"It was experiencing direct involvement in putting down two major riots in my first year as a correctional officer, finding a near dead fellow officer, unconscious and bleeding from razor slashes over his face and entire body; finding myself being beaten with iron rebar and steel chairs and personally observing both physical and mental torture of those under our custody and care that spurred me on toward a goal of better corrections.

"It was during the early days that I began to learn that [the Florida Department of Corrections] had a two-core staff assembly throughout the department. There was first the core group who did the work as required by rules and regulations, but often with the exception of 'not reporting' certain incidents observed, for fear of job loss or retaliation. The second group was certainly the minority core but the group who illustrated that they owned the law and could enforce at will without regard for its content. Though not core, a third and very small group did in fact give their full worth toward excellent corrections as demanded by law.

"…In the years that followed at other locations around the state of Florida it became obvious that prisoner abuse — more than anything else — was systematically chronic. The large prisons were plagued with 'goon squads' that were well known to, and feared by, staff and prisoners."

Excerpted from a written statement submitted to the Commission