there would’ve been no problem. I suggested that if she truly wanted these inmates the soonest possible, she take care of the business that she should have taken care of previously.
I would’ve paid for a video of her at this time, because she had entered that going berserk stage when I hung up on her.
Eventually, I received authorization to release the inmates she requested and this time the names were the names of people I actually had locked up in my cell block.
WISCONSINITES
As officers, we are under more scrutiny than the inmates. Our calls are monitored just as the inmates’ calls are monitored. The institution checked out an eight day section of staff phone calls. It was discovered that some were making long distance phone calls from the prison. An email was sent out informing everyone to stop doing this immediately.
Part of the problem lies in that the prison is just across the river from Wisconsin. Many people from Wisconsin work here. If they must call home, that is a long distance call even if it is only a couple of miles away.
However, this should be their burden and not the states. Proper planning could've eliminated most of these calls. I could see if someone was forced to work overtime or volunteered to work overtime, that they should be allowed to make the call on the state's dime. However, it takes only a few people abusing something to negatively affect others.
MENTALITY OF SOME OFFICERS
When I first started, an officer gave me some papers and told me to put them on the lieutenant’s desk. When I tried to open the door, it was locked. I asked him where the key was. He said it was on the key ring. I had a set of keys on me. I tried all of them. One key slipped in but would not open the door. The officer that told me to put the papers in the office was laughing. He had been watching me try out a full ring of keys on a door when he had the correct key in his pocket all the time. I can take a joke if it’s funny, but this was just stupid. It was something a little kid might think was funny. I require higher standards and more creativity from adult