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Danny and Allison, Part 1
They're young, Jewish professionals who routinely split their ticket. So far, they lean toward Rudy because they say Hillary doesn't seem to have any principles.
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[11/22/99]

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[11/22/99]

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[11/20/99]

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By Anthony York
[11/19/99]

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State prosecutors alleged that in March 1993, the four Corcoran State Prison Security Housing Unit officers, led by Sgt. Robert Alan Decker, deliberately transferred inmate Eddie Dillard to the cell of Wayne Robertson, aka the "Booty Bandit" knowing that the younger, smaller inmate would be raped. At trial, Robertson testified that he had indeed beaten and sodomized Dillard for two days because guards had said that Dillard needed to "learn how to do his time."

But the defense -- led by four adroit lawyers and funded by the guards' union -- countered that the accused guards had no idea at the time that Robertson was a rapist. "I agree that Wayne Robertson is a rapist and a thug, but that fact was not known to the floor staff," said defense attorney Curtis Sisk in his opening arguments. One of the officers told the jury that the first time he even heard of Wayne Robertson was in an article in the Los Angeles Times.

The California Correctional Peace Officers Association -- which paid the defendants' legal costs and launched a media campaign to support them -- is one of the state's most powerful lobbies. During the last election cycle, the group poured millions of dollars into state races, supporting candidates from both parties and waging a $2 million media campaign on behalf of Gov. Gray Davis.

"We are obviously very pleased. The four guards and their families are the real victims here," said union president Don Novey.

With a pending federal trial and several criminal investigations of prison staff still open, the CCPOA left as little as possible to chance during the state investigation and trial. The union's publication, the Peace Keeper, encouraged rank-and-file members not to trust or speak with the FBI and state investigators. Critics of the union say this and quick intervention by CCPOA lawyers effectively shut down the flow of information at the source.

As the so-called "Booty Bandit" trial approached, the CCPOA also turned to the public relations side of the political equation, targeting Hanford-area residents with a slew of radio and TV ads full of menacing, tattooed convicts and brave guards walking "the toughest beat in the state." (The union says the timing of the ads was mere coincidence, and was not related to the pending case.)

And once arguments in the case opened, the CCPOA's concern was manifest in attendance of a steady stream of local chapter officials and union heavies.

For prisoners' rights activists like Tom Quinn, a private investigator who specializes in researching cases against California jails and prisons, the presence of CCPOA honchos was just another example of how a code of silence is encouraged and enforced by the leadership of both the union and the Department of Corrections.

"Fundamentally, the claim that these guards didn't know that Robertson was a rapist is totally implausible," Quinn said. "The SHU [Security Housing Unit] is a unique social experiment designed to generate information." Along with elaborate records and dossiers kept on all the inmates, Quinn points out that guards have a relatively clear view into most of the SHU cells, both from the tier and from inside the control booth. "Furthermore," adds Quinn, "the C.O.s [correctional officers] are constantly working snitches. They know who's who. And they knew ... that Robertson was a rapist."

Quinn's claims were affirmed by Connie Foster, who worked as a staff member at Corcoran in 1993. "I heard about Robertson a week after I arrived," Foster said.

Next page | Did Lockyer's office botch the prosecution?