Joe Reynoso was

ostracized and threatened

for investigating his

own in the Department

of Corrections

BY STEPHEN JAMES

24

Standing up

to corruptionStanding up

to corruption

VOLUME 17, ISSUE 17 | SACRAMENTO’S NEWS & ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY | THURSDAY, JULY 21, 2005 | WWW.NEWSREVIEW.COM

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GRIT. SENTIMENT.HIP-HOP.See Film, page 33.

AY YI YI! SEX WITH CO-WORKERSSee Joey, page 73.

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24 | SN&R | JULY 21, 2005

Corrections co-workers

Joe Reynoso and Dave

Lewis both were called

heroes by their peers.

One was an investigator

digging into prison crime,

and one was accused of

a crime. Guess which

one was supported

by the guards union.

Standing up

to corruptionStanding up

to corruption

BY STEPHEN JAMES

I n her letter supporting the nomination of investigator Joe Reynoso

for the Award of Ethical Courage, federal prosecutor Melinda Haag

never used the word “hero,” but her implication was clear.

Haag described the hardships and trauma that Reynoso, who worked for

the California Department of Corrections (CDC), had to endure during the

years he helped her build and prosecute the federal government’s case

against prison guards Jose Garcia and Michael Powers of the Pelican Bay

State Prison in Del Norte County. It was one of the most

publicized, high-profile trials of the prison-scandal-ridden 1990s, and the

assistant U.S. attorney and state investigator worked side by side.

Before he agreed to help Haag’s team, Reynoso had worked for years

at Pelican Bay as a guard, sergeant and lieutenant, and was liked and

respected by his peers. But when he began assisting the federal govern-

ment with its case, he was seen by some co-workers as a traitor for

acknowledging the dirty laundry of the close-knit prison community.

Reynoso had violated the code of silence, which required corrections

employees to ignore, or help cover up, the misconduct of co-workers.

Actually assisting outside federal investigators, as Reynoso did, was a

potentially fatal breach of the code.

PHOTO BY LARRY DALTON

“Reynoso was told by a number of colleagues that he was hurting his

career and should get off the case,” recounted Haag. But the reaction went

beyond career advice. “The tires on his personal vehicle were slashed, and

the doors were ‘keyed,’” she said. Reynoso was labeled a rat—the ulti-

mate insult in the cliquish world of prison workers— and “officers who

had been Reynoso’s friends would not speak to him (at least in front of

anyone else),” she added.Eventually, the retribution took its toll on Reynoso and his family, and

they moved south to a city near Sacramento. “He and his wife sold the

lovely home they had designed and built together, and moved hundreds of

miles away so they could shop, see movies and live their lives without

enduring glares and whispers from their neighbors. All because he was

just trying to do his job,” said Haag.

The Powers-Garcia case, as it came to be known, was complicated and

involved 11 separate incidents spanning a four-year period, requiring testi-

mony from more than 35 witnesses, and the trial took two months before

it was handed over to the jury. With Reynoso’s help, Haag convinced the

jury to convict Powers and Garcia of conspiring to violate the civil rights

of inmates by arranging to have them beaten or stabbed by other prisoners,

or by carrying out the assaults themselves. One prisoner was stabbed to

death at Powers’ behest, according to the indictment. Haag called Reynoso

“the single most important person to the prosecution team.”

The ethical-courage award is given by the California Peace Officers’

Association, whose membership represents more than 538 police and law-

enforcement agencies in the state. Each year the association gives out

awards for valor, distinction and professional achievement to law-enforce-

ment officers. The ethical-courage award, however, is unique and is not

necessarily given out each year, but only when a peace officer breaks the

code of silence and exposes inter-agency or similar misconduct. “It is

intended to commend and spotlight individuals who do not confuse

“STANDING UP” continued on page 26

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Former Pelican Bay prison guard Dave Lewis was virtually canonized in the 2001 end-of-the-year issue of the prison-guard-union magazine Peacekeeper.

California Department of CorrectionsSpecial Investigator Joe Reynoso

outside the federal courthouse in San Francisco.

silence with loyalty and integrity

and who have the strength of char-

acter to withstand the criticism and

accept the personal risks associated

with their decision,” explained asso-

ciation executive director Rich

Gregson.

Two months ago at a ceremony

in Indian Wells, the award was pre-

sented to Reynoso by California

Attorney General Bill Lockyer.

“The recognition that I got from the

other law-enforcement people that

were in the room validated my

work,” he said. After he received

the award, some of the

other law-enforce-

ment officers in

attendance came

up to him and

offered him encour-

agement and

support. “They said,

‘Congratulations on

a tough job,’ ‘Not

enough people do

what you did.

Congratulations for

sticking it out,’” he

recalled.

The peer reinforce-

ment meant a lot to

Reynoso because his

own employer essentially ignored

his achievement in the successful

Powers-Garcia prosecution and his

receipt of the ethical-courage award.

Even though a letter announcing

Reynoso’s award was sent to

California corrections czar Rod

Hickman, “all I got from my own

department was ‘Oh, you pissed off

a lot of people. Man is your career

over,’” he said. A call to CDC

spokesman J.P. Tremblay confirmed

Reynoso’s frustration regarding

recognition: Tremblay was unaware

that Reynoso had received

the award.

Reynoso barely had time to savor

the moment of honor because he was

working up to 12 hours a day to help

the government prepare for a new

federal criminal trial against another

Pelican Bay prison guard, Dave

Lewis. Reynoso had worked the

case, off and on, for more than 10

years, and the trial would be the final

showdown from the Powers-Garcia

era. Like Santa Barbara County

District Attorney Tom Sneddon’s

unrelenting 10-plus-year pursuit of

Michael Jackson, Reynoso had a

piece of his psyche in this battle. But

unlike what happened with Jackson,

who escaped Sneddon’s grasp in an

earlier alleged child-molestation inci-

dent by paying off the victim,

Reynoso had helped the feds put

Lewis away once before, only to see

his conviction reversed on appeal

and a new trial ordered. Reynoso had

a huge investment of pride and emo-

tion in the case and viewed its

anticipated outcome as the final vin-

dication of the years of sacrifice that

had irreversibly altered his life.

The case was expected to be dif-

ficult to prosecute because some of

the witness challenges from the first

trial and the Powers-Garcia case

were expected to occur in the Lewis

retrial. “The witnesses are very

reluctant to take the stand again for

us,” Reynoso said.

In her letter, Haag recited some of

the witness-intimidation problems

from the Powers-Garcia prosecution,

including a Pelican Bay female staff

member who had human feces spread

on her car in the prison parking lot.

Another witness, who had critical evi-

dence proving that the defendants

were involved in having an inmate

stabbed, had to take a stress retire-

ment. “One staff witness literally

begged us in the hallway outside of

court not to ask him to go through

with testifying—he was happy in his

current assignment, his children were

happy in their schools, and he was

certain he would have to move if he

went through with testifying,” and

prosecutors honored his request. In

addition, inmate witnesses faced the

possibility of retaliation by staff and

prison gangs. Haag said Reynoso had

the unique ability to work with and

reassure both employee and inmate

witnesses because he understood the

prison culture.

The final prosecution of Lewis

would be a pivotal point in the ongo-

ing struggle between the handful of

CDC employees, like Reynoso, will-

ing to stand up to the corruption,

endure the retaliation that was guar-

anteed to follow, and weather it all

with virtually no support from the

higher-ups at the CDC. Reynoso also

stood up to the money and power of

the prison-guard union. And, for a

prosecutor, the landscape was littered

with those who had sought justice

but had failed to bring back the cov-

eted criminal conviction, the only

measure of success.

After three years of false starts

and delays, the second Lewis trial

finally went before a San Francisco

jury last month. But the outcome

would leave a permanent scar on

Reynoso’s soul.

About a year before Reynoso was

forced to move from his Northern

California home, the state’s prison-

guard union, the California

Correctional Peace Officers

Association (CCPOA), held its 25th

annual convention in Sparks, Nev.

Taking place just two weeks after

the September 11

World Trade Center

attacks in 2001, the

event had the theme

“Of heroes and heal-

ing,” according to a

detailed post-con-

vention report, with

26 color photos, in

the union’s in-

house magazine,

Peacekeeper.

The conven-

tion planners

drew a connec-

tion between the

firefighters and

police officers

killed in the World Trade Center

disaster and the brotherhood of

California prison guards. “Two

weeks following the tragedies of

September 11, where the professions

of law enforcement and fire and

rescue lost so many of their own

trying to save the doomed souls in

the World Trade Center, CCPOA’s

annual convention was marked by

the shocked and sad faces of a

brethren of peace officers mourning

the loss of their brothers and sisters

3,000 miles away,” reported

Peacekeeper. The convention floor

featured a replica of the

Statue of Liberty, and a

photomontage presenta-

tion of the terrorist

attacks “stunned and

hushed the crowd” and

then “brought the dele-

gation to its feet

chanting USA,

USA, USA.”

A live and in-

person hero highlight

of the convention,

attended by more

than 1,000 union

members and their

families, was the tri-

umphant return of former Pelican

Bay prison guard Dave Lewis. Just

weeks before the convention, Lewis

had been released after serving 15

months in federal prison for the 1994

nonfatal shooting of inmate Harry

Long after an altercation in the

prison yard. In 1999, the government

indicted Lewis, claiming that he

deliberately shot Long because he

believed Long was a child molester.

In early 2000, Lewis was convicted

and then sentenced to more than

seven years in prison and fined

$2,000, but then he was released

pending the outcome of a retrial

ordered by the appellate court. At the

convention, Lewis took the stage

against a dramatic backdrop—deco-

rated in a red, white and blue

star-spangled theme that might have

made Leni Riefenstahl blush—and

recounted his ordeal to the audience.

“On his conclusion, his peers gave

this hero a standing ovation,” said

Peacekeeper in its account of the

moment.

Reynoso, who used to be a

member of the CCPOA, is disturbed

by the union’s promotion of Lewis.

“It’s a disgrace to think that you

have an employee who you’re prop-

ping up as a hero, compared to a lot

of people who do a great job and

should be heroes—people who do

their job everyday and don’t get in

any trouble and finish their careers,”

he said.

Indeed, to an outside observer,

the elevation of Lewis to hero status

by the CCPOA might seem puz-

zling. In 1996, two years after he

had shot Long but when he had yet

to be indicted by the federal govern-

ment, Lewis was still working at

Pelican Bay when he was fired by

the state for an assortment of mis-

conduct unrelated to the Long

incident. According to State

Personnel Board (SPB) and court

records, Lewis was canned for inex-

cusable neglect of duty,

discourteous treatment of the public

or other employees, willful disobe-

dience, and other failure of good

behavior that caused discredit to the

CDC. Among other employee rule

and regulation violations, Lewis

“routinely referred to black inmates

as ‘primates,’ ‘monkeys,’ ‘toads,’

and ‘niggers’” and also was accused

of demeaning actions toward sex

offenders, including referring to

child molesters as “Chesters,”

according to the records.

The nine-year veteran also was

found to be dishonest because he

gave false statements during the

investigation of his misconduct. His

termination was affirmed by an SPB

administrative-law judge who also

noted that “the likelihood of recur-

rence is significant given [Lewis’]

dishonesty at the investigation of

the incident, continued denial of

wrongdoing at the [SPB] hearing,

and his apparent lack of remorse.”

(Lewis did not respond to several

interview requests relayed through

his attorney and the union.)

“And here you’re holding up a

guy as your hero who was fired by

the department for misconduct and

racism and other stuff, and shot a

guy. I mean it’s a disgrace to what

CCPOA claims they stand for, work-

ing ‘the toughest beat in the state.’

It’s incredible,” Reynoso said.

But what was apparently more

important to the union officials and

convention delegates was that

Lewis had beaten the federal gov-

ernment’s case against him, at least

for the time being. The subject of

Lewis’ return and retrial was the

cover story in the next issue of

Peacekeeper (January/February

2002). The article, “Miscarriage of

Justice—A former correctional

peace officer is forced to relive a

nightmare as he prepares for a

retrial,” detailed a litany of alleged

government misconduct from

Lewis’ first trial and implied that

Lewis was the victim of a conspir-

acy between CDC internal-affairs

investigators, including Reynoso,

and the feds.

“Yes, there does seem to be a

conspiracy afoot,” surmised the

story. The article also said that

Lewis and his new and

improved legal team,

which included

nationally renowned

San Francisco crimi-

nal-defense attorney

Dennis Riordan, were

anxious to get the retrial

started. Although Lewis

initially refused to waive

his right to a speedy trial,

the proceeding was in fact

delayed for more than

three years. At the end of

last month, the day of reck-

oning finally had arrived.

Surrounded by his high-

priced legal team and a small

entourage of CCPOA officials,

Lewis walked into a federal court-

room in San Francisco and

confronted the nightmare.

26 | SN&R | JULY 21, 2005 INSIDE | OPINION | NEWS | COVER STORY | ARTS&CULTURE | FILM | THEATER | DISH | WORDS | NIGHT&DAY | MUSIC | BACK OF THE BOOK | CLASSIFIEDS | JULY 21, 2005 | SN&R | 27

When the United States of America

v. David Gene Lewis criminal trial

began on June 27, both sides had

pride and ego at stake, as well as a

sizeable financial investment in the

case. Reynoso estimates that the

CCPOA had gambled well more

than a million dollars of its mem-

bers’ money to defend Lewis

(CCPOA Vice President Lance

Corcoran declined to estimate what

the union had spent on the case). It

was a gamble because, under the

terms of the union’s contract with

the state, if Lewis was found not

guilty, the taxpayers of California

would have to pay Lewis’ attorney

fees and all related costs of his

defense. If they lost, the guards

union would eat the sizeable invest-

ment, which dumbfounded Reynoso.

“Because they’ve held this guy up as

their hero, they’re willing to go to

the mat for him,” he said.

The federal government undoubt-

edly had spent even more. At least

two FBI agents, prosecutors and sup-

port staff had worked on the case off

and on for more than 10 years. The

result of the prosecution likely was

also important to the government’s

self-esteem: It was still stinging from

a defeat in a similar, but much larger,

case it had lost in a federal courtroom

in Fresno in 2000. In that case, eight

Corcoran state-prison guards were

acquitted for allegedly setting up

inmate fights and shootings for

“blood sport.” The scandal had gotten

nationwide coverage, including a seg-

ment on 60 Minutes. The retrial of Lewis began on

the last Monday in June with jury

selection. By the end of the day, the

jury was seated, and Reynoso was

cautiously upbeat. “They think they

got a good jury, and we think we

got a good jury, so one of us is full

of crap,” he joked.

Riordan’s defense team was

trying to block some documents

from being admitted into evidence,

and Reynoso spent that night round-

ing up written declarations from

CDC officials in order to validate the

records. On Tuesday, federal prose-

cutor Laurel Beeler got the case

under way. Lewis was charged with

depriving Long of his constitutional

right not to be subjected to cruel and

unusual punishment by assaulting

him under color of law and, in a

second count, using a firearm in con-

nection with the deprivation of

Long’s rights.

In essence, Beeler had to prove

that the shooting was deliberate and

did not comply with CDC policy,

which only permitted shooting to

break up a fight if an inmate faced an

imminent threat of great bodily injury

or death. In most cases, that standard

was interpreted as requiring the pos-

session of a weapon by one or more

inmates, and neither Long nor his

assailant was found to have a weapon.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, a

parade of inmate and prison-

employee witnesses testified to

various aspects of the incident,

essentially painting a picture of a

minor fistfight between two inmates

without weapons. On cross-exami-

nation, Riordan attempted to

discredit the government’s wit-

nesses and, in particular, the inmate

witnesses, by pointing out their gen-

erally extensive and, in some cases,

heinous criminal histories. Riordan

also hammered home the fact that

the convicted felons were given, or

were potentially eligible for, sen-

tence reductions of three to six

months for their testimony

against Lewis.

On Thursday, Beeler called to

the stand a CDC training officer

who testified that Lewis had

attended an annual group training

session less than a month before the

shooting. The class included

instruction on the CDC shooting

policy. This was one of the

strongest parts of the prosecution

case, according to Reynoso. “He

also reviewed several shoot/don’t

shoot scenarios where he said

adamantly, ‘I do not teach that you

can shoot for a fistfight,’” he said.

The training officer’s testimony was

incriminating, and Riordan spent

more time on cross-examination of

the witness than he did on any

other, according to Reynoso.

Riordan got the witness to admit

that even without a weapon, an

inmate conceivably could use a bare

fist to kill or cause great bodily

injury. “But clearly the evidence

that the training officer put in

showed that you could not shoot a

man for a fistfight,” Reynoso said.

The last witness of the day was

Reynoso, who mostly testi-

fied to the authenticity of

the records in the case, the

cell histories of the

inmates, employee time

sheets and other technical

aspects of the

evidence. At the conclu-

sion of his testimony, the

government rested its

case. The jury was

given Friday off while

the lawyers met with

the judge to hear a

motion. The defense

case would begin on

the Tuesday follow-

ing the three-day

Fourth of July

weekend. It was

anticipated that the

defense case would run a week

or longer.

On that Tuesday, Riordan began

the defense by entering into evi-

dence a portion of an official CDC

report on the shooting. CDC regula-

tions required that the investigation

of all shootings be conducted by a

Shooting Review Board (SRB),

which is partly made up of prison

officials from other institutions. The

SRB then determines whether the

shooting was justified and complied

with CDC policy. Riordan had the

jury read the report, which had con-

cluded that the Lewis shooting did

not violate CDC rules. Without put-

ting Lewis on the stand, Riordan

then announced that the defense

case was finished. Keeping Lewis

off the stand, Riordan later

explained, prevented him from

being grilled on cross-examination

and possibly opening the door to the

potentially damaging details of his

1994 job termination. “[W]e wanted

to keep the focus on their case,”

he said.

The prosecution was caught off

guard by the abbreviated defense,

but it had expected Riordan to bring

up the SRB report, and Reynoso

had prepared an elaborate rebuttal to

the report, which, in connection

with a long-running federal civil

case against the CDC, Madrid v.

Woodford, had been independently

reviewed by a court-appointed

investigator in 2004. The review

concluded that “no competent man-

ager would use the SRB report as a

valid basis for finding that Mr.

Lewis acted in conformance with

policy in the use of lethal force

against inmate Long. The report

raises more questions than it

answers, is superficial, and fails to

address the legal standard for using

lethal force.” In fact, during the

1990s, the SRB report process

statewide was found to be

grossly inadequate, leading to leg-

islative hearings and major

procedural changes to the shooting-

review process.

The Lewis jury wasn’t shown

any evidence that the SRB process

statewide, and the Lewis SRB

report in particular, had been signif-

icantly discredited.

When Beeler told Reynoso she

had decided not to offer evidence to

discredit the SRB report, Reynoso

was taken aback. “I was [thinking],

‘What the hell are we doing?’ We

could have shredded [the report] to

pieces, to pieces. The state SRB

process was a sham!” he recalled.

Reynoso said Beeler attempted to

downplay the SRB report in her

closing argument, but without

having presented evidence to back

up the assertion, it was too little too

late. “I knew then we’d been beat. If

we can’t rebut the SRB, we’re

through,” he said.

Beeler told SN&R she couldn’t

discuss the case without permission

from U.S. attorney’s office

spokesman Luke Macaulay.

Macaulay said the office “won’t be

able to make [Beeler] available for

an interview” and instead provided

a written statement from U.S.

Attorney Kevin Ryan. Ryan said he

was “gratified by the dedication and

commitment of our trial team” and

wanted to thank everyone, including

the FBI and the CDC for their sup-

port and participation in the case.

After Riordan and Beeler com-

pleted their closing arguments late

that Tuesday, the case was sent to

the jury. The jury came back that

Wednesday morning and deliberated

for about three hours before return-

ing a verdict of not guilty on both

counts. And Dave Lewis walked out

of the courtroom a free man.

“Well, I think it’s fair to say he

was extremely relieved,” Riordan

said after being asked for Lewis’

reaction to the verdict. Even though

he was terminated by the CDC in

1996, Lewis was granted “industrial

disability” retirement status and gets

$2,156 in retirement pay each

month, according to Brad Pacheco

of the California

Public Employees

Retirement System.

Reynoso obviously

was frustrated by the

trial outcome, and his

concerns about the gov-

ernment’s failure to

effectively rebut the SRB

report turned out to be

valid. Both Riordan and

Reynoso talked with sev-

eral jurors when the case

was over and confirmed

that the report, which was

virtually the entire defense

case, had been the key piece

of evidence that persuaded

the jury. “One juror we talked

to afterward said, ‘We were of

the opinion that if Ms. Beeler

was going to argue that we should-

n’t give the SRB report any

credibility or any credence, then we

thought, ‘Well, then why didn’t she

put in any evidence to back that

up?’” Reynoso said. Riordan talked

to a juror who was also a lawyer.

“STANDING UP” continued on page 29

To an outside observer, the elevation of Lewis to hero status by theCCPOA might seempuzzling. In 1996, he was fired for an assortment of misconduct unrelated to the Long incident.

Joe Reynoso, left, with California Peace OfficersAssociation President and Lodi Police Chief JerryAdams, center, and state Attorney General BillLockyer, right, after Reynoso received the Awardof Ethical Courage from the association.

“STANDING UP” continued from page 25

“And here you’re holding up a

guy as your hero who was

fired by the department for

misconduct and racism and

other stuff, and shot a guy.

I mean it’s a disgrace to what

CCPOA claims they stand for.”

Joe Reynoso

Dave Lewis, center, posed with prison-guard-union officials Chuck Alexander, left, and RickNewton, right, in Peacekeeper magazine in 2001.Alexander and Newton reportedly were instru-mental in convincing the union to bankroll Lewis’criminal defense, even though Lewis had beenfired years earlier.

INSIDE | OPINION | NEWS | COVER STORY | ARTS&CULTURE | FILM | THEATER | DISH | WORDS | NIGHT&DAY | MUSIC | BACK OF THE BOOK | CLASSIFIEDS | JULY 21, 2005 | SN&R | 29

The juror confirmed that the SRB

report was important and that the gov-

ernment failed to prove its case

beyond a reasonable doubt. “[The

juror said] that if it had been a civil

case, they might well have concluded

that the shooting was negligent, but

they definitely didn’t think that he had

criminal intent,” Riordan said.

Lance Corcoran, the CCPOA’s vice

president, called the verdict a victory

not only for Lewis, but also for the

profession. He attributed the prosecu-

tion to vindictiveness—a payback by

the federal government for its loss in

the Corcoran prison case of 2000.

“I mean, this is a story about

federal court abuse; this

was truly a case of

politics,” he said.

“They brought a

case that had no

merit whatsoever.”

Corcoran is also bitter

at the CDC for not pro-

viding Lewis legal

representation from the

beginning. “What kills

me is even though

his department cleared

him of wrongdoing,

they did nothing to

support him,”

he said.

Corcoran said

he has great

respect for Lewis,

whom he called a

gentle soul and an

amazing man in

spite of his abruptly

ended career. “He

was terminated for

some really awful

language, and he

acknowledged that.

He’s noble in that he

acknowledges his mis-

takes,” he said.

At least one member

of the CCPOA rank and

file also was apparently

elated by the verdict. An

Internet message board

used by Pelican Bay guards posted the

outcome of the trial within 24 hours

after the jury decided the case.

“WHAT A RESOUNDING NOT

GUILTY this was from the federal

courts in San Francisco,” read the post.

Illustrating that not much has changed

in the workplace culture at the prison,

the author also had a coded message

for Reynoso and another CDC investi-

gator that had worked on the case.

“[T]o those two idiots involved in this

case from the [CDC] who helped in

the harassment of Dave Lewis I say,

‘See that blinking light in the corner of

your eye …’”

Reynoso explained that the mes-

sage was a veiled threat promising

future payback. “The blinking light in

the corner of our eye is the train

coming; the train’s coming after us

now,” he explained.

But it won’t be the first train he

has stared down, and, for now, he is

glad to be out of the partnership with

the federal government and will go

back to working on run-of-the-mill

CDC investigations, preferably not

involving staff misconduct. He said he

would not object if he never has to

work on another case against a corrupt

co-worker.

“I’m never going to do a staff case

again, not like this. Not until the

department is really and truly

reformed to where they support this

kind of an effort. The department has

to be behind a guy that’s doing this.

If they’re not, it makes for a miser-

able existence.” Ω

“STANDING UP” continued from page 27

CDC investigator Reynoso

had violated the code of

silence, which required

corrections employees to

ignore, or help cover up, the

misconduct of co-workers.

Actually assisting outside

federal investigators, as

Reynoso did, was a

potentially fatal breach of

the code.