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DIGITALLY RECORDED¶
SWORN STATEMENT¶
OF¶
OIG CASE #:¶
2019-010614¶
DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE¶
OFFICE OF THE INSPECTOR GENERAL¶
AUGUST 5, 2021¶
RESOLUTE DOCUMENTATION SERVICES 28632 Roadside Drive, Suite 285 Agoura Hills, CA 91301 Phone:¶
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APPEARANCES:¶
OTHER APPEARANCES:¶
NONE¶
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This interview is with Federal Bureau of Prisons employee, It is being conducted as part of an official U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General investigation. Today is August 5th, 2021, and the time is 6:19 p.m. This interview is being conducted at the Metropolitan Correctional Center, MCC, 150 Park Row, New York City. Also present is DOJ/OIG Senior Special Agent, This interview will be recorded by me, Special Agent Could everyone please identify themselves for the record, and spell your last name? To start, again, I am DOJ/OIG Special Agent, My name is senior special agent, with the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector¶
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the judge or anybody tell him that, like, yeah, he gets to make a phone call or whatever. So, okay, no problem. You know, you’re owing me at this point in time or whatever. So, now, at that point in time, there was a lot of stuff going on. That, I do remember. There was a lot of things going on. Two other inmates attempted suicides, and, you know -.¶
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So, he handed him off to me, and told me he needed a phone call or whatever. So, I had to put Epstein, you know - where’d I put him? - I had to put him in the shower because I couldn’t put him in the room, with the phone, by himself, and I’m pulling out other inmates at the time, because one of them had a noose tied around his neck. He was probably playing it, but you can’t joke like that.¶
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Like, I’ve heard times that, you know, a judge may call, like, this person needs a legal call. And when that happens or whatever, like, all right, we got to get these people a legal call. And so, that does happen, but I’ve never known him to do that on his own accord.¶
: Okay. Our understanding is, based on the investigation, I think Epstein stated that he wanted to call his mother. So, you think that would have been on the - that should have been on the -?¶
That should have been on the recorded line.¶
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I know up there in that SHU, that if - and it’s very difficult, especially when you’re short-staffed - you know, you have orderlies that walk around and, you know, try to help keep the place clean. If you’re short staffed, and you can’t be everywhere, and you have an orderly cleaning the tier, they will take those little things, and flip the, you know? Like, so, if you have somebody that’s¶
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coming up to SHU to work overtime, who doesn’t work up there all the time, they don’t know that the inmate pulled a fast one, and moved the thing that says legal down to social, and vice versa.¶
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Like, because usually, on a social call, you don’t really have to monitor, because you could just go on the computer, and listen to the phone call. You know, on legal calls, you know, they have attorney/client privilege, so you can’t listen anyway. So, any time I know it may be a legal call going on, and I know I can’t listen in, it’s because they - well, this is now - but they put inmates in a little visit room for their legal calls, so they could do the teleconference because of COVID.¶
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: I just didn’t like the way he was looking. I can’t determine what this man was thinking, but -. And he normally, you know, saying, you ask him a question, if it’s a yes or a no question, he would normally just give you a thumbs up or whatever, and stuff, like, pretty much just not want to be bothered with you, for the most part.¶
: Well, it was -. Wasn’t it not true that he was kind of the priority for the whole SHU? Was this sign up in the SHU, saying that, “Mandatory rounds must be conducted every 30 minutes on Epstein, as per God.”¶
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So, and then, you got dudes over here acting like they want to commit suicide. So now, as you’re doing rounds, and everything is going on, you talk to one inmate, now this inmate has a problem. You may forget sometimes to go up there and just write it, you know, write it in or whatever. So, sometimes they might be, like, shit, fuck, I forgot. And then, they’ll go back or whatever. I’m not saying, but that’s just, you know, normal or whatever, like, oh, man, I forgot. And you just go write in it. That’s just normal, how they do it.¶
That’s why I hate these papers. I rather just do it on the computer because you can’t miss.¶
: You have questions on that?¶
: But there’s still some more, right?¶
: Yeah. “When told that there is a video of the SHU area, stated that he would be surprised to see video of the rounds not being conducted.”¶
: Mm-hmm.¶
: When asked about -.¶
: Because they were on their feet all day.¶
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Because that was a problem, with people doing that before, and nobody wanting to sign round sheets, for what reason or whatever. So, I was, like, okay, if I did it, sign it; if I didn’t do it, not sign it. That’s how I learned my lesson. That’s why my name is not on this.¶
: Okay. So, your name wasn’t specifically on that round sheet because you’re, like, I’m not signing it, and getting¶
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jammed up for it?¶
If I’m not getting jammed up, if I did it, I sign it; if I didn’t do it, and you did it, because I won’t sign for anybody else.¶
I gotcha. So, she was signing for everybody else, but you wouldn’t sign for everybody else.¶
Yeah. I didn’t even -. I didn’t touch this paper at all that night.¶
Okay. But previous to that, would you have touched the papers?¶
Previous to that, I probably would have done rounds. But I wouldn’t have pre-populated the whole thing, like that.¶
Would you ever pre-populate any part of it?¶
No. I don’t think I pre-populate. I don’t remember a time that I did pre-populate a thing or whatever. Now, what I will say, because I know it’s common or whatever, in the beginning, I probably had something pre-prepped for the count, and that messed up or whatever.¶
So, you would pre-prep¶
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or whatever you -. I wrote it out. I don’t remember if I put a number in there or not yet, or whatever. And then, the count was supposed to take place. So, I pre-wrote it or whatever. And then, we just kept working. But there was a lot going on that day. So.¶
: Yeah. “When asked about the count number in the SHU, for the date, and the number matching the MCC master number, stated, ‘This would be a mistake on my part.’ He probably just used the numbers off the master sheet, and that there was probably signing off, down in response to pressure, and having the count cleared.”¶
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assigned as a Special Housing Unit officer, I proceeded to enter the Nine South visiting room. As I walked towards the door, I observed through the visiting room door, inmate Fernandez, register number 86824-054, attempt to grab an unknown item from his visitor. Once inmate Fernandez reached to grab the item, I called the door, and called for a lieutenant. Once I was able to enter the visiting room, I gave inmate Fernandez a direct order to walk the visiting room, walk off the visiting room, to conduct a visual search. Inmate Fernandez complied, and a visual search was conducted. The operations lieutenant was contacted, and inmate Fernandez was removed from the unit.Ӧ
Mm-hmm.¶
: The lieutenant log states, “Inmate Fernandez, 86824054, on dry cell with staff watch in R&D.” If you look down here, 3:15 p.m., inmate Fernandez was placed on dry cell.¶
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happened because, like, because I remember, when I put him in the cell, I was, like, where the hell is your fucking cell mate at? So, you actually -. When you put Epstein back from the shower, you mean? Yeah. You asked him where his - I asked where, you know, where is your cellee? Or whatever. So, he said, like, he got released. So, I don’t -. Like, I don’t know if he actually did get released or not, or whatever, but that was the question, like, but we don’t have anybody else to put him with. I don’t remember who I spoke to that night or whatever. But I asked that question, like, there’s no cell mate in there with this guy. So, you asked someone? I asked someone, but who it was, I don’t remember who it was. Would it have been a lieutenant? It would have been a lieutenant. But my question -. But, like,¶
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1 reason why we’re reading this to you is to, one) make sure that you —¶
: That it’s accurate.¶
: — it’s accurate, but also to refresh your memory. This is what you stated to these people, is that accurate, and - again - to fill in some of these blanks. Now, we have a memo that was drafted on August 12th, 2019. Let’s see if it was - it says United States government, Federal Bureau of Prisons memo. And it says, past information from Special Housing Unit. It says, “On Friday, August 9th, 2019, at approximately 1:50 p.m., I, SOS , passed on to oncoming staff member, Officer , and present staff, SOS and Officer , that inmate Reyes was going WAB, and possibly may return, also that inmate Epstein will be needing a cell mate upon arrival from his attorney visit.” Do you know if -?¶
: I don’t remember having that conversation with .¶
: Do you remember that that conversation had, or do you believe that he’s lying to us? If he swore under oath that he¶
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Yes. Replaced him and, yeah, somebody should have -. Like, because during the day shift or whatever, this dude leaves, he goes to WAB or whatever, and you know that it’s¶
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going. And then, you know, you just keep going or whatever. So, like, it should have dawned on me then, but I’m thinking about this guy over here, that may have, you know, that had the noose around him, and he wants to play that game. And then, you got another inmate on another tier, doing some other crazy nonsense. There was just a lot of moving pieces that day. So, even in my movement around or whatever, like, it missed - it escaped it - it missed me.¶
Yeah. And that was what I was going to go to, after that, is the fact that, would this have been the only - this mandatory rounds must be conducted every 30 minutes on Epstein, as per God - would that have been the only orange card that was up there? Saying to make sure that Epstein is your priority in the SHU right now?¶
: It shouldn’t have been. Like, I don’t remember if there was anything on his door, or anything like that, or whatever. But I remember that. That, you know, that was per God, obviously, that’s a joke.¶
: Yeah, yeah, yeah.¶
: But I do remember, it was¶
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something else on a wall, at some point in time, about, like, yeah, make sure you watch this guy. So, I don’t remember if it was a memo or something, but it was something else. But I definitely remember that one. If I’m not mistaken, there was more than one copy of that thing.¶
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: Yeah. I mean, he’s claiming, he’s the guy who was apparently, you know, is apparently signing this, I believe, for all these. He’s claiming, yeah, I passed on the information, he’s gone, he’s going to need a new cell mate, if he, in fact, doesn’t come back.¶
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instructions come down?¶
The instructions started coming down about him needing a cell mate after his first so-called suicide attempt or whatever, and that’s when they started picking, and that’s when, you know, like, how - well, what’s the other guy’s name, Tartaglione? And that’s why we, as officers, can’t determine who we’re going to put in there with this guy. You know, like, because if I -. Like, let’s say I ought to put somebody else in there with him or whatever, and because Epstein is saying that Tartaglione attacked him, and this, and that, and the third. That would fall on me. You know, you want a supervisor to make that determination.¶
So, let’s talk about —¶
So -.¶
— that. Were you there for that incident, when that happened, the first attempt of suicide?¶
I wasn’t there for that, no.¶
Do you know what happened between Epstein and Tartaglione?¶
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I don’t need - who have you heard about? - I don’t need dates or anything, but who have you heard about pre-filling the rounds and counts sheets?¶
You know, some of the old school staff, like, you know, like, when, like, but these people don’t even work here anymore. You know, like, I mean, I don’t know these people. They don’t work here anymore. They, you know, like, they had a whole SHU crew. Like, there was a whole system of things that they had it on lock. That was just how it worked.¶
So, you said SHU —¶
So, I remember, as a rookie, I would go in there. And then, you know, they teach you things or whatever, and then, you know, like, I guess they’ve been working so long, you know, they know the short cuts that they do. So, I remember learning about it then or whatever. And then, I even got taught at one point, or whatever. I’m, like, okay. But I wasn’t working up there then.¶
So, the names. I know you¶
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No. But they were all -. I do recall an incident where, I guess there was a bad count. No. There was two good counts. It was two good counts, and then, they figured out it was a bad count the next shift or whatever. So, basically, what people were doing, they would look in on the computer to see what the number was, fill out the paper, and send it down. I remember that happening a while back.¶
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1: Did you know why Epstein was in prison? 2: Well, yeah. I watch the news. 3: Okay. Did you have any feelings regarding why he was in prison? 4: No. 5: Did Epstein have -. Go ahead. You were going to say something. 6: Like, feelings, what you did is what you did. My personal feelings don’t matter. It’s a job. You know what I’m saying? 7: So, like, I do my best for something like that. 8: That’s why I don’t personally like to read people’s paperwork. Because once you know, you can’t un-know it. 9: Mm-hmm. 10: So, but nah, I didn’t have any feelings towards him or whatever. I’m, like, okay, he needs to go here, he needs to go - 11: All right. There you go. There you go. 12: What is your understanding of what happened to Epstein on August 9th and 10th of 2019? 13: My understanding of it was that —¶
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I think it could have been a deterrent, but the truth of the matter is, if somebody is actually attempting to do that, they’re going to do it. That’s not going to stop. And the only reason I say that is because of my mother’s (Indiscernible *01:40:12). If you want to do it, you’re going to do it.¶
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doesn’t have a cell mate, but there was no directive of who to put in there. Like I said, if you have an odd number, you don’t have a body to put there.¶
There should have been a backup plan for that. You know, and it was -. To me, it was decisions made, on the part of the institution, that were wrong. And because they made these decisions, now those other two officers have to pay for it. You know, Epstein, as high-profile as he is, should not have been in SHU. He should have been in Ten South.¶
That’s not a decision that we get to make. Because he’s too high a profile. Look, after that thing hit the news, the world knew who he was. The world knew who El Chapo¶
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That’s a collective. Really. You know, in the SHU, there’s supposed to be the OIC. And probably with a little help from C&A. On a regular housing unit, you get a new inmate, hey, C&A, I got this new inmate, here’s his numbers, and here’s the bed assignment, and C&A keys it in. In SHU, usually - because it’s supposed to be four people in there - the SHU OIC would key the inmate in, when they arrive.¶
Okay. So, if after they’re -. So, if he arrives from suicide watch on July 30th, 2019, and he’s placed in cell A —¶
Mm-hmm.¶
— but for whatever reason, a few hours later, it’s determined he can’t be in cell A, he’s got to be in cell B, and him and his roommate, Reyes, were moved over to cell B. Who’s responsible for making that change?¶
For making it physically or on the computer?¶
In the computer.¶
You, like, you, normally, you would want it to be the OIC. For this¶
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out like that, it’s impossible to do that. So, when you do your searches in SHU, you search kind of, like, the common areas, and, you know, things of that nature, during the day, you know, because inmates are going to recreation, medical, and all this, and things of that nature, or whatever. And so, and you have more people. So, it’s a lot easier to move people from one place, holding cell over here, search the cell, put them back. It’s a lot easier.¶
When I’m on the evening shift, if, you know, if I’m doing social visits - social visits, well, that, too - social visits, or phone calls, or cell sanitation, meaning that, you know, inmates get the broom and sweeps out his cell, I hold the bag up to the slot, he throws his trash out, and then I’m onto the next one. You know, it’s —¶
: Okay.¶
So, are you aware that, at the time, in August 2019, though, it was a policy at least, maybe not practice, but a policy, that five cell searches were supposed to be being conducted during the evening watch?¶
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1: Mm-hmm. 2: — what it is that’s going to happen to people. So, I can’t necessarily say this or that, how you stand, or how you don’t stand. We’re the fact finders. 3: Mm-hmm. 4: You know, we, you know, we present information. We don’t make determinations. So, based upon, you know - and again, I think you’ve already provided all this information in the past - it’s just now, we needed to gain clarification of exactly what you meant from what you said — 5: Okay. 6: — and that was, again, the purpose of this. So, we can’t really say. What we can say is that - again - you’re kind of, like, a small piece of this puzzle. 7: Mm-hmm. My next question is, even though this happened so long ago, why wait so long? 8: And then, that’s — 9: Because that’s not the only — 10: Like, that’s an incident, yes, and it’s a big one, but working in here, things happen all the¶
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CERTIFICATE¶
I hereby certify that the foregoing pages represent an accurate transcript of the electronic sound recording of the proceedings before the Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General in the matter of:¶
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