Essex County PBA Local 382 Memorandum

November 18, 2006

To All Members & Other Interested Parties:

In an effort to further educate the membership as to what goes on behind the walls of government, and especially in the world of corrections, there is a book that I've been reading, which I believe would be beneficial to every Essex County Correction Officer to also read.

I'm also calling on everyone in county government and other concerned parties to also familiarize themselves with this book because in a round about way, we can all directly or indirectly identify with a lot of its contents and the mind set and demeanor of some individuals named in the book.

I've often said that corruption and mismanagement within a jail system remains a constant problem because the things that we deal with are locked away from the general public and no one but us knows the reality of what goes on behind our walls. Therefore, our issues are usually ignored.

This is why for the past 5 years as your PBA president, I've taken the initiative to make our jail, union, safety and security issues a "public issue" to get the word out. As bad as things have been, they would be a lot worse if the PBA didn't do what's necessary to protect its members, make public complaints and to make our administration and the public aware when our safety is compromised and our concerns are ignored.

With that said, the name of the book which you must read is...

"Rose Tainted Justice... Power, Privilege & Internal Affairs"

The author of the book is Kenneth Freeman who was a Senior Internal Affairs
Investigator with the New Jersey Department of Corrections for many years and the book is a very realistic look inside the corrections system and a true account of everything that's wrong in our profession when the wrong people are given positions of power.

Mr. Freeman has seen, heard, and most importantly documented things that will boggle your mind and will leave you with the question...How do these people live with themselves?

His story is a who's who on the corruption, retaliation and head turning that existed within the New Jersey Department of Corrections and how certain individuals who are very familiar to us were attached to this corruption in one way or another.

What the book describes, are actions which would seem to be criminal or at the very least highly unethical, which I would assume went unpunished unless there's more to the story than what's in the book.

The book chronicles a system of negative political influence within the states prison system and how certain protected people were given the power to do what they pleased. With that power, they protected those who they wanted to protect and hurt those who dared speak out against them or questioned their authority.

Does that sound familiar?

What was most shocking to me was to read about the lengths that state prison officials would go either to misuse their authority to hurt people or to protect certain individuals from investigations, but it was no surprise to learn who some of those protected individuals were and it hits very close to home.

Who knew back in 2004 when we asked the former State Corrections Commissioner to intervene into our failing county jail system what was in store for us, but as I read this book many of my questions were answered as to why the oversight by so-called experts from state corrections hasn't exactly worked out for us.

In two recent speeches that I heard at the Essex County Police Academy and in countless news articles, our county administration continues to defend themselves on their decisions in the operations and management of our jail system.

When our administration speaks about the management of our jail, they use words like "Professional Oversight" & "Expert", but if they read this book that I suggest that they read, it may cause them to re-define the words "expert" and "professional".

There is a distinct difference between being a "professional" and being a "political survivor" who is pushed through the system to gain positions of authority and protected by an abusive and corrupt system as described in the book.

When a "protected political survivor" rather than a "professional" holds the safety and careers of 700 correction officers in the palm of their hand, it can only breed "chaos" and "confusion" and what better words can I use to describe the last three years in the Essex County Jail?

I can easily give some prime examples from the book, but I would much rather people read the book and draw their own opinions and conclusions.

An associate of ours has personally spoken to the author of this book who I'm sure will be labeled as a disgruntled state employee when our critics read this communication, and when this book begins to make the rounds, but that's not the impression that I've gotten from the book and I pride myself on being extremely objective.

"Disgruntled" is another favorite word of the politicians to describe anyone who dares to speak out, who dares to have an opinion or who dares to question their authority.

We plan further communications with the author of the book and maybe he would be willing to speak to the entire membership, but in the mean time, if you wish to read the book, I believe it will put into perspective, the origin of the many PBA issues, complaints and requests made over the past few years and during our public protest on September 20, 2006.

Thank you for your time and continued support.

Respectfully,

Joseph Amato, President
PBA Local 382