THE LIFE OF A DEPUTY PROBATION OFFICER

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Yeah, this is life inside Chris. You want the real deal, homie.
This is what you miss when the sale lots. Get
your mind right and thinks straight. You know, the perspective
of seeds in the inmates. This is life now. Just
want to survive? Now when the lights out? Keep quiet?
Better right down. If you're ready for less, get it.
You want to know the truth, take a visit life

(00:22):
inside prison.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
Lay Welcome back everybody.

Speaker 3 (00:33):
Well, we have a great guest today, Jay. He's a
deputy probation officer in La County, and boy do we
have some stories to share with you. A lot of
interesting stuff in the field you don't usually get to
hear a lot about. This is why I'm excited about
this interview. We like to share things that you don't
always hear about. So hopefully you'll learn a lot today.
I know I always do talking to Jay, So this

(00:54):
is going to be a fascinating conversation.

Speaker 2 (00:55):
Before we get started.

Speaker 3 (00:56):
You know what to do, folks, thanke sure to share
subscribe hit that I like button. You know we like
it and that's not waste any more time. Welcome to
the show, Jay, Welcome buddy.

Speaker 4 (01:04):
Hey, thank you for having me on.

Speaker 3 (01:06):
Thank you for being here. We talked a lot outside
of the interview. We've known each other for a little
bit now, and and every time we have a conversation,
we can't, you know, can't go short. This's just so
much that you know, and it's always so fascinating to me,

(01:26):
like here's oh my gosh, really and we.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
Don't ner really get to hear this stuff.

Speaker 3 (01:30):
But before we get to all that, what I wanted
to do is learn a little bit about you. So
tell us a little bit about your career law enforcement.
What was the path you took to leave to where you're.

Speaker 4 (01:39):
At down Sure, well, I didn't plan on becoming a
probation officer. I was actually, i'll say about nineteen years old.
I had my first real job. I was working at
ross I don't believe it or not. And my parents
had a friend who was actually a probation officer. So
when I was twenty, he said, hey, probation's hiring for

(02:03):
a student a student worker position. It's not the greatest,
but if you want to have a job in probation
or law enforcement, it's a great way. At the time,
I was only making I think minimum wags back then
it was only three dollars and twenty five cents.

Speaker 2 (02:17):
Ag.

Speaker 5 (02:19):
Yeah, and this job at probation was paying six dollars
and forty seven cents.

Speaker 4 (02:25):
And I thought, wow, that's a lot of money back then,
So I applied, I got hired, and from that point
on I did not plan on continuing my position with probation.
I actually wanted to go to law school, so I
was going to Crito's College. I you know, then went

(02:45):
on to kel State Long Beach. I got my degree
in criminal justice, and I just decided, hey, Probation's not
a bad job. So I just stuck with it. And
so twenty years later, here I am. I am twenty
and a half years later, here I am. I you
must have tried the things that I yeah. Yeah, just

(03:06):
time just flies. I remember when I had a couple
of years in and meeting other senior or season probation
officers who had fifteen years, twenty five years, and.

Speaker 2 (03:15):
I was like, wow, that's a lot of time. But
here I am.

Speaker 4 (03:19):
Now I'm the old guy and everyone else is the
new kid on the block.

Speaker 3 (03:24):
But you must have liked it, though, I mean, to
keep you entertained for the twenty years, I.

Speaker 2 (03:28):
Mean, it must have been a pretty yeah.

Speaker 4 (03:29):
It's I mean, you're dealing with the public, so it's
every day was something new. It's almost if I I've
always said, if I had a body camera back then,
I would have been the number one horror comedy drama
show in America.

Speaker 2 (03:45):
You know, So, is that Tiger's type of personality? Do
you think? Is that something you like?

Speaker 3 (03:50):
You like diversity, You like a lot of stuff going
on to keep you entertained. Is that kind of the
thing that is not a lot of cops are kind
of like that too, right, They like to keep busy,
they like going on.

Speaker 2 (04:01):
Is that something for me to correct?

Speaker 4 (04:03):
I think a lot of people in law enforcements share
similar personality trade, which is pretty much they want things
black and white, law and order. They want to do
what's right. They want to protect victims. And I think
a lot of times what I've noticed during my career
is everyone forgets about the victims. You know, they want

(04:23):
to focus on the suspect or the perpetrator or the defendant,
you know, whatever name you want to call, about how
they were deprived of the childhood, their socioeconomic status, you know,
make every excuse to kind of minimize or mitigate circumstances.

Speaker 2 (04:41):
But what about the victims.

Speaker 4 (04:43):
You know, if I was personally, if I was attacked
and rob I don't care what the suspect or the robber.
You know, if he had a diminished capacity, he came
from a broken home, I wouldn't care about that.

Speaker 2 (04:55):
What about me as the victim?

Speaker 4 (04:57):
You know, And I think a lot of police officers
will off they want to stand there for victim's rights
as well. I mean, you should be able to go
to the store or the park or the beach without
getting harassed. You know, people are begging for money, you know,
looking at you, trying to confront you or try not
tack you.

Speaker 3 (05:17):
Yeah, And I think it's interesting you mentioned that because
I know sometimes certain groups will misphrase it, I guess,
and they'll because a lot of times when you when
you look at the perpetrators and you look at their history,
I know people will sorry, oh you're justifying No, no, no, no.
We want to figure out what led to this behavior
so we can stop it for future criminals developing the

(05:39):
same kind of behavior, we have to kind of understand it.
And I think sometimes you see that the conflict too,
because I think some groups will.

Speaker 2 (05:49):
Show a lot of sympathy, which is perfectly fine.

Speaker 3 (05:52):
But it's also they don't really highlight the part of
we're trying to stop it from happening anymore society, and
I think that's something that doesn't really get.

Speaker 2 (06:03):
Talked about a lot.

Speaker 3 (06:04):
It's just always about trying to help the perpetrator in
a weird way sense, I guess, and I get that,
But at the same time, it's I think the main
focus really is let's not continue this problem, because obviously
there is a pattern.

Speaker 4 (06:17):
That we see correct correct, But I do agree with
that one hundred percent. We do need to somehow curb
or stop this from happening, and the only way to
do is to study patterns or criminal behavior patterns or
even socioeconomic patterns.

Speaker 2 (06:32):
Right.

Speaker 4 (06:33):
But I think for me too, you know, I do
want more, I guess highlight on the victims. You know,
if anyone's ever been a victim of crime, you know
they'll know what I'm talking about, right, because it seems
that people forget about them. You know, once the case
is adjudicated or you know, prosecuted or sentenced, you know

(06:55):
what happens to the victim, right, So you think about victims,
their their scar emotional scar is going to be last
for the rest of our life, you know, while the
suspect spends a couple of years in prison, comes out
on parole and gets to live his life.

Speaker 2 (07:13):
So yeah, you're absolutely right. Yeah, victims, it's tough.

Speaker 3 (07:17):
That's one of the things society needs to focus a
lot more on, are the victims in the different capacity
than what they are now. And law enforcements interesting too,
because it depends on law enforcement you're talking about when
I talk to homicide detectives. I don't know if you
know Moses Castillo.

Speaker 4 (07:34):
He's over there in La Yeah, mo, I think they
called him.

Speaker 2 (07:37):
Yeah, we had him talk.

Speaker 3 (07:39):
And the relationships that the homicide detectives have with their victims.

Speaker 2 (07:44):
Families is intense.

Speaker 4 (07:46):
Man.

Speaker 3 (07:46):
People don't always get to see that side of it,
but it's pretty pretty serious or real sometimes because I mean,
he goes the child died. I think the child had
the same birthday that he has. So he's been celebrating
this little girl's birthday who passed away eight years ago
because it was murdered. And he goes to that family's
house every year celebrate the birthday. And you can see

(08:10):
when he shares that story he cries, because it's a
pretty powerful story for him.

Speaker 4 (08:15):
Oh no, yes, I do believe. You know, I've seen
him myself. And I worked at a police station as
a probation officer many many years in South Central and
the officers are I mean, they're great. You know, they
really connect with the community. Remember, you only got like
ten percent of the population that do ninety percent of
the crime.

Speaker 2 (08:35):
Right, that's right? Right? So you know about you myself,
do you.

Speaker 3 (08:41):
Connect like that with like victims? If you had situations
where in cases where you go and you're like, man,
that really stings. Have you had those moments as well?

Speaker 4 (08:51):
Yeah? What happened to the probation field is so say
suspect gets put on probation for whatever, three to five years. Now, well,
there's a new Assembly bill that passed. I think now
you could only have failing a probation for maximum of
two years before he used to be five, right, so
they know the maximum you could be on a formal probation.

(09:13):
So it is fell any probation. And what happens is
if there is some kind of damage where there was
a victim, where there's monetary what happens is you if
the probationer's probation expires before they pay off their restitution. Unfortunately,
the victim has to take that probation or to civil

(09:33):
court and sue them.

Speaker 5 (09:37):
It's it's horrible because I think you shouldn't be off
probation until all your restitutions we paid to the victim,
the city, county, whoever.

Speaker 4 (09:45):
You owe money to your financial obligations. But unforcing, just
the way the criminals just set up. A system is
set up in La County. That happens quite frequently, and
the victims get so frustrated they just give up and
they're out, some of them tens of thousands of dollars,
hundreds of thous as the dollars, especially if they're if
their shop was burglaris or babilized. Oh there's some kind

(10:05):
of monetary loss, and people just give up. And I
think that's why people get so frustrated. And that's why
you see a lot of things locked it. Look at
what's going on San Francisco. They're locking up all their
targets or you know comedience stores, they're closing the glass right, Yeah,
they're closing the stores down, Yeah, closing them down.

Speaker 2 (10:25):
So I think.

Speaker 3 (10:26):
Portland lost three or four stores now. Walmart just left
ARII left a few months ago. I don't think Starbucks
is closing down, yeah, because right.

Speaker 4 (10:39):
There's no repercussions, you know, there's there's none.

Speaker 2 (10:43):
Right.

Speaker 4 (10:43):
It used to be what felon in California used to
be four hundred.

Speaker 2 (10:46):
Dollars or above?

Speaker 3 (10:47):
Was it four before?

Speaker 2 (10:48):
Right? Yeah? Now it's what nine hundred? Right? So I
think it was. Is that what it is? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (10:55):
Because one guy got sentenced because he went nine fifty
four and he was griping that did his math ron m.

Speaker 2 (11:03):
Yeah, it's crazy. What's going on? You know?

Speaker 3 (11:06):
So well, let me ask you this then I was
gonna ask you this question. I disappeared on me, but
we were talking about the impact of that. Oh, for
the audience out there, in case they don't know, I'm
not sure. I don't know who the audience really is
half the time out I know I never met them,

(11:27):
so but there might be some people are not as familiar.
Can you tell us the difference between probation and parole?
Sometimes people are like, well, what's the difference, They're both
out and whatever?

Speaker 2 (11:37):
Is there a dish? Yeah?

Speaker 4 (11:38):
So the difference is basically once on a county level
once on a state level in California. Now, other states
in this country, their probation and parle are combined. So
it might be say like Nevada, I know, their probation
and proles combined into some department of something public services
or some name like that. They have a division of Probation,

(11:59):
Division of par California. So we have fifty eight counties
in California. I think all fifty eight if I'm not mistaken,
have their own probation department because their county it's a
county position. Parole is through the state of California because
parole is associated with people on prison and who come

(12:20):
out of prison, and probation normally is in view of
prison or county jail. However, a condition of probation can
be to serve time in county jail. So the difference
is ones at a county level, which is probation, one
is at a state level, and the state level is
the one that deals with actual people from prison. However,
now you have these new Assembly bills that came.

Speaker 2 (12:41):
Out that.

Speaker 4 (12:43):
So the California Youth Authority used to be juvenile offenders
who've committed some serious offenses, which is considered seven oh
seven b of the Welfare Institutions Coast, which divides certain
murder rate, some manslaughter, some serious felonies. And they used
to be awarded to the state Californ Youth Authority because
they were too young, their crime was too young to

(13:04):
go to prison, and they were crime was more serious
could be housed at a county level facility. So you
had you have something in between, which is a California
Youth Thorty. So a couple of years ago, Californ Youth
Thorty closed all their facilities in California and those offenders
went back to the county they came from, so Elli

(13:27):
County proviasion you have, So Californ Youth thirty used to
house minor slash young adults up to the age of
twenty five or young youth, young defenders, right, So you'll
have some offenders now who are twenty three, twenty four
inside of a juvenile hall facility.

Speaker 2 (13:48):
Right, so growing men.

Speaker 4 (13:50):
Yeah, it's and you know, unfortunately a lot of the counties,
their juvenile system is not equipped to house adult defenders
or offenders who are now adults, I should say, because
they could have been convicted when they were you know,
under the age of eighteen.

Speaker 3 (14:05):
So what kind of problems that leading them to having.

Speaker 4 (14:08):
Oh, well, the thing is these frienders who have been
in the state systems, their criminal sophistication level is high
because they've been exposed to people who have done, who
are doing life, who have you know, made I guess,
learn how to live in prison, meaning how to make

(14:30):
weapons out of certain you know every day, you know,
tools such as the toothbrush, maybe you know a four,
you know, making shanks out of them, learning, you know,
cutting razors out of the razor blades. And you know,
you also have to remember inside of the juven halls
and the jails and all that, everything is counted, Like
when I used to work in the juven institutions, you

(14:51):
have to count every fork, every spoon, everything else given
to them. Yeah, so you have to count everything that's there,
and if one's missing, nobody leads until the missing item
is found.

Speaker 2 (15:02):
Because of certain things like weapons.

Speaker 4 (15:06):
Like their toothbrushes, you know, unfortunately, they need them and
we're not gonna have them reused. You know, it's wasteful.
We're not gonna have them use it once and throw
it away. You can't reuse them, so they're allowed to
keep them, but then they end up sharpening the you know,
the edges of them, things like that, or breaking them off,
saying it broke or whatever, and then they keep the
piece that's broken and make that into a shank. You know,

(15:30):
very genius. You know, anything that they can get their
hands and they'll make something out of it, right, Yeah.

Speaker 3 (15:35):
I think that the beds used to be. They would
get the metal out of the beds. I've heard stories
about you.

Speaker 4 (15:39):
Yeah, they get metals out of the bed and what
I've seen them uses a lot of sugar water. So
if they're given some kind of sugar packets for their
foods or whatnot, you know, they'll put that in water
and sugar water it's sticky and it makes things. It's
almost like starch, so it hardens things.

Speaker 2 (16:00):
Ingenious, right and genius. They're like chemists.

Speaker 4 (16:03):
Yeah, yeah, because I've seen some of the places where
they make their own kinds of cigarettes and hookahs and.

Speaker 3 (16:08):
All kinds of weird things that they're doing in there.
Products like they get from the commissaries. It's like what
the worst guys doing.

Speaker 4 (16:14):
They'll use outlets, electrical outlets to start fires. I mean they'll,
you know, whatever they can think of, you know, and
a lot of this stuff is handed down from the
prison you know, population on down trickles on down to
the juveniles.

Speaker 2 (16:27):
Jeez, you know, so let me do this.

Speaker 3 (16:29):
Then we started with your career as a deputy probation officer. Well,
you didn't start as a deputy probation officer.

Speaker 2 (16:35):
What did you start off as? I started as a
student worker.

Speaker 3 (16:38):
Student worker, and then you went from there to what
was your first after this promotion?

Speaker 2 (16:43):
From there?

Speaker 4 (16:43):
Was a student professional worker? And then right then I
went into the probation officer series, And.

Speaker 3 (16:53):
Tell us little bit about that. How does that work?
Do you have to do training? Do you have to
do any kind of like physical test or so written?

Speaker 4 (17:02):
Well, now are our recruitment now is more regiment, you know, regiment.
It wasn't back then. When I got hired, You get
hired and you pretty much get assigned to wherever your
work assignment, work facility is. A year later, then they
send you to an academy to tell you everything you've
been doing wrong. Right, normally it's the opposite. You go

(17:24):
through academy first. But hey, what can I say? That's
the way system was. Our department was designed that way,
I guess the training. But since then our training has
evolved tremendously.

Speaker 2 (17:38):
You know.

Speaker 4 (17:38):
Now, once you get hired, you go through an official academy,
you get trained, you get your peace officer status, and
then you get you know, you go to your assignment.
So from there, I mean, I've had let's see here,
I worked at a juvenile boot camp. I've worked at
juvenile intake inside of juvenile hall. I've worked a juvenile

(18:02):
narcotics testing case load. I've worked at a high school
actually as a probation officer in the Highland Park area.
There was an Assembly bill that came out, grant money
that came out to gave it to all the to
I think most of the probation departments in California, especially ours,
that because there were so many high school kids on probation,

(18:23):
they wanted a probation officer stationed out of high school
so they can have immediate access to them.

Speaker 2 (18:29):
It was to ensure that the kids.

Speaker 4 (18:31):
Went to school, to make sure that they're getting good grades,
and to curb any kind of legal activity, especially gang activity,
because Elie's that's what it's basically known for us games.
From there, I did do some time in South Central
almost about ten years work in the gang unit there
and then from there I went to a sex for

(18:52):
their compliance team, and then from there we started up
a keen one unit and that's where I ended up
the canine unit.

Speaker 2 (19:03):
So I had a drug detection dog.

Speaker 4 (19:05):
Ah, you know, do you get trained for that too?
Then yes, I had to go through training, very interesting, right,
So I didn't have a bite dog Mine was just
a detection dog, so trained on narcotics.

Speaker 2 (19:18):
So narcotics were marijuana.

Speaker 4 (19:22):
Most police agencies now they don't train their their canines
on marijuana because it's legal. However, for us, you know,
you still can't have marijuana inside any of the juvenile
institutions and it can be part of your probation too,
not to have any kind of narcotics, including marijuana. And
so we still, you know, put our dogs on marijuana, odor, methamphetamines.

(19:45):
You have cocaine powder and cocaine base in heroin. And
we had a great partnership my my canine. I Unfortunately,
I suffered a lot of injuries and which is I'm
curly in the process of medically retiring.

Speaker 2 (20:05):
So yeah, okay, dog was it.

Speaker 4 (20:10):
I had an English springer spaniel really German. Yeah, yeah,
well usually they'll have the shepherds because it's dual purpose.
Or the melin wall was the most more popular one, right,
because they'll use those for biting purposes, right, and they'll
train them for either gunoder or narcotics. Older our department,

(20:33):
they our heads just didn't want the liability of bites,
so we went with the medium sized dog and plus
you know German shepherd's malimals. You know, I think there
are years of service is what maybe five six seven
years at most, maybe especially with the German shepherds. No
one may go a little bit longer. But the Springer Spaniels.
I had a Springer. So the sheriff's and l APD

(20:57):
personnel their canine they have Springers as well, and they said,
there's last you know, they're working us a service, probably
ten to eleven years.

Speaker 2 (21:08):
Yeah, I think that. You know those dogs.

Speaker 4 (21:09):
Are they're all four wheel drive over time over drag.

Speaker 2 (21:12):
Them all the time. Right. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (21:17):
So my other partners, you know, we also have Labrador retrievers.
We also have a German short haired pointers as well.
Oh wow, yeah, so great dogs.

Speaker 2 (21:29):
Now that was kind of like a speed through your
in your career.

Speaker 3 (21:34):
Tell us a little bit about some of the Well,
I did say this, what was your first assignment that
really rocked your world? I guess as a probation officer,
and you thought, wow, what did I get myself into?
Or did you ever have that moment? Or have you
had multiple of those moments?

Speaker 5 (21:52):
Right?

Speaker 4 (21:53):
Well, I think of two when you asked that question.
I think my first actual probation officer assignment was inside
the the you know, the boot camp, you know. And
I was very young, very green, naive, you know, and
I thought, as a person of authority, whatever I said,
the juveniles, the you know, they're going to listen.

Speaker 2 (22:12):
Of course they don't.

Speaker 4 (22:13):
They talk back, you know, they want to cut you out,
challenge your authority, try to embarrass you.

Speaker 2 (22:19):
You know.

Speaker 4 (22:19):
You also have to remember too, when you're in law enforcement,
you're working with a bunch of alpha males, you know.
And I think as a male, just the ego part
of it, you don't want to look weak because number one,
the kids, believe it or not, they'll sniff you out
just like a cane I would they and they'll gang
up and they'll pick on you, they'll expose you, and

(22:40):
you don't want to be that guy who's just considered
a weak or nobody wants to work with all the time.
All right, So that was a real shocker for me.
It took me a while to kind of, you know,
i'll say, get used to or kind of find my
my personality in the big pie, you know, working in
the camps. And so I learned a lot there. I

(23:03):
mean every time I had I've learned something. And then
when I came out and promoted to a probation officer
number two, which is when I came out into the field,
I had the juveni on narcotics testing caseload. I remember
I had one hundred and sixty three kids. All of
them had to be drug tested once a month. One
hundred and sixty three kids under you correct. Wow, Yeah,

(23:23):
you talk about not having any spare time. I was
taking home you know reports on the weekends. I mean,
I wasn't getting over time. It was just you know, clusted.
At the time. I didn't mind because I was single,
I had no children. It was just me and I
wanted to learn them and I've always been a learner.
And you know, looking back on it now, obviously I

(23:45):
could have did time management the case management a little
bit better. But I you know, I think I just
did what I thought was right at the time, and
so I learned.

Speaker 2 (23:55):
A lot from there as well.

Speaker 4 (23:57):
You know, I think once I got to the gang unit,
that's when I was really, uh, there's been times so
I was afraid for my life because I'm actually you know,
in the trenches. I still remember one of the first
times where I really kind of you know, kind of
shook me a little bit was we had just passed
the liquor store and my partners and I were talking about, Wow,

(24:18):
this liquor store gets.

Speaker 2 (24:19):
Robbed a lot. As we passed it.

Speaker 4 (24:21):
Literally about five seconds later, you hear there's a robbery
in progress at that same liquor store.

Speaker 2 (24:27):
Jesus.

Speaker 4 (24:28):
So we had a you know, we had to pump
each other. Hey, get ready, get ready, it's going to
go down. So we get back and you know, forcing
for us is I don't know what happened, but it
was a false radio call where false somebody called it
in make a false report. We went in there, guns drawn,
and you know, there's no robbery going on. But I
remember that part alone, and then from from that part alone,

(24:51):
that from that time on, I had to really prepare myself.

Speaker 2 (24:55):
You have to be mentally prepared.

Speaker 4 (24:57):
When you're working out in the field like that, especially
you're high crime area. South Central is known for being
South Central for a reason. I've always thought of it
as like the wild Wall West. I mean, people want
to challenge you all the time. They want to fight
you all the time. They don't care if you're in
law enforcement or police probade. They don't care about any
of that stuff. You know, they're so quick to I'm

(25:20):
sorry to challenge you.

Speaker 3 (25:23):
Two questions popped up and started to interrupt you, but.

Speaker 2 (25:27):
I don't want to forget them. Fifty one one. That
one's interesting.

Speaker 3 (25:33):
I want to get back to that because I wanted
to ask you if there was if you've seen differences
over the last twenty eight years and how they act
towards you in regards to the streets and challenging you.

Speaker 2 (25:43):
Is that something that's new.

Speaker 3 (25:43):
Because I've talked to officers who are officers in the
seventies in the eighties, and they say, you know, we
never had that, But it could be locations.

Speaker 2 (25:51):
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (25:51):
But and the first question then we'll get to that
one is did you ever run into anybody.

Speaker 2 (25:56):
That you were.

Speaker 3 (25:57):
It was on your one and sixty three case. I said, Jimmy,
put that stuff back.

Speaker 2 (26:05):
You know you're doing this.

Speaker 3 (26:06):
We just caught yet and I'm your probation officer.

Speaker 2 (26:08):
For God's sake, have you done that?

Speaker 4 (26:10):
You do something like that many times? Oh jeez, yeah,
running to them at the mall. Maybe some were working
at certain stores that I went into.

Speaker 5 (26:20):
But how about committing crimes or nothing. Oh no, not
they were, you know, hanging out, just hanging out. Well,
I'm glad they were working number one. The ones that
I did run into, a lot of them actually thanked
me for being strict with them. I mean, they didn't
like me at the time, you know. But you got
to remember a lot of these kids are the way
they are because they have no you know, strict parenting

(26:40):
at home. The parents are just you know a lot
of them aren't enforcing criminals themselves.

Speaker 2 (26:46):
You know, it's a generational thing.

Speaker 3 (26:48):
But you never saw anybody like maybe dealing drugs or
anything that was on your your thing and you're like,
wait a minute, what is this guy doing. He's part
of my lister now.

Speaker 4 (26:56):
No, but I do remember, uh, well, I ran it
to adults now that we're on my case though before
who are on probation? Okay, so they're on juvenile probation.
So with probation, if you're in juvenile probation and you
turn eighteen, you don't automatically go into adult probation either

(27:17):
it gets terminated and then you have to reoffend obviously
to get on probation as an adult. I think some
places they transferred over, but for La County, no, it
doesn't work like that. Interesting but yeah, but I remember
one time it was a Friday, my coworkers and I
we decided to afterwards kind of go to dinner maybe,

(27:41):
and then it turned well i'll say happy hour, right,
so we went to kind of unwind talk about our week,
and that's what our ritual was, Friday nights. And I
remember we had a kid come always always getting into trouble.

Speaker 2 (27:57):
You know.

Speaker 4 (27:57):
Mom was always blaming you know, probation for not doing
their job. We go to this place and who do
we see? They're drinking, having a grand all time.

Speaker 2 (28:06):
The mom no way.

Speaker 4 (28:09):
Yeah, and I was thinking, well, this lady blame us
for her kids, you know, actions like what is she doing?

Speaker 2 (28:15):
She's I get it. You know, people need to get
out and kind of let loose.

Speaker 4 (28:18):
But I mean, you know, here's this lady blaming us
for her child's mistakes and she's not doing anything, you know,
which which leads me into a lot of parents. You know,
they blame us for a lot of things that their
kids are not doing. For example, when I was a
probation officer at the high school.

Speaker 2 (28:37):
You know, I was being blamed or not.

Speaker 4 (28:40):
It's my fault that the kids weren't going to school,
you know, it's my you know, my fault, my fault
always right, knowing none of these parents took ever took responsibility,
you know, So I said, hey, you have every legal
right to grab your kid by the hand, take them
to school and sit inside classroom with them. Because I
even asked the principal vice principal if that was legal.
This is yeah, it's legal. I said, you have it.

(29:03):
And guess what they're like. I must have heard every
excuse why they couldn't.

Speaker 2 (29:08):
Oh does the over there no, not La cities. I
don't think so.

Speaker 4 (29:18):
No, there's you know, you know you hear truant officers.
I don't think those exist, you know, you know, maybe
back in the day before my time, but you know, yeah, yeah,
if you get I mean, remember, if you get caught
during school hours and you're supposed to be school, you

(29:38):
get a citation for violing a LA municipal code.

Speaker 2 (29:42):
Right.

Speaker 4 (29:43):
So, and then there was this other thing called three
hundred of the Well Friends Welferred Institution's Code, I think,
where you're incorrigible and you know, there was all kinds
of diversion programs, but honestly, I don't think any of
those worked if you're kind of on the you know,
if you're not really a criminal minded kid and you're

(30:05):
kind of on the fence, you just have bad friends.
I think diversity programs work for kids like that. But
if you've already committed crimes, you come from a you know,
gang infested I won't say neighborhoods's a lot of kids
come from that, I'll say more if your family's more.
You come from a family of criminals or people of
committed crimes, I think you're almost almost set in your ways.

(30:30):
You know, that's just my opinion for what I've seen.
I have seen. There are those that I've seen over
the years that have you know, gotten out of that
lifestyle and made something of themselves, you know. But very
you an interesting point because I think.

Speaker 3 (30:48):
Society and I get it because the media always portrays
it this way, so people think of it this way.
And sometimes activist groups will do it too. And I'm
not against activist groups. What I'm against is when they
mislead individuals, no matter what activist groups, and that most
of them do in a sense because they become hyperbolic
or whatever they're talking about.

Speaker 2 (31:04):
So I get it. Sometimes you have to motivate human
behavior that way too.

Speaker 3 (31:07):
It's complicated, but it's not as simple. A lot of
these interventions, as you mentioned, work for some and don't
work for others, and people sometimes have the weird mentality.
If it's got to be one hundred percent right, how
do we give all homicides? How do we get rid
of all robberies? You're never going to get rid of homicides.
You're never going to get rid of robberies. Can you
reduce them?

Speaker 2 (31:27):
Yes, that's the question.

Speaker 3 (31:29):
How much can you reduce it? Is one program more
effective than another in reducing these things? Just like you said,
with that truancy, is it going to help everyone? No,
But if it helps at least twenty out of one hundred,
it's twenty less. Now we've got to deal with Now,
how do we focus on the other eighty? Can we
reduce those? But I think a lot of times people
get the misunderstanding that they think, oh, it doesn't work.

Speaker 2 (31:52):
But like you said, it does work.

Speaker 3 (31:54):
It just works on certain populations and not others. And
people don't usually discuss like you just did. They don't
seem to break it out that it doesn't work with everybody,
and we're going to have to have different things for
different people.

Speaker 2 (32:07):
Right.

Speaker 4 (32:08):
So the second part of the question is, you know,
I think there has been a difference in the sense of,
you know, people just they just don't respect authority. You know,
everyone has this sense of a titlement. You can't do this,
you can't do this, and it's so what happens is

(32:32):
it consequently that's why all these robberies.

Speaker 3 (32:36):
Are I'm sorry, Jay, we had a little bit of
a glitch. So you were saying they have changed, they
don't respect authority as much as they used to. I
get a lot of that from officers now just said,
you know what, they're not the same. They're really not
the same. You have to be much more on guard
as if not they're going to hit you, when twenty
years ago they wouldn't, Now they would, right.

Speaker 4 (32:57):
I think what's going on The laws have been getting
more more relaxed every year. You know, punishment for certain
crimes are being you know, reduced significantly or pretty much eliminated.

Speaker 2 (33:09):
So from what I come like, door then right.

Speaker 5 (33:12):
Correct, So if there's no consequences for your actions, why
why stop?

Speaker 2 (33:18):
Right?

Speaker 4 (33:19):
So I've spoken to SHP officers who've gone on high
high speed pursuits with you know, suspects, and they were
already out before even the reports were written, you know,
because of you know, the reduced bail walls. Right, So
every year there's a bail schedule that comes out, and

(33:40):
it seems that every year to bail them out for
certain crimes is getting lower and lower lower.

Speaker 2 (33:47):
In New York they had that issue.

Speaker 3 (33:48):
They had that one lady who was arrested one hundred
and thirty four times in one year, and she had
twenty court cases because she shows up.

Speaker 2 (33:56):
Ryan, What's what's the real consequence? You know, that's crazy stuff.

Speaker 3 (34:03):
You know.

Speaker 2 (34:03):
I wanted to ask you a little bit.

Speaker 3 (34:04):
I know we're going to talk a little bit about
your schooling as well. And your academic career. But you went,
you went to a lot of homes, you said, and
a lot of times you have the adult defenders there,
but they had children and stuff like that. What was
that like for you and what did you encounter a
lot of times?

Speaker 4 (34:22):
So you know, I was on a team obviously as
a canine unit, and we had suppression teams who were
their sole assignments were just to go out and a
through proactive probation condition enforcement and we find you know,
everything under the sun, illegal narcotics, weapons, guns, you know,

(34:43):
check stealing, I mean, you name it. So we used
to have from La County Department of Children Family Services
or DCFS, they had a they have a set group
of dc FS social workers called the Mark Team multates
your response team, and they would come out with our

(35:05):
teams and do child well for assessments after it was
a co for inside the house and they would determine
if a child needs to be removed or if there's
or a referral needed to be made because there were
the experts at that and a lot of times the
children were removed and surprising and a lot of children
didn't want to go back to their homes because they

(35:26):
were putting foster care where they were fed, clothed, you know,
had loving people.

Speaker 3 (35:33):
Surprising, what was the average age of those children, do
you think?

Speaker 2 (35:36):
I know it's harder to pin that down.

Speaker 3 (35:38):
There's no official study, but I would think was the
average age running between seven to eight. I can't imagine
that young wanting to do that. That's a really bad
scenario for them. Is it more like eleven twelve year olds?

Speaker 2 (35:49):
Two?

Speaker 4 (35:49):
No, it's more like I want to say, three four
five year olds.

Speaker 2 (35:53):
Really.

Speaker 4 (35:54):
Yeah, they were surprising. Yeah, they're very very young.

Speaker 2 (35:58):
And they didn't want to go come back. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (36:00):
A lot of times I mean the social work soh yeah,
they I said, because if I was the also in
charge of a certain you know, search operation, I would
have to follow up with d cfs and say what
happened to this miner that was removed, you know, because
they would be part of my probation report. And a
lot of times they know, oh, kids don't want to
go back, you know, they want to stay with their

(36:22):
foster parents or whatever home they're put in. Surprisingly, because I.

Speaker 2 (36:26):
Would think that at that young age they would want
their parents. So what do you do?

Speaker 3 (36:30):
Did you leave them in the foster home at that point.

Speaker 4 (36:33):
Now, unfortunately they have to go back with their parents. However,
they have to fix whatever they were removed because of
their removed. For example, I remember we were in city
a lot point. They were working with the shares and
there was a minor child, obviously the daughter of the probationer.
She had a dress on but no underwear. So and

(36:56):
he had two or three of his buddies with them.
So you know, I'm not suggesting any kind of illegal
activity is going on with his minor, but very what
is she doing with no underwear? You know? So and itways,
it's not a crime per se. However, that's when DCFS
decided that's this is not right, you know. So remember

(37:17):
they removed children for the basic necessities, and I think
having underwear is considered basic necessity. Why she hadn't you know?
I think the parents, Oh I forgot to put some
on her or whatever.

Speaker 2 (37:29):
His reasoning was. How old was the girl?

Speaker 4 (37:32):
She was probably about four years old, Yeah, so you know,
oh I forgot to mention. I think he was a
sex offender too, by the way, So I think that's
what prompted the removal.

Speaker 3 (37:44):
I was going to ask you all those children who
didn't want to come back. And again, I know it's
as complicated because there's so many people individuals, But do
you remember any of them being removed because of sex offense?
Or is it because of the dirtiness of the home
only or anybody else? Because I'm understanding of you know,
they're spacing child abuse, physical abuse, emotional abuse, sexual abuse,

(38:07):
I get it, terrible home abuse. I'm od of here.
I don't want to go back. Did any of that
happen or is it just mainly individuals that got moved
because the house was filthy and things of that nature.

Speaker 4 (38:17):
Right, So from what my understanding, and I just want
to make it clearly, I'm not an expert in you know,
child welfare issues. This has just been my experience of
what I observed. Children are not necessarily removed for the
house being dirty. If it's filthy, and I'm talking filthy
where it's roach infested, the kids have bug bites, you know,

(38:39):
things like that.

Speaker 2 (38:40):
Is prompt you know, it's reason for removal.

Speaker 4 (38:42):
But just having a dirty house, you know, I was
informed as long as there's kind of running water, food
in the refrigerator, place to live roof of their head, those.

Speaker 2 (38:50):
Are not grounds for removal.

Speaker 4 (38:52):
So there has to be something you know, obviously outstanding
or that pops out at the social worker for the removal.
And I mean, I just can't remember. There's just been
I've done over a thousand home searches, so I mean,
you know, take your pick of the removal reasons, right,
You could just imagine, you know, yeah, I guess you

(39:13):
don't know the pravity or you know what goes on
inside someone's home, and that's you go in there.

Speaker 3 (39:20):
Yeah, so anything stand out to you. You still can't
believe what you saw. There's too many of the.

Speaker 4 (39:31):
Yeah, well, not regarding minor children, but probationers. There's some
crazy stories, you know. I remember one time we did
a search at a sex feader's house in city of Torrents.
Knock on the door, mom answers warriors, so and so
that's my son. He's in his room. Pull everybody out.
We call him out to the front. I said, you

(39:52):
sure your son's home. Yeah, he's home. He's not coming out,
so obviously we have to go in. We found this
guy naked in the closet with various sex toys, you know,
all filled with poop, right, because you could imagine what
he was doing to himself. Oh right, really yeah, it

(40:16):
was just weirdest thing.

Speaker 2 (40:19):
He discovery heck of a discovery.

Speaker 4 (40:23):
Yeah, it's I mean I could go on stories days
for it, things like that. Right, It's just amazing what
you see out there. This guy had all kinds of
this back then when VHS was still around. Yeah, so
he had, he had all these videotapes, would put them
on and they're all him in the park videotaping little

(40:47):
girls on the playground. Is that illegal? You know, it's
kind of one of those Uh. I mean you would
think it's illegal, but you have to actually remember to
violate to to violent probation, you have to violate a.

Speaker 2 (41:01):
Condition of probation.

Speaker 4 (41:02):
Just because you're on probation and you're doing stuff that
should not be done doesn't automatically, you know, want an arrest,
So you have to violate a condition. So person A has,
for example, don't possess a blue chair, and he possesses
a blue chair, then obviously he can be subject to arrest.

(41:23):
Person B might have the same condition and has a
blue chair. I'm sorry, same chair, but not that condition. Obviously,
there's no condition to violate, so there has to be
a condition of probation to violate. He unfortunately did not
have a condition where you know, he couldn't have because
some I've seen don't have any videotapes, don't have access

(41:43):
to internet, don't have certain things where he could access
pornography anything like that. Unfortunately, I don't think he but
he ended up going to jail for I mean other stuff.

Speaker 2 (41:53):
He did have.

Speaker 4 (41:56):
Images on his phone of girls that appeared to be
under the age of eighteen, you know, and that's where
you know, it's kind of question, but hey, he has
a condition. Took him in, that's what we called him,
like the sheriffs, and asked them. We asked their forensic
you know, auditing team to help out, you know, to

(42:17):
kind of verify ages if they have any matching uh,
you know, missing children.

Speaker 2 (42:22):
You know.

Speaker 4 (42:22):
So there's a whole background that goes on with these arrests,
not just kind of like hook them and book them
like you see on TV. There's a lot of detective
work that has to be done after the arrest.

Speaker 2 (42:36):
Yeah, but.

Speaker 4 (42:39):
Yeah, it's just uh, it's the stuff that you see
out there is just amazing. It's it's unbelievable. Actually, you know,
I we had a sex there's a sex offender. I
remember this guy thought he was a vampire, which I
have pictures of. He thought he was a vampire, he
implanted to I guess his wisdom not the words. The

(43:00):
bike cuspets made them longer. He had a coffin in
his living room, so that's where he slept, and he
thought it was a full fledged vampire. Had vowels of
what appeared to be blood blood, but he said it
was just water with red dye in it, you know,
which it did look like that because the liquid is
world watery. It was a thick like blood, so the

(43:20):
know psychosis. He did have some mental health issues I remember,
I don't quite remember what, which leads me to another
topic here. So your job as a probation officer, there
are a lot of you know, mental health issues out
there with these probationers. However, you know, back then, I

(43:40):
was more of the you know, mindset of if the
if the court didn't address it, who am I? I
addressed it after the fact, because remember probation is a
reactive I guess impostment sentencing, So this should have been
brought up during fort and if it wasn't brought up
who in mi. I. However, there was a couple of
times I did do refers to the Regional Center in

(44:03):
Alhambra because clearly certain people that come, you know I
had on my case sold they really needed help. There
was something not quite right with them mentally, you know.
I remember one kid I had in my case though
there was just he was just not right. The mother
told me, she even told that to her, their attorney,
even to the court, but they were just she said

(44:25):
that they were just ignored. So he really, I mean,
his case was I think just like kind of like
burglary or theft or something like that, nothing really really serious.
I think he shouldn't have got probation and he should
have been referred to a mental health facility for evaluation.
So the good thing about my job is I had
the authority to refer him at the time. So I

(44:47):
had him seen by a therapist or a psychologist at
the Regional Center and looking on Hambra, and they did,
you know, diagnosing would have some kind of disorder. I
don't remember because this is like twenty some years ago,
but it was where he was a diminished capacity or
even though he was sixteen or seventeen, is he functioned
as a little boy, you know, And I remember, you know,

(45:10):
he always came in disheveled looking, you know, kind of
hygiene was bad. Just really couldn't take care of himself.

Speaker 2 (45:16):
You know.

Speaker 4 (45:17):
And the mother, you know, I will say she tried
to do the best she could, but I mean he
is physically a big kid too, so I think a
lot of times and the mother did have other children,
and so it's I get it, you know, being a
father myself, it's hard to focus all your attention on
one child. So you know, it was a success for
him because they ended up getting services that obviously they

(45:38):
wouldn't have got if they didn't get probation, and they
won't refer and I'm talking to like mental health treatments
of the services, transportation services to and from you know,
school and counseling. And I think they got some money
too out of it, you know, just to help them
out because he was a diminished capacity kid. So it

(46:02):
wasn't always you know, arrests and you know, holding them accountable.
You know, there were some good points that I felt
good helping them.

Speaker 2 (46:09):
That's good. That's good.

Speaker 3 (46:11):
Let me ask you this. We talked about conditions a
minute ago. Are there universal conditions? In other words, you
can never do this, no matter what your offense is,
you can never do this, Like, for instance.

Speaker 4 (46:22):
I'm assuming condition number one and two of the conditions
of probation in La County, which is number one is
obey all laws. Number two is always going to be
obey all orders and instructures of the probation officer. How
about drugs? Drugs are really not all the time.

Speaker 2 (46:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (46:39):
It's funny because you'll have probationers that are convicted of
a drug offense, but they have no drug conditions, so.

Speaker 2 (46:47):
They can use cocaine for instance.

Speaker 5 (46:50):
Right, Well, if you catch them, what that I'll be
obviously it be a new charge, but it wouldn't be well,
I guess it would be conditioned violation.

Speaker 4 (46:56):
Number one, obey all laws. Right, so if you get arrested,
then that be the violation against a lawyer.

Speaker 3 (47:02):
Anyway.

Speaker 4 (47:02):
It's amazing. You'll have gang cases with no gang conditions,
you know.

Speaker 3 (47:09):
And I think a lot it's you can hang out
with the gang as long as you don't committing crime.
You can hang out with that gang.

Speaker 4 (47:15):
Right, and you're on probation for a gang related offense
because you were caught with the gun in the furtherance
of your gang. You know, sometimes they'll get gang enhancement arrest.
But I think at the end of the day, it's
all about plea bargaining. I think they'll say, you know,
we'll plete, we'll plead of this if you take away
this condition. You know, I think a lot of that

(47:37):
goes on.

Speaker 3 (47:38):
Did you also, I know I've talked a lot of
undercover cops. I'm not sure if you did this at all,
if you're in that purview. A lot of times you know,
they got they got small fishing. I guess you could
say it wasn't really worth it, but they had the
ability to persuade them in some capacity, whether either more
charges or something unless they gave them the big fish
involved in gang activities and things of that nature. Were

(48:02):
you ever approached for that by other officers or is
that something you ever thought about if you had somebody
on probation, Hey, we can cut this short if you
help us catch who the leader is of this particular group.
Did you ever have any of those?

Speaker 4 (48:14):
Yes, I did many times. The most significant one was
it ended up leading into a shooting. So yeah, So
I remember I was working the gang in it, and
some officers I worked with pulled over a car for
whatever their public cause was traffic violation, and long story short,

(48:36):
there was a probation or in the car. And remember
probation arrests are all discretionary. Okay, they're all discretionary unless
it's part of Nothing is mandatory from what I from
my experiences.

Speaker 2 (48:53):
But you don't want to.

Speaker 4 (48:54):
But you if you have the ability to take someone
back to court, you should. That's that's not to be,
you know, arrest everybody. That's more for I think you
got to hold people accountable, number one. And second ball,
you don't want to let somebody go and then they
commit a murder right after you let him go, right,

(49:16):
so you know you have to have those things, think
about those things, right. But there was one I remember
he said he just couldn't go back to the court
if his judge, he said, as judge told me if
he came back to his court for any kind of violation,
that he was going to send him to prison.

Speaker 2 (49:35):
So right, so you know I talked.

Speaker 4 (49:39):
To him, you know, and he had mentioned he wanted to,
you know, give some information to help us out. He
knew where people were having some massive amount of guns
and hu high amount of narcotics. I didn't let him go.
I still we still sanctioned him. I still did report
it to courtA whatever I remember, I don't think, trying

(50:08):
to remember. So it was probably about ten years ago.
I'll get back to it. Anyways, gave us the location
of a house over there in La kind of border Compton.
You know, we did a work up on the house. Obviously,
when we go to these houses, we don't we don't
just go and blind we obviously we have to do

(50:29):
our homework, right, So we do our homework. We go
and long story short, pulled some people. There was an
SKS in there in AK forty seven and a nine
milimeter bretam and so we got the guns and there
was someone hiding in the attic.

Speaker 2 (50:49):
So we have to clear the attic.

Speaker 4 (50:51):
As one of the officers went up, got a ladder,
went up to the attic, there was someone hiding right
at the attic cover hold and he shot one of
the officers the face. So officer involve shooting ensued. Probably
about three to four hundred rounds were exchanged. Yeah, so
as a result. Officer was, you know, shot in the face.

(51:13):
He was obviously disfigured, and you know he's back multiple
has about twenty surgeries. I remember he lived through it. Myself,
I did get hit in the leg. Great, yeah, so
you know, I remember my leg was burning after the fact,

(51:35):
and I told one of our partners, hey, I've never
been shot, but I heard if you get shot.

Speaker 2 (51:38):
You don't feel it, you know.

Speaker 4 (51:40):
And he's checking my body out and he's like, no,
you're fine, You're fine. And then we started walking towards
the command post after and I was like, man, my
leg hurts. I remember an lped sergeant comes, Oh, man,
look at your lip. You got a hole in your pants.
So he looks down and sure enough there was a yeah,
I got a shot right there. Oh man, there's more superficial.

Speaker 2 (52:00):
You know.

Speaker 4 (52:01):
Obviously the skin came off, but you know it wasn't
too not not like my partner, No.

Speaker 2 (52:07):
Not at all.

Speaker 3 (52:08):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (52:10):
Right, So the aftermath for me, I have now I
have vertigo, which I can't turn around in one place
or also i'll get dizzy.

Speaker 4 (52:18):
I have tonight, I'll have that bringing in my ears
every so.

Speaker 2 (52:21):
Often because of the shooting.

Speaker 4 (52:23):
Yeah, because my whatever, your equilibrium is all messed up.
I did go to the hospital emergency room that nine.
This doctor said, Man, my ear drum was about to burst.
It was really, really red. If everyone's ever heard gunshots,
they're loud. Remember these aren't just nine millimeters you're talking about.

Speaker 5 (52:44):
Uh.

Speaker 4 (52:45):
So we went out of the house and we had
to go back to the house to fire back. You
remember I had a brighter nine millimeter at the time.
My partner, I think on my right had he brought
out as ar.

Speaker 2 (52:58):
So you got to too. Three rounds going off, and then.

Speaker 4 (53:02):
My partner left. He had a twelve age the shotgun.
He's shooting that. So the thing is, if you're on
a shooting range and you don't have any ear protection,
your body kind of knows, well, your body knows it's
gonna or prepare itself. You know it's going to be
a big bang. Your mind prepares your body. But when
you're out there in a shootout with no hearing protection
and you don't know what's coming on, it's startling. My

(53:26):
ears were ringing, i'll say for a good half a
day or full.

Speaker 3 (53:29):
Day, and you were closed in the house too.

Speaker 4 (53:33):
Correct, right, And what people don't realize is all that gunfire,
the gun smoke.

Speaker 2 (53:39):
That was a.

Speaker 4 (53:40):
Cumulated you can see in front of your face. So
that's another word. You don't want to shoot your partner, right,
So there was just so much going on at the time.

Speaker 2 (53:53):
Did you suffer trauma from that too, Ja.

Speaker 4 (53:56):
Yeah, I did suffer trauma. I remember everyone. I remember everyone.
I thought everyone had a gun after that, so yeah,
so every time I heard the a loud bang, it
kind of any slack straps of the shooting, and I
thought everyone who pants are reached inside their pants pocket

(54:19):
was going for a gun.

Speaker 3 (54:23):
So that's I'm sorry, Jason. You were saying that you
thought everybody had a gun, and.

Speaker 4 (54:31):
Right, I thought everyone had a gun. I was watching
my back all the time, you know. And then I
also experienced something called an adrenaline though. Yeah, so yeah,
I didn't know what that was. I mean, obviously, you know,
once you're in a shooting, you have to go see
a psychologist within three seventy two hours, you know, make
sure you're okay, and to see if you're fit for

(54:52):
duty to return to duty. It took me thirty days
to get cleared, I remember, just because of my hearing
I do some hearing in my right ear. I do, Yeah,
I do see an audiologist once a year to make
sure my hearing isn't deteriority more and more.

Speaker 2 (55:10):
So far it's been okay.

Speaker 4 (55:12):
However, the audiologist thinks that it'll probably get worse obviously
as I get older. Right for right now, it's okay.
So the adrenaline dump, I didn't know what that was,
but from what I understand, the doctors told me, your
body has to run on a certain certain level of adrenaline,
and anytime you experience a traumatic episode or a traumatic situation,

(55:33):
your body just burns it up. Because your body burns
it up. I remember I was lethargic, pungue tied, uncoordinated almost.
I felt like I had two left feet. I would
slur my words for a couple of days until the
doctor said, you'll get it back. Your body will build
up the adrenaline again, but it's gonna take some time,
you know, a little bit. And so I remember experiencing that,

(55:56):
and the officer I remember I work with, you know,
he got the worst of it, obviously, you know, so
I had, like I said, multiple surgeries. You know, I'm
sure that he went through some mental health challenges himself.
But he's alive. He's back to work, and you know

(56:16):
from that, you know, the officers I work, you know,
we're bonded for life even more now because we went
through traumatic you know, situation together. So I'm still in
touch with most of them. A lot of my sergeants
now are lietenants, and which is great for them, you know.
As for me, I ended up developing some health issues myself,

(56:40):
and I'm putting for medical retirement and so I'm just
waiting for the actual retirement date to kick in. And
here I am. Yeah, I'm still you know, I'm in
my late forties now, and so I think too personally speaking, Uh,

(57:00):
you know, I've gone through a divorce, I've gone them
still going through a child custody battle, and because of
certain you know, traumatic events in my life. With that,
you know, I I'm seeing a therapist myself. You know,
at first, I didn't want to, just because of the stigma.

(57:20):
You know, if you see a therapist, you're crazy. I
don't know, and that is the old school way of thinking. However,
I think, you know, having a divorce and going through
child custody, I really did need help. And I reached out.
I wasn't suicidal or anything like that, but I did
reach out. I felt, you know, I do feel therapy

(57:41):
helped me quite quite a bit. Now because of that,
I'm in clinical psychology master's program. I do want to
help other you know, single or our divorced dads who've
kind of gone through similar things, because it's very traumatic
when you're you know, like I always felt, I'm one

(58:01):
of the good guys. You know, I'm not a dead
big father. I'm heavily involved in my two daughters. They're
in sports, heavily involved in them. With them, I support
them as much as I can, and it's overwhelming. It
is overwhelming, but I do the best that I can.
And so because of what I've gone through professionally, personally,
I think I do want to help other people in

(58:23):
a different capacity, not through probation, but maybe through being
a future therapist myself, and hopefully that will help. You know,
I could be part of a bigger, you know, world
of therapy or psychology.

Speaker 3 (58:41):
That's so good. I didn't say that. I didn't say
it before, but I'll say it now. Thank you very
much for your service, Chatty. You're a part of the.

Speaker 2 (58:48):
Law and so incredible story.

Speaker 3 (58:52):
People don't usually get to hear much from the probation world.
It's one of these sides that kind of get hidden
in the background, but they don't realize. I mean today
you shared a lot of the stuff that officers will
deal with too, the things that you see, things you hear. Obviously,
the shooting is not something you'd ever really associated too
often with probation officers. It's a very different world. I

(59:15):
think I really appreciate it very much for you coming
on and sharing your experiences. We got to bring it
back because I know this is probably just a.

Speaker 2 (59:22):
Tip of the iceberg.

Speaker 3 (59:24):
What you know, it's probably again you had twenty eight years.

Speaker 2 (59:28):
There's so much you saw.

Speaker 3 (59:31):
We wish you the best of luck as well in
your academic career too, and I think you're going to
do some great things. And you're right, it's a population
in need. There's just so many populations in the aren't there.
There's so much out there.

Speaker 2 (59:42):
Well, I do appreciate your having me on.

Speaker 4 (59:44):
I do you know, I hope I was able to
aspire someone or help somebody maybe, you know.

Speaker 3 (59:52):
I think it definitely educated a lot of the people
in the forensic psych world, and I think the people
who also probably are in your field are going to
appreciate that their story is getting hurt again. I'm sure
a lot of your proviation guys are not usually your
gals have not been on podcasts too often, not that
I know.

Speaker 4 (01:00:08):
Oh yeah, same here, Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:00:10):
Awesome stuff. Thank you so much, Jay, Thank you for
listening to folks. Hopefully you enjoyed that as much as
I did. Make sure to subscribe and hit that I
like button. Did I say share things I'd share? Don't
know what came out like, but say to share, subscribe
and like I screamed it up again and thanks for
listening everybody,