Locked In with Ian Bick - Inside America's Most Corrupt Women’s Prison — What I Saw As A Guard Was Shocking | John Meekins

Episode Date: April 14, 2026

John Meekins joins Locked In with Ian Bick to share his experience working as a correctional officer inside one of Florida’s most notorious women’s prisons. After leaving the Air Force, John entered the Florida Department of Corrections and spent nearly 13 years at Lowell Correctional Institution, a facility known for corruption, trafficking, and abuse. In this episode, he breaks down what it was really like working inside a women’s prison, the realities of the job, and how he worked his way up to Sergeant. He also talks about the corruption he witnessed firsthand, including contraband and staff misconduct, the mental toll of working in corrections, and the moments that changed how he viewed the system. _____________________________________________ #PrisonGuard #CorrectionalOfficer #PrisonStories #WomensPrison #CorruptPrison #TrueCrimeStories #JailLife #lockedinpodcast _____________________________________________ Connect with John Meekins: http://www.johnomeekins.com _____________________________________________ 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 Inside Florida’s Women’s Prison (Full Story) 02:00 Becoming a Prison Guard in Florida 05:00 First Day in Prison: Culture Shock & Reality 10:00 Prison Scams, Hustles & Survival Tactics 13:00 Pen Pal Scams & Sugar Daddy System 18:00 Human Trafficking Inside Prison 22:00 Reporting Corruption & Internal Pushback 28:00 Tax Fraud Schemes & Prison Corruption 33:00 Staff Misconduct & Abuse in Prison 40:00 Underfunded Prisons & System Failures 46:00 Staff-Inmate Relationships & Exploitation 52:00 Fighting Human Trafficking Beyond Prison 57:00 Prison Politics & Reentry Challenges 01:04:00 Gangs & Relationships in Women’s Prisons 01:13:00 Notorious Inmates & Prison Stories 01:20:00 Florida vs Ohio Prison System 01:26:00 Advice for Prison Reform & Change 01:31:00 Lessons Learned & Speaking Out To advertise on the show, contact [e-mail] or visit https://advertising.libsyn.com/LockedInWithIanBicka Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Start comparing hundreds of sites with kayak and get your trip right. Bad advice? You talking to me? Kayak. Got that right. trafficking ring that was operating out of that door. Women started coming up and show me letters from their pimps. And I was like showing these letters to the to the warden and showing them to the captains and stuff. And they're like, well, that's not human trafficking. Nobody really wanted to do anything about it. My name is John Meekins. And I've worked in

prisons and with inmates for at Lowell Correctional Institution for 13 years. And I've worked in a halfway house now for five and a half years. John Meekins talks about working nearly 13 years, inside one of Florida's most corrupt women's prisons, the trafficking, staff misconduct, and what really goes on behind the walls. I grew up in Columbus, Ohio, pretty much. I was born in New Hampshire, but my dad, he was a journalist, and so he transferred from, you know, a couple different newspapers. And so we pretty much I grew up in Columbus, Ohio, from about the time I was four.

And then I went in the military, and then I wound up in New Jersey. for seven years in the Air Force. And then I wound up living in central or central Florida. And so I was living in this pretty small community. It's Ocala, which is probably like about an hour north of Orlando. And the whole reason that I got into criminal justice is because there were no other jobs around this place other than like the hospital, you know, working on in horse farms or working in the prisons. And so I was just, one day some guy comes in and when I was working this

little store, when I was just getting there. And he said, hey, yeah, you don't come out to this prison to sign up and get a job there. He said, you know, they're building some dorms and, you know, they're going to need, you know, they've got a hundred more beds going in. And so anyway, I just, I really didn't know anything about prison until I started working there. And I never, none of my family had ever been to prison. I didn't know, none of my friends went to, I went to, I went to, I went to, I went to high school with probably like 600 people in my class and I don't know anybody's dad that was in prison or went to jail. I just didn't know anybody like that. And then finally I went to I went to this women's prison and I applied and I didn't know anything about it but it was just like culture shock.

Just like standing there and you know going in this dorm one day on this first you know I'm sitting there thinking it's going to be everybody can be locked up in cells and handcuffs and it's going to be you know, like you see in the prison movies, you know, and it wasn't. I mean, I just like at a, you know, you walk outside and there's a yard and there's people walking all over the place. Like nobody's like in handcuffs. And it was just like a really amazing. Like I would be standing in a bubble in the officer station, you know, you can see into the dorm.

And I'd see people like crunching up like things like Cheetos and putting water. from the water fountain into the potato chips and then like smashing them on the ground. And I'm sitting there saying, what the hell are these people doing? And it was really wild because it took, it was like at least three years going there every day before I stopped learning like finding out something crazy. You know, like just like all the, I was just like always interested in like the scams. And I have a degree in business. I went to the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. It's like a really pretty impressive business school, but I wound up working in prisons.

And so I was like always putting my business, like marketing, you know, hat on. And I was always like looking at the way these people survive from a business perspective. And that was always like extremely fascinating for me. Just like I say, the way that these people scam and the way that people survive and they make money and they make a living in prisons. What was one scam that stuck out to you? The pin pal scam. Just like the way that these women would, you know, write these men and you would go in the day room, right? And there would be some woman and she'd have all these girls in there writing letters to like all these different men.

And she was like, well, this guy, he's like a pervert and he's into, you know, he's into, you know, being tied up and stuff like that. He's like a sub and a slave or whatever. And so, you know, you need to write these kind of dirty letters to him. And then, you know, so they write like maybe two or three letters. And if the guy didn't start sending him money, they'd stop writing them. And it was amazing. Like, how many, like, lonely loser dudes are out there? And it was really funny, too, because I had another inmate with saying, well, you know,

we just got a list of, like, sex offenders. off the internet and somebody mailed it in so we just started like writing all these guys dirty letters like nasty dirty letters and she goes eventually like three or four of them it starts you know sending you money and sending you stamps and to me that was like really crazy but it's actually pretty clever because you know a lot of like the sugar daddies and stuff or you know if they live nearby they're going to want to get on your visitation list and come see you but if you have a sex offender no way he's coming to visitation. And so now you don't have to waste your time, you know, kissing some guy on the mouth. It's like, you know, there's a nasty looking dude.

You know, and so, but, you know, it was really amazing just like all the old men that would be coming into visitation and every weekend to see some girl. And he's just like putting, you know, hundreds of dollars on their books like all the time. And then. The girl gets out and, you know, he shows up to pick her up on the day she's getting out, right? And all of a sudden, it's like, well, she left with some other guy, you know, two hours ago. And then another hour later, another guy shows up. You might have like three or four guys coming to pick up the same woman. It's like, well, she's been gone, you know, or she left yesterday.

Would some of these men ever talk to you or some of the other officers and ask for the 4-1-1 or try to get a scoop on any of these women at all? I was in the visitation a lot, and I was actually kind of friendly with some of the sugar daddies or whatever. And I never really told them that they were getting ripped off. But it was funny because I used to like, because these guys, they were like financing a lot of the tobacco trade

and like the, you know, and I couldn't believe that they would, like this one guy, he came in, and he was getting patted down. And I guess when they patted them down to come in, they went too high when they were like checking his junk or whatever. And he had this great big ball of tobacco came out of his crotch. And some way he got sent home. And then the inmate got sent back to the dorm.

And then I went and I was like listening to the phone call after she went home. Or after he went home. And he's like, well, you know, they were patting me. down and they went a little bit too far and they hit that big ball of tobacco and it came out of my pant leg and they said what's that? And he goes, so they sent me home and he said

well I'm going to call the warden on Monday and see if she'll let me you know come back because I'm like your only source for the free world or whatever and I'm an amazing they let the guy come back

he was only suspended for like you know three months or something. And the fact that they would just, but these guys, they would, there were like three sugar daddies, right? There were these three guys, right? And I just wanted to see, because they were like, I would see like the bank statements every month.

They would hand out like the, you know, the little thing for their emmate trust fund showing who sent them money that month. And some way, I would go through them for the whole prison. And all of a sudden, I'd see like one guy be putting money. like on several different inmate books. And I'm sitting like, well, who's this guy? And then I'd look him up in the computer, right? And so I'd figure out, well, it's this person.

And then so I'd listen. It just seemed like every time you picked up the phone, like these people, certain people called, there would be like hundreds of dollars in transactions are being made. Hey, I need you to send this person, you know, I need you to go down to Walmart. And I need you to go get a money gram. and this is the, I need you to, you know, send it to this person and it's going to this number. And then I need you to put $50 on this person's books. And it was crazy just like, so like there were these three guys that were like pretty much like big hitters in that prison.

And they did $62,000 between the three of them in a year. They were sprinkling on the books of the inmates. What was the most amount of money you saw in one account over your time there? We had a one woman, and her account would be around 50,000. It would be like fluctuate, and she would have $15,000 fluctuations in her inmate account, like, every month. You know, and it was this guy, and he was, like, making all these transactions. And they think that some people were suspecting that she was, like, trafficking, like, other inmates, like, when they got out, you know. and so that's when I started getting into the

when I started like looking into these scams and stuff I just thought it was like I just thought it was just fascinating just like all the business skills that these people had as far as you know making money and just all the ways that they would you know skim you know just like you know buying the whole tobacco thing was really bad because before when I first started, the inmates were allowed to smoke on the compound. For years, they were allowed to smoke.

And that was really cool. But then one year, they decided in 2010 that they were going to eliminate the cigarettes and the tobacco on the compound, but the employees could bring it in. And what was really crazy was all the money that we had fined cash on the compound. I mean, they were finding inmates

with like hundreds of dollars like in their pockets and stuff. And, yeah, they were paying staff because the staff were allowed to bring in cigarettes. And I remember one day we had this one officer. She came in and the people like doing the bags and tags when you come in the prison, they're going through her lunchbacks and stuff. They were like, what are you doing with the carton in Newport?

And then she goes, oh, I just started smoking. I'm going through a divorce. And I'm going through a divorce. So I started chain smoking. and nobody ever saw this officer smoking at all. And this one guy said, so he was like outside. He was like working a little medical in the pill line area. And he like looks over.

He sees this officer from this dorm that had the cart and his cigarettes walking around. And he's like, hey, you got a light. And she's like, I don't have a lighter. And she didn't have a lighter, right? But, you know, but then like a couple days later I found like, 17 packs of Newport's on an inmate in her dorm, right? And in some way, I was, like, so excited because that was, like, the biggest bust. Because I was, like, the contraband king.

But, like, in the women's prison, I mean, like, like, a big thing might be just, like, you know, finding, like, maybe, like, maybe, like, maybe, like, some money or something like that. But I got this inmate. I got, like, the 17 and a half packs of newports. like so excited and the captain he's like now now me because when you send her to the hole when you when you when you when you when you send her to jail and I said hey captain I said I don't like care if she goes jail or not he goes she got to go to jail and and and I said why I got 17 packs of Newports what else you're going to do to her I mean what could you possibly do to her than that's like this like you know 14 dollars for one cigarette like for times you know some you know

those like 17 and a half packs or whatever. And he goes, he said, well, she got to go to jail. Somebody's going to whip her ass for losing that, right? And then so anyway, then he's like, I'm like, all right, I'll tell us to jail. And he's like, now when you write the ticket, you know, for the discipline, and it's like, hey, I don't care if she beats it or not. I don't care if I write a good or not. It's like 17 and a half packs of cigarettes.

I mean, what more can you do to her? I mean, there's nothing you're going to do. her. You can send her to the hole for like three months. It's like, who cares? She's not like $5,000 worth of cigarettes, you know? Why do you get the name Contraband King? Because I was like really good at, um, at doing like, you know, it taking people stuff because I, I, I knew, like, I would, like, I would like read like the policy procedure is called chapter 33. I'd read and I knew everything. Like, I knew, um, so a lot of times, you know, you might have a lot of people there in prison for life. and, you know, one time I had an inmate, she was, like, really pissed me off

because she was, like, just, like, ignoring me. And she's like, hey, it's hard. She goes, that's all right. She goes, I got six life sentences, you know. She goes, I've been to the whole, I had, like, 14 disciplinary reports last month. She goes, what's another one going to do to me, right? And so the next day, all of a sudden, I saw her walking out of the yard. She had, like, a whole bag of, like, stolen radios and stuff that she was going to go sell

and, you know, some, like, sweat. and some chips. And so I confiscated it, and I threw it all in the counterband locker. And I wrote her a DR, right? I didn't really care about the DR, but I knew that they weren't going to give back the contraband. And all of a sudden, she starts crying and stuff. That's how you get them.

You know, that's how you get the inmates is, you know, take their stuff. You know, especially, like I say, they're especially, there are certain inmates that they just really got to have, like, everything. They got to have, like, a full bank, you know, full locker. And, you know, so that was my way of, like, getting it. This episode is brought to you by Redfin. You're listening to a podcast, which means you're probably multitasking, maybe even scrolling home listings on Redfin, saving homes without expecting to get them.

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Someone on Deepop wants what you've got. Start selling now. Where Taste recognizes taste. Getting at them. So did the inmates like you or not like you? It's funny because most of them liked me. Yeah, the one that's like, if you weren't causing problems, like if you weren't, you know, if you're doing what you're supposed to do, I didn't harass anybody. And the thing is, is I don't think I ever abused people.

I think maybe they might thought that I was like mean to them or something like that. But I never like beat anybody up. I probably used force like maybe like in 13 years that I worked in the women's prison. I probably used force like maybe five times. And most of the time it's just like spraying somebody. And so it's not like I didn't, I never knocked out anybody's teeth. I never split anybody's head open anything like that. But in all the years that I worked there, you know, people get out of prison.

and they like looked me up on Facebook and nobody ever said that they wanted to come whip my ass which is like really cool. It's a good way to gauge if you were like they're not. Yeah, yeah. It's like I, and then, you know, every now and then it was funny because, you know, in most states there's only like one or two women's prisons

in any state. And so anybody had ever went to prison in Florida, it's like I worked with them, you know, I knew them all. And so I could be like in Key West or I could be like two hours away like in Tampa. And this might be at a flea market and all of a sudden somebody's like, Mr. Meekins, what are you doing here? And I'm sitting there like, I'm like, how do I know you? And it's like, you don't remember me from Lowell?

And I'm like, hold on to me. I'm sitting there at Google and trying to figure out who they are and stuff, trying to like figure out if I'm going to get stabbed or not. And it's really cool because I feel like if I ever like ran into any of those people in a bad neighborhood, they'd like go out and say, oh, hey, he's all right. Just leave him alone. He's good guy. You know, he's not going to, you know, I just really feel like I had a pretty good camaraderie with a lot of the women. And it's kind of funny because just some like, like the human trafficking stuff that I was doing in the prisons.

stuff. I turn in from like a bad guy into a good guy because I spent a lot of time like getting them free attorneys. You know, some of the women that I worked with. And, you know, I did a lot

of like outreach with, um, I worked with like the attorney general's office and stuff like that from when I was, um, when I, I kind of stumbled into the, that world. What do you mean by human trafficking in prison? What is that?

Um, I was talking to you a little bit earlier, but when I started in the prison, I wanted to be like really good at like certain, certain things. And I ended up getting, like, joining the Florida Gang Investigators Association. And I went to like, you know, some of their little conferences and I'd, I was learning about bloods and crips and all this stuff. And I'd say, wow, this is really fascinating. And then I would meet some of these other, like, gang detectives and stuff. They say, wow, you're a, you're a, oh, you work in a prison. It's like, yeah, they go, wow, that must be exciting.

You must be surrounded by gangs. It's like I am. And then they say, well, where do you work? What prison? And they said, why work at Lowell? They go, isn't that at the women's prison? And they'd say, yeah. And they'd say, oh, that's not real gangs.

And they'd, like, roll their eyes and they walk away. And so I started feeling really disrespected, you know, because they'd, didn't really think that there were any like women gangbangers. And some way, um, I ended up seeing an ad for a class on human trafficking. And some way, I didn't know anything about human trafficking. I knew nothing about it. And some way, I ended up taking this class and it was like two days. And it was, um, all is like a, it's the, um, international association of human trafficking investigators. And it was a like the first annual conference. And some way, I attended and I was in this big room and they were asking people in the room,

raise your hand if you deal with human trafficking on a regular basis in your job. And I was like the only person in that whole room that didn't raise their hand. I felt like a big loser. But I went back to the second year and I guarantee you I had more experience with human trafficking than anybody in that conference that year. Because I went back to the prison where I was. working and I was a sergeant by now and I said my I had a dorm that was like my dorm that I worked all the time and so anyway one day I came back from this conference and I stood up in this dorm and I

said hey you know I just took this class in human trafficking and I said it was really fascinating and I have a feeling that some of you might know stuff something about it and if you ever want to like tell me about it or whatever you know we can yeah I won't like put you out there or whatever I'll be you respectful and so next saying, I know women started coming up and showing me letters from their pimps. And I'm sitting there looking at these letters. It's like, and there was a human trafficking ring that was operating out of that dorm. Like that exact dorm where I was in the prison.

And some way, it's like, well, well, what's this? And they sold, well, there's this guy, Rick Rawls. He's in Orlando. And, you know, he's picking up all these girls. He's taken to his house in Orlando. and he's like pimping them out and making them. And he's like, put money on all their books. And every time, you know, and I'm like, what are you talking about?

And they started, like, showing me these letters from this guy. And he was, like, writing letters to these women. And he had, like, really nice handwriting. But he was, like, in his 70s. But I, like, pulled up his, I looked him up. Like, I pulled up his, like, criminal history. And he'd been in prison, like, nine times. And he'd been in prison for, like, rape, strong-arm robbery,

or strong-arm rape, all these, like, drug crimes and stuff like that. And I mean, this guy, he was like, he was like a really big crook or, you know, big time criminal. And so I started like seeing these letters that he was writing. And, you know, he would pick,

he would pick girls up. And then he'd like make the girls that he picked up write other girls and say, hey, how great it was. And, you know, he's like, well, I saw your picture on the internet. And wow, you look, and it says right here you're like 180 pounds. I know the thing isn't, I know that website isn't exact,

you know, exact or whatever, but, you know, you probably need to trim down if you want to be my girl. And he's like, have you ever been like anybody's bottom bitch? And, you know,

and I'm sitting there, what's the bottom bitch? And it's like the, that's like the head, like the head prostitute, you know, that's working for the, now he's like keeping all the other girls in,

in check. And I just, and I couldn't believe what I was like seeing. And some way I went and I told my captain and they're like, well, that's not human trafficking because, you know, what he would do is he would use like the website for the prison. And he would like, you could get a list of like all the girls that were getting out of prison in the next, you know, 90 days, just like going on the website. Or he would have like girls in the dorm and she's like, well, I just got to prison. and I need some money for Cheetos and stuff.

And he's like, well, you're not doing anything for me. And, well, there's this girl in my dorm and she's going home in like another month or two. And she likes to party and she's into this and she's into that. And so he'd start like writing letters. It was like pretty much it was like all letters. It was all mail. And so he'd just like writing these girls friends. And he'd sit there and say, well, you know, I'll pick you up.

And, you know, you need to dress like this. I need to know your sizes and stuff. And so he was, you know, he'd like look on the website and he could see everything about him. And he, you know, they'd say, well, you know, she's, she likes this kind of drug or this narcotics or whatever. And I couldn't believe I was like reading this one letter this inmate wrote back. And she's like, man, he was here at 1201, just like he said, you know. He said, first stop, Wendy's. I had a, you know, I had a frosty with, you know, French fries and all this stuff.

And then she goes, I got to the house. and she's like, I smoked a dilauded and ate of Xanax and smoked some crack. And she's like, talking about all the drugs that she did. And then she's like saying, well, there's, now she starts listing off all the girls that are in the house and like they're not allowed to leave. And she's talking about how, you know, you're not allowed to go anywhere or do anything, you know, without them present and stuff like that. And she's like, I just left one place where they tell you what to do and how to do it and when. And that's exactly what it's like here. You know, and I was, like, showing these letters to the, to the warden and showing them to the captains and stuff.

And they're like, well, that's not human trafficking. It's like, well, did you take a class in human trafficking? And they're like, no. And I said, well, I did. You know, they're like, you know, human trafficking, when you think about it, it's kind of like, it's like a little, there's like a little chart. It's called the AMP model. It's like the action means purpose. and the action would be recruiting, you know, the recruitment part, you know, enticing, luring.

And then, you know, the means would be, you know, through fraud force or coercion, you know, like, you know, telling these people how great it's going to be and then it's not or whatever. And then the purpose would be like for sex, you know, for the sex trade. Or it could be for labor, forced labor. And so based on my understanding from the laws, you know, that's what it looked like to me, but I kept getting pushback. They're saying, well, we don't have human trafficking here, but it's like, we don't have reports of it. And it's like, well, I just made one.

And I would get so much pushback from my agency. I was, like, under investigation all the time for it. And then I started, like, going to conferences, and I started speaking. I started doing, I started showing people, like, the letters. And I started showing them, like, here, he picked up this girl, this girl. this girl. And then they all went to the same address, the same house. And then I said, if you Google the guy's phone number, this is the phone number. Like, you know, when the girl's getting ready to get out of prison, like they go down to the office and they, you know,

the classification says, well, where are you going to go? It's like, well, I'm going to go this house. And this guy's picking me up. And they say, well, let's call him and make sure he knows what day it, what time and all this stuff. And so you would Google the phone number. It's like all these escort ads pop up, like on, on, like, um, like all these prostitution ads. And so my, um, I just showing them, it's like, look all these ads and look all these girls. And this guy's got, like, he's, he's got a phone number, but he's like listing all these girls for available. And you're calling him and he's like picking them up. Like the same guy. And he's a rapist. Look at all these, like, you know, he's got all these sex crimes. And they're saying, well,

meekins, if that's what you, if that's what they want to. do and I'd say well how do you know that's what they want to do are you allowed and and I said did you ask them if they want to go with a rapist or whatever and they're just like oh you can't tell them to somebody else's crime it's like you're not allowed to tell people what other people's crimes are and it's like it just like really nutty to me you know and so I ended up pretty much going like the human trafficking conferences around the country and I started like talking about what was happening in my prison. And then I ended up getting, going to criminal justice,

like the American Corrections Association, I started going to their conferences. I started talking to the prison people about the human trafficking that I was finding in the Florida prisons. And at first I would have thought it would have been like, maybe it's like a, it only happens there, but then I had people from Indiana content. me, the state of Indiana, because they'd seen me speak, and they wanted me to talk to them

about what I was finding. And then three or four months later, they called me, and they're like, wow, we found the same thing going on in our prison, right? And then, you know, I went, I went to the Ohio prisons, and, you know, I was on vacation or whatever. I went up there and talked to their prison people about the human trafficking that was going on in my prison. And they said, wow, hey, you know, we found this one girl. They said that, you know, she's keeping track of people sizes and stuff on her little, on her tablet or whatever. And, you know, she's, you know, so, you know, she's making money off of whoever this guy picks up.

And so it was just like really fascinating, just like how. And that's one thing that I learned from the prisons is that if something is happening in one prison, like I used to think that, like, you know, Suboxone was only happening in one prison, but come to find out it's happening in all the prisons. Another one that was really big was like tax fraud. And I couldn't believe, like, you know, when I was in the gang investigator stuff, I kept hearing these people from the jails and like these other prisons would say, hey, you know, we got this big problem with tax fraud in the jails.

And the way it works is people would go around and they would collect the names in the, in the social security numbers and the dates of birth. of other inmates. And they'd say, hey, you know, my friend on the street, he does taxes. And if you give me your information, we'll give me your name, your date of birth, and your social. And I'll send it out to him. He's going to do turbotax.

And when it comes through, I'm going to give you $100 on your books, right? And so a lot of people would do that. And there'd be, like, one person is like the collector. And you would see, like, people writing out the little business plan. I'm going to go get 10 tax refunds and I'm going to get $1,000 each. And then my buddy on the street, he's going to do the tax refund for just under $10,000 because if it's under $10,000, the IRS won't touch it. Because, you know, it's got to be over $10,000 for the IRS even, you know, for the FBI does anything about it, you know, about fraud.

And so, I was like, I'd like talking to the people from, like, the federal. prison and stuff and they're like, oh yeah, that's really bad. And I said, well, what's it looked like? You go, well, if you see this, he's like, pulls out these little papers. Like, this is what it looks like. It's like a list of names and stuff. And so I just, like, started looking around the prison.

And I would, like, I would, like, go in the office and I'd pull up, like, a list of inmates that were in prison for fraud, like some kind of, like, financial fraud. And I'd go look in their lockers, and I start going through their address books. And there it is. It's everywhere, like the tax fraud. And suddenly, the first couple times I'd find it, right? And then I'd write them up and I send a couple of them to the hole for, you know, fraud or whatever. And then the first couple times, you know, the captain and stuff, they're like, hey, Mika, that's a nice job, man.

You're like the fraud king or whatever. And it's like, I'm like, thanks. It's like, wow, this is really cool. Like, I'm really like doing something about crime, like in prison. and all of a sudden, next day and I, I'm, like, starting getting called into people's office. They're going, well, that's not really your job. You go, you know, if you want to join the FBI, you know, my brother did the same thing, you know, but you're not an investigator.

And I sit there, I said, well, I just do a shake. You always do shakedowns. And, like, I guess they just want us to go in there and get, like, the extra soaps or, you know, the stuff that's stolen from the chow hall, like the onions and or the bleach, you know, that they steal. and but I would all of a sudden I would start getting pushback because it occurred to me that, you know, after a while I would like talk to like, I'd be called to a warden's office, you know, about, well, you know, you really shouldn't be doing all that. That's not your job. That's somebody else's job to be finding, you know, the tax fraud and the human trafficking stuff. And I'd sit there, I'd say, well, yeah, there's a lot of tax fraud.

And they'd say, well, you know, we haven't had any reports. tax fraud. It's like, well, that's because, you know, you used to jump on my butt about it when I used to do it. So now instead of, like, writing them up, I'd just take it and throw it in the trash. I confiscate it. And, you know, that way they can't have it or like the identity theft. And so it occurs to me that, you know, the lack of reports, like, when you start reporting something, that's when I would get in trouble because, like, they didn't want problems. Like they didn't want people realizing that what goes on in their prisons. And they didn't, in the very last thing that they wanted,

they wanted anything that was going on in their prisons to be in the news. And so I remember like the, remember Ginger Wolf, she was in my prison at the time where I had an assistant warden. And, you know, I was doing, I was confiscating a lot of like really good contraband. And this is like during the time that the cigarettes and stuff were like really big, like with the, um, and some way there's this warden. And he was like, really, you could tell that he was like really into women, like the inmates. Like he was like, yeah, they, he ended up, um, you could tell like he had inmates that were his,

like best friends almost, you know, like the hugged thug. But he was like really into like the cute Spanish girls. or the, you know, the cute little white girls, but he didn't like, you could tell he didn't like black girls because, but he was like a magnet for, like, certain inmates. And he would, like, get inmates moved in with their girlfriends, like, you know, into the dorms together. Where you're walking into a dorm and next thing,

you know, these two girlfriends are, like, the biggest problem on the compound. And they're, like, right next to each other. Like, they're moved in, like, you know, like right next to each other on the, on the two beds or whatever in a dorm. And it's like, oh, that's because, you know, that's, that's, because Marty did that or whatever. And so anyway, he had like certain inmates that were like his like, you know, he protected. And so I shook down a couple of them one day.

And he got so mad because they got mad because like this one woman, she, she, I went through her stuff and she had like a really expensive pair of sunglasses like polo sunglasses. And we don't sell those on the compound. Yeah, we saw 99 cents. sunglasses, but she had like $100 sunglasses in her locker. And so I get called in this office and this guy, he's like, man, you're going to get your ass kicked. He kept telling me I was going to get my ass kicked. I've got to get my ass beat and all this stuff.

And I could believe like how mean and nasty he was like really, really angry. And in some way, he kept telling me I was going to get my ass beat. And so I went and I went and did an incident report. and then I called the police law. I called the sheriff's office, and I filed a report with them. This guy was threatening that he's got to get my ass beat. It's like, I don't want him beating my ass.

And because, and then I called the Miami Herald because they were, like, investigating the prison. And so I told the reporter for the Miami Herald because they were doing, like, a big investigation. And so they ended up, like, looking into it. And the guy, he ended up getting fired. And then they did like a big piece in this series that they were doing on like all the corruption that was going on in the prison where I worked. And but, yeah, it's just, it's really fascinating just, you know, like all the, all the politics and all the.

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and we'll come to you with a check in hand. Your car, your timeline, your terms. Visit Carvana.com to sell your car today. Carvana. Pick up fees may apply. all the stuff that goes on in a women's prison. What was some of the corruption you were seeing in there, aside from what you were just describing with the warden?

The biggest thing that I was seeing is that they knew, like the prisons there were so underfunded. Like, you know, they were, you know, the prisons in Florida, there's like the biggest agency, the Florida Department of Corrections. It's the biggest agency in the state of Florida. the biggest budget. And so they were like really, really cutting the budget.

But they were, they would like look the other way at a lot of stuff because they, like I say, like these guys that were the three guys sent in $62,000 all like all over the inmate books or whatever. Nobody, nobody really wanted to do anything about it because the idea was that, hey, you know, if you don't have any incident reports. about certain things happening, you know, like fraud or, or, you know, like pre-a-type stuff.

If you don't have those, if you don't have instant reports, well, then you don't have a problem. You know, and so, so like I say, they, you know, if, if it's not reported, there's no problems.

But they didn't really care that an inmate was getting money by scamming somebody's granddad out of his life savings, you know, through the, through the pen pal websites, even though it was illegal, because, you know, the inmates, they're not allowed to advertise for pen pals, but they didn't do anything about the inmates that were sending out ads for pin pals,

even though, hey, this girl just put an ad out, and it's right there on the website and stuff. Can't you use a flight writer a ticket? And they could, no, anybody could have put that on there. You know, somebody could have done that for her. And then, but you could see there's like this big pin pal business, right? And they didn't really care that inmates were like, gaming people out of money or people that are like the sugar daddy's coming to visitation because they're putting so much money on the books that the women, they didn't have to feed and clothe

these women. They didn't have to spend the prison's money because they were spending the sugar daddy's money. So for every $100 that an inmate gets, they don't have to feed that inmate properly. The food in the child hall was nasty. You know, there's like, you know, it's like old and rotten a lot of times. sour, like sour milk or spoiled milk or the amounts of food that they would get would be like really small compared, like, as far as like serving size. If you're brand new in prison in Florida and you're coming into the prison in the women's,

they would give you, they would give you clothes that have been probably like you're like the third or fourth person that's had those because, you know, they would give you like use clothes. They would never give you a brand new uniform getting to prison. for some reason. But if you had $14 or whatever, you could probably pay like the clerk. Like, you know, you could give her $14 worth of whatever,

and she might steal a nice uniform for you, you know, from the back or whatever. But so they would like undercloth these people and they would give them shoes with big holes in the soles. And, you know, like the, like rotted leather, you know, and just very uncomfortable with no shoelaces. And so the whole thing was, well, if you don't like it, you can buy your own off the,

catalog or you could buy your own, you know, on the prison somewhere, or you buy it from the commissary or the canteen. And it's like I say, they would just underclothe these people. They would not clothe them and they would not feed them right. And like in Ohio, the inmates, they get, I worked in Ohio prisons too, and they get, they call it state pay. It's like $18 a month. You know, and that's for, that's to pay.

for like their hygines. But in Florida prisons, they don't get anything. Like there's, you know, once a month, like once a week, they hand out like one or two rolls of tissue.

They hand out like a small bar of soap. And that's about it. But if people don't get money coming in, there's very few inmates that have money at all because there's only probably like 50 or 60 inmates that they work in the prison factory. They get maybe, up to $75 a month.

And then the commissary workers, and there's probably like five of those on the compound. Those are the only people in the whole prison that get money. And so, and then they, like I say, they don't even give them deodorant. You know, that's not even part of the, the hygreens that they pass out.

So, like I say, when these people, they're half-starved to death and their nasty clothes and they're indigent, it's horrible. It's really, really horrible to be indigent. in prison in Florida. Now, I spoke to some inmates that were at Lowell, and they said that there's a lot of staff that sleeps with the inmates.

Did you witness that? Actually, I had an inmate actually told me one day that she said, well, you know, this one officer, he had, yeah, he has to sex with inmates. She was like getting ready to, like, walk out the door. She goes, this one guy, he has sex with inmates, and it's like, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like, it's always like rumor and innuendo, but it's like really, really hard to catch, right? And some way, she was, it was like on a Saturday. And she, her mom was outside getting ready to pick her up.

And there's like an ice in medical. It's like all by myself. And some way, this woman, she goes, well, you know, he had sex with me. And it's like, oh crap. And some way, I'm sitting there like, she goes, you're going to let me leave, right? and I'm like because yeah she knew how I was from like the human

trafficking like I'd help a lot of the women that were getting out and stuff and some way I'm like crap so now what I do? And so I had to report it right but so I I waited I let her go out but then I reported it like about probably like two hours after

and it was really wild because the officer actually got arrested like a few a few weeks later and then he ended up doing five years in prison. Didn't they do a whole article on what was going on in that prison with the men and the women?

Yeah, there's a pretty big series of articles in the Miami Herald. If you look, I think it was Julie Brown was the reporter. And I interviewed, I started, I would give her stuff. I'd feed her information about

you know, certain things. And she would do like really big pieces, like on the assistant warden that threatened me. And then he ended up getting fired. And there was a lot of legal stuff that wound up with that. But it is really cool because anytime I wanted to get back at the prison, like, if I wanted revenge, put in the newspaper. That's all you got to do. Put it in the newspaper.

They hate the newspaper. They hate being in the paper. And so just put them in the news. You know, like, like when I was good. I was getting a lot of pushback for the guy Rick Rawls, the big pimp from Orlando that was picking up all these women and putting them on these escort websites. And I was, you know, getting, they were like moving me around from this dorm to that dorm and I was getting called into offices. It's like, hey, you know, that's not your job type stuff. That's somebody else's job.

And, you know, I had, yeah, I was, I had people that I would call like in the attorney general's office in the state of Florida, like on these human trafficking. task forces and stuff. And finally, it was really wild because I was like on this circuit, like doing these little trainings and stuff, like jails and prisons. And then one day I got a call from this, I got a call from somebody in Orlando and they said, hey, you know, there's this inmate. And she was at our work release facility and she disappeared. And she hasn't been found for like a week.

and they said somebody heard you speaking the other day and they said you'd probably be the best person in the state of Florida to help us figure out where this person is. And I sit there and I said, well, and they said, they figure you probably know where she is or whatever because we found some mail in her locker. And it's like from somebody that probably shouldn't be

picking up inmates or whatever. And it's like, well, who's it from? She's like, well, the letter's from, the mail is from Rick Rawls. And I sit there, I go, oh, I know exactly where she is. She's at that house on Sapita Street in Orlando. And then I said, he writes from like two addresses. There's one on Sapita Street. And then there's the other house on Clearway.

Clearway is the real house. And I said, you're going to find her on that Sapita Street. That's where you're going to find her. And a couple days later, they found her, right? And right exactly where I said that she would be. And apparently she was at work release. And she had a job at like some carwalk. or whatever, and apparently he was like picking her up and like taking her on, like, when she was supposed to be at work.

And he was like, you know, he was like, you know, putting her to work. And, you know, so he ended up. And so that's when like the Metropolitan Bureau of Investigation, that's like a multi-agency task force in Orlando, they called me. And they said, hey, you know, we're going to, we're going to prosecute this guy. And we're going to, you know, whatever. and I said, when are you guys going to bust this guy? It's like, I'm getting so much crap from these people where I work. And the guy down there, he goes, well, you know, he goes, I'm getting a, he goes, one of the victims or whatever, they keep like pushing her from different prisons around the state.

He goes, I'm getting a lot of pushback from the IG's office. And he goes, and my supervisor's got to know about it. And I said, hey, whenever you, like, bust this guy, I said, would you, like, plaster it all over the news? you know, and put Lowell, like, put the prison's name, like, all over the news. And some way, like, he goes, he goes, yeah, I'm going to do that. He goes, the news media, they cover, like, all my busts, you know, like, all his human trafficking things. And some way, it was really amazing because, like, I'm sitting there, like, you know,

the warden, then I got called in the warden's office, you know, like a day later for something, something stupid and and then um he said he said he's sitting there saying well you need to decide if you want to do human trafficking or if you want to be a corrections officer and I said well you know human trafficking is a big problem for reentry and that's part of our job is reentry he goes and I said human trafficking is a big problem and he goes no it's not and then I just like kept my mouth shut and then I went back and I called and said when you got to bust him it's like and then so finally It was funny, like, probably like a week and a half later they called me. They say, hey, we got Rick Rawls.

You know, and they had like two victims in the house. They got two victims out, you know, from the prison or whatever. And it was like really wild because I went back to work the next day. And I was like all excited. And my supervisor, he was like really cool guy. He goes, wow, are they eating crow yet? Are they like, and it's funny. Like nobody, the warden, nobody ever called me down and said, wow, I guess you were right.

Like, nobody called me, I never got called anybody's office about it, right? And, and then the warden, he ended up getting fired or, like, he got, like, he got, like, demoted or transferred or whatever. And then, I guess he, like, you know, like, he went to, like, a small prison, like, it was, like, because they're, like, a big demotion. And then he just got, like, moved out to pasture. And so he got retired, like, probably, like, a few months later. But, and that was, like, a really wild. like time to work in that prison but and it was really interesting because um it was kind of yeah i would have women that would come up to me and they say well my friend she's getting ready to go

home and she doesn't want to go home because her pimp it watches the website and he knows when she's getting out and the website would show their address where they're going what day and she said my friend's been in prison twice because of him because of the stuff that he was making her do And some way, I went home when I looked this guy up on the internet. Like, I interviewed this woman that was getting ready to go home. And I interviewed her for probably like an hour and a half one day, just like getting all the information that she was like telling me about, well, you know, this one girl, you know, she would probably testify against him

because, you know, she was up in, she was at the spring break. And she got hit in the mouth because she got out of the car and she only had $15. and the pimp her pimp didn't think it was enough money or whatever but we've had the same pimp and he's really violent and he talks about how he would like

beat her to half the death or whatever and then you know he would like beat her friend when he didn't think that was good enough and he would like beat the girl her friends just for like the psychological you know damage that that would do and so I went home

and I looked this guy up and it was funny because I ended up calling like the, when I first started, I would call like the human trafficking hotlines in Florida and it would be like a voicemail and they would never get back to you or I'd call like the National Human Trafficking Hotline

and that was like a really waste of time because there's like college kids that really didn't know anything and they didn't really know who to call or help. It was like really, really tough. But then one day I had this one inmate, she was telling me about her. pimp down in this other part of Florida like six hours away, right? And some way, I ended up calling this prosecutor, or I called this human trafficking hotline from this county where she was from.

And so that way, next time I know what prosecutor called me. And she's like, hey, I'll come up there on Tuesday or whatever. It was like Friday. It was like all excited. And I said, hey, I got this other girl here too. And she'd like to talk to something. me about her pimp in this other part of the state, right? And some way, she goes, all right, well, I'll bring another prosecutor and I'll bring two, like, special agents from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. And they came up. And they interviewed this one woman, and I provided him with, like, a lot of, like, back detail.

Like, I provided them a lot of paperwork on the guy that she was trying to report. And it was amazing because the FBI ended up picking up this case. and they prosecuted him and he was in jail before she ever got out before she got out and so he was in jail and he's doing 20 years right now in federal prison and kind of find out like the um they said that he had like you know 64 victims or something like that as what they they could identify and it's just like really amazing the number of women that I met that were in prison because of things that they were doing while they were being traffic. And so, and then, you know, then you get these women where they're getting out and the prison

didn't care if they had a place to go or not. They would just, like, throw them out. And I had one woman I knew. She was in my dorm for a lot of years. And she was coming up to me. She's like, like six months out. She's like, Mr. Meekin, she goes, I don't have anywhere to go. It's like, you know, her husband died while she was in there.

You know, she didn't have any family. You know, no, she had one son on the street. And she's like, I don't have anywhere to go. And she's like, I talked to Helen, like her friend Helen or whatever. And she said I could stay with her, but I don't really, I haven't even, I only talked to her like one time in the last six months. And it was amazing, like, how many people would come up to me. They're like, I don't have anywhere to go. And, you know, when you start, when I started doing the trafficking, I didn't.

didn't really, I went to like a human trafficking conference one time. And one of the people that had been in that kind of work for years, she said, well, what you need to do is you need to look at vulnerabilities, what makes somebody vulnerable to like a human trafficking. And that's what a pimp is going to pick up on. And that's what they're going to exploit. And a lot of times it's like homelessness, you know, people that don't have any place to go. You know, they're, they come from like abusive situations. You know, they don't have any financial resources, you know, and they kind of burned their bridges, like their family, like through drug use.

And so it's just amazing how easily, like, shooting fish in a barrel, like a women's prison would be for people like that. And so the prison, like I say, they would spend, you know, you might have somebody that did 10 years and they had no job skills by the time they get out there's very few programs for these women other than like the religious programs which which i like but you know as far as like employment skills and stuff there's very few jobs that they really get these people and so they would give them $50 they'd give them a bus ticket and they'd give them like a little coupon or whatever good for like two nights at the open shelter or the homeless place wherever it was they're going and

So, I mean, it just made those women just like really easy targets for, oh, hey, you know, my boyfriend, you know, I got this guy, I know, and he'll let you stay for free. But, you know, and then they start putting money on their books. Save now at Whole Foods Market. It's the summer splash event with great everyday prices on 365 brand ground beef for the grill and ice cream for dessert. They have yellow sales signs on ready to cook beef or chicken kebabs too. Level up with savory marinate, spices and ruff. and complete your cookout with a crowd-pleasing cherry pie and their balsamic chicken salad. Available at the prepared foods counter.

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Are there female gang members? Yeah, I actually knew a woman that was actually a, was it the what's the Latino game oh she was like a high-ranking member Latin king or Latin queen she was a Latin queen

and she was like she was pretty crazy you know she used to she used to like threaten other inmates she used to like you know do finger guns like she was like pointing point with her finger and like she was going to shoot him and stuff

and she would like act like she was like chopping things up. She'd be like doing like this. Like she's like playing crazy and and I don't really know what happened to her but I actually, she's like the one person I looked up on Facebook like a few years ago and I

and I contacted her and she's like probably the one person that probably would have whipped my ass if she saw me on the street and she's like she's like you know sending me these little middle finger emojis the whole time I was talking to her but that was like probably like the biggest one but most of them most of the women for the gangs

it seems like they're like the boyfriend or they're the girlfriends of the gang members you know I've had some like old ladies for um one of the I guess there's like this one guy um his old lady was in my prison he was like a high-ranking member of like the outlaws motorcycle gang and I thought that was pretty cool And I remember I went and went through her address book one day. And there's like a list of like all these, like it said old outlaw, old outlaw. Like she had like all the people in her address book were listed as like outlaws. Like, you know.

And so I was talking to the gang investigator people one time. It's like, well, I had this one name, mate. She had this address book and she had like a list of like all the like all the people that were outlaws. She had them like listed. He goes, man, I would love that list. Like they were like really dying for that list. But it was funny because I gave it to like our little gang person, the coordinator at the prison. And it was her job, she was like, that was like one of her like tiny little duties out of like all the duties.

And I'm sure she just like threw it away and didn't do anything with it. Now you mentioned there was a few altercations you were in where you had to use pepper spray. What were those about? It's mainly the only time that I ever really sprayed anybody was mainly just like breaking up a fire. or something like that. I never really had to use force on on inmates, you know. Most of the time, whenever I got somewhere, it's like the fight was already broken up.

Or, you know, but there's a couple of times where I went, and there's like two women to be rolling around on the ground. They're like, hey, y'all need to break up. Because I don't want to, like, if you, like, start, you know, putting your hands on people, you know, then all of a sudden you start getting into like, you know, legal problems or whatever. But so I would just mainly spray them and then handcuff them, right? Because I don't know what it's in the pepper spray down there, but it's like really good pepper spray.

It's like I worked in this one dorm and we were right next to the youthful offender dorm and they were spraying inmates all the time. They were always getting in fights like the youth, you know, the teenagers and stuff, the inmates that were in this youthful offender program. They were always getting to fights and they were getting sprayed and they put them in handcuffs. And within like two minutes, there's like snot coming out their nose and it's like going down to their knees. And they're just like totally miserable. And, you know, we had to do that. We had to get sprayed with that stuff in the academy. And it was absolutely horrible.

But then when I moved to Ohio, I worked in the Ohio Department of Corrections and we had to get sprayed with their stuff. And their stuff with nothing. I mean, I don't know what it was, but it was just the stuff in Florida was like really good quality pepper spray. And what would these fights be over? A lot of it, it's amazing. Women's prisons. Okay, I worked at the women's prison and I worked in the men's prison and people say that like men's prisons run on cell phones. Like the cell phones are everywhere and they probably in like, you know, K-2 and stuff like that.

women's prisons run on girlfriends. Like, prison, women's prisons, everything revolves around the whole lesbian girlfriend thing. And it's really wild because where I work,

we had a main unit and we had an annex. It was like a giant prison. Like I say, there's the biggest women's prison complex in the United States. There's probably, probably now there's like around 4,000 or 5,000 women. like right there's like there's a new prison across the street plus the main unit in the annex and there's like a fence that goes right down the middle between the two and we would have the women

that were on the main unit if they would get in trouble they would have to go to the annex to go to the confinement and but it was it was kind of weird because you know we wouldn't let the inmates go back or forth between the main unit and the annexes. you lived in one prison and that's where you were the whole time unless you were in the hole or unless you got transferred from one prison to another. But so we would have women and they would always trying to get together, right? And if you had a woman at the main unit and she went to the hole, her girlfriend was going to go to the hole.

Like her girlfriend would do something so that she would go to confinement. And it's like, oh, great. So now you got, now you're not just taking two people, one person. Now you've got to take two. and then they spend the whole time trying to get put in the same cell, figure out how to get in the same cell. Or like we had situations, you know, where women would accuse, like, they would accuse an officer of having sex or having some kind of relationship with the

inmate. And then the officer and the inmate would get under this big PREA investigation. And then all of a sudden, the one inmate would get moved out under investigation. She'd go to the hole, right? It was all because this other inmate wanted to get with her girlfriend that was in the dorm. So, I mean, it's just like these allegations of,

I mean, like the backstabbing and stuff that would go on. Or like, it was just amazing how people would get together. And a lot of times it was all about the commissary. It would be about the canteen and stuff like that. And, you know, you'd see people, it's like the we have we had like um some of the girlfriends they look like boys and people people would always like when when people find out like you worked at a women's prison they're like wow I bet you see a lot of amazing like lesbian stuff and you know girls girls like girls like girls sex or

whatever and I'm sitting there like well it's not like you think it's not like the internet it's like you know usually one's like really amazing looking like and then the other one kind of looks like me You know, like, except she got boobs in a, and, you know, and one of the women was saying to me one time, like, they call them the studs, you know, the women that are, um, look like boys or whatever. She goes, well, you know, they got everything. It's like, they get all the commissary. They're always getting commissary. They get full banks every week. Every week.

They're getting all the commissary. And then, and then, um, they're getting all the commissary. And then they get got we go down on them and all this They talk to me about all the sex that they you have is like They talk about how great it is to look like a boy in a women's prison And that was like really that was like really eye-opening you know It's like how how like how financially Advantage that is and

Like I say, just you're having that Would you ever catch? two girls having sex with each other? And what would you do in a situation? Yeah, I have a few times. It's like mainly, it's weird because they would like do it in the bathroom or they're having sex in a closet.

And because like in the women's prisons where I work, most of them they were like open bay dorms. And so and you could like, you could pretty much see most of the dorms from anywhere. You know, like in the, but the only really privacy would be like a closet or like a bathroom stall and so every now and then I would like maybe like I'd open up a I would never like just walk in the bathroom I would pretty much I I wasn't like I was like really conscious of Pria stuff and you know the only time I really would go in a bathroom would be like a count time to make sure nobody's in there or like unless maybe there was a fight or something or or but every now and then it's something. Somebody say, hey, there's two girls in the bathroom having sex. And so, I sit there like, oh, crap.

So I sit there. I, like, I open the bathroom and I, like, look under the stalls or whatever. I can see, like, two feet in the same, like, two sets of feet in the same thing. And I'd like, all right, you two, come out of there. And so where they come out and they, like, make sure they're clothed or whatever. But, like, I really, you know, if I wanted to see these people naked, if I wanted to, I could have probably had a lot of, like inappropriate relationships with these people, but I really wasn't there for that. You know, I absolutely wasn't there for that, you know, and I valued my job.

And then I always, like, especially like with the human trafficking stuff, you know, I didn't want to, like, exploit people, you know, and I wanted to treat them right. And so, like I said, I never, I wasn't there for, to get laid. wasn't there to, you know, see boobs and tits and stuff like that. But it would have been, it would have been really easy if that's what I was there for. Why do you think some guards don't follow that same mindset and are there for that and do have the inappropriate relationships? Why do they risk their freedom, their career, everything? I don't know.

It was really wild. Like I say, when I was working there, we, it was easy. to tell when it was like really obvious that there was a relationship between an inmate and a staff. But I didn't realize how bad it was until after I left and people would tell me

that and it seemed like everybody there was like had girlfriends except for me. And it was even like the like there were female officers that had like full on relationships with inmates. I mean

um and I think the biggest reason is because like those relationships occur is because almost nobody ever gets prosecuted you know it's most of time you know it's a slap on the wrist that you get walked off walked out the compound you know they

they don't put you in handcuffed you don't wind up in a police car very very few people ever get prosecuted and then I think it's also Also because maybe the people that work there, they're immoral maybe. I mean, I'd like to think that I wasn't the only one that was like that. But, you know, it's, I think there are a lot of good people I work with, but then there's a lot of people that weren't good people that were working there, that were there for the, they were there to get laid.

Now, you're telling me off camera that Jennifer Gomez, the cat burglar, was there while you were there. What was that like? Yeah, she was in my dorm for 10 years. And it seemed like every time I went from one dorm to another, she was like in my dorm. I remember when she first got there, I would like shake her down. She was in Lima dorm with me.

And she had her girlfriend with her niece, or no, Shrnees Brinson. And so her and her girlfriend, they were in there. And I remember, One day, Jennifer, she kept getting tattoos. She kept tattooing herself. And so I was like giving her a raft of shit about tattooing. I said, you don't want to look nasty and stuff when you get out.

Women tattoos in prison are gross. They do not know how to tattoo. It's amazing when the women, they all get like these blobby looking tattoos. And it's always like a girlfriend's name on. And so you, like, see these women that have been in prison a long time and they've had like 10 girlfriends. And they got 10 girls' names on their arms or on their neck or whatever. And you're like, oh, wow, who's all those different girls? It's like, oh, those are my kids.

It's like, they're all boys or are all girls like, no boys. But, you know, Jennifer, I kept catching her tattoo. She kept tattooing these little things on her arms and stuff. And like on her fingers. And so one day I went through her locker. I found like some free world tattoo ink. You know, it's not like the prison ink that they make. And like, so for that time, that was like some pretty serious stuff.

She's getting free world ink. And I don't know where she was getting it. But so I gave me a take her to the hole, right? And so in a way her friend, Brinson, she's like, oh, no, Mr. Megan, you can't send her to jail. And I'm sitting there like, you're not going to tell me who I can't send to jail. because, you know, it's like they go all out for their girlfriend, right? And so finally, Branson talks to me out of, like, taking her to the hole. And so I just, I gave her, I said, all right, I said, I'm not going to do that,

but you owe me a snitch, you know. And Branson, she'd been in prison for, like, you know, she had like, you know, 25 years sentenced and she was like an old-time convict, you know, she's like that, you know, the prison, you know, the prison thing were no snitching. That was like her big thing. And so I was like, well, you're going to owe me a snitch. And then I figured, well, if you like your girlfriend so much, that's going to be your price. And it's like, you're going to owe me a snitch.

I don't know where it's going to be, but you're going to owe me one. And so she agreed. And then so one day, I remember, like, somebody had some contract band that I was looking for, and Brinson told me where it was. And so, all right, we're clear. And so I was like, all right, you're good. I said, we're clear. like you know you paid your debt and and so and so and then so it was like really interesting because

um she was like one of the like um Jennifer she was one of the ones where this warden right liked her you know the assistant warden that like threatened me and some way one day Jennifer she got moved to you dorm in some way I was still in Lima dorm and and then and like a day or two later, Brinson got moved out, right? And so I went over to you dorm for something to help count one day. And there they are sitting in this, like,

right next to each other. And we're sitting there like, while there's only one way that could have happened, you know, because, you know, they got in touch with Marty, you know, and so Marty is the one that moved them in together. And, but actually, you know, it was, and then, like, even when, like,

they moved from one side of the dorm to the other, they were still bunkeys, like, you know, right next to each other. And it was really interesting because they actually never really even caused any problems. Like a lot of, like, a lot of the prison girlfriends, they're just like constantly having sex and they're fighting each other. Like, they get, like, you know, a lot of domestic violence between, like, couples and stuff. and oh my God you know you can't even like it's like

the lesbian like they're not even allowed to like talk to other people in prison or they might get beat up you know it's like lock at a sock you start like you talk to the wrong girl's girlfriend and it's like and me and my friend you know we used to like work in the

we used to work in the tower when we were at the annex here and there and we'd see like an inmate walk by and they'd say hey I saw your girlfriend talking to a Spanish girl down in medical yesterday when she's like walking with somebody and and she and she say so and I say the same person three days in a row like we just like messing with them just to like get a rise out like to like see if they like start fighting with their girlfriend and stuff and and and it was just like

funny like we would like try to like get between them and stuff but yeah what it was really kind of interesting is I always heard like a lot of people that like gay for this day type stuff. And, but what's really cool is like some of the people that were like girlfriends in prison, they actually, there are couples when they got out and they're still together, which I, which I think is really cool, you know. Did you look up Jennifer's case to see what she was there for? I didn't really pay attention too much until I heard her on your show.

Oh, so that was the first time you saw her after prison? Yeah, like, like, um, because I moved, I moved, um, out of Florida. probably like about a year before she got out. And but then one day she just like sent me a text on Facebook. She's like, hey, thank you for being like the only security that, you know, like the real security we ever had, you know, in the prison or whatever. Because like I said, I had like, I was like really, I really saw myself as like a role model. And like I knew like a lot of people have been abused by men or whatever.

And so I want to like set a role. So that's why I was like always I always bit over backwards, try to be honest. And I did my best to treat people with respect and that sort of stuff. And so it was like really sad because when I knew like I was going to be leaving the women's prison. But I wasn't exactly sure when. But one day I was sitting there talking to one of these women. And I was like, well, I'm going to be probably winding down here. her in the next, you know, a few months or whatever and going somewhere else.

And she's like, well, you know, when you leave a lot of these women, a lot of these people won't have a, like, positive real, or male role model or whatever. And so that really, that really kind of stuck with me, you know. And but so when Jennifer got out, like I say, the first time I ever really knew anything about her crimes or whatever was when I listened to her on your show. What do you think your worst day on the job was? Um, I'm not really, I'm not really sure if I had like a worst day, but, yeah, I had a lot of rough days, you know, um, like maybe like when I, you know, was threatened by that warden, you know, I thought that maybe I was going to get fired or something was going to happen. But then, you know, it turned out that, you know, he had a lot of other complaints when I started reading, like, the investigation on him. It's like, I couldn't believe, like, all the stuff that he'd been doing. you know and so yeah it was it was interesting because you know i had a lot more um enemies

that were like worked for the prison than were actually the inmates or i mean i wasn't like i wasn't like um like a hug a thug but i didn't i didn't mistreat them and i actually went out of my way to help them out and you know make you know some of them like i had lawyers that would come I could identify the human trafficking victims just by, I could look, I would go on the website for the prison and I would just like pull up certain people and I would never actually approach anybody that I knew was a human trafficking victim. But, you know, I had inmates that knew like other ones and they would bring them to me. And then I would work with them.

And I would actually have a lawyer down in Tampa. And I started working with him. And he would represent human trafficking victims. And when I first met him, he's like, well, you know, I got one inmate up there in your prison. And she shouldn't be in prison because of the, you know, crimes that she committed she was doing while she was being a victim of human trafficking. And so I'm a, I said, well, I'll get you some more. And so this guy, he might have just had an office.

in the prison from all the women that I would bring him. And there are several inmates that, like, even like the last year that have been released, and now they don't have any more criminal convictions, like none. And they'd had, you know, 24 convictions for, or, you know, like, a lot of convictions just for, like, prostitution and, like, drug charges. And it's all stems from the fact that they were being, like, the things that they were doing that got them sent to prison were because of, like, their pimps were making. them shoplift or their pimps would like they would like look on websites like for like

mugshot websites and they could see you get like a list of all the people that have been arrested like in Orlando in the past you know 10 hours or whatever and you can see like all the people and you could see like what they're arrested for what the charges are you can see like how much their bond is and so this guy he would like say well that one's cute right and this is what Rawls would do it and he'd say, well, I don't have a girl in that jail, so I'm going to get one of you girls to go over to that county over Orlando and you're going to get arrested for shoplifting. You're going to go to the jail and when you get there, you're going to have her come out and come work for me. And so he'd start putting money on their books and stuff.

But just like the fact that I was like, had inmates that were talking to me about, like, how this worked, like how the whole trafficking thing worked, the prison officials didn't. like it because, um, and then they didn't like the fact that I was going around the country, like speaking on like, like, doing conferences and doing trainings and stuff. Choice hotels get you more of what you value. Here's a little tune to help you remember. Same drive, different day. Don't you wish you were getting away. Pack your beds and come on through Texas, Ohio, Alaska, we're up there too. Comfort in. It's calling your name. Save on the stain.

Oh, and free waffles are yours to claim. Well, I hope you like my little song. Book direct at sourcehiltails.com. Starting a business can seem like a daunting task, unless you have a partner like Shopify. They have the tools you need to start and grow your business. From designing a website to marketing to selling and beyond, Shopify can help with everything you need.

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and have one of your assistants assistants to switch you to MintMobil today. I'm told it's super easy to do at mintmobile.com slash switch. Up front payment of $45 for three-month plan equivalent to $15 per month required. Intro rate first three months only, then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. See full terms at mintmobile.com. And so I used to get a lot of pushback from that. Did you leave because you were pushed out or did you just want to move to a different state?

I ended up going across the street to the men's prison for a year from the women's. In some way, I really didn't like that. then so finally I just I grew up in like I said I grew up in Columbus Ohio and I just I just wanted it changed from Florida and then I ended up moving back to Ohio excuse me and I thought that Ohio was like really I thought they were really progressive like with their criminal justice system and I thought wow you know they actually care about people and they you know give them job they help them get jobs and they treat them right and you go into prison there's like all these programs like all kinds of it's like almost like a college campus you know except with barbed wire

and prison guards right and after a while i i'm i worked in the men's prison in london ohio and it just seemed like they were like overly overly like um hug a thug with law of these guys. They're just constantly like, hey, you know, you're not allowed to talk mean to them, you know, it's like, it doesn't matter how many kids he raped, you know, you got to make him feel good about himself. Like, you can't just like, like in Florida, you could just tell somebody, hey, you're a child molester, you know, get away from my window, turn around, go, go sit down on your bed and shut the fuck up and get away from me, right? And you could say that, you could talk to an inmate like that in front of the captain. You know, guys would, in the captain's office,

you know, in the prisons in Florida, they bring the women up there and talk to the captain because, like, she's causing problems. And they would, like, this, start calling the inmate a bitch or a hoe or whatever in front of the captain

and, like, talk to her any old way. And I'll just, just to make her, like, go nuts so that she'd like, well, you dumb motherfucker, like, and then all of a sudden, they'd send her the hole for, you know, disrespect or for being disorderly because, you know, she's, you know, she's getting, pissed and she's not putting up with it, right?

But the men's prison, it's like one time I caught this one guy, he had a big bunch of hooch under his bed, right? And this young kid. And so many, it was like, I looked under bed, there was a big bunch of hooch that it was wrapped up in, like, it was in a pitcher, and then it was wrapped up in a coat. And so I pulled this coat out from under the bed and the pitcher, and I took it in the office. And all of a sudden, the guy comes up, but I said, you got a ticket for hooch. He goes, that wasn't mine.

That was in a general area. I said it was under your bed. He goes, yeah, but there was a common area. It could have been anybody's. And then some way, I sit there. I said, well, you're getting a ticket for Hoots anyway. And then he goes, well, can I get my pitcher back? Like, no.

He goes, well, how about my coat? And I said, you know, you're just like a big stupid dumb fucker. And I said, get away from me, right? And I said, you're not getting any of this back. And so he comes back like five minutes. So he's got like a little note pad and he's like, excuse me, sir, can I get your name? So he's got to like write me up, right? And it's like, well, I'm sure these people run this prison really care that I called you a dumbass for, or whatever, for having hoot on your bed.

And I'm sure you'll probably get out of your ticket because I called you a dumbass. And I mean, that's just like the kind of stuff that really bugs me about Ohio is. so now I work for a halfway house and I pick people up from prison every morning I'm picking somebody up from prison somewhere in Ohio and I'm taking them to one of our halfway houses that we have and I can't tell you

like how many people I pick up from prison that have only been in prison for like two months or like I pick people up that got out of prison and they've you know they've been in they're getting out of prison for their fifth time and they're like, you know, 35. Or like, I remember one time I had a guy that I picked up from prison,

and he had like, you know, 17 years in prison. And I, before I picked them up, I like to see what he did, you know, because he had all that time, like 17 years. That's pretty unusual for the type of people they pick up. And so he had, like, all these, like, kidnapping charges and all these different charges, right? and he only got 17 years like all these kidnapping

and like these like some very violent charges but the last year that I worked in the men's prison in Florida I had this guy in my dorm he's like a really good barber and I used to make him cut my hair for free an inmate right and I used to like on when I was on midnight shift and this guy he had like almost the same like kidnapping you know convictions like multiple like almost as many, right?

And I couldn't believe it. And the guy that was making a couple of here, he had like eight life sentences. This guy only had 17. And so I just remember the time this guy got in the car, right? The guy with the 17 years, and he's like, wow, 17 years. And I'm sitting there thinking, good thing you didn't do it in Florida. I mean, and so some of the people that I pick up now, it's really cool when you pick somebody up that did like 20 years or 40 years.

I've had a couple guys that did 40. And there are people that in Florida, they never would have had any prayer of getting out of prison. And so it kind of occurs to me that maybe Florida was like, maybe they were brutal. But if you're the victim of like a heinous crime, if somebody did something to your, you know,

did something heinous to you or like your face. family, you don't want him to go to prison in Ohio because they're going to have it too good. You know, it's like I picked people up. I picked one, I picked up a guy from prison a few weeks ago and he's like, well, you know, I was in the truck driving program at the prison. He goes, I was only in prison for, he's only in prison for like a year, right? And he goes, I was in the truck driving program. I've driving trucks all day all over Ohio, like back and forth to the different prisons, like for the prison industries. And so he said, I was never in prison.

I was just only like sleeping there at night. And it's like, well, that's amazing. It's like I couldn't afford truck driving school. But if I would hit somebody's grandmother in the mouth, I could have got a, you know, free. I could have gotten the scholarship, right? What advice do you give these guys coming out of prison that you pick up? Or even, I guess, anyone listening that's, you know, just getting out of prison? It's my job is like really cool.

school, you know, the job I have now picking people up every morning because they're always excited to see me. But I try to tell them how much to take advantage of their opportunities, you know, and with the, and the fact that, you know, Ohio is like a really good place to be getting out of prison because of like all the reentry programs that they have. I mean, I had one guy he did like 40 years in prison for, he stabbed two people in a bar. And so he got out of prison. He did 40 years. And I was taking him to like Walmart for the first time, you know, because there was no Walmart when he went to prison. I was, you know, taking him to like doctor's appointments.

And then I couldn't believe like the nice apartment that he got in like a really nice neighborhood. And in Florida, it's like the guy would have been. homeless. There's no, I mean, just like I say, the opportunities that they have to like turn themselves around to all they have to do is take advantage of it, you know, and I guess my, the biggest things that I tell them is like, don't get high. That's like number one and don't fight. And, you know, everything else is in the halfway house is like really easy. What do you think that your career has taught you, like the life lesson? I really wanted to, the thing that I liked about working in the criminal justice system is like even, it's like a low level, like I was in the Florida prisons.

I noticed things that they didn't really want anybody noticing. And I didn't look the other way, like with the human trafficking and the, And I just started writing just some articles on a few little websites. And I couldn't believe the people that would call me or they'd see my article and they'd reach out like the state of Indiana. I had people from like human rights groups and the Middle East would call me. And they'd say, well, we saw this article you write, you wrote. And we were curious about, you know, we're doing a rule of law project. on Iraq and we're trying to go talk to their ministry about, you know, setting up their prison system

like more humane or whatever. And I said, well, this is what you look for and this, I explained to them exactly, you know, how it works and the prisons and stuff. And then they were kind of skeptical. And then they had their training. And then next thing, you know, the lady wrote back, she goes, hey, greetings from Baghdad. She's like, we had a training. And, you know, we, and we went to the ministry and we talked about, we read your article that you wrote on the first day and they said,

oh, it doesn't happen here, doesn't happen here, absolutely not, not in our women's prisons. And then she said, at the end of the training, we went back and we read the, we read your article that you wrote again and she goes, they admit that it did happen. It does happen in their prisons. And they said that it was like a source of funding

for terrorism over there. And then she said, you know, there's this lady, There's this other guy. He's from like this prison system in Finland, and he's going to call you too because he wanted to find out about what you know about. And so it's, it's amazing.

And when I started doing, working in the prisons, you know, it was in 2004. And then by probably about 2000, or yeah, about 2010 or whatever, that's when I started getting into the human trafficking stuff. And I started writing articles in kind of speaking.

and doing the trainings and stuff. And when I started, nobody believed me. Everybody's like, oh, that doesn't happen. It's like, it doesn't happen, doesn't happen. And then everywhere I went, I had people that would like, I'd say, well, here's what you look for. And so they started like looking and they started finding out that it was happening in all their prisons. And now there's like training. So many states have training for human trafficking in the women's prisons.

And the Department of Justice has programs through the National Institute of Corrections. They have training programs on human trafficking. And it's pretty much because I was like the pioneer for that. Because like I say, nobody had ever found human trafficking in a prison until I showed up. And like I say, now you talk to people, well, you know, prisons have problems with the human trafficking for the women when they get out. They're like, oh, yeah, yeah. It's like, that's obvious. It's like, of course they do.

It's like, well, when I started, it's like nobody believed it. And so I guess my career is, you know, if it doesn't really take a lot to make a difference, but you can, you know, even if you're like a lower level employee. If you're just smart about it and you use, like, media, you know how you use the media and kind of like circumvent people. And that's one thing that I learned from working in prisons, especially like with the women. It's like they would never take no for an answer. It's like, you know, it's like you would like tell them, no you can't go outside, right? But you turn your back and next thing, you know, they're like going out. back door or they're going out some door.

They're going, they're going to do what they want to do, right? They're going to do. And, you know, because, but, but they wouldn't give up. Like, they wouldn't give up, like getting with their girlfriend. They would, they would call their family and try to, you know, call the warden and have them, like, you know, put in this program because that's where their girlfriend is. But don't mention my girlfriend, but they, but, you know, and then they get in the program and then they're in the same dorm.

now they want to be in this like right next to each other in the in the bunks you know they want to be bunkies or whatever and they it's all you would see is like everything revolved around you know getting with this person and like it's not enough that you're on the same prison now you want to be in the same dorm you won't be in the same job you want to be the same shift it's like 24 a set they just want to be together and so and they wouldn't take no for an answer and so that's what I learned from like working with the women in the is you know one door closes another one opens it's not because you're in prison but it's like it's like you know just like look for you just like look for other angles you know and that's the kind of stuff that I

learned and you know Ginger Wolf she was the one that was on your show too and you know she was like one of the people that you know taught me you know just like about you know, some of the stuff that people do as far as like the pen pals and stuff like that.