The Three Forbidden Acts in Arizona Prisons

On March 27, 2014, Director Charles L. Ryan implemented a new director’s Instruction memo tagged as DI 236 that handles maximum custody inmates in conjunction with other department orders already written and followed. In this directive he added his own “three strikes and you are out” rule only you don’t need three events for it to apply but rather, just one of these forbidden acts will land you in maximum custody according the outline. 

Generally speaking this means that if you were to commit all three of the forbidden acts, your chances of being in maximum custody are good that you will serve your remaining time there as well as released from these special housing units designed for behavioral modification treatment and mental health care.

The directive defines the Three Forbidden Acts – Serious assaults on staff, serious inmate on inmate assaults with a weapon and multiple inmates assaulting an inmate with serious injury.” The purpose as written shows the Arizona Department of Corrections employees are being directed to adhere to a new maximum custody management system that was implemented to  facilitate a process that requires inmates in maximum custody to work through a program utilizing a step system providing the opportunity to participate in jobs, programs and other out of cell activities.

Based on behavior and programming, inmates may progress from controlled based housing to open privilege base housing where movement outside a cell is without restraint equipment. This modifies the concept of programming maximum custody inmates involved in commission of one the Forbidden Three Acts (see definition) and the Guiding Principles (see definition) developed by the Association of State Correctional Administrators (ASCA).

The guiding principles are:

1. Provide a process, a separate review for decisions to place an inmate in maximum custody;

2. Provide periodic classification reviews of inmates in maximum custody every 180 days or less;

3. Provide in-person mental health assessments, by trained personnel within 72 hours of an inmate being placed in maximum custody and periodic mental health assessments thereafter including an appropriate mental health treatment plan;

4. Provide structured and progressive levels that include increased privileges as an incentive for positive behavior and/or program participation;

5. Determine an inmate’s length of stay in maximum custody on the nature and level of threat to the safe and orderly operation of general population as well as program participation, rule compliance and the recommendation of the person(s) assigned to conduct the classification review as opposed to strictly held time periods;

6. Provide appropriate access to medical and Mental Health staff and services;

7. Provide access to visiting opportunities;

8. Provide appropriate exercise opportunities;

9. Provide the ability to maintain proper hygiene;

10. Provide program opportunities appropriate to support transition back to a general population setting or to the community;

11. Collect sufficient data to assess the effectiveness of implementation of these guiding principles;

12. Conduct an objective review of all inmates in maximum custody by persons independent of the placement authority to determine the inmates’ need for continued placement in maximum custody;

13. Require all staff assigned to work in maximum custody units receive appropriate training in managing inmates on maximum custody status.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Arizona Prison Gangs Emulating EME Sureños Reglas (Rules)

There is a subtle trend developing around the state of Arizona prisons that hasn’t caught the eye of the media nor the attention of the prison director Charles L. Ryan unless he is being ignorant about the red flags and warning signs that are waving on every yard in his prison system. In Arizona, Mexican Americans that were once thought to be autonomous in their activities are now emulating the gang styles and rules of the Mexican EME California and their brotherhood relatives the Sureños and are under current proposals to join them into a new alliance and brotherhood.

As usual, this information is not being shared and handled as a “need to know” basis that has suffocated any and all information related to the recent racial warfare situation in Winslow prison unit Kaibab as well as an sweeping infection in the Lewis, Florence and Eyman complexes ending up in the maximum custody clusters of the Security Threat Group leaders housed in the Browning Unit in Florence, Arizona. Strangely, in their ill-advised attempt to curb the violence against the Blacks, the agency transferred many Black inmates throughout the state spreading the hate and violence with it and putting all public prisons at risk of a race war especially those that have open yards.

On the outside, the Arizona New Mexico Mafia resemble a very violent group involved in  murders and assassinations, drug deals and other money laundering activities on the street for those working the game inside prisons. They are a mixture of street gangs, released prison gang members and other criminals that are heavy into the drug dealing scene and often doing business with cartel related customers that fund there violence and subversive trend to control and take the power away from other gangs.

It is not unusual for street cops to see the Mexican Mafia tattoo or ink on these street gangs as they are wearing them proudly and not being shy about how their homies roll with the prison gangs. Yes the EME has had ties with MDTOs (Mexican Drug Trafficking Organizations) and this is what makes Arizona so volatile and vulnerable as there are sufficient avenues of access to infiltrate the prisons with staff or contract employees to facilitate their goals and mission to dominate the prisons.

On the inside, there are gang leaders locked up in the Browning STG housing units that have daily access to cell phones and communicate their business activities with much regularity without the fear of being caught or disciplined as they have developed a network that is coded and hard to break unless you spend a sufficient amount of time and effort to decode and understand what they are doing. Such communications are related to drug deals, gang revenues and taxes, green light on hits on the street and inside, alliances with other gangs and approval of memberships.

The most disturbing concern is the unification and association of Mexican Mafia members in Arizona with members of the California Emme and Sureños. When you look at history and the rules involved, the Mafia stressed three things in their lifestyles; in for life, no disrespect to each other and live with violence to rule with power.

It’s their mantra to exercise extreme violence on their victims and sparing them nothing so that their role as intimidators remains intact and feared on the prison yards without any question how far their will go since they have engaged in recent homicides without holding back any kicks or punches as they are usually delivered on a four to one or even six to one odds during these attacks.

The Mexican Mafia physical force type of strong-arm executions is backed up by the intellect of the Sureños who control the brains of the gangs. In addition, this alliance has worked itself into the Bureau of Prisons gang territory that makes them more brutal and dangerous to all the other gangs that compete for the control, drugs and power on these yards.

As of late, the rules have been changing and they have been changing for the worst as prisons become battlefield between rival gangs struggling to survive or dominating for control and power of all they can get. It is suspected that within the next year or so, there will be a four state gang infestation that will influence the prisons located in Texas, Colorado, Arizona and California as one network.  In conjunction with this growth there will be a massive increase in strength and ferociousness against other prisoners and prison employees.

It also revives the long standing feud between the Blacks and the Mexicans that originated in California prisons long time ago and puts a green light on any Black group that opposes their will to control the yards. The war against the Blacks will be escalated and more homicides will occur at the hands of these brutal gangsters that will show no remorse and do what their code allows them to do. It has been no secret that the Black, as do others, join up by race and requires that this gives them a significant level of protection while incarcerated and out in the general population.

The strength and influence of the EME is increasingly intimidating. Their obsession is to control everything. Their application of force is anything but aesthetic but rather brutal in nature. They oppose numbers with ferocious abilities to commit violent strikes and hesitate none to take a life to show which of the groups is the most powerful as it has become the way to handle the business. Hence numbers mean nothing to them while their ferocious and brutal combat style of engaging the others is their key to dominance.

 

Such outright vitriol is becoming more and more frequent inside our prisons. The mindset has been changed and no paper truce can survive their voracious appetite to control and to wield power over others. Their goal is to be the one gang in control and become the dominant culture to deal with as they spread out their plans for the future for this gang is all about planning for the future.

One has to ask a specific question and ask it quickly. What is Charles Ryan doing about this gang problem? It is obvious he has no means to control their willed violent and predatory behaviors as they are running rampant on the yards and even attacking staff members that find their cell phones and drug paraphernalia or weapons.  

It is also obvious that he has rendered his gang units powerless to manage these predators as their violence has not diminished one bit in the last four to six months and in fact are increasing in incidents and the type of brutality involved.

It is true that in cooperation with the Phoenix street gang task force, they have busted a few gangsters in the last few years but those were a slight tip of the iceberg compared to the daily profit sharing business that is going on the yards today. These task forces act on confidential information and informants that have been disowned or dissed by the gang members and are organized on plea bargains of other criminals testifying and then sent out of stat to the federal system for protective custody.

The point being that rarely do these task force members attain any evidence strong enough to convict these gangs on RICO charges or other significant criminal acts as most are already serving time for murder or murder for hire and long drug related sentences. The DOC rarely finds someone in their own custody that is committing crimes on the street and inside without the cooperation of these drug agents that are investigating cases of their own with common links to prison gang activities.

This method of gathering intelligence has been severed by the lack of informants willing to give up information for the threat of death has become more of a reality than ever before. It has also been severely impaired because the DOC have no individuals that carry any credibility with them as a reliable and dependable source to deal with this life and death situation.

It is no secret that the intelligence gathering capabilities of the DOC have been severely severed. They are out of touch with gang warfare and activities and refuse to allow any outside agency to assist them to clean it up. Their attitude is “it’s our problem and we will fix it” but that is certainly not enough to quell the violence or body count that is piling up each day somewhere in our prisons. Denial and ignorance are two dangerous elements of this gang management approach.

Whatever they are doing is alienating correctional officers working the line as they have been omitted from gang intelligence gathering and are oblivious to what is going on around them and which prisoner is a gang member and which one isn’t. the odds are that out of a yard population of one thousand inmates, at least a third are gang members incognito or associates eager and willing to become a gangster by performing one of the required acts to join the gangs.

Mr. Ryan, It is these gang initiations and serious assaults on other prisoners and including staff that has to be prevented and intervened so that the power of these gangs can be reduced and the fear of intimidation subsides to the point where communication is restored between officer and prisoner to keep things safe and orderly.

Secondly you can re-organize your gang units with individuals that are skilled at gang intelligence and gathering information rather than just filling the role because the belong to the “elites” at that complex denying the DOC the ability to gather sound and practical intelligence of what is really going on inside our prisons. Just lately, when your STG officers intercepted a “declaration of war” letter your staff didn’t know what to do with it and in the end resulted in a closed door negotiation with “influential yard leaders or shot-callers” that has provided you a temporary truce that is as fragile as the next fight.

Last and certainly not the least, you must open your doors to the FBI gang task force that is working on these issues diligently and can, if you want them to help, provide you with the latest intelligence gathered with the most modern technology or drug interdiction methods available to gang technology today and provide you specific assistance in identifying the surreptitious elements that are lurking in your backyard today. Your refusal to disallow them to assist you is costing lives and jeopardizing the state’s public safety.

Charles L. Ryan, A most effective evil

No matter how many stipends, how many promises to add staff or how many times Charles Ryan promises to make things better for correctional officers, the facts reveals he actually accomplishes just the opposite of what he reveled or bragged about. Officers and administrators in the know are dubbing him the lesser of the two evils dividing their fears between the gangster prisoners and his administrative rule of law.

Although he has been awarded positive accolades by Governor Janet Brewer, the facts reveal he is a pure proxy for the Republican intentions for private prisons in Arizona and does anything to engage the profit margin for them.Why is Ryan more evil? What makes him such a threat to those that differ with his opinion or management style? The truth is in his management of the prisons as he has been more effective in evil doings than anybody else before him including Dora Schriro and Terry Stewart. Pretty soon his evilness will even outdo himself as he has been hired to do nothing good and everything destructive to state prisons and state employees.

As a change agent for specific GOP legislators, Ryan has protected the citadels of state government bribed by the lobbyist to build more prisons and rent more bed space than ever before. He has created the private prison industry as a powerhouse that influences legislation for almost everything under the sun in the Arizona desert. Almost every piece of legislation has impacted how Ryan runs the prisons and keeps them full with discontent and hate making it more necessary to pass stricter laws that keeps the prosecutors content to put people in penitentiaries for the sake of public safety.

Public prisons are dying and falling apart under Ryan. Thus through his ineffective means to run the public prisons he has bolstered the need for private prisons making stockholders happy and gratified. This was Wall Street’s expectation by ALEC and other groups pushing for more incarceration laws. They were buying stocks and betting Arizona public prisons would fail and privates would expand and they made out like bandits.

Charles Ryan has protected the private industry’s interest in medical care, food service, telephone and commissary services and did this by accepting all litigation as the agent of harm. The fact is that the Attorney General’s office is busy daily with lawsuits that rarely meet the light of a courtroom and a jury thus the risk as low as are the out of court settlements that reflect rare guilt and rare neglect in their summary judgments ordered.

This hedge protection is effectively created by the way Ryan hires his own legal attorneys to steer the AG’s office into the right direction and accept their evidence as factual even though it may have been fabricated or altered in some form or matter.

Governor Brewer’s Chief of Staff and closest advisors vetted Ryan. Before he came back from Abu Ghraib as a contract employee for the government he was already being groomed for the director’s spot before Dora Schriro even left office and Janet Napolitano took the job at homeland security. They helped him against political accusation about Abu Ghraib and their disastrous revelation of abuse and neglect. They backed him then and they are backing him now to keep him in that office.

Who is the most effective evil and what has he done? It has been assumed from the moment he arrived he had good intentions. His promises were for better training, more staff and pay and better prison management principles. In fact he held many prevailing warden’s meetings and conversations that were really based on facts but on personal intentions to change the agency. This assumption he is trying to do the right thing has saved him many times in the minds of his subordinates who began to support him even though his intentions were evil. The fact is that Ryan will do whatever he wants to do or intents to do now and tomorrow.

Ryan has let staff down in many ways. He has taken away from them their covered employee classification and makes them serve at will so they can be terminated at any moment of their service. He stripped them all of their  dignity, respect and promotional opportunities for those qualified and changed the investigative process into a witch hunt for those identified to be undesirables as they do not fit the profile of those running the show and holding coveted positions of power and authority invested and empowered by Ryan himself.

Anyone that criticizes practices, supervisory methods, staffing patterns, or investigative means is targeted and let go. Employees fear the falsely accused method commonly used by investigators that set up staff on the word of prisoners that they are ‘dirty ‘ and dealing with the inmate population although there is no sound or proper evidence to support that.

He is more effective as an evil because he has allowed persons to die inside his prison and masked or disguised the death as a natural one or a certain “other causes” death that is rarely challenged. In fact, between the Governor’s office and the United States Department of Justice, they have allowed him to get away with murder.

Murder in the delay of medical care and prevention of serious diseases, murder of those mentally ill and killing themselves as they struggle to cope without the right medication or the withholding of medicine because of budget constraints. Murder by violence of rampant gang attacks and beat downs that have created racial tension and warfare inside all the state prisons. Murder by the refusal to provide protective custody to those requesting safety because their crime, their sexual orientation or their former gang association is hampering their abilities to cope and function in general populations.

Murder in the form of failing to hold contract facilities to the minimal security standards, resulting in the deaths of innocent civilians

The real Charles L. Ryan emerged after his official appointment in 2010. He has provoked an unannounced racial war, destroyed the inmate classification system and reduced meaningful inmate activities to the point inmates are fighting each other for the good job and people are picked by race and gang influences rather than skills. He dressed up this cover up by creating his own inner circle of cronyism that would convey and obey each and every order from him.

When it’s all said and done, Ryan is not the lesser of the evil in the agency. Ryan is more dangerous that all the gang bangers combined as he holds the key to safe and secure prisons that provide legitimate responsibilities for public safety.