DIGITALLY RECORDED¶
SWORN STATEMENT¶
OIG CASE #:¶
2019-010614¶
OFFICE OF THE INSPECTOR GENERAL¶
JULY 15, 2021¶
RESOLUTE DOCUMENTATION SERVICES¶
28632 Roadside Drive, Suite 285¶
Agoura Hills, CA 91301¶
Phone: (818) 431-5800¶
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Basis. The form states, “You are being asked to provide information as part of an investigation being conducted by the Office of Inspector General. This investigation is being conducted pursuant to the Inspector General Act of 1978, as amended. The investigation pertains to job performance failure and security failure. This is a voluntary interview. Accordingly, you do not have to answer questions. No disciplinary action will be taken against you if you choose not to answer any questions. Any statement you furnish may be used as evidence in any future criminal proceedings or agency disciplinary proceedings or both.” The waiver states, “I understand the warnings and assurances stated above and I am willing to make a statement and answer questions. No promises or threats have been made to me or no pressure or coercion of any kind has been used against me.” Do you understand that? You can read it if you have to and if you understand, please sign under where it says, “Employee signature.”¶
MR. : And if you wanted to ask any questions about it, this would be the time¶
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MR. : So, I was working Special Housing Unit on overtime and me and the officer had heard some sort of commotion and we were about to do our round down that tier, I believe it was M tier and inmate Tartaglione was his bunkie and he was at the door asking for help. We got there. When I looked, because Tartaglione is a little bit big and the window is small, I asked him to move to the side. I saw Epstein with something tied around his neck, but he was sitting on the floor. I told him, you know, “Call for medical assistance,” I told my partner. We cuffed up Tartaglione, took him out. I took it off from Epstein’s neck and we started doing CPR, but he was breathing. You know, he was already breathing and everything.¶
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MR. : His back was against the ladder, so, you know, he wasn’t laying flat. But his legs were - one of his legs was definitely straight out. I can’t remember how the - I think the other leg might have been curved a little bit. But that’s about it. He was on his butt though and his back against the ladder with, you know.¶
MR. : In the days prior, that was the rumor that was circulating that allegedly Epstein must have told someone, Operations or whatnot, but no one has directly told me. I just remember hearing it in the building. But what I do know is when he came off suicide watch, Epstein, he did ask to go back with Tartaglione.¶
MR. : I mean the days after, you know, the days after he attempted suicide. He went on suicide watch then his lawyers reached out and said, you know, it was an attempted¶
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assault. I don’t know what they said, but I was there when they took him off suicide watch and they said, you know, “It wasn’t a suicide, so take him off,” but, you know, “Put him back in Special Housing,” whatever the case may be and he asked to go back with Tartaglione and the Lieutenant was like, “No, he can’t do that.” So I’m assuming he told the Lieutenant that it was an assault.¶
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you to believe that Tartaglione in fact tried to harm Epstein?¶
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MR. : From what I heard, because obviously medical staff clears them, so I don’t, you know, I have no part in clearing anybody. But from what I heard, the reason why he came off is his lawyers told something to the judge and the judge called the building saying, “He shouldn’t be on suicide watch, get him off.” Because when you’re on suicide watch you don’t get attorney visits. So, and he used to get attorney visits every day, like she said and he would have that room like from when attorney opens until when attorney conference closes. So when he went on suicide watch you don’t get it no more. So I don’t know what transpired, but the lawyers spoke to the judge¶
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MR. : Well, one, I know because I’ll transport, you know, and I’m on Special Housing quite a bit just bringing inmates back from attorney conference or helping out, whatever the case may be. But I know the first cell because I’m the one that responded when he, you know, tried to attempt suicide the first time, so I remember that. And the second one I know because, you know, I worked that unit on overtime. Not the night he did it, but so I know the cell he was in.¶
MR. : Well, what would happen is, unless they’re severely busy, but Internal, we just meet them at the door. So whatever officers are there, take him out of the thing, you know, they get a phone call and then they¶
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remember he had another bunkie when he came back and that guy, if I’m not mistaken, I could be wrong, was shipped out either the day before or the morning of when Epstein, you know, killed himself.¶
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it may be you’re leaving in the next week to another jail, so they’re put on the list to send him down with all his property so that it can be inventoried and whatever he wants shipped or whatever he’s going to donate or whatever the case may be and then he comes back to the unit. So we call it packed out because we’ll tell the inmate, “You’re being packed out,” so that’s how he knows he’s leaving soon to pack his stuff and go to R&D.¶
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MR. The SEP rosters like I said or the movement in the building. Like, literally everything is in SENTRY, so what ends up happening is the Lieutenant’s log, the officer’s log, everything is - you could go back in SENTRY and look and be like, “Oh, well, inmate Daniels, the court list said he had court but he never went to court because he got injured playing basketball and they took him out on a medical trip.” So now, I go to SENTRY and it will say that you weren’t in court, but you were out on a, you know, hospital, you were out at a hospital that’s why you’re off the count. So it’s not that you never came back from court, the court list said that you had court so that’s why the computer and the log is necessary because now I look at the log and I’m like, it’s 2:00 in the morning, Daniels isn’t back from court, that makes no sense. No, you never went to court, you’re in the hospital because you broke your finger playing basketball. You know what I’m saying?¶
Okay.¶
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- wouldn’t have noticed him. Quiet guy. I don’t know if he’s ever been in a fight or any of that, you know, so it’s safe to say, had he not been his bunkie, I might have not even remembered what he looked like.
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ever be notified if a certain inmate is not coming back?¶
MR. : I mean, yeah, they’ve told me, because remember, we’re doing the count. So, they may say, when I come, they may be, “Internal pick up two from R&D going back to the housing unit,” and when I come, they’d be like, “Oh, Reyes ain’t coming back for whatever reason,” but it’s through passing, they don’t have to tell me because what happens is, Control Center should be keying that in so that when I do my count, I don’t need to know that because on SENTRY, it’s already he’s no longer there and - you know what I’m saying? So if it is, it’s through common conversation but it’s not a must for them to tell me because where - we have the faith that everybody else did their jobs and the computer is, you know, everything is logged in and moved and accounted for so I don’t need to worry about that when I do my count.¶
What count are you doing?¶
Like as Internal, where do you do the counts?¶
MR. We do the 4 o’clock when we come in.¶
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yourself. But they usually have, you know, more than one officer to help them, so usually only people inside SHU count SHU.¶
MR. They hand it to us and we bring it to the Control Center and the Control Center gives it to Control #2, which is C&A, Counts and Assignments and he does a cross list based off of what he has in the computer and what was counted on the units and he’d be the one to say - because they also got to call it in to them besides us giving them the paper. So they’ll tell them right there, “Good count,” that means you’re good. “Bad count,” count again. And bad count means obviously you’ve got the wrong numbers.¶
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MR. : So if an inmate in SHU is on what’s called the kick out list, that means their time is up, you know, with whatever they went in SHU for, their time is up, they get put on a kick out list and the kick out list gets cleared by everybody, SIA, the Captain, R&D, the Lieutenant, everybody signs off on it.¶
There’s a bunch of people. So that usually happens day time, and then by night time, they’re being kicked out because everything was signed off on because they can’t go to certain units with separations or if they had a problem on that unit. So it’s a process. It’s a lot of forms they’ve got to go through. So, right there, if it was on the kick out list, that’s how many people were notified and they already know about it, you know.¶
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MR. No. Control has to figure it out because it will mess the count up. If you just move an inmate to Five North and tell nobody, when we do the count, we’re going to want to know why your unit is short and his has an extra body. So eventually, Control has to be notified about something. Now, if it’s just cell to cell, you know, maybe your sink breaks on the unit and you’ve got an empty cell over there and you move him there. That’s, you know, and you do it yourself in the log, that’s different. But anything leaving the unit, Control has to know.¶
: Okay. And does Control have to open the outer doors for each unit for¶
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MR. : Either heading back or going - I just know that his - because, for a while, he wanted what’s called his PAC number. His PAC number is so that he can make a phone call. So the lawyer had asked me, like, “Who do I have to talk to to get him his PAC number.” This is prior to March 9, or —¶
MR. : — August 9th, I’m sorry, I’m all over the place - prior to August 9th. He said, “Yeah,” - she said, “He needs his PAC number,” just asked, “All right, I’ll find out, you know, why he didn’t get his PAC number.” Turned out he had his PAC number, so I told her the next day, I said, “He has his PAC number.” She said, “All right. He said he didn’t have it,” blah, blah. So when I asked him, I said, “Why did you tell your lawyer you don’t have it? You have it, you showed me.” He said, “No, but they said they monitor those phone calls.” I said, “Yeah. It’s the jail,” you¶
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know. So his lawyer then asked, how does he get an unmonitored phone call, to me. I said, “That goes on a different level, a Lieutenant or Unit Team is the only ones that could do that when they’re in Special Housing. An officer cannot do that.” So after that, I remember he kept on wanting a phone call from either Unit Team or the Lieutenant but it was never happening and then that day, I forget how it came up, but he was happy, he was like, “Yeah, I got my phone call finally.” But it wasn’t like a whole conversation, I just remember him saying it. So I know he got a phone call. I just don’t know who gave it to him and, you know, what transpired that got him that phone call, but I know he was finally like, “I got the phone call,” like happy about it.¶
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MR. : No. That I don’t know, but if I - in Special Housing, normally it’s when he’s in his cell because the phone jacks are on the tier. But one is monitored and one is unmonitored. So, if Unit Team gave it to him, you know, it was probably unmonitored.¶
MR. : When they’re in Special Housing, yes, so that they can reach out to their lawyer and, you know, we’re not allowed to listen to that type of conversation. But, the officer can’t give him that phone call.¶
It’s Unit Team or a supervisor and what normally happens is they give the card, you know, the lawyer’s card, they’ll call the number, “Okay. It’s here,” and then, “Here,” and give the phone through his slot and then it, you know, it cuts off at a certain time.¶
Now being that he was with his lawyers all day and that phone call comes around and what if it wasn’t his lawyer that he¶
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called, what if it was somebody else? Is that-.¶
MR. : I mean, I’m not going to say it’s not possible. It’s definitely possible, but from what I’ve seen, when people get phone calls, because I’m not allowed to give unmonitored phone calls, but what I’ve seen is, like I said, they’ll dial it for the inmate and wait and then, “Oh, Attorney Rodriguez office,” “Oh, okay, you have a client so and so?”¶
“Okay,” and then they hand it. So, but if they have the number written on a piece of paper and you call it and the inmate tells you, “You’re my father,” and I’m like, “Just say that you’re Attorney So and So,” how do I know. You know what I’m saying? There’s no way to - so I’m sure there’s a lot of inmates that make unmonitored phone calls and trick whoever is giving it to them, but, as far as I know, that’s how they’re able to judge if it’s an attorney or not.¶
: Were you asked to monitor that call that night and be with him when he made that phone call that night?¶
MR. : No. Not - no.¶
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MR. : Okay, so there you go. So what would happen is, especially that it’s specified right there, R&D would have their own count slip. So R&D has their own count slips sometimes because people come back from court, let’s say, right before the count and we didn’t get to put them back in the unit so they stay in R&D. So there’s plenty of times R&D will give us a count slip, like, “We got three inmates in here,” “We got four inmates or one.” So, in this situation, he would be on R&D’s count slip.¶
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MR. : Yes. What happens is you do one line in the X when they call you and it’s right, you make the line, you hang up. When you get the paperwork and check it and it matches what they called in, you do the second line. So this is a must. This, I don’t know if there’s a rule about it, but I know since I’ve worked that post, you know, I was always taught that that’s how you do it, make sure unit is correct because sometimes people - if you work overtime on one unit, then all of a sudden you go to another, you might forget and put that unit’s number on it. So, the units are right, the dates are right time, number, you got two signatures, we’re good.¶
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rule for this, it’s just the way I was taught and a lot of senior officers do it. So, I don’t know, you know, a lot of Lieutenants come from other institutions, they were taught different. So it’s not odd if the Lieutenant that took the count didn’t do it, but most of the time they would and -.¶
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would have had access to the Control number to be able to write in that, the number that they were looking for?¶
MR. : I mean, it’s possible because you brought up a ghost count. Ghost count does happen, but, this reflects it. You know what I’m saying?¶
MR. : So, what a ghost count would be, let’s say - I’m trying to think of a scenario where it would - okay, it’s count is on. I’m counting, all of a sudden, you’re throwing up crazy, like ridiculously and there’s blood in the throw up and everything. So I call for Medical. Medical is like, “Bring him to me, you know, bring him to Medical.” I bring him to Medical. We’re not going to¶
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MR. : It depends who’s working the SHU and what they have access to. You know, I had senior officers that, like I said, have access to it and they’ll tell Control, “I got it. Don’t worry about it, I know you’re busy, you’re doing everything else, I got it.” But if you have someone working the SHU, which is very possible because of all the overtime, who¶
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doesn’t have access or doesn’t know how to do it, they’re not doing it, Control has to -.¶
MR. : But would that be a conversation they would have about —¶
MR. : Yes. I -.¶
MR. : — who was actually going to key him out?¶
MR. : Exactly. That’s the conversation they’re having.¶
MR. : And so there’s not an automatic control being like, “We’ll do it.”¶
It’s actually a conversation they should have.¶
MR. : Well, regardless, a conversation they’re going to have because Control looks on camera, pops the door, they don’t know that inmate, what numbers he is, where - you know, so they would have to SHU and say, “Inmate so and so, what’s his reg number? What’s his ID number so I can do all the paperwork for it?” You know, you can’t just assume by looking at the camera, you know, the cameras is - I don’t know about now, but they used to not be that clear where you could tell exactly what inmate, you know.¶
MR. : Would that be done over¶
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possibly swallowed drugs or something, we don’t know what it is. So he swallowed it, so we put him on dry cell, which means he has to use the bathroom three times and a supervisor has to go through it to see if there’s drugs in there before he can get cleared coming off dry cell. And he has to be visually watched. So what happens is, if someone goes on dry cell, the Lieutenant is advised immediately because either you’re in a tussle with the inmate where he tried to put the drugs in his mouth or you’re seeing him through a cell and you’re like, “LT, I got one, he just swallowed drugs,” or, “I need you to respond.” Then the Lieutenant makes the decision to put him on dry¶
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a bell on the outside of the door, so the Lieutenant rings the bell, “Control, I need the 27 door popped for Lieutenant .”¶
They’re going to pop it because they look on camera, the Lieutenant is there. Now once he’s inside, the door is locked, “Control, we need 27 popped, exiting with one.” Now we’re exiting. Now from there, if I’m in the Control Center, I’m calling SHU, like, “Yo, is that inmate coming back? What’s going on?” So and so. But everybody works different.¶
MR. : All right, so, I guess this will be my last questions.¶
MR. : There’s no protocol exactly on how to communicate that movement because you don’t know if he’s coming back, you don’t know. I’m assuming if an inmate went to R&D for dry cell, they would put him on what’s called the X-ray machine because there’s a machine in R&D that reads the body, like the TSA machines. Because you could do dry cell in Special Housing, you don’t have to move them for that. If you have an empty cell, you shut the water off, you put them in dry cell in Special Housing with the Lieutenant. So the fact that¶
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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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