This morning's Tribune had an article about the State being sued because an AP&P Agent, (or probably SEVERAL of them, with the turn over, over THERE) failed to keep an eye on a Parolee who was convicted several times of being a swindler, and had done it again, to the tune of millions of dollars.
I'm not going to repeat the details here, you can see it in the paper on line if you missed it and feel that I'm not being honest with you. The name of the blog is, "TRUTHstick" after all, so I'm big on telling the truth.
I have to say, that after being retired for five years, and hearing what I'm hearing from my friends who still work there, I'm not surprised.
I had lunch yesterday with a great friend, and former partner at AP&P (who shall remain nameless because he's one of the finest human beings I have had the privilege to know, and I don't want him to get in trouble for telling the truth. We don't agree on much politically, but he's always been an HONEST Republican) who was telling me that the new guys think this is a, "day job". That you just show up and do your paperwork, and you don't have to be out at night, or hit the streets to supervise probationers and parolees.
And another former partner tells me the same thing but indirectly. I'll call her up and see if she wants to go to lunch and she's working in the field that afternoon, because her partner has a family and doesn't want to work nights. WTF? Really?
When both, Deb and I were doing it, and our daughter, who turned 23 today, by the way, was little, we would have to coordinate our schedule so that one of us was at home every night. Sometimes it wasn't possible, so thank heaven for Grandma.
You HAD to work nights! It's when violations happened. If you think about it, who are you going to find at home during the day? Well, if you're doing your job and your, "bandits" are working, and going to therapy, or in residential treatment programs, they won't BE home during the day! They will be at work! You hope. And even if they are NOT working, they won't be home smoking dope and drinking during the day, because I'll have them out looking for jobs and doing a record of it so I can call all the places they say they applied, and confirm what they were doing all day. It's simple stuff.
I never met a bad guy with a holster, or a good guy without one, and there is no GOOD reason to be out of your house late at night if you have to work and take care of a family. That should be chiseled in stone some place. Some place high up on a mountain.
The week I retired, Dorian and I had to book one of her probationers into jail in the middle of the afternoon. I think the woman had turned herself in, so it wasn't an arrest we made out in the field. One of the nurses at the jail at the time is a friend. Her husband is one of my cigar buddies. When she came out to check out our prisoner, she took one look at me and said, "What are you doing here? You AP&P guys are vampires! You only work at night." At the time, that was a true story.
Many years ago, when I was still working Probation, I got the opportunity to work in the Intensive Supervision Program (ISP). This was, at the time, the group of Agents who could handle even the worst situations. It was in the early 90's, AP&P Agents hadn't been Peace Officers for very long at that time, and we still had people in the office who took the job in the 70's and 80's who were social workers and would not, under any circumstances, become Cops. They HAD a gun, but might not be sure where the bullets were, and they didn't wear it. It was in their desk. It was a different time.
ISP was started with a Federal Grant, and the idea was that you would only take the worst of the worst. People that shouldn't BE on probation, but probably in prison, and give them one more chance to turn their life around with a LOT of supervision.
The average probationer/parolee would have to report to the office once a month, the first week of the month, and would be seen at their home once every 30 to 90 days, depending on the level of supervision our matrix said they deserved. On ISP they had to report every other week for drug testing, and they would be seen face to face at least six times a month. That meant a LOT of time in the field. There were only five agents and instead of between 50 and 100 cases, depending on your caseload management skills, that the other Agents had, you had no more than 25 cases. So you got to know them well. And you spent at LEAST two or three nights a week in the field.
And you had to work on weekends. There was always at least one team out on Saturday night and Sunday morning every weekend. Saturday night, you catch them drinking. Sunday morning, you catch them hung over and still blowing a .10 in the Intoxolizer from the night before.
As, Jimmy Buffett says, "There's a fine line between Saturday night, and Sunday morning". Amen.
One year, our supervisor decided that we were ALL going to work on New Year's Eve since everyone on ISP had a, "No Alcohol" clause on their probation agreement. That went over like a fart in church with my wife, who wanted to go out. We were still young then. We don't go out on New Year's Eve any more.
You know how many violation arrests we made that night? NONE! The crooks figured we'd be out, and they were all home by curfew, with their family's, watching, "New Year's Rockin' Eve" and staying out of trouble. But I was out NOT partying until one in the morning.
And with Parolees the standards are even higher! The last embezzler I had was a guy who took New York Life for more than a million dollars writing fake policy's. He was a good Mormon guy, in the Stake Presidency, drove a Porsche, lived in Little Cottonwood Canyon. Upstanding citizen. And a crook.
This guy probably should have been put on probation to work and pay back the company he ripped off. But New York Life didn't see it that way. I think they are big enough that the million dollars wasn't the issue, and they wrote to the Judge to ask for restitution (which they never really expected to get) and prison time, which they hoped would send a message. So with no previous arrest record, and not crime of violence, this guy spent five years in the joint. Cost him his wife, his house, and his Porsche.
Then, he gets ME as a PO. I made this sucker bring in his phone bill every month so I could make sure he didn't have the money in an off shore account somewhere. This was way before the Internet was common and cell phones were the only way we talked to each other. One call to the Cayman Islands, and I'd have put him back in prison and had the Attorney General seize his assets.
So, I'm thinking the game has been changed, and not for the better. Kind of sounds like the folks that SHOULD be out at night, and on weekends, and chasing bandits and kicking in doors are just putting on their guns in the morning, and wearing them while sitting at their desks all day. And that saddens me.
The worst thing anyone ever said to me was when a friend I've known for ever said to me that she knew I didn't retire because of my, "Shitty little social worker job" but because my dad left me money. Well, I DID retire because my dad left me money. But my job was anything but a shitty, little, socal worker job. I changed AP&P, and I put my life on the line for 20 years to do it.
I was a part of changing AP&P from a Social Work Agency, to a Law Enforcement Agency, who also did (had to do!) social work. Because both parts of the job are equal. You work for the Department of CORRECTIONS because you DO believe that people can change, and you want to help them do it. If you didn't believe in the social work side of it? You would work for the Department of Locking You Up And Throwing Away The Key.
But you also had to go out, and arrest guys who were committing new crimes and not paying back their victims, and not working, and not doing therapy. That works better than having to call someone else to do that part of the job. Utah was on the cutting edge of this with probation and parole.
When I started, I got a 9mm pistol and a holster, a set of handcuffs, a belt badge and had to check out a car once a week to do my, home visits.
By the time I retired, I had been part of the movement that had us wearing gun belts, extra magazines, batons, pepper spray, tazers, and shirts that said, "POLICE" on the back. Oh, and bullet, "resistant" vests! They didn't hand THOSE out when I started. By the time I was done, everyone was issued one, and it was custom fit.
But as a field training officer (FTO) I always reminded the new guys that the state bought them from the lowest bidder, so they should be careful anyway.
So, if AP&P has reverted to being desk jockeys with guns, I'm truly disappointed. I hope the Agent or Agents who supervised this latest swindler have documented their efforts to do so. If they haven't? Oh boy. You'll be out of a job, lose your retirement, and your POST Certification. And it won't be pretty if you tell them you did it because you didn't want to actually go out, get dirty, and spend a couple of nights a week in West Valley and Magna's trailer parks, and Herriman's, "Starter Mansions" (My buddy and I used to call, Herriman/Riverton/Bluffdale, "Misdemeanor Hell" because everyone out there was on probation for a felony that had been plea bargained down to a misdemeanor, was white, rich, and Mormon, and thought they were too important to be bothered with probation. So they would do dumb stuff like not answer the door when we showed up, or complain that we shouldn't wear the, "POLICE" jackets and gun belts when we came to THEIR house, because the neighbors would SEE it! It was THE toughest assignment I ever had to deal with). Law Enforcement is a 24/7/365 job. If you can't do the time, don't take the job.
I'll be real interested to see how this works out.
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