Locked In with Ian Bick - I Was a Rikers Island Prison Guard — Here's Why I Quit | Jelani Vanholten

Episode Date: November 2, 2025

Jelani Vanholten didn’t grow up wanting to work inside one of America’s most dangerous jails—but life led him behind the walls of Rikers Island. After attending college and trying several career paths, he put on the correctional officer uniform and was assigned to one of Rikers’ most feared units: The House of Pain.Inside those walls, respect wasn’t given—it was earned. Jelani became known as a CO who treated inmates with firmness and fairness, earning credibility from both staff and prisoners. But the longer he stayed inside Rikers, the darker the job became. From daily violence and psychological battles to navigating gang politics and surviving high-tension housing units, Jelani saw the brutal reality of New York City’s jail system up close. But everything changed when he felt his life was in danger—and the department didn’t have his back. #RikersIsland #PrisonStories #FormerCO #LawEnforcementLife #PrisonGuard #InsideTheSystem #WhyIQuit #truecrimepodcast Connect with Jelani Vanholten: https://www.instagram.com/broadwaycasino?igsh=MXFxMDdjc3owZTl3OQ== Hosted, Executive Produced & Edited By Ian Bick: https://www.instagram.com/ian_bick/?hl=en https://ianbick.com/ Shop Locked In Merch: http://www.ianbick.com/shop Timestamps: 00:00 The Rikers “House of Pain” Unit Explained 00:38 Who Is Delani? Meet Today’s Guest 02:12 Growing Up in NYC & Early Survival Skills 04:46 Childhood Friendships & Street Lessons 05:52 Dreaming of Music & Reality Hitting Hard 06:44 First Encounters with the Justice System 07:59 Choosing a Career in Law Enforcement 09:03 Applying to Work at Rikers Island 10:07 The Corrections Academy: What It’s REALLY Like 11:17 Mental & Physical Challenges in Training 12:56 The OC Spray Test — Everyone Breaks Here 14:39 Training vs. The Actual Jail… No Comparison 15:54 How Delani’s Family Reacted to the Job 20:28 Day One on Rikers Island — Shock to the System 24:19 The First Shifts: Chaos, Noise & Control 27:05 Breaking Up Fights & When Force Is Necessary 30:12 Working the Mental Health Units 32:04 A Crisis in Segregation — Life or Death Decision 36:43 Controlled Chaos & Officer Culture on the Job 42:06 How Officers Earn Respect Inside 49:20 Balancing Rapport with Inmates vs. Authority 01:03:12 Boundaries, Respect, and When to Act 01:09:54 The Moment Respect Starts to Slip 01:10:54 Why Delani Ultimately Left Rikers 01:18:16 Feeling Betrayed by the Department 01:23:52 The Breaking Point: Safety vs. Family 01:27:17 Life After Rikers — What Comes Next 01:33:01 New Work & Purpose Beyond Corrections 01:34:57 Looking Back: The Cost of the Job 01:35:32 Closing Thoughts & Takeaways Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Inmates take piss. Normally, they defecation from the toilet. They'll take the water. They'll put it in the toothpaste. They'll let it sit for days. And then when you're coming down to tear, they have the toothpaste, and they'll pop it, and it'll splash out. And you got shit and piss all over you.

Why did you leave Rikers Island? Jelani Van Hulton kept order inside one of America's most dangerous jails, but the moment he feared for his life and saw no backup coming, he knew he had to leave. Jolani, welcome to Lockton. Thanks so much for coming out here today. Appreciate it. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it.

Yeah, I got to say every correctional officer I interview, they always wear the New York Yankees hat. I had two people yesterday with the New York Yankees hat on and then a couple of the past episodes. It's the most famous hat. You got to wear Yankees. It looks good, though. too. Like whenever I normally tell people like for the thumbnail photos take it like their hat off and their glasses, but the Yankees hat like pops in it. There's something about the hat. It just makes it look good. I feel like people click on the videos. Yeah. Yeah. It's just so New York. When you see it,

you just like, it's so New York. Now I don't live in New York City. I realize how popular it is because now when I'm in the South, I'm like, oh, he's from New York and they're like, no. I'm like, okay, you just like the hat. Yeah, you came back from the cold to be here today. Yeah, it's like this is a cold that's been in a couple weeks. It's like in the 40s today. It's chilly. Yeah. Nice.

I like the cold, so I'm with it. Oh, you're okay with the cold? You would have to move it down south? Yeah, I'm a winter baby, man, November. So I love the cold. Oh, that's when your birthday is? Yeah. Oh, okay.

Happy almost birthday. Thanks, I appreciate it. Where'd you grow up? Well, I grew up on 156 Street in Broway, which is considered Washington Heights. It's literally a block out of what's considered Harlem. So that's where I grew up. Spent most of my time between Harlem and the Bronx. You know, the Bronx is literally like, feels like it's across the street.

Living up the hill from Yankee Stadium, you know, once I cross a bridge, I'm in the Bronx. Or go a block over, I'm in Harlem. So that's where I spent most of my time. What was your upbringing like? Cool. I would say regular, but that would be a lie. My dad is very entrepreneurial. He had a bunch of, like, we call them bodegas and little dining places.

Like, he had businesses that I found out about later. My mom, same thing, very entrepreneurial, had her own credit business, worked as well. She helped my father in his businesses. So we were in the, what's considered a rough neighborhood or rough area, but we weren't, I wasn't really raised in a rough situation. Like I always went to Catholic school, always. You know, it kept me kind of off of the neighborhood type of thing most of the time when I was younger.

That was pretty much, you know, how I grew up. Do they teach you about business and want that for your life? My mom's just like, work for yourself, work for yourself. You know, and I'm that way as well. As I got older, I got into having some businesses myself. I love the business aspect of it, but I guess what you don't realize is that sometimes when you work for yourself, you're doing more work than you would if you work for somebody else. Everybody's not built for that. So I know the dynamic now, but yeah, I love, I love, you know, business and ownership and having something that you create.

That's, it's nothing like it. It's rewarding. What kind of kid would you say you were? I was a jokester. I was a jokester. I love to be the center of attention. One thing that was really fun for me growing up, my mom used to let me stay up late to watch the Cosby Show and different things and I would be off to bed.

And I grew up kind of wanting to be in the movies or on TV and stuff like that. So, you know, I was born in the 80s, raised in the 90s, which I feel is like the best time on earth. Like it was so much fun in that time period. So growing up with people like Eddie Murphy and these people and that, people just comedy and the shows and the Martin's on. And, you know, I just was pretty funny. I loved to dance. I love to dress. My mom used to keep me in, you know, nice little fresh clothes.

I used to love that stuff. So I was, you know, somebody who tried to stay in a lot of my, unfortunately, got me in a lot of trouble. What was your friend group? Like, who were you hanging out with? I had a tight, I had a tight net. group of male friends. I only really had five pretty much growing up. My family dynamic is a lot of females. There's a lot of women. So I always felt more comfortable around a lot of women, or I always felt comfortable around women more than a lot of guys. You know, guys get around each

other and they want to like compete. It's a competition. It's, oh, you know, I'm better than you at this. I'm better than you at that. I just be like, all right, whatever, man. So, but I had, I had like five friends. We were kind of thickest thieves. We were ride bikes from Harlem to the Bronx and, you know, go check on girls with each other. You know, go shopping and talk about clothes and music. You know, this is the 90s. Everybody thought they was a rapper, so I spent some time thinking I was a rapper.

But I love to write music. I got into all that stuff, writing music and stories and stuff. So it was fun, man. My childhood was really fun. People still think that they're rappers. Everybody still does kind of work. want to be a rapper. I'm not going to lie. I do still enjoy writing music. But yeah. I mean, and that's great. More power to them. Pursue your passion, but it's just not

sustainable in those early stages, you know? Just be a rapper. You got to work a regular job while you're building that dream. Yeah. And I, you know, I didn't, I wasn't selling drugs, so it was hard to, like you said, sustain. You're paying for music videos and producers. And it's like, man, okay, well, how are you going to make money off of what you're doing? Because really, you're just putting money into it. Yeah, some people I'll interview when I ask them, like, what their career is now, how they've rebuilt their life after prison, and they say they're a rapper. And that's the only thing they do. Yeah. I'm like, okay. If you really are great, like I, I'm proud of you, but I just hope like you're not doing something other than that. Exactly.

Exactly. Like you said, how are you making the actual money? And it's hard. It's definitely hard now with the streaming. I definitely have to find a different way. Were you exposed to the criminal justice system at all at a young age, either through friends, family, or maybe even yourself if you had any run-ins? Well, I mean, I grew up pretty much in and around Harlem. One or two times, just stopped by the cops to, you know, where you guys going type of stuff. but nothing, nothing too intense. I had an uncle that was in law enforcement. So my uncle was a NYPD officer

who was, that I'm really close to. But, you know, in that time in the 90s, nobody wanted to be a cop. Like, you didn't really want to be associated. New York cops, I think, had a bad kind of rap. You didn't want to be, I'm not being a cop. So it was nothing I aspired to do. I really only got into law enforcement because I had children, had a wife.

I needed to have a sustainable lifestyle, and I didn't want to, you know, just be struggling. And it just seemed like they were paying a good salary, you know. They offered, they packaged it up real pretty. So I took a chance. So you graduated high school? Yeah. And then where do you go after high school? After high school, I took some time.

I signed up for DeVry, went to DeVry, so I was in the computers and did that for a while, but it wasn't a passion of mine. So I had a time trying to find what I was passionate about. And it was like I bounced around. Man, I bounced around from being a security guard to Wall Street. trying to be a broker. So I bounced around from there to everything in between, you know, and looking for what am I passionate about?

What do I want to do? But through that, a cousin of mine was in on Rikers Island. And I told you about my uncle was in law enforcement, but my other uncle was in FDNY. So they kind of, that side of my family, my mom's side, was more into getting a city job type of thing. So I did the exam for FD and Y, and then I did the exam for corrections, and corrections call it like that. And FDNY was, I think, a heavily sought after job, so it was harder to get in. Even with a great score, it was hard to get in. So I said, okay, DOC it is. What year was this that you applied?

I probably applied in like 2011, because I started in 2012. And how old are you? At the time I was 31, 32. Okay. Did you see when you got the call and you went to the academy, were there a lot of people that age, or were they younger, or were they older? Yeah. There were a lot of people, mid-20s to 30s.

There were some older people, too, because I don't believe correctly. If I remember correctly, there wasn't an age. There wasn't a cutoff, I don't think. So there was some older guys and some older ladies in there, too. But, man, the academy was super fun, though. So I was hype, really, when I was in the academy. I was like, this is a lot of fun. I think you might be the first Rikers guard

that said the academy was fun. Because it pushed you, you know? It pushed you to get in better shape. It pushed you to study. They broke us up into groups, so that there's a competition aspect of it because you're competing against other groups. So this company, that company,

it taught you cadences. They made you step out your body. You know, I grew up in New York, so I'm familiar with. New York is very aggressive, pretty much. It's an aggressive place. So I was cool with that and being pushed. I love challenges. So, yeah, that was a lot of fun for me, actually.

What was your mental state at that time? Were you feeling defeated because your past careers didn't work out, or were you ready for a new chapter? What did that look like? No, didn't feel defeated. I did optimistic, very optimistic. You get friends in the academy and that you, you know, people I still keep in touch with

to this day just because, you know, we ran the miles. We, you know, was jogging around the parking lot. We were doing push-ups in the gym. We were studying together. We were learning canaces. We were, you know, doing all this new stuff. And it was just like, you know, you go through these tough situations.

You get sprayed, you know, that, so you go through these hard times and these tough situations and you're just like, you start leaning on people, you know? That's in your, or they help you up, they encourage you, you know. So it was just a fun time, you know. But no, definitely not, not defeated, more optimistic, yeah. Tell us about getting sprayed during the academy. Oh my God. I have a friend I still speak to this day.

I'm not going to say her name because I don't want to embarrass her. So if something is scary to me, I'm a little opposite. I run towards it. If it scares me, I run towards it in a sense of now I'm excited. Like, oh, this is a challenge. Okay, go. So we were going to get sprayed this day. And everybody talks about getting sprayed.

and I said, you know what, I'm going to volunteer. Let me go first. I just wanted to get it out the way. And then one of my company mates was like, man, let me go first. I need to get this out the way. I need to do, da-da-da-da. I'm like, okay, cool. Go ahead and go first.

Man, she gets sprayed and she throws a fit. She's screaming. She's yelling. She's rolling on the floor. I'm like, oh, my God. So any toughness that I have built up to get, like to actually do it, now I'm like, oh, my God, what am I getting into? But, you know, we all went, we all did it.

But the spray is horrible. Is that, that spray that they make, and they literally do it right across your eyes and make you blink. So you're going to get affected by it. What does I feel like? It's a, it's just a burn that you can't. It's a very intense burn. You can't stop. It's going to open you up nasally. So there's going to be snot. It's not going to be pretty. It's not going to be pretty. There's going to be snot. There's going to be tears. And your eyes are just simply going to burn. And you can't, you can't, like, you can't solve it. It's just, you got to just let the time pass. And yeah, it's like, this is pain. This hurts. Nothing's going to. make it better, but besides the time.

How long is it last for? I don't know how long it would last without decontaminating, which is they basically give you water to flush your eyes. I'm not sure how long it will last in that sense. But when you get sprayed and then you go through the obstacle course or what was the obstacle course at that time

and then decontaminate, it probably will take you 20 to 30 minutes before you start feeling okay. but it's going to be majority of the day. And fun fact for people who don't notice, when you decontaminate it, when you go home that day and you get in the shower, it's going to reactivate. So the best thing for you to do, especially for the males who can sit and go through that,

lean your head back because anything that the water touches that's washing off your face is going to burn. So I just say you will burn in other places, so you have to be careful. You might want to watch your face on the thing first. But, yeah, getting sprayed is definitely an experience. Do you feel like the Academy prepared you for what was to come at Rikers? As much as they can, in theory. Nothing compares you, of course, didn't experience. But in theory, sure, absolutely.

I had some guys who I consider great instructors in the Academy. Yeah, I would say from the experiences that I've had, the Academy at DOC was like top. It was like top-notch experience. This episode is brought to you by prize picks. You and I make decisions every day, but on prize picks, being right can get you paid. Don't miss any of the excitement this football season on prize picks where it's good to be right. So I was building my lineups for this week and I'm actually excited about these projections. I've been having a lot of fun playing on prize picks because it's so.

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And there's all these unsaid rules that you'll learn when you work there. you know and it's like oh okay so this is what i'm supposed to do but to get to that point it's kind of hard to make that connection you know how to do it you know it's it's it's difficult it's really difficult how did your family react uh to you taking this job and and going through this process and your your wife um they were cool um they were cool i had an uncle was you know He kind of asked me, are you, you know, you're scared? I'm like, no. Like, he's like, all right, you know, you're going to go in there.

And it's a preconceived notion because to enter into Rikers and you know you're in a male facility and like I was telling you earlier, males compete with each other. But now you're in a super aggressive environment. The first thing, you just got to, as long as you're mentally prepared within yourself, to kind of be who you are. And I think that's one thing that really helped me. I'm confident in who I am. I don't feel the need to be anybody else in any other situations. I'm like, this is, like, a fan is not going to turn into an AC because you want it to be.

You have to deal with the fan because it's the fan. You know, I'm fan, that's who I am. That's what I'm going to be. That's what you're going to have to deal with. And that's kind of just how I, my outlook on it, my take on it. Tell us about day one at Rikers. After the academy, they suit you up, they send you in there. Well, they kind of test you first.

They treat you like a tea bag. They dunk you in the hot water a couple of times. So during while you're training, they let you go to, you know, the jail. They let you go to Rikers. And everybody knows you're new because we, they call us the light shirts or the shiny shoes. So that's all you have at the academy. So you wear these light shirts and these shiny shoes. Everybody knows you're new, you know? And nothing really, nothing really happened. People will say a little things to you to see how you're going to respect, react, respond.

But nothing really happened. You're with season officers and I'm pretty sure they take time to make sure that they put you in specific places that's not to, won't expose you too much. But it's nerve wracking if you've never been to record. Because I have. had never been locked up. So I hadn't, the closest I've been to anything locked up was I had a suspended license and I was in a holding cell for a few hours. Like, so jail, going to that island, knowing there's 10 facilities on that island, and each one is a different level, different situations, different dynamics. It's like, this is a lot. It can be overwhelming. You know, it can be really overwhelming. What was your view of inmates at that point in time when you

first started? My view on inmates, if I'm being honest, was they're just regular people, which they are, they're regular people. The dude at the deli, you know, who's chopping your meat, you know, he may have gotten in a tight situation and did a few years in jail for whatever. Like, they're walking, people who've been locked up are walking around us every day. So when you go in there, they're not aliens. They're just, they're people who got caught up.

and New York is such a hustle, you're either, you're hustling regardless, either legally or illegally. You know, so both are hard. So you could trip and go illegally and get caught up and vice versa. So it wasn't really a, I didn't really have any preconceived notion. Like, I had family members who have been locked up before, just people. Do you have the same view of inmates now to this day? Or do you think it changed at all?

No, just people. They're just people. There is a best of us and the worst of us and everybody, you know. I'm great right now. Who knows five years, something traumatic happened to me, you know, or, you know, you don't know what someone can go through. I look at people a lot, and especially people who seem problematic. And if you really dig, I think if you really, really dig and take the time, people are problematic normally have gone through a lot.

So the people who are the most, I'm ready to, oh, I'm ready, you know, reactive, I'm ready to, they've probably been through a lot. And in most cases, what I found, they've, they've been through a lot. So, but when you just paint over everything with the wide brush and you just say, oh, they're just probably, They're just problematic. Yes, they are problematic, but why are they problematic? You know, why are they acting like this? Why? It's normally something behind it. And if you take a little time, you might find a human space in them to be like, oh, okay, I get that. I'll address it differently because of that. You know, it's hard because you don't really know these people, you know? Where do you get assigned to for your first shift? Like your first actual shift? I think the first place I got put was called One Upper.

I was in a four building, GMDC. Yeah, I think one upper. It was a cell area. I believe there's, yeah, there was two sides. Because how Rikers was back and then, There would be one officer in the bubble, and there'll be two tiers on each side of the bubble, and then there'll be one floor officer who would go back and forth. So you had literally maybe 30-something bodies over here.

I don't think it's 1 to 18 and 18 through 36. It's been a while, but it's probably 30 bodies over here and 30 other inmates over here. And you're literally walking back and forth trying to make sure nothing. nothing happens, which is problematic in itself. You're telling me if there is an issue or there is something that's going to happen, because on Rikers, if something's going to happen, it's going to happen. While I'm over here, I can't see what's over there. But my bubble officer hopefully is backing me up and watching, and then vice versa, and then

we're supposed to watch each other. You know, it's kind of like you're asking, you're asking one person or two people to do kind of two things simultaneously. And it's hard. It's hard for an officer to do that, really. When was the first time you experienced an issue? I experienced an issue in the dorm. It was funny, really.

I was in this dorm. And so my report right off the bat with most of the inmates that I've encountered was, wasn't really too bad. Like, my report was just, I'm here to do my job. I was not there to make anybody's time harder, but I wasn't going to let you make my time hard either. Like, I just want to do my job, bro, the way I'm supposed to do it and go home. I'm not trying to develop a thing with you. So now I'm doing extra stuff to piss you all for you doing extra stuff to pit. I don't have time for, I don't want none of that.

I don't have time for none of that. I'm going to respect you as long as you respect me. You don't respect me. I'm going to, we're going to have a problem. But that's just, and that was just it. So one time these two guys were about to fight. I saw them going into the bathroom, and I kind of got them out the bathroom or whatever. And they're on the floor, and I'm like, hey, chill out, blah, blah, blah.

They're like, I have, V, you know, we're going to cool, no. So I went to the other side. And then I hear a commotion. And I get over there and they're fighting. and I put myself, I'm 6-2, right? At the time, I'm probably about 300 pounds, 6-2, 300 pounds. I'm not a small guy, but we have a spray on us, but I managed to get them apart.

But one wouldn't stop, and he tried to swing at the guy over me, so I sprayed him. You know, spray all in his face and put now the whole dorm is pissed off because that spray is affecting everybody now. But that was the first time I had to, incident. And it was so funny because they was like, damn, have you sprayed? You ain't have to spray. Everybody was mad at me because everybody was coughing. And everybody was, and I'm like, okay, yeah, I sprayed, you know. But that was like really the one, only time and it's the stint that

I was there that I used my spray. Do the inmates get mad at the inmate that caused everyone to get sprayed? They do, depending on what the situation is, right? So if you have a situation where it's really a serious issue that two inmates feel like they have to address. And they're going to fight. And the inmates know, like, yeah, that's going to happen because of whatever, it's serious enough. They just know the sprays come in. If the team arrives or whatever happens has to happen, they just kind of expect it.

But if it's something that's like minuscule or like dumb or one, one, when an inmate just is just dummy keeps bringing heat to the hallowing area, then yeah, they'll probably make him pack up or, you're like, yo, you got to go. You know,

so they'll be mad about that from my experiences, but that's pretty much how they, you know, they know it's jail. So, yeah. And when you spray, does it affect yourself too?

Yeah, but since you've gotten sprayed directly before is a lot lower. The effect is a lot lower. So if someone were to spray now, um, my eyes might tend. a little and I might feel like I've, you know, got some kind of burning in the back of my throat, kind of like sinus area, but it wouldn't take me out per se, yeah.

And now do you stay at that unit your whole entire time or how often do they switch you to different units? Well, when you first start, you're on a stinghole of will. So you're doing different shifts and they're just putting you wherever until they find a set, a specific place for you, or that they want to put you in or see how you. you handle yourself. So I did that for, I would say probably about three months, just was on a wheel until they actually put me in a house. Wishing you could be there live for the big game, soaking up the atmosphere in the crowd. But too often, life gets busy. Or the price holds you

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Housing area, and that was my permanent housing area. What was the worst section you worked in when you're on the wheel? I forgot what it was called, but where the mental health people were, that was, especially if you're working overnight, if it's five in the morning, man, and you got a guy who's 6-6 and 280, and he's, in his cell and he won't sit down but he's just looking at the window or he's banging his head and you know at 5 a.m. I got to feed these guys. I have to open a cell and you can't show fear. Like you, that's not, inmates eat fear. They're like, oh, he's scared. Even with other

inmates, you know, you come in there if you're scared, you're, that's a bad situation. for you. So the mental health to me, because for me that makes me uneasy, I don't, I don't know how to gauge what you're going to do. A regular person or somebody who's just prone to being violent or want to fight or, you know, whatever case may not like you, I kind of can gauge what's going on, see the temperature. You don't know what the mental health do could just be and then just snap. And I've seen things just like, it's a cool day until it's not. It's a cool day and then alarms are ringing. And it's like, what the hell happened?

It was like, we were just sitting here laughing and talking. And now we're putting on vests and getting batons and helmets. It's going to shit now. Tell us one of those stories from when that happened. One day, that's kind of really agitates me. But there was this. There's a housing area called Three Bay. Three main is right across from one vein

where it was my permanent housing area. So we had this warden man, and he was just, he was always changing stuff up for some reason. He always wanted to try something, trying new stuff, and it was just like, what's going on? So I was already in one main,

which was a very, one side is a pretty much a blood unit and pretty much all bloods on one side and alternate areas on another side so I already had what they considered a problematic main area to work in my study one day they took me from working one main to go work in three main call themselves needing some strong offices to work over there so I'm already agitated because I want to go to my my steady my study unit Three main had I think this is when they were doing SEG

These guys were pretty much They only got out for an hour Right And if when you bring them out of their cell If they go to the shower They're handcuffed in the shower Or handcuffed to the shower If you bring them to the day room

They handcuffed to the table They don't have free range Or if they go out for rec It's really in a In like a box Like a cage area Right. So this is where we have the, the biggest, the problems of the problems, right?

So, okay, cool. All right, you want to put me in three main. Fine. I go to three main. I used to work three to 11 tour. I mentioned earlier, inmates used to eat at 5 a.m., right? Three to 11. I go in.

These inmates are. yelling and banging on their cells from the time I enter. Oh, where the fuck? I'm like, what the fuck is going on in here? They are, they are. You could tell the temperature and the mood in there was like, what? I talked to the officer, what the fuck is going on? Oh, one of the inmates, I think they grabbed one of the officers

through the slot or something like that, and they were scared to go down the tier. They hadn't fed them breakfast. These guys are supposed to eat at 5 a.m. It's three in the afternoon. You haven't fed them breakfast? They still had the breakfast where the kitchen area was supposed to be

to wheeling in. The officers were scared to go down the tier. They're locked in their cells. Why are you scared to go down the tier? All right, cool. So they packed up so quick, the officers who were there, the floor officers that I came to leave and left. But now I'm here. Now I'm holding the bag, right?

And I'm really pissed. And I'm like, all right. I got to get a handle on this. So I go to the tier and I make an announcement. They're yelling, so I quiet them down. Yo, yo, yo, yo, you know, listen. This is V. It's Officer Van.

They used to call me V or Officer Van. You know it's Officer V. I know y'all haven't eaten breakfast. Now it's time for basically the next meal, the next vina. I'm going to get y'all. I'm going to get the ones who need to go in the shower to the shower. I'm going to start the breakfast. Right after the breakfast, I'm going to start your next meal.

I make this announcement. I need y'all to quiet the, down, and let me get this. going, right? I'm kind of pissed because now I'm in a tier, I'm in an area, housing area that I don't belong in. You reassign me here. This shit is tumultuous, right?

I've pretty much gotten my housing area the way I wanted to be. They know me, they know my program, they know how I work. I'm familiar with these guys. So it's easier. I'm not familiar with these dudes. I don't know who's over here.

After I make my announcement, I start walking, oh, and they were also, I'm sorry, I left this out. They were splashing officers coming down a tear. You know what that is? With jerking off? No. It's when the inmates take piss.

Normally they defecation from the toilet. They'll take the water. They'll put it in the toothpaste. They'll let it sit for days. And then when you're coming down the tear, they have the toothpaste, and they'll pop it, and it'll splash out. And you got shit and piss all over your brush.

I'm not proud of this, but I'm going to say it. I'm just say this. I've said, I've made an appeal on a tear before. I said, listen, please do not splash me. Honestly, I will lose my job today if you splash me. I can't conceptualize a man peeing and shitting and splash. But I could not conceptualize that. That was crazy to me.

Just don't do that. I'm going to get you what you need. Don't, don't do that to me. Don't disrespect me like that. All I hear from the distance, one of the last selves is, yo, that's Officer V? Yo, y'all chill out. That's Officer V.

That's my officer. Yo, whoa, whoa. I'm like, who is that? It's an inmate that used to be on Rikers. I don't even know if that's his I think his real name I'm like well we just call him doctor I'm gonna just say that

and he used to be in my housing area so he know how I work and so here I am I'm getting the feeding started I go take inmates out of the cell to take them to the shower area right they're relatively calming down I'm thinking everything is going to be cool

I got an inmate in the shower. I'm going back to get another inmate because there's multiple showers in there. They're all sectioned off. So I'm going back to get another inmate to bring him to the shower. Also, during this time frame, it's been a while,

so I don't remember how it lined up. I had a couple of inmates in the day room as well, handcuffed to the table. While I'm taking my second inmate up to the shower, All I hear is Bo boom, boom, boom, boom. I'm like, how do you fucking are they fighting? I'm going in the day room.

Now there's fighting in the day room. How are they unhandcuff from the table? Law story short, the previous crew who was there, the inmate snatched the officers cuff key. And he never told anybody that there was a missing cuff key. So these inmates,

these inmates that are handcuffed to the table now are undoing themselves and fighting in the day room. So now we're pressing alarms because now I got inmates fighting in the day room. I got inmates in the shower. I got one person on the tier, but I can't leave him on the tier because now I have an inmate I'm going to leave on the tear

while they're fighting. I need to secure him. I put him in the shower. I respond. to that. I'm in a whole melee in the day room now because a previous officer did not say

hey, somebody has a cuff key. Hey, you know what we're supposed to do in that instance? We're supposed to search this housing there and get the cuff key back. No. It left me holding the bag. So now it's all kind of report, right? And it's a fucking

shit show. It's a shit show. And I'm like, I thought it was it turned out I thought it was going to be a good day. But on Rikers, I'm telling you, from one minute to the next, boom, it's something totally different. Now I have to deal with all of that.

Now is one of those days, man. I was just, I was really pissed off on how that happened because it didn't have to go that way, you know? You got to, you got to use your head out there. When you're assigned to your normal housing unit where you're there for months, maybe even years on that specific shift, is it? Is it hard to have other officers come in on different shifts and, you know, maybe change things up or, you know, treat the inmates maybe differently or enforce different rules than what you're used to? Is that hard to kind of keep control of the unit?

Yeah. I mean, it's just flat out. There's good officers and bad officers, you know. There's officers who just have, there's a couple of different ways and cultures of officers, you know. if you talk to our Rikers Island officers who were there in the early 90s, late 80s, they'll tell you about just times when there was so much fighting going on and, you know, we, you know, get an MA, we do this. They ain't going to do that again.

Like, but now it's not really like that. It's not really, stuff is not really handled that way. But if you have officers who've been there for 20, 30 years, that's kind of a school they come from, you know. And then there's a dynamic where it's like, you know, if you're in a male prison, if you're a pretty female, attractive female officer around a guy who's going, let's say he's going to court for years and he's away from his family and stuff like that. Now, you as a female have to handle these males differently and respond to them differently than I would as a male, you know, who has to handle these inmates differently.

So, yeah, absolutely. There's people who come in and they come in with their culture and their views and stuff like that. That's why a lot of times inmates find out which officers are working. And they kind of adjust to the officers who will come in and they're like, oh, your officer Vs here. If I'm sick or, you know, my leg's swollen, he'll try to get me the, he'll actually try to get me the medical. Whereas officer, whatever, they're not going to do nothing, you know, that type of stuff. But yeah.

How would you have considered yourself as an officer? I consider myself, I consider myself a good officer. However, I do feel I was unorthodox. The guys in my housing area on one side were all bloods, right? Relatively the same age as me. I like, you know, I like going on a scary rise at the amusement park. This is a scary housing area. Cool.

I'm fine with that. It's fun to me. But I also, I've always had an element. element to my personality where I like to be impactful to somebody. Even to this day, like I used to have an AAU basketball team for three years. I love mentoring young men. My first job when I was 12, I worked in a nursery school that I worked in, that I attended when I was a kid. So when I went in there and there's these young 20-year-olds, 25-year-olds, you know, who are these, quote,

unquote, heart in gang members or even the other side that was gang members. That doesn't really, that doesn't move me per se because that's kind of normal in New York City, you know, being around Harlem and being around the Bronx. See, I heard Cardi B the other day say, you know, seeing Bloods is normal. Like, it's normal. It's not a thing, you know. So I used to sit around at my shift, you know. I hate me for saying this, but

so gay members have this thing with big homies, right? So for a short time, I lived in the Bronx, and I used to have some blood friends or whatever, and I used to play jokingly with my blood friends, not disrespectfully, I used to be like, yo, big homies here type of thing. So when I went to Rikers and I had to do, when the first thing you do when you come on post

is you do a count, right? I used to be like, you don't want to count big homies here. And they were cursing me out behind the door. Like, fuck you, V, da, da, da, blah. But it was fun for me, right? And that's the type of thing that helped me develop rapport with the inmates that I had because I'm from the same place you're from.

You know, two, three different decisions is the difference while I'm here and you're there. I'm not trying to be better than you. This just happens to be my job. I'm not going to let you get me in a situation though that's going to put me here. But, so I feel especially in hindsight that... This episode is brought to you by Subaru. Go further in a long-range Subaru hybrid,

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Zootopia 2. Now available on Disney Plus rated PG. I was a very good. I felt like I was a very good officer. How would other officers describe you? I have no idea. I have no idea, really. I never,

respectfully, I don't care. You know what I mean? Like, at the end of the day, if I sleep well, if I know that I can go into my housing area. For example, I'll give you a prime example. I was in the Bronx one day, and I had this white art class Mercedes, right?

So love it. And the same day, this happens the same day. If you're Rikers Island correction officer and you are somebody who constantly gets into altercations with people in the jail, you're thinking you might see these people outside, one day, right? I was getting my car wash on East Tremont.

East Tremont, East Tremont, used to have this big car wash I used to let it go to. So my Mercedes is coming through the other side, so I'm about to hop in. I just, I wasn't, I'm not in New York. I don't have to look at my back like that. Somebody comes behind me and puts his arms around me like this. And they say, yo, V, what the fuck is up, Vita? And I'm like, he's calling me V. this dude has to have been in jail.

Turn around. It's a former inmate. What's up, man? How are you? Da-da, we talk, blah, blah, blah. Cool. Hey, I'm glad you out. You know, try to stay out.

Da-da-da. Go about my business. I'm driving to Harlem now, right? So I used to get my hair cut on 145th in Harlem, between Broadway and Amsterdam. So in the chair is a former inmate. that I had in my housing area. What the, so you, what you do in there could catch up to you.

I mean, and it can and it will, you know. So because of that, I think I was a great officer because, one, I never did anything illegal. I never did anything illegal. I did things that probably weren't advised to do, like talk and care about the people. I had around, talk to all of those guys. I tell you a quick little story. I moved to North Carolina in 2015.

I took a year, I leave an absence. And I was living in Kerry. Carrie, North Carolina is really pretty, it's really nice, serene. I'm always up late. I'm a guy stays up late. I'm always doing something. I'm always writing or looking at some film or documentary or something. I'm always doing something.

We're watching locked in. Oh, watching locked in. Episode upon episode. So I get a, my phone's ringing from Facebook. It's like two in the morning. Who the hell is calling me on Facebook? I don't recognize the person or anything. But I don't duck.

it. So I answered a Facebook after a while. I mean, it's two almost 3 o'clock in the morning, but I answer my Facebook. I'm like, yo, hello? All I hands. Yeah, nigga, what's up? Who the fuck is this? Yeah.

They say it's something, but they're not, they, they, they sounded like it could be something. Like, it sounded like, oh, somebody's trying to prank me or start something, but I don't know. Anyway, long story short, this kid, I'm a shout your name out too, named Bentley, calls me. He used to be in my housing area. His name is Bentley. Bentley Bugs.

Yo, I just wanted to thank you, man, for the times you talked to us and da-da-da-da-da and did this, this, this, that, and the third. He just had got out of jail. This was maybe 2018. So he had maybe did eight years, I think, in jail. You know, I'm doing my music now. I'm staying out of trouble. You know, I was like, he's like, yo, I had to find you just to tell you to thank you for being a man that you were in there.

Because my thing is, and I tell people this all the time who know me, in jail, if you. you say you're going to do something. If it comes out your mouth, do it. Don't cash, don't cash no wolf tickets. Do it. If I say it, I have to do it. And people who know me know I kind of live by that. If I say I'm going to do it, I'm doing it. It's done. Or at least I'm going to attempt to do it and say, look, I tried, but I couldn't make this happen. And I didn't go, I didn't, I never played Rikers like I wanted to be the toughest. I want to be the toughest officer around. That's for lames.

Like, you know, who you are is who you are. If you can fight, you can fight. Why you got to tell everybody? Oh, I could fight. You're not convinced. Oh, I'm the man. Why are you telling everybody? You're not convinced.

Who you are is who you are. Just be who you are. People who don't, who go into there and are something, they're telling you there's something that they're not, that gets tested. quick and then it's proven and once they see that's not who you are but that's not what you're about it's over why even why do that so things like that and times like that really hit me because i feel like hopefully he'll do something better and end up in a better situation or find

a find a way um yeah as far as other officers i don't really i don't really talk to them nor ask them you know how do you think how was that's an officer i don't know I go, it's cool. It's a cool question. Maybe I'll ask, but I just haven't. You mentioned that your housing unit was considered a scary unit. Why was that? Oh, man.

It was called amidst GMDC, it was called One Main, the House of Pain. That's what they used to call it. I'm like, okay. But a lot of uses of forces, a lot of uses of force used to happen in. So, and I think they, on my shift, my 3 to 11 shift, there was no steady officer there. So they had just had all different. So nobody could really get on the set schedule of how to run it. And me and my partner at the time, she was really young.

She was from Brooklyn. We were so locked in and cool. as far as what we knew we wanted from the guys who were in our house area. My personal things were I used to tell people three things. Listen, everybody eats on my tour. Don't cut anybody on my tour and no fights. Outside of that, we can have a cool day. Y'all want to get in yourselves, cool.

I'm going to do my little options. Y'all want to watch TV. cool y'all need services fine don't make my day hard i don't i don't want to make your day hard but again respect is that's the top of the hill that's the paramount you have to have respect if you don't have respect it's it's not nothing in there is going to work for you so i had to get respect give respect to them and get my respect and demand my respect and that was kind of it so it became a place where officers used to ask for overtime after a while and it was like why you want to do overtime over here because it's it calmed down it calmed down because of me

and my partner and I feel like that can happen in any any jail I mean if you're locked up the CO ain't in keeping you he's not the reason you locked up but he's the person there that's supposed to uphold whatever rules that's supposed to be in jail. Yeah, I get that. But even if he's doing it on a level that this is not a personal thing, this is just what the job is and you lay it out, even if you might not, it may not be something that you like. Like, I don't want to come search you in yourself.

But if I do it, I just do it with integrity. Hey, give me your shoes. That's it of there. Here you go. Give me a shirt. All right, cool. Here you go. Give me, you know, boxes.

All right, cool. Here you go. Pants. That's just the job. But if I'm like, yeah, give me your shoes. Throw them over there. Give me a box. I'm tossing them.

You're doing extra shit now. You know what I mean? You're asking for you don't have to do that, you know? Yeah, some officers be tearing up cells. I mean, like, I think the worst officer. and my experience are the ones that will start taking like an apple or a piece of fruit. And you're not making a hooch with it. I mean, the ones that are cool, take it.

But if you're just a normal person, staying out the way and you're having a couple items from the chow-hole, who cares? You're going to eat it that day. Unless you're one of those weirdos that leaves it in the locker. Like guys in prison are convinced that if you take the food and just put it in the Tupperware container, you're safe. It's like a refrigerator. I had an old roommate that a Dominican guy,

he would put the food, a tray of food that we'd cook left over in the microwave and just sit it there for like two days. I'm like, bro, it doesn't work that way. It's not safe in the microwave. Or put the milks in the toilet. I haven't seen that. They do that? Yeah, you never see that?

We would hang a net bag because when I was in Wisconsin, it was cold in the winter. That would be our refrigerator. You hang it out the window and keep all the stuff. So that worked. That was legit. Yeah. But leaving the stuff in the Tupperware container for days, that does not save it.

And no wonder why some of these CEOs be getting mad. But yeah, the ones that are super cops, I don't know, I don't necessarily have respect for them. The ones are going out of their way to flip cells. Yeah. And I mean, I honestly had problems with other, and maybe that's back to your point of when you asked me, what do I think other officers would have thought about me? Because I've had problems with other officers because of stuff like that. I just flat out don't like stuff like that.

Like I had a captain, big head captain, I swear. I just, okay, that was huge. I come into work one day, and after lineup, he grabs a few of us that I guess we have reputations for just, or maybe he just grabbed us because we had big size, I don't know.

But he takes us to a specific housing area and he, we go to this, he's like, we got to search this bunk. And we're searching the bunk. He said search the bunk. All right, cool,

whatever. Search the bunk. The guy has like Doritos and stuff, you know, from commissary. He's stepping on. He wants to step on all these Doritos and just mash up all of his stuff.

And I'm the type of person. I'm sorry. like, I do question, I question everything. I need to know why I'm doing what I'm doing. Like, oh, this officer, this inmate cursed this officer out the other day. He cursed out to filth, right? It was Wednesday. This shit happened Monday.

Why am I in here stepping on, you want me to step on the Doritos and mess up because of something that happened Monday? and the story is because the inmate cursed the shit out of a female officer who wouldn't give the inmate toilet paper. What am I doing? What am I doing here? I'm leaving. I don't care what authority figure it is. Sometimes authority asks you to do stuff that are beyond what you need to do. I'm leaving.

You can't get me in trouble for leaving because this is not something we're supposed to be doing anyway. And I've never had that fear. So certain officers I have a problem with, just like certain people on the street I have a problem with. Oh, you're a super thug? You want to bully people around? When I was in school, I used to love bullies. I used to love to bully bullies. Are you a bully?

All right. I'm a bully you now. Doesn't that make you a bullying essence? Yeah. Why are you bullying people? Leave people alone. But bullies are... Where I grew up with bullies are punks.

You're a punk because you're a bully. Like the real men don't bully people. Real men don't have to assert this and make you feel small. I hate... That's the quickest way to get under my skin. Try to make in my... Like, make me feel small or make a person. or people around you.

Why are you doing that? To me, it says something about you. So I have a few officers that I definitely don't like personally myself. I have a few captains that I'm not going to say your name, but I do not like you and you know why I don't like you. But it's because you're trying to be disrespectful. And, you know, it's not just in a profession where there's authority figures, you know, you should

try to chill out with that. You're already an authority figure. Now, you mentioned that use of force was used a lot in your unit in the House of Pain unit. Why was that? And do you agree with use of force? Yeah, if you need to,

if you need to, yeah, here's my opinion. Like I said, respect is everything. You can't allow yourself to be disrespected in a housing area so you'll get

you'll get new bodies all the time you know you'll get one or two new bodies all the time they don't know you they don't you don't have a rapport with them you know which whatever side is it is they may have come from a place where they've had bad experiences with other offices so a lot of there are some there are a lot of inmates who are like

F every CO. Okay. That's how they feel. That's how they feel. But if you have somebody who is invading a space or attacking you or going to attack you or you. Yeah, you have to, of course. You got to defend yourself. And it's, it behooves of you to define yourself in a way that other people know if you have to defend yourself, you will at the drop.

of a dime because they'll, they're in that environment, right? If an inmate disrespects an inmate, it's almost, it's going to happen just that quick. And you have to respond in kind. If you don't, you'll be looked at like food. So that's not a position you want to put yourself. And that's why I also why I say, be who you are. If you're like, listen, man, I'm just going to. spray you if I have to. I'm not going to, I don't want to fight, but I'm going to spray you if I have to

get the team now here and do a report. And that's what you do. Spray them, do a report. If you're somebody who, you know, is one of those officers who want to come in and be like you just said, Robocop. You want to be Robocop and you want to beat your chest on everybody. That's the energy you're going to get back. So yeah, definitely there's, yes, there needs to be used as a force because there's really no other choice in that environment, you know? I don't want to jump around, but the gentleman who took my post, I don't remember the officer's name. I could get it to you later, but he was on the news, maybe a month or two after he took my post. When I finally left the department, inmates tried to cut his net.

I never had nothing like that happen. I'm not saying that's his fault, but I'm just saying how you treat these. You got to realize you're calling these people inmates. These people are men. The end of the day, they're men. They're going to react and they're in a bad situation. Like, jail is not a cool place.

You don't wake up in jail and go, oh, ah, good morning. You're in a place, man, mentally and physically where this is not for your enjoyment. It's a constant reminder of a punishment. You're away from everything and everyone that you love. You don't have freedoms for yourself. So you have this long of you list of things that are on your shoulders right now because you're in this jail. If you're away from your loved ones, what's your girl doing right now?

What's your kids doing? Are they safe? Do you got enemies out there? Are they looking at your family? Like, you got all of these things. that could possibly be going on. You're going to court. You're trying to see if you're going to get off

of whatever happened. The judge is not feeling you. You're feeling like, I'm going to be in jail for 30 years. You're all this demise, you know? You're contemplating all this stuff. And then here's the CEO. Yo, get over here, do this.

You'll go get that broom, sweep up this tear. Now, he's telling you talking to you like shit. it just goes along with the rest of the list, you know? So if he snaps on you, you're probably just one, one extra thing, you know? If I could just say, hey, Adams, can you come here for a minute, can you be my janitor for the day, you know, sweep up or whatever the case may be, you know, I don't know. I look out for you. I'll give you extra TV time while we're doing whatever.

Why wouldn't that be a better approach for me than saying, hey, dickhead, do that, like, why would I do that? You know, like, you're asking for certain things. So they tried to, the last officer that took over when I almost lost his life. That's where you work. And you have to treat it like, this is a place where I could lose my life, is what I'm saying. So, yeah, uses of forces are important because you could lose your life or how you respond or something. Now, you mentioned that the inmates respected you.

what's one way for an officer to lose respect by inmates? It's funny because everything right now is preferencing how this stuff can happen in jail, right? How can an inmate lose respect for an officer? It's like, to me it's the same with the street. Same with outside, you know. Don't be somebody who says you're going to do something you're not going to do. don't abuse an inmate. If you have to have a use of force,

have a use of force. Make your point. Make sure that you're safe. Be professional. Be professional. I mean, that's honestly what they pay you for. If you're fighting with me, boom, boom, boom, you're fighting with me.

Now you're on the floor. And I can, the team comes. I can handcuff you. Now there's four other officers around you. I'm not going to keep punch you in the face. It's over. Like, I think a lot of officers already are functioning at a deficit just because of the history of COs,

how they are typically seen. Like growing up in the 90s, it wasn't a good thing to be a cop. COs have a reputation too, you know what I mean? So you don't function at a deficit already. So now, when you're not working at a deficit already. you're there and it's just like the street. If you respect me as a man, I respect you as a man. It's only based off my actions.

You gave me an opportunity to be on the show. If somebody reached out to me and they needed something, I got it for him. Sure. If I'm communicative, I'm showing you with my actions what I care about or what I'm going to project. If I tell you, bro, I'm not doing an option or I'm not letting you. yourself until the next hour. And he was like, come on, man, let me in myself, let me in myself.

And then five minutes later, I just do it. He knows, all right, he asks me, just ask me four or five times you're going to do it. You know, people start to get, and they're like, you know, he's not serious or whatever the case we're being. Like, you know, they just watch your actions. That's all. So just watch your actions. Be the person, be the type of person that you will want to be.

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what I would say. Why did you leave Rikers Island? I'm trying to answer this the right way. I left because I felt betrayed. I felt like the department attorney back on me so in kind I had to go what happened so um there's a chain of events a little chain of events uh it was a time I got there was a time I got injured on the island um we used to have these doors these cell doors that slide and I was so broken

down, man. They used to open up electronically, but it doesn't work anymore. So they gave us, they used to give us these bars. I mean, this is really like a piece of metal. This is just a metal bar that you'd have to walk up it down and tear with both sides. Put the bar into like a lever on the top, click it, and then you can open a cell. And one time, one of the cell doors was really jammed. I couldn't get, it opened for the offender to get the inmate to get out. I was pulling on it, pulling on it, my right wrist, and I just heard a pop. So I chilled. I finished doing what I was doing.

I went up to the nurse. I had a look at it. They sent me out, and I injured my wrist. There was a tear, like I tore some things in my wrist. So I was out of work, I think maybe 60 days, and then I came out of flight light duty, and then I eventually went active duty. but I'm not mistaken if I was still on probation or not during that time period or not but even if you're on at work and you get injured at work and you have time out they hold it

against you so that came to be it got held against me because I had a altercation I had a use of force with with this this image on my particular on this particular day he had threatened to like in front of the whole housing and we were

kind of having words back and forth I wasn't letting him I just wasn't letting him move however he wanted to move because I knew the things that he was trying to do was assert his dominance over the housing area and we had some words back and forth and he like threatened

to cut my face. So my entire time on the island, out of the time I told you, I sprayed, I've had three physical altercations in the years that I was on the island. That was it. I never had an altercation that was, that I did in front of people, per se. Like, for example, let's say me. you, I'm a CEO and you're in my housing area, and me and you are bickering this day or whatever, right? Towards the end of my shift, I'll go to yourself, I'll let you out so we can go into

the day room privately because the day room's off the tier, and we can talk and see what the is the problem. So, in kinds, sometimes, an altercation would ensue like that, too. But I wasn't the person who would, if it's just me and you, I'm not the person who's going to hit my alarm. We just have an altercation. Okay. Cool. I'll be back to more home. So one particular inmate I had a, I had an issue with, um, and we had a, there was a, there was a use of force. There's a physical, I guess it was a use of force. You could say that. Brought him back to his cell. We had a pretty decent conversation, right? Cool. He threatens to cut my face on a tear um yelling at me y'all fuck i'll fucking cut your face that are oh so now man i'm now i'm upset

because we're going back and forth so you're telling me one i'm like you're going to cut my face so you must have something to cut my face that's one thing the second thing you're threatened to be in front of your entire gang because y'all are all different factions of bloods but y'all all bloods right all right cool for me you got to clear this up because I work here every day. All right, cool. So I went to lunch, put on my vests, because we have slap vests and slash vests.

I put on my vests just as a precaution. And then whatever ensued and suit later. And I didn't think much of it afterwards. It kind of like calmed down and mellow down. And my sons at the time, I had twin boys. So my sons at the time were, maybe 10, 9 or 10. They were just learning how to ride their bikes

where my wife and I had lived. At that time, we were in the Bronx in this area, and we had a front door and the back door, even though we lived in a building. Parkchester, what's up? So I came home one day. I'm not even thinking, like this happened, and then maybe a month later, two months later,

I came home and I used to use my back door a lot I had a pair prison shoes at my back door it was as if someone walked to my back door in my head it was like as if someone from Rikers

walked to my back door took off their shoes and left them and walked away just to give you some backstory to this there's lockers in my building I don't never leave home in uniform

I never why my uniforms at work who knows I live here and I saw in my head my sons riding their bikes in the back and somebody knowing that I live here I said okay seems like a message to me now what being saying that let me say this I don't there are a couple of people that I've encountered in jail that there are people that's just not going to like you. There are people that's not going to effort you. What I have, with that altercation is my most notable altercation that I have, and I didn't go into great detail,

but I'm not saying that that was the cause of the shoes. I don't know. It could have been totally random. It could have been someone else who saw me or noticed me or recognized me, who thought maybe they'll send me a message. I don't know. but you wanted me to know

that you knew where I lived if you put Patakis in front of my back door. Got you. Called the NYPD just to make a report. And at this time, I wasn't carrying a firearm. But I'll tell you this. As a young father, I'll take Shaquille O'Neal out for my kids. I don't care who you are.

Like, for my, for my family, that is the, that's the, that's the, that's the line for me. That's the line where there's no more chill. There's no more, don't play with that. I made a report. I spoke to the cops. They was kind of like Pataki's back door. Okay, well, it seems like a prank. And I'm, I'm like, y'all are so, we don't have the same job.

So you don't even, you probably. can't equate what it is that I'm saying. You don't see what I see every day. You don't answer these alarms every day. When you go in my building, it used to be alarms every day. People wouldn't even go out for lunch because they know they go out for lunch is going to be an alarm. You're suiting up. You're responding to something. You're responding to something. So after I made the police report, I go to my next tour. I go to whenever I'm next at the job. And I say, hey, I need to apply to carry my firearm because now I'm taking this as a threat. This is a direct threat.

Later on, I was denied a couple of days later for carrying because I was out so much because I was injured on a job. So you're going to tell me I'm doing your job, which I get hurt. doing your job, I come here and risk my life every day doing this job. And because I'm injured and I now have a presumed threat on where I live that you're going to deny me a fire on, how does that make sense? What way do you equate me being out on an injury to not giving me a gun because I have a threat that originates from my job at my home. Fuck y'all.

Fuck your job. Fuck your money. Fuck. Fuck all of that. This is my life. This is my family. Got you. All right.

For me not to go into that, because now, now I'm here now. You know what I'm saying? I'm like, all right. That's your final answer? Got you. Am I fucking with y'all? No.

I don't have time to play to see if this is a prank. You know how many times? How many times I've seen people I know grow up and be like, oh yeah, they're just playing. They end up in the dirt? You don't tell me I'm tired coming home one day. Someone's going to be just randomly around my back area or my lady walking with my kids and,

you don't know what could just happen. You don't know what could happen. And you're not even going to give me what I feel is the peace of mind to feel like I can protect my family doing a job where I risk my life every day, where I back my officers every day, where I care about, sue me, I care about, I care more for younger men growing up on a, mental a level, like trying to talk to them and trying to get them to do the right things, then older adults, man, you should know better.

But at the same time, because I'm not gung whole to beat up, tear up your commissary, curse you out, not give you toilet paper or soap, that makes me an inmate lover, so be it. if that's what you consider, guess what? Fuck you. I'm a good person. I'm a good person. That's what I care about. That somebody could call me on Facebook because they just had to say thank you.

That I get into an altercation because somebody threatens to cut my face while I'm working here. And I try to talk to them about it so I don't have any issues. and it ends up into a physical, little physical altercation. But later on, when things seem to come back to you and now it's threatening my home, the same people that pay me are going to not give me what I need to protect myself. I can have it. Fuck y'all. I'm not doing that.

I'm not putting, I'm not putting my family on a line. So what should I do after that? Say, okay, I'll just keep coming to work, working eight-hour shifts that turn to 16 because we're short. And I'm out of my home for 16 hours a day. And then when I do get off, I'm so tired. It takes me a day to recover. Then I got one day more day off. So guess what I'm doing?

Everything that needs to be done, so I'm still busy. It's not, it's already not allowing me what I feel. is the time I need to be a father to be present. No, that's not acceptable. I don't care how much money they pay you. You pay me, it doesn't matter. You're going to pay me to lose. Family, that's invaluable.

There's no price on that. That's not a for negotiation. So, yeah, I had to make other arrangements. Time to go. So you quit there and moved? I took a leave of absence. I ran out. We ran out of our place.

We took a leave of absence. Still stayed in New York for a little while. But, yeah, I wanted, you know, I wanted a different environment anyway. Change the scenery is always good. Change the scenery is good. I had so many people, you know, you wouldn't imagine how many people reached out to me. you know, I heard you left. Yo, how is it, man?

When you leave, how's the South? Yo, I'm thinking about moving. Like, so many people reached out to me. Like, some people didn't know. It's really the first time I'm talking about my story like this. Because, yeah, it's my story, but I'm not like, you know, you know what happened to me? You do this what happened to me. This is what.

It's just. You're not that type of person. Yeah, I'm not, you know, I'm not that chatty about it. It's like, yeah, stuff happens. You got to make moves. Like, what? It's no need to cry over spilled milk, man. It's just one plus one equals two.

Certain things are unacceptable to me. And my family's not negotiable. So I'd rather be safe than sorry when it comes to them. With me, fine. Do whatever you want to me. Put me. Put me in this area, that area, fine. When you go over there, I'm a totally different person about that.

So, yeah. What do you do now for work? You really want to know? Yeah. I work in a female prison now. Oh, so you're in a prison? Ah, you're back in the prison. I'm back in the prison now.

Well, my son's, my son's a 20 years old. So, you know, my lady and I were empty-nesters. Like, my son's 20 years old. I'd stayed in, I went to North Carolina, I stayed in corporate in sales for a while. It was cool, man, but now I'm just in a sense of I just wanted to go to a job where I just have to show up and do the job, you know. And it's a lot. Having the experience of Rikers. It's probably a whole different ballgame over there.

It's a whole different ballgame, but it's honestly, it's a different ballgame because there's different ballgame because there's different things you have. have to worry about in a women's prison. They're not as aggressive as men. There's certain things that are definitely different, but the environment, the officers, the long hours is, I've been exposed to it. You know, it's kind of like being sprayed. It's not, doesn't affect me as much anymore. I don't have to worry about going home and some, some inmate finding out where I live and, you know, this, that, and the third. Like, I like, I like calm, man. I like peace. I like peace. I like, simple. And aren't you also working on media and a couple other projects you were talking about? Yeah, yeah. Actually, thank you for asking about that. When my sons got, when they graduated high

school, went off to college, I just felt I felt like I could turn a little bit more into my passions. So I started doing stuff. I started writing more music. I started jumping into, I started jumping into I started auditioning for like little independent films. I got in a couple of independent films. I'm writing now. I wrote a whole entire series on my experiences on Rikers. It's actually called Life on the Island. So I'm just, man, I just, I want to get on.

I really wanted to be a series where it's on like a Netflix or Stars or something where you could just see that progression. Because I really, in hindsight, I love the experience, even though everything's not, wasn't good. But it was so, man, there's so much to unpack there, you know? There's so much to unpack to see how this big gangster kid

goes to thanking this CO for this. Or this CEO who's not, was the street kid, goes into the jails and how that experience, you know, um, treats him because when you're a CO, yes, there are people that in jail. It makes their offenders, right?

But you're doing time. You get to go home, but you're doing time as well. You can't leave that. That's not a job that you just leave on the table. And you're just like, oh yeah, you know, I'm just pick it up and clock. And you're thinking about it.

There's serious things that are going on. There's things that you have to make sure you keep watch over your mind for love. When I was on Rikers Island, I used to kind of dread when I had a bunch of days off. Like if I were going on a little vacation or something, not dread it, but I'll be like, I know something's going to happen because I don't know if you had this experience, but if they have respect for you, they're not going to pop on your tour, right? They're just not. They, yeah, we're not going to give you no paperwork to do.

We're going to, we're going to chill out, V, blah, blah, blah. But when I would go on vacation, I'd be like, oh, man, I'm going for like a week. Like, what's going to happen over there? And it's a hell of an environment because you're always on 10 or close to it. So I've had verbal communications with police officers because of, you know, it, who just, I feel like doing overzealous things. And I'm like, you know, I'm a CEO of myself, like, chill out. Or I remember at the time, my wife felt that me like I was crazy.

But we were in this store a long time ago. We was in this clothing store. And I had, we were just shopping. And apparently I had something on my shoulders and a stranger who I don't, know, like brushed it off my shoulder, I flipped out. Like, fuck, like, you don't know me? But I was, yeah, I was turped up. So I kind of decompressed. When I went to North Carolina, it's so crazy. I was there for maybe six or seven months. And I was like, I was working at Spectrum. I was working at the cable company. And I was like, yo, it's so crazy. Like, I haven't gotten

into any verbal or physical altercations at months. Like, I was going through withdrawal. Like, we, no arguments, no nothing. Like, no sirens, I didn't hear nothing. I was like, yo, this is crazy that I've been accustomed to this so much that now that I'm not in it, it's like this calm is weird, you know? But yeah, I'm working on a lot of things. I want to continue to do acting, which I will continue to pursue because that was one of

my passions as a kid growing up, you know. And I definitely want to do this series, like, Fuller Island, I think I was a huge power fan. I love power. You know, we had Gianni on the show. I saw. That plays Braden and Teresa. I mean, Patricia Callumber, who played Tommy's mom.

Okay. I did see Gianni out on your wall out there, man. Yeah, we have a couple force actors coming on the show. That's dope. That's dope. Tommy is like, Tommy's incredible. But I loved it from the first one, I watched them all. And, um, we were watching it in prison.

Were you? Yeah, that's how I found out about it. I used to watch it. I think stars used to let you see it at like 12 midnight. I would wait. I would wait to 12 midnight. Like, my friends would hate me because I'd be on Facebook like, did you see power? They'd be like, spoil.

Like, it's spoiling it. And I'm like, I'm sorry. It really is the best show. It was what to. It would have blown up even more if it was on a different network, like a Netflix or something. Think so good. Yeah. Yeah.

But that's the kind of suspense that I want to have. have in Life on the Island. So I've reached out to a couple of people. Nobody's reached back yet, but I'm stalking a couple of people. It takes time, man. It does. You know it's consistency in time. I've learned you don't rush the process and everything comes to you at the exact moment

it's supposed to. I feel that. I agree with that. Absolutely. Well, I appreciate you coming on the show today, brother. Absolutely, man. Thanks. It's been a, it's been super fun.

Thanks, man. Good. I'm glad you enjoy it. And thanks for supporting the show, man. Absolutely. We'll continue to. Awesome. Alright.