February 6, 2024 • 17 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, Senior Lead Officer Deon Joseph shares this vivid story about how he helped the ladies who lived on LA's notorious Skid Row.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American stories,
the show where America is the star and the American people.
The Safer Cities Initiative, as implemented in Los Angeles' Notorious
skid Row in September of two thousand and six, was
enacted as a part of their crime reduction effort.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Skid Row is a fifty four.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
Block area in downtown LA that has become synonymous with homelessness, crime,
and drugs. Dean Joseph as a law enforcement consultant author
an active senior lead officer in the downtown LA skid
Row community.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Let's take a listen, Okay.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
In two thousand and five, the year before the initiative
and all my efforts and there fors and other officers there,
we had ninety five people die from non homicidal debts.
We had thirty four people in two thousand and two
die from homicides. So three years into the efforts, we
look at two thousand and nine and we had sixty
three people die in skid Row, which is I think
about thirty three percent reduction, and we only had five
(01:12):
found dead in the streets. You know why, because we
were able to enforce the ten laws from six am
to nine pm, because if we could see somebody getting raped,
we can save them. If we could see somebody overdosing,
we can save them. The fire department can save them.
And it worked, it really worked. And we, of course
we allowed them to sleep after nine o'clock because there
wasn't enough shelter and it was just a really beautiful
time in homicides. We looked at just the following year
(01:35):
of two thousand and seven, I believe, and I think
in the whole division six people were murdered. Guess how
many people were murdered in skid Row three. I always
tell people, look, I know what we do is not sexy.
You want sexy, call the fire department. They're handsome guys.
They look at our calendars. I love the fire Department.
They're hardworking guys. Station nine shot out really great guys.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
But hey, they do feel good stuff. You know.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
Our job is to respond to the true systemic failures
of our government failing to deal with poverty, homelessness, crime
in a common sense way on a consistent basis. That's
our and the mental health of failure. So anyway, everything
was going fine, Everything's going fantastic until about twenty eleven,
(02:22):
and that was the beginning of the end for crime
patrol in the state of California. First, we had the
governor come up with ABY one oh nine, which basically
took individuals who were in prison off the backs of
the states and put it on the already over burdened
probation department. So they were so backed up that instead
of supervising these individuals directly, they gave them ankle bracelets
(02:46):
and told them to check in at a kiosk. So
what happens, These guys cut their ankle bracest SOUF. Now
they're running around committee crime. Then it comes twenty fourteen Prop.
Forty seven. They turned serious crimes into non serious crimes.
That made it difficult for us to keep criminals like
burdery suspects, birdery from vehicle suspects, theft suspects, to send
(03:07):
them back and hold them account but made it very
difficult for us to do it. And then it comes
twenty and sixteen. I couldn't believe that the voters voted
for it, seeing thirteen years of crime reduction dissipate Prop.
Fifty seven, which turned violent felonies into non violent felonies,
and I couldn't believe it. I mean, if someone took
(03:28):
your love one a female love, onto a bar and
put GHB in their drink and knocked them unconscious and
took them to a room and raped them. The average person,
if you ask them, they would tell you that's a
violent crime. It's not a violent crime anymore. If someone
walked to my house right now and started firing at
AK forty seven, but they missed me, by the grace
of God, you and I believe that's a vining crime.
(03:48):
The average sane, rational person thinks that's a vinent crime.
Under the new law, it's nonviolent. It's still a felony,
but non violet. And what it did was it created
a lever to release hundreds, tens of thousands of individuals
into the street. And where did most of them come?
Speaker 2 (04:04):
To? Skid row?
Speaker 3 (04:06):
So now I was watching the justice system fail again.
Imagine being in what's called the recovery zone called skid row,
where there's one hundred and eight programs designed to help
people with the narative issues, but there's a drug dealer
standing right outside the door or inside the door. In
some of these low income supportive housing units, they're worse
(04:27):
than being on the street. And the reason why that
is is a lot of the people who got housed
in skid row still old drug debts to the local
loan shark, and the loan shark finds out that order
drug dealer, and the loan shark and drug dealer finds
out they're still in there and says, hey, guess what,
you got to sell this drugs for me in this hotel.
Help me turn this place out, or if you won't
(04:47):
do it, you have to get out of your own
room and let me move in. So now you've got
somebody who's house who's now back on the street. Because
the criminal element is able to run wild and rampant
once again. Women are being victimized at a high rate.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
Tens are up.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
We can't take him down. The most tragic thing I
ever saw was I was parked and these tents were up,
and it was about twelve noon, and I didn't hear anything.
Everything was quiet. I went to the station, came to
work the next day, and I saw a report at
twelve noon at fifth in San Pedro, where I was parked,
there was a woman who was savagely raked by three males.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
I was parked there.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
But even though that's a failure, I look back on
the successes and the one thing they can't take away
from me is the relationship that I built with the
people on top of housing them. During the period where
we had it safe, I created several programs off the cuffs.
One was called a Lady's Night, and Ladies'.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Night was birth in my heart.
Speaker 3 (05:44):
In nineteen ninety nine, I was an undercover investigator in
skid Row and talk about seeing the real underbelly of
skid Row. I couldn't believe it. A I couldn't believe
they didn't recognize me as big as my arms were
at the time. But be you know, it was just
seeing drug program raiders participating in the drug drug trade
and allowing drug dealers into the facility and handing out drug.
(06:06):
I couldn't believe what I was seeing. It really broke
my heart. When I saw these people, I felt had
no hope. So working under cover, I remember I had
to go arrest sex workers. There were two sex workers
I was looking for and I could never get them.
I can never put on the right costume right, So
finally I thought I had the right one. I was
dressed as a preacher. I had a little collar on,
(06:28):
you know. I'm driving through the streets and I see
the girl. I'm like, I'm gonna get her this time.
And I pull up next her and say, hey girl,
I'm gonna lay hands on you.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
Right.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
She looks at me and says, what do you need,
big daddy? Lips split open, eyes swollen shut, skirt torn
and she's walking looking for another customer. And my heart
just broke, and I broke my cover. I said, look,
it's me. I'm trying to get you, but I'm not
gonna arrest you. Please tell me who did this to you.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
And you're listening to Dion Joseph sharing with you his
story of his time spent unskid row. And for a time, boy,
that death rate on skid row went down, and then
came rules and rags and policies that made it just
more difficult for someone like Dion, and cops across this country,
they get harder for them to do their jobs and
(07:15):
keep us safe, including the most vulnerable among us. When
we come back, more of Dion Joseph's story here on
our American Stories. Here aret our American Stories, we bring
you inspiring stories of history, sports, business, faith, and love.
(07:36):
Stories from a great and beautiful country that need to
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we do, please go to our Americanstories dot com and
click the donate button. Give a little, give a lot,
help us keep the great American stories coming. That's our
(07:57):
American Stories dot Com. And we continue with our American
stories in Dion Joseph's story. He's a law enforcement consultant, author,
and active senior lead officer in the downtown Los Angeles
(08:20):
skid Road community.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Let's continue with Dion.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
There were two sex workers I was looking for, and
I could never get them. I could never put on
the right costume right. So finally I thought I had
the right one. I was dressed as a preacher. I
have a little collar on, you know. I pulled up
next her and say, hey, girl, I'm gonna lay hands
on you. Right lips, split, open, eyes swollen, shut, skirt torn.
My heart just broke, and I broke my cover. I said, look,
(08:46):
it's me. I'm trying to get you, but I'm not
gonna arrest you. Please tell me who did this to you?
She said, I got to live here. You either arrest
me or let me go. And I had to let
her go. And the same guy that violated her violated
several other women in the skid Roy area. I couldn't
do anything about it, big Gun. I didn't have the resources.
But in two thousand and eight, we were having the
(09:06):
same problems. The ladies were telling me about it in
skid Row. They felt I was the only officer they
could talk to. So I said, you know what, let
me talk to you about your rights. Because what they
were hearing from pimps, from activists, from their johns is
you go to the police, the police are going to
arrest you because you're a drug adad. I'll tell the
police you were a drug addict and they're going to
arrest you too. Or I know you have a warrant,
(09:26):
so I'll tell you if you have a warrant.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
The police are going to arrest you. None of these
things were true.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
So I established some really great relationships with the SRORO
and they allowed me to use one of their community
centers and the hardest skid Row called the James M.
Wood Center, and I created Ladies Night, and I rolled
out the red carpet for this lady and I think
I set out about fifty cheers, but I only expected
about fifteen ladies, because usually people in skid row don't
show up for things. But a grace of God, about
(09:52):
one hundred and seventy five homeless women came to the
first Lady's Night, and I treated them just as if
they lived in westvill I had a da there, I
had a city council woman there. I had all these
people there that normally they wouldn't expect to come talk
to them. But the whole thing was, I don't care
if you're in a pipe, on parole, a prostitute, or
off swinging from a pole or undocumented. If somebody hurt you,
(10:14):
it is my job to serve you. And my brother
and I also taught them some self defense as well,
and not enough to kick my own butt, but just
enough to add seconds to their life should they get
assaulted in the street. And you should have seen the
impact it had. I had made connections for life with
those ladies sharing their stories of abuse. And I just
sat there and listened all night long to these ladies
(10:36):
they felt listen to they felt hurt. Now here was
the wonderful gift from that. Two years later, we had
a serial cap a taxi cap Cereal rapist driving through
skid row, picking up women and just doing things I
won't even mention on this program to these women, and
three of the women that he sexually assaulted went to
(10:56):
Ladies Night, my first Lady's Night. Gues came to the
police and we put that guy away for the rest
of his life. But the funny story side note behind
that was when they were brought into court to testify,
they wouldn't get on the stand, and they kept asking them,
why you guys won't testify. We're not going to get
on the stand unless the Angel shows up. So I'm
(11:18):
at home, sitting in my Superman draws, drinking on the
Smart Strawberry Smoothie, trying to draw my day off, and
I get a call from the DA's office, Joseph, They're
not going to get on the stand if you don't come.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
So I'm like, but I'm in my Superman draws. I'm
trying to relax.
Speaker 3 (11:33):
I'm watching Marie. I want to know who the baby
daddy is, and I said, you know what, this is
too important, So I suited up, went down there, and
when I walked into the waiting room, all three of
the victims collapsed into my arms and they went and
testified and put that man away for the rest of
(11:53):
his life.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
Hopefully.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
That was one incredible moment that no one could take
away from me, and to this day, I still have
a connection with the women of skid Row. During that
same time I work with the missions, the shelters, I
had to learn a hard lesson about once again, once again,
about judgments and stereotypes. I always thought the missions were scams.
I thought that they were there to basically corral the homeless,
(12:17):
feed them soup kitchens, and then drive off a Mercedes
Benz and not change a thing. I always felt the
missions were a problem. They were the problem. They were
the main source of problem. As lots of homeless were
going there. You know, there was always going to be problems,
and I'll never forget when I first became a senior
lead officer, my captain says to me, Officer Joseph, you're.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
Doing great out there.
Speaker 3 (12:37):
You're making a lot of arrest, but that's not what
I hired you to do.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
You have to.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
Build relationships with the community. And I was like, what
do you mean. I want you to go a meet
with the director of the Union Rescue Mission. His name
is Andy Bales, and I was like, oh God, the mission.
So I went. I showed up, I saw him. I
shook his hand and said, hey, I'm Officer Joseph. Captain
told me to meet you. Here's my business card. Nice
talking to you. And as I'm walking away, he says, hey,
your captain said I had you from thirty minutes. Oh man,
(13:03):
I got crying to fight and everything. So he says,
come walk with me. So we're walking through the first
level and I've been in there many times making arrest
and I'm seeing people arrested before. Hey, that guy is
smoking crack right there. Oh, arrested that he got a
ware for his arrest right there. I'm like, I'm judging right,
But he must have sensed it because he was taking
me to the second, third, and fourth floor, and every
(13:23):
floor got better. And by the time I got to
the fifth floor, I saw individuals who I arrested. I
arrested them. And when I arrested them a year or
two years ago, I said to myself, not because I
was mean spirited, this person's going to die just based
on the trajectory of life that they were on. And
these people were cleaning, sober and running the program. I'll
(13:45):
never forget. One lady approached me and says, you're a RoboCop.
I remember you, And I'm like, I don't remember you,
beautiful lady, And she goes, well, you probably don't remember me.
Back then, I had no teeth. Remember I told you
I wanted your family to catch AIDS and die.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Oh oh you.
Speaker 3 (14:02):
I forgave you for that a long time ago, right,
And she says, Officer Joseph, I'm doing well in here.
I'm doing good. I hope you're proud of me, I said, baby,
I am. She says, but let me tell you truth.
If you guys don't deal with these dope dealers and
long stars out here, I don't know how long we're
gonna last in here. That gave me pause. It made
me realize that not only did they need the shelters
(14:23):
and the programs, they also needed the police. And I
made a whole shift, mindset shift, and I became a
guardian for the drug programs for the shelters, and I
did everything I could to make sure I kept drug
dealers and gang members. And when I noticed that while
I was doing it, people were graduating from drug programs
at a higher rate. The missions were reporting less guns,
(14:43):
less drugs. Oh, They'd let me come in there and
watch videos and all the time inspire on drug dealers.
It was just a wonderful thing that God was just
blessing me. But one of those beautiful things they did
was they allowed me to engage in a program called
the Jest Like You Program. I created this program after
being invited to the missions to talk to the kids.
And I went there, and the mistake I made was
(15:04):
I patronized the kids. I walked in there and I
did the old song and dance. Hey, I'm a police officer,
I'm your friend. Hey, little billy, what do you want
to be when you grow up? A football player? Hey, Johnny,
what do you want to be when you grew up?
A fireman?
Speaker 2 (15:16):
No?
Speaker 3 (15:16):
I did the old song and dance right, the old
soft shoot. And then there was a twelve year old
girl and she was looking eastbound down at the street,
and I was kind of insulted. The party was over here, right,
I said, Hey, lady, the party's over here.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
A young lady what do you.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
Want to be when you grow up? And she looked
at me. It's beautiful, chocolate black girl, and she says,
I'm probably going to be like these people having on
sex on the sidewalk if you don't get me and
my family out of here, shut me down. I got emotional.
I couldn't continue. I walked out and let my partners
handle the rest. I went to the station. I'm sitting
at my desk praying to God and said, what can
(15:52):
I do? What can I do? Who can I put
in these front of these kids who are just like them?
Speaker 1 (15:56):
Ding Ding daven name.
Speaker 3 (15:57):
The idea popped on my head, that's just like your
program was born, and I found individuals who could be
mentors to these kids who they didn't grow up with
a silver.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
Spoon in their mouth.
Speaker 3 (16:07):
They were in foster care, they were homeless, they were abused,
and somehow, some way, they turned their life around. I
brought a judge, I brought a lawyer. I brought a
former actor. I brought a guy who I found in
a trash band covered in scabies, okay, and I put
a poem in his jailhouse bag and he read the
(16:29):
poem and somehow it inspired him to change his life,
and he went on to manage hotels.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
In the area.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
I couldn't believe it.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
It's amazing, you know.
Speaker 3 (16:37):
That's why I can't stop, you know, It's just like
I'm always looking for the miracle.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
And a terrific job on the editing, producing and storytelling
by our own Greg Hangler and a special thanks to
Dion Joseph. He's a law enforcement consultant, author, an active
senior lead officer in the downtown Los Angeles area, the
notorious Good Road community and doing what he can to
make life better for the people there and safer. And
(17:05):
I can just picture that lady's night and his skepticism
running it, because not your typical ladies night. But yet
he treated these women as if they were women of
high society, like they were from Beverly Hills, treating them
with the same dignity and respect.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
They had rights.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
He wanted to let them know, and they had someone
who cared to talk to.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
He was there to listen and serve, and what a
beautiful thing.
Speaker 1 (17:31):
And all those women showed up and then ultimately were
able to talk to him about their fears and the
monsters who were preying on them.
Speaker 2 (17:40):
The story of Dion Joseph.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
And the story of so many of the people who
serve us in uniform, doing good, seeing things that most
of us well don't want to see and couldn't handle
if we did his story, their stories. Here on our
American Stories.
This is Lee Habib and this is our American stories,
the show where America is the star and the American people.
The Safer Cities Initiative, as implemented in Los Angeles' Notorious
skid Row in September of two thousand and six, was
enacted as a part of their crime reduction effort.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Skid Row is a fifty four.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
Block area in downtown LA that has become synonymous with homelessness, crime,
and drugs. Dean Joseph as a law enforcement consultant author
an active senior lead officer in the downtown LA skid
Row community.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Let's take a listen, Okay.
Speaker 3 (00:48):
In two thousand and five, the year before the initiative
and all my efforts and there fors and other officers there,
we had ninety five people die from non homicidal debts.
We had thirty four people in two thousand and two
die from homicides. So three years into the efforts, we
look at two thousand and nine and we had sixty
three people die in skid Row, which is I think
about thirty three percent reduction, and we only had five
(01:12):
found dead in the streets. You know why, because we
were able to enforce the ten laws from six am
to nine pm, because if we could see somebody getting raped,
we can save them. If we could see somebody overdosing,
we can save them. The fire department can save them.
And it worked, it really worked. And we, of course
we allowed them to sleep after nine o'clock because there
wasn't enough shelter and it was just a really beautiful
time in homicides. We looked at just the following year
(01:35):
of two thousand and seven, I believe, and I think
in the whole division six people were murdered. Guess how
many people were murdered in skid Row three. I always
tell people, look, I know what we do is not sexy.
You want sexy, call the fire department. They're handsome guys.
They look at our calendars. I love the fire Department.
They're hardworking guys. Station nine shot out really great guys.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
But hey, they do feel good stuff. You know.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
Our job is to respond to the true systemic failures
of our government failing to deal with poverty, homelessness, crime
in a common sense way on a consistent basis. That's
our and the mental health of failure. So anyway, everything
was going fine, Everything's going fantastic until about twenty eleven,
(02:22):
and that was the beginning of the end for crime
patrol in the state of California. First, we had the
governor come up with ABY one oh nine, which basically
took individuals who were in prison off the backs of
the states and put it on the already over burdened
probation department. So they were so backed up that instead
of supervising these individuals directly, they gave them ankle bracelets
(02:46):
and told them to check in at a kiosk. So
what happens, These guys cut their ankle bracest SOUF. Now
they're running around committee crime. Then it comes twenty fourteen Prop.
Forty seven. They turned serious crimes into non serious crimes.
That made it difficult for us to keep criminals like
burdery suspects, birdery from vehicle suspects, theft suspects, to send
(03:07):
them back and hold them account but made it very
difficult for us to do it. And then it comes
twenty and sixteen. I couldn't believe that the voters voted
for it, seeing thirteen years of crime reduction dissipate Prop.
Fifty seven, which turned violent felonies into non violent felonies,
and I couldn't believe it. I mean, if someone took
(03:28):
your love one a female love, onto a bar and
put GHB in their drink and knocked them unconscious and
took them to a room and raped them. The average person,
if you ask them, they would tell you that's a
violent crime. It's not a violent crime anymore. If someone
walked to my house right now and started firing at
AK forty seven, but they missed me, by the grace
of God, you and I believe that's a vining crime.
(03:48):
The average sane, rational person thinks that's a vinent crime.
Under the new law, it's nonviolent. It's still a felony,
but non violet. And what it did was it created
a lever to release hundreds, tens of thousands of individuals
into the street. And where did most of them come?
Speaker 2 (04:04):
To? Skid row?
Speaker 3 (04:06):
So now I was watching the justice system fail again.
Imagine being in what's called the recovery zone called skid row,
where there's one hundred and eight programs designed to help
people with the narative issues, but there's a drug dealer
standing right outside the door or inside the door. In
some of these low income supportive housing units, they're worse
(04:27):
than being on the street. And the reason why that
is is a lot of the people who got housed
in skid row still old drug debts to the local
loan shark, and the loan shark finds out that order
drug dealer, and the loan shark and drug dealer finds
out they're still in there and says, hey, guess what,
you got to sell this drugs for me in this hotel.
Help me turn this place out, or if you won't
(04:47):
do it, you have to get out of your own
room and let me move in. So now you've got
somebody who's house who's now back on the street. Because
the criminal element is able to run wild and rampant
once again. Women are being victimized at a high rate.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
Tens are up.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
We can't take him down. The most tragic thing I
ever saw was I was parked and these tents were up,
and it was about twelve noon, and I didn't hear anything.
Everything was quiet. I went to the station, came to
work the next day, and I saw a report at
twelve noon at fifth in San Pedro, where I was parked,
there was a woman who was savagely raked by three males.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
I was parked there.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
But even though that's a failure, I look back on
the successes and the one thing they can't take away
from me is the relationship that I built with the
people on top of housing them. During the period where
we had it safe, I created several programs off the cuffs.
One was called a Lady's Night, and Ladies'.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Night was birth in my heart.
Speaker 3 (05:44):
In nineteen ninety nine, I was an undercover investigator in
skid Row and talk about seeing the real underbelly of
skid Row. I couldn't believe it. A I couldn't believe
they didn't recognize me as big as my arms were
at the time. But be you know, it was just
seeing drug program raiders participating in the drug drug trade
and allowing drug dealers into the facility and handing out drug.
(06:06):
I couldn't believe what I was seeing. It really broke
my heart. When I saw these people, I felt had
no hope. So working under cover, I remember I had
to go arrest sex workers. There were two sex workers
I was looking for and I could never get them.
I can never put on the right costume right, So
finally I thought I had the right one. I was
dressed as a preacher. I had a little collar on,
(06:28):
you know. I'm driving through the streets and I see
the girl. I'm like, I'm gonna get her this time.
And I pull up next her and say, hey girl,
I'm gonna lay hands on you.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
Right.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
She looks at me and says, what do you need,
big daddy? Lips split open, eyes swollen shut, skirt torn
and she's walking looking for another customer. And my heart
just broke, and I broke my cover. I said, look,
it's me. I'm trying to get you, but I'm not
gonna arrest you. Please tell me who did this to you.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
And you're listening to Dion Joseph sharing with you his
story of his time spent unskid row. And for a time, boy,
that death rate on skid row went down, and then
came rules and rags and policies that made it just
more difficult for someone like Dion, and cops across this country,
they get harder for them to do their jobs and
(07:15):
keep us safe, including the most vulnerable among us. When
we come back, more of Dion Joseph's story here on
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you inspiring stories of history, sports, business, faith, and love.
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American Stories dot Com. And we continue with our American
stories in Dion Joseph's story. He's a law enforcement consultant, author,
and active senior lead officer in the downtown Los Angeles
(08:20):
skid Road community.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Let's continue with Dion.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
There were two sex workers I was looking for, and
I could never get them. I could never put on
the right costume right. So finally I thought I had
the right one. I was dressed as a preacher. I
have a little collar on, you know. I pulled up
next her and say, hey, girl, I'm gonna lay hands
on you. Right lips, split, open, eyes swollen, shut, skirt torn.
My heart just broke, and I broke my cover. I said, look,
(08:46):
it's me. I'm trying to get you, but I'm not
gonna arrest you. Please tell me who did this to you?
She said, I got to live here. You either arrest
me or let me go. And I had to let
her go. And the same guy that violated her violated
several other women in the skid Roy area. I couldn't
do anything about it, big Gun. I didn't have the resources.
But in two thousand and eight, we were having the
(09:06):
same problems. The ladies were telling me about it in
skid Row. They felt I was the only officer they
could talk to. So I said, you know what, let
me talk to you about your rights. Because what they
were hearing from pimps, from activists, from their johns is
you go to the police, the police are going to
arrest you because you're a drug adad. I'll tell the
police you were a drug addict and they're going to
arrest you too. Or I know you have a warrant,
(09:26):
so I'll tell you if you have a warrant.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
The police are going to arrest you. None of these
things were true.
Speaker 3 (09:31):
So I established some really great relationships with the SRORO
and they allowed me to use one of their community
centers and the hardest skid Row called the James M.
Wood Center, and I created Ladies Night, and I rolled
out the red carpet for this lady and I think
I set out about fifty cheers, but I only expected
about fifteen ladies, because usually people in skid row don't
show up for things. But a grace of God, about
(09:52):
one hundred and seventy five homeless women came to the
first Lady's Night, and I treated them just as if
they lived in westvill I had a da there, I
had a city council woman there. I had all these
people there that normally they wouldn't expect to come talk
to them. But the whole thing was, I don't care
if you're in a pipe, on parole, a prostitute, or
off swinging from a pole or undocumented. If somebody hurt you,
(10:14):
it is my job to serve you. And my brother
and I also taught them some self defense as well,
and not enough to kick my own butt, but just
enough to add seconds to their life should they get
assaulted in the street. And you should have seen the
impact it had. I had made connections for life with
those ladies sharing their stories of abuse. And I just
sat there and listened all night long to these ladies
(10:36):
they felt listen to they felt hurt. Now here was
the wonderful gift from that. Two years later, we had
a serial cap a taxi cap Cereal rapist driving through
skid row, picking up women and just doing things I
won't even mention on this program to these women, and
three of the women that he sexually assaulted went to
(10:56):
Ladies Night, my first Lady's Night. Gues came to the
police and we put that guy away for the rest
of his life. But the funny story side note behind
that was when they were brought into court to testify,
they wouldn't get on the stand, and they kept asking them,
why you guys won't testify. We're not going to get
on the stand unless the Angel shows up. So I'm
(11:18):
at home, sitting in my Superman draws, drinking on the
Smart Strawberry Smoothie, trying to draw my day off, and
I get a call from the DA's office, Joseph, They're
not going to get on the stand if you don't come.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
So I'm like, but I'm in my Superman draws. I'm
trying to relax.
Speaker 3 (11:33):
I'm watching Marie. I want to know who the baby
daddy is, and I said, you know what, this is
too important, So I suited up, went down there, and
when I walked into the waiting room, all three of
the victims collapsed into my arms and they went and
testified and put that man away for the rest of
(11:53):
his life.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
Hopefully.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
That was one incredible moment that no one could take
away from me, and to this day, I still have
a connection with the women of skid Row. During that
same time I work with the missions, the shelters, I
had to learn a hard lesson about once again, once again,
about judgments and stereotypes. I always thought the missions were scams.
I thought that they were there to basically corral the homeless,
(12:17):
feed them soup kitchens, and then drive off a Mercedes
Benz and not change a thing. I always felt the
missions were a problem. They were the problem. They were
the main source of problem. As lots of homeless were
going there. You know, there was always going to be problems,
and I'll never forget when I first became a senior
lead officer, my captain says to me, Officer Joseph, you're.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
Doing great out there.
Speaker 3 (12:37):
You're making a lot of arrest, but that's not what
I hired you to do.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
You have to.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
Build relationships with the community. And I was like, what
do you mean. I want you to go a meet
with the director of the Union Rescue Mission. His name
is Andy Bales, and I was like, oh God, the mission.
So I went. I showed up, I saw him. I
shook his hand and said, hey, I'm Officer Joseph. Captain
told me to meet you. Here's my business card. Nice
talking to you. And as I'm walking away, he says, hey,
your captain said I had you from thirty minutes. Oh man,
(13:03):
I got crying to fight and everything. So he says,
come walk with me. So we're walking through the first
level and I've been in there many times making arrest
and I'm seeing people arrested before. Hey, that guy is
smoking crack right there. Oh, arrested that he got a
ware for his arrest right there. I'm like, I'm judging right,
But he must have sensed it because he was taking
me to the second, third, and fourth floor, and every
(13:23):
floor got better. And by the time I got to
the fifth floor, I saw individuals who I arrested. I
arrested them. And when I arrested them a year or
two years ago, I said to myself, not because I
was mean spirited, this person's going to die just based
on the trajectory of life that they were on. And
these people were cleaning, sober and running the program. I'll
(13:45):
never forget. One lady approached me and says, you're a RoboCop.
I remember you, And I'm like, I don't remember you,
beautiful lady, And she goes, well, you probably don't remember me.
Back then, I had no teeth. Remember I told you
I wanted your family to catch AIDS and die.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Oh oh you.
Speaker 3 (14:02):
I forgave you for that a long time ago, right,
And she says, Officer Joseph, I'm doing well in here.
I'm doing good. I hope you're proud of me, I said, baby,
I am. She says, but let me tell you truth.
If you guys don't deal with these dope dealers and
long stars out here, I don't know how long we're
gonna last in here. That gave me pause. It made
me realize that not only did they need the shelters
(14:23):
and the programs, they also needed the police. And I
made a whole shift, mindset shift, and I became a
guardian for the drug programs for the shelters, and I
did everything I could to make sure I kept drug
dealers and gang members. And when I noticed that while
I was doing it, people were graduating from drug programs
at a higher rate. The missions were reporting less guns,
(14:43):
less drugs. Oh, They'd let me come in there and
watch videos and all the time inspire on drug dealers.
It was just a wonderful thing that God was just
blessing me. But one of those beautiful things they did
was they allowed me to engage in a program called
the Jest Like You Program. I created this program after
being invited to the missions to talk to the kids.
And I went there, and the mistake I made was
(15:04):
I patronized the kids. I walked in there and I
did the old song and dance. Hey, I'm a police officer,
I'm your friend. Hey, little billy, what do you want
to be when you grow up? A football player? Hey, Johnny,
what do you want to be when you grew up?
A fireman?
Speaker 2 (15:16):
No?
Speaker 3 (15:16):
I did the old song and dance right, the old
soft shoot. And then there was a twelve year old
girl and she was looking eastbound down at the street,
and I was kind of insulted. The party was over here, right,
I said, Hey, lady, the party's over here.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
A young lady what do you.
Speaker 3 (15:31):
Want to be when you grow up? And she looked
at me. It's beautiful, chocolate black girl, and she says,
I'm probably going to be like these people having on
sex on the sidewalk if you don't get me and
my family out of here, shut me down. I got emotional.
I couldn't continue. I walked out and let my partners
handle the rest. I went to the station. I'm sitting
at my desk praying to God and said, what can
(15:52):
I do? What can I do? Who can I put
in these front of these kids who are just like them?
Speaker 1 (15:56):
Ding Ding daven name.
Speaker 3 (15:57):
The idea popped on my head, that's just like your
program was born, and I found individuals who could be
mentors to these kids who they didn't grow up with
a silver.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
Spoon in their mouth.
Speaker 3 (16:07):
They were in foster care, they were homeless, they were abused,
and somehow, some way, they turned their life around. I
brought a judge, I brought a lawyer. I brought a
former actor. I brought a guy who I found in
a trash band covered in scabies, okay, and I put
a poem in his jailhouse bag and he read the
(16:29):
poem and somehow it inspired him to change his life,
and he went on to manage hotels.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
In the area.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
I couldn't believe it.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
It's amazing, you know.
Speaker 3 (16:37):
That's why I can't stop, you know, It's just like
I'm always looking for the miracle.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
And a terrific job on the editing, producing and storytelling
by our own Greg Hangler and a special thanks to
Dion Joseph. He's a law enforcement consultant, author, an active
senior lead officer in the downtown Los Angeles area, the
notorious Good Road community and doing what he can to
make life better for the people there and safer. And
(17:05):
I can just picture that lady's night and his skepticism
running it, because not your typical ladies night. But yet
he treated these women as if they were women of
high society, like they were from Beverly Hills, treating them
with the same dignity and respect.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
They had rights.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
He wanted to let them know, and they had someone
who cared to talk to.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
He was there to listen and serve, and what a
beautiful thing.
Speaker 1 (17:31):
And all those women showed up and then ultimately were
able to talk to him about their fears and the
monsters who were preying on them.
Speaker 2 (17:40):
The story of Dion Joseph.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
And the story of so many of the people who
serve us in uniform, doing good, seeing things that most
of us well don't want to see and couldn't handle
if we did his story, their stories. Here on our
American Stories.
Host
Lee Habeeb
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