Datasets:

robbd
/

epstein-index

---
title: "DOJ Epstein Files, Data Set 9 (EFTA00125329)"
source: "DOJ Epstein Files, Data Set 9"
sourceUrl: "https://huggingface.co/datasets/ishumilin/epstein-files-ocr-complete"
date: "2026-01-01"
category: "DOJ Data Set"
eftaNumber: "EFTA00125329"
ocrPages: 0
ocrChars: 45753
ocrElapsed: 0.0
parseTier: "external"
engine: "ishumilin OCR pipeline (engine undisclosed; CC0 mirror)"
externalSource: "ishumilin-ocr-complete"
externalLicense: "CC0-1.0"
externalCredit: "ishumilin/epstein-files-ocr-complete (Hugging Face)"
externalUrl: "https://huggingface.co/datasets/ishumilin/epstein-files-ocr-complete"
---

```markdown

SWORN STATEMENT

```

DIGITALLY RECORDED

```markdown

OIG CASE #:

```

```markdown

2019-010614

```

OFFICE OF THE INSPECTOR GENERAL

MARCH 21, 2022

RESOLUTE DOCUMENTATION SERVICES

28632 Roadside Drive, Suite 285

Agoura Hills, CA 91301

Phone: (818) 431-5800

EFTA00125329

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125330

EFTA00125331

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125332

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

5

3-226/10A, which would be the Non-Disclosure Agreement, and you signed - you read both of them, signed them, but for the record I’m going to read them to you and let’s start off with the Warnings and Assurances form.

The United - the form states: The United States Department of Justice Office of Inspector General Warnings and Assurances to Employee Requested to Provide Information on a Voluntary Basis. You are being asked to provide information as part of an investigation being conducted by the Office of the Inspector General.

This investigation is being conducted pursuant to the Inspector General Act of 1978 as amended. This investigation pertains to job performance failure and security failure. This is a voluntary interview. Accordingly, you do not have to answer questions. No disciplinary action will be taken against you if you choose not to answer questions. Any statement you wish to - you furnish may be used as evidence in any future criminal proceedings or agency disciplinary proceeding or both.

The waiver states I understand the

EFTA00125333

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

6

warnings and assurances stated above and I am willing to make a statement and answer questions. No promises or threats have been made to and no pressure or coercion of any kind has been used against me.

the document after the interview. The second form states: Department of Justice Office of Inspector General Non-Disclosure Agreement. I, understand that the Department of Justice Office of Inspector General OIG will allow me to review certain documents in connection with my remote interview with the OIG on March 21, 2022, in order to facilitate that remote interview. A copy of the documents shown to me during my interview with the OIG

EFTA00125334

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

7

labeled OIG Documents will be made part of the OIG record of that interview.

As a condition of being granted access to review the OIG interview documents, I agree not to make an audio or video recording of the interview, excuse me, and I also agree that until the OIG’s final report or a summary of the final report is released to the public I will not copy, photograph, discuss, or disclose any information from or about the OIG interview documents I review to anyone other than the OIG, my attorney if I have legal counsel who also executes a non-disclosure agreement with terms similar to this agreement, or other specifically authorized by the OIG after any such person executes a non-disclosure agreement with terms similar to this agreement.

I further agree that even after the OIG’s final report or a summary of the final report is released to the public I will not discuss or disclose any information from or about the OIG interview documents that are not contained in or that are redacted from the publicly released final report or summary of the final report.

These provisions are consistent with and

EFTA00125335

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

8

do not supersede, conflict with, or otherwise alter the employee obligations, rights, or liabilities created by existing statute or Executive order relating to (1) classified information, (2) communications to Congress, (3) the reporting to an Inspector General or the Office of Special Counsel of a violation of any law, rule, or regulation, or mismanagement, a gross waste of funds, an abuse of authority, or a substantial and specific danger to public health or safety, or (4) any other whistleblower protection. The definitions, requirements, obligations, rights, sanctions, and liabilities created by controlling Executive order and statutory provisions are incorporate into this agreement and are controlling.

EFTA00125336

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125337

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125338

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

11

trades. I can’t even count how many jobs I’ve had, but my main career out of everything was truck driving. I was pretty much a truck driver. I drove all kinds of trucks and stuff like that. Then when I met my current wife back in ’08 we had moved to North Carolina to be by her family and that’s when I acquired a job with the North Carolina Department of Corrections, and then I was down there for two years and did that.

We moved back to New York, which is where I went back to driving truck again while I was in the hiring process for the Bureau of Prisons. And then I ended up getting hired with the Bureau of Prisons in November of 2011, and I started at MDC Brooklyn.

EFTA00125339

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

12

EFTA00125340

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125341

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125342

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

MR. : I would probably have to say - I don’t know the exact dates because his exit was kind of unique. He didn’t actually initially retire; he went out on some kind of other type of leave and eventually it’s to my understanding he ended up retiring. But when he had went out all communication stopped with everybody with him. Nobody - he never kept in touch with anybody. He never reached out. But

MR. : -- I really don’t know what hey, I don’t know his exact date, but I would probably want to say that I was there for almost maybe just under or right around or another year after he had left. I don’t think it was that much because there was several other people locally that had filled in including me for his position.

MR. : So you recall that other

EFTA00125343

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

16

EFTA00125344

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

17

EFTA00125345

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

18

EFTA00125346

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

19

time which I can’t remember which one it was because there was so much staff that came and went throughout this whole thing, that one time it was the executive assistant who was told to oversee the department, and then at another time the AW oversaw the department.

He was told to oversee it. And then there was a little bit of a stint where, you know, I could just informally absorbed a lot of his job duties just to get the department functioning, but I was never actually promoted or paid or anything like that that actually - I was never formally designated as acting or anything like that, I just had to do some of

EFTA00125347

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

20

the facility manager functions in order to have the department operational.

So I would get my go-ahead for - to do those functions. They would - they oversaw it or approved by either or at the time.

MR. : I wasn’t really designate - I wasn’t really acting, I was just - if I had to do - if I had to get something done that a facility manager would normally have to do, I would just go to the - whatever time period it was, if was over the department or if was over the department, I would have to go to them and say, “Hey, listen, can I go ahead and do this? Can you give me the approval, sign off on it?” and then I would actually do the act.

MR. : Okay. Bear with me a second. Let’s see. Maybe this might help -- I have a SigNet contract here, right? And it’s multiple questions will be on the SigNet contract --

EFTA00125348

EFTA00125349

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125350

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

23

EFTA00125351

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

24

EFTA00125352

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

25

EFTA00125353

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

26

come back I remember that the Warden was very, very upset with whatever was going on, and I just remember somebody, I can’t recall exactly who - came down to the office, to my office, and spoke to me personally and told me that he would like me to just hold things down until they figure out things, what was going to happen with , and see what was going to happen.

MR. : Okay. So according to this you were acting facility manager, but you were general foreman, but you were acting at this point. And so, on record is it possible from the time that when Warden assigned you the title to when you left were you the acting facilities manager - facility manager?

MR. : So I don't - I would - definitely not up until the time I left because there was some butting of heads between me and

EFTA00125354

27

EFTA00125355

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

28

EFTA00125356

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

29

all kind of issues with the cameras from what I heard from internal communications and stuff like that.

So started this program, this project, at the request of higherups. I don’t really know the backdrop on that, that was in between them. And then I really did not get involved with it at all until he never came back to work. He dropped off and then I just picked up after him.

MR. : I kind of missed a key point I wanted to ask. So as a - can you differentiate the job duties between a facility manager and the general foreman?

MR. : So basically, the facility manager they keep track of the budget. They authorize expenditures. They obviously supervise me, and then I in turn supervise the subordinate staff, the wage grade trade guys. But basically, he handled the approval of projects, you know, submitted approvals for projects. He did, like, the five- and 10-year plans for the facility, authorized all the expenditures. He went ahead and sat in on all the department head meetings to give executive

EFTA00125357

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

30

staff briefings on what’s going on in the department, progress reports, stuff like that. Listen to any concerns that they would have and then he brings it back to us.

And in my job, my main job by title is literally - I was in charge of supervising, monitoring, and then the wage grade guys that were below me because I was also wage grade. The facility manager is a GS employee. I was a WS employee just like the rest of the trade guys. And my job was basically to supervise them guys, assign them work, make sure they were coming and going in the facility with the inmates, make sure that they were handling their tools and all that other stuff. I did their performance evaluations and all that other stuff. And the facility manager pretty much did all that on me.

So he was my supervisor. He would evaluate me, you know, keep track of my time and all that other stuff. And that's pretty much it.

MR. : Who were some of the employees that reported to you? You said the wage employees. Who were the employees that

EFTA00125358

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

31

reported to you?

MR. : In the Facility Department it was the trade specific wage guys, so you had the communications technicians, engineering technicians, carpenters, plumbers, electricians, HVAC guys. And then each one of those tradesmen have a cadre of inmates that work for them, so I would go ahead - work orders would come in from all departments, you know, requests, “Hey, can you change a light bulb? Can you unclog the toilet here?” I would give that work order to the appropriate trade guy and then he would take his group of inmates and go out into the institution and fix it and close out the work order, report back to me.

MR. : Okay. Agent , any questions on that before I move forward with the contracts?

MR. : Yes, I’m just writing down some follow-up questions. So just - can you just clarify again, when were you actually the acting facilities manager?

MR. : It was whenever they wanted me to be basically. It was sporadic and on and

EFTA00125359

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

32

EFTA00125360

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

33

things within the department.

EFTA00125361

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

34

signature line you maintained the acting facility manager?

MR. : I guess. I guess I just never took it out, yeah. But --.

MR. : But was there ever anything official that went out, like there was an official email saying you’re the acting facility manager. Was there ever anything that said you’re no longer the acting facility manager or - you know what I’m saying, like --?

MR. : Yeah, no, not to my knowledge there was - because there was talks because they were dragging on the hiring of a replacement facility manager because case, whatever he had going on on his personal side with the Bureau they couldn’t fill the job until they finalized what was happening with him. They needed like, I guess, an end date or something like that. They needed to know when was falling off the books in order for them to re-post the job.

So there was never - it went on for so long. Like I said, it was from the point that I had walked out the door there in February of '19 there was still no facility manager there.

EFTA00125362

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

35

EFTA00125363

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

36

EFTA00125364

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

37

EFTA00125365

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

38

MR. : No, if you’re acting, if they sent out an email, I would say that’s pretty official saying that you’re the acting facility manager and you could put it in your signature line. I mean, there’s not like --.

MR. : I would normally and I thought so, but I also found out also that if you’re, like, you know, not temporarily promoted into it and stuff like that and you’re not getting paid to do the job - but like I said, I do remember emails going out, I just cannot recall if the word “acting” was put into it or not and if the word “acting” was in it, but I don’t know if I ever recall that or not.

I mean, there was several times where it would go out because called in sick or he went on vacation. I just don’t recall if it was ever done when he went off permanently. I don’t know if that was ever --.

MR. : Would it be a fair statement for us to say that you were acting facility manager with oversight? Would that be a fair --?

MR. : I --.

EFTA00125366

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

39

EFTA00125367

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125368

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

41

out an email letting the institution and the executive staff know that “■ ■ will be acting in my capacity while I’m out.” Happened all the time. Same thing like me, I would do the same thing and I would designate one of my subordinates as acting for me if I went out.

But I do believe that at some point some kind of email went out by one of the executive staff after left that everybody should come and see me for all facility-related issues till further notice. And like I said, came to my office right after we had found out that wasn’t coming back shortly after that Denver trip and he told me that I would have to run the department until they figure out what was going on with him, which was top secret and nobody knew anything. They didn’t know nothing, couldn’t tell you.

MR.  : Just to clarify. After you had that meeting with , is that when he sent out that email?

MR. : I don't think - I don't know if he was the one that sent it out, I can't

EFTA00125369

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

42

EFTA00125370

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

43

December of 2016, so nothing happened in ’16. I think, you know, because I was - I got there, like, the week of Christmas. So going into ’17, I know that there was talks about - it wasn’t so much on the cameras, it was on the recorders. There was always constant internal chatter between the comm techs and SIS and everything else on how - I guess they had an older system that was analog and everybody else had digital, but their main gripe was, I guess - and I’m not too familiar with the security side of stuff, I’ll be honest with you, I always refer to them when I needed a question answered, but from what I gather, what I understand, they weren’t able to go back in time on the recorders as far as they experienced, I guess, with other institutions.

So there was no secret that there was cameras that were not working throughout the facility. Like I said, that was a dead horse from what I understand. They were dealing with broken cameras long before I had even gotten back there. And this recorder issue for whatever reason evolved and turned into camera issues, you know, and exposed the entire

EFTA00125371

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

44

MR. : So you mentioned there’s two issues. There is one the - there were actual cameras that weren’t recording, I mean, cameras that weren’t working.

MR. Right. So the - from what I understand you had a combination of two problems there. You had some cameras that legitimately were not working. They just - there was no communication. There was no nothing. And then you had other cameras which were in certain cells up in the Special Housing Unit where whether they were working or not, it was to my understanding that there was a lot of damage being done to them by the inmates that were in those cells. So they were either scratching the lenses on the cameras, covering up with wet toilet paper or whatever the case may be.

I, myself, I couldn't even tell you if those cameras were ever working. I only knew

EFTA00125372

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

45

of one camera in the Special Housing Unit that worked for the cells for the ranges and that was, like, one suicide cell that they had there on J-Range. But I don’t - it started out with me, the recorders were the issue, and then they were like, “Oh, okay, we’re going to go ahead and spend this money and fix these recorders and get these - this conversion from analog to digital, let’s suck in the cameras too that don’t work.”

But I can tell you that I know that SIS was constantly going to the comm techs all the time because they were doing investigations and had no camera footage. It almost seemed like (Indiscernible *00:45:47). And obviously this was long before the Epstein thing because, you know, I had even left the institution before Epstein got there. This was just for, like, smaller internal investigations that they were doing where they were constantly going to Daniels for the camera footage issues.

And the determination was made by and the higherups, I guess, and they said, well, if we’re going to go ahead and change

EFTA00125373

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

46

EFTA00125374

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

47

MR. : TMS, yep, Total Maintenance System. So, you know, all that equipment was in there, so you should be able to pull the report out of there. That would list all those cameras including any asset numbers assigned to the associated components that’s maintainable. If it’s something that’s maintainable and could be repaired and it’s not like a throwaway. We call it run-to-die. If it’s maintainable, reparable, it’s worth putting money into it, it’s in that system.

MR. : Okay. So in the SHU, do you know how many cameras were in the SHU offhand?

MR. : No, because it was very inconsistent because it was to my understanding certain cameras were added throughout the years for certain specific reasons. They would designate certain cells for certain purposes and then they would cancel that purpose and convert it back to a regular cell. I mean, it was just the constant changing of the operations that changed the cameras, and that was just obvious without even knowing the backdrop because you could tell just by the cameras there were so many different makes and

EFTA00125375

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

48

EFTA00125376

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

49

MR. : So I really - for the project the way it was designed, the way we wanted it done was had put this package together.

We were going to get - he had the map of the cameras I was telling you about. So we were going to upgrade the existing cameras, add new cameras because took this map, brought it to the executive staff and to SIS and they said, "Hey, listen, this is what we have now. We’re going to go ahead and try to get this project. Where do you need cameras?"

So they did a tour around the institution and they went ahead and they asked to have other cameras placed, like on certain ranges that didn’t have any coverages. There was, like, a little mini TV rec room in the housing units that had no camera coverage in them.

There was a lot of blind spots in certain areas throughout the institution. So they went ahead and they added what they wanted to add.

But then also because the recorder was getting upgraded, the infrastructure that was in place because it was analog, obviously it was going to go to digital, they had to run new wiring, new conduit. All that had to be done.

EFTA00125377

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

50

So under that contract, last I remember walking out that door, what happened was it came in over a million dollars originally and somebody came back and said, “Listen, we need to get this to 800,000 or lower.” Somebody threw out a number there, I don’t remember who it was. It came through and somebody up top said that because of some kind of procurement avenue or regulation or something, they would’ve had to go through a whole different procurement avenue because of that amount. They said to make it easier and to try and increase our chances of getting this money and getting it done, we had to bring the number down to like 800,000 or something. I don’t remember the exact number.

So then the decision was made because originally we did this contract, whoever we were purchasing the cameras from, they were also supposed to install those cameras. We paid for the labor for them to do the entire project initially. My guys weren’t going to touch anything, they were just going to provide support. So the initial $1 million number was to have the contract SigNet, I guess it was in

EFTA00125378

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

51

that contract, whoever we were getting those cameras from, they were going to go ahead and do the install and we would supervise them, escort them, and give support when they came.

so when they came back and told us that that number needed to get down below 800 or whatever, that’s when the decision was made to where they said, “Okay. We can do this. We can just have the contractor install the cameras and we can use the trade guys, the electrician and the comm techs to run the cable and the wiring to save on the labor, to bring the labor costs down to try and get into that number.”

And that was the last - that’s how I left off. That’s how the project was supposed to be done, because when I was there, my last year that I was there for the better - for the second half of ’19, well, ’18 into ’19, the electrician and the comm techs had already started running conduit in the housing units and stuff like that. They had already begun to hang conduit. But I could tell you from the right up till I walked out that door there were never no cameras or even wiring for that matter

EFTA00125379

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125380

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

53

EFTA00125381

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

54

EFTA00125382

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

55

EFTA00125383

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

56

EFTA00125384

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

57

MR. : You have - so I believe - we had a lot of conduit left over at Building 4. It was a warehouse that we had in Brooklyn that belongs to MCC New York. It’s like their food service warehouse and facilities had a storage and I guess they had a whole bunch of conduit there from a surplus from another project, so they started bringing that stuff over to the institution and using that. The wiring I believe was purchased separately through - I don’t remember the company’s name. The comm tech would know because he did the order, but we purchased that through - what is the website where you buy stuff from GSA?

MR. : That’s it. Yeah, so all these companies sell their stuff on this GSA website, GSA Advantage, and I know all of the

EFTA00125385

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

58

EFTA00125386

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

59

it was metal and you run the conduit and you run the junction boxes and everything and then you pull your cable through it and it’s basically a protective housing to protect the wiring and keep it from being exposed.

MR. : And according to your memory, do you recall whose decision it was to have the in-house staff do the conduits and the wiring?

MR. : It came down from the executive staff, but that was discussed, jeez, I can’t even remember. That was back when the numbers started flying in and they were trying to find out ways to bring the numbers down and everything, but it was somebody higherup that made the decision to try and cut there on the -when they saw how much the labor was, they were like, “Well, maybe we could cut back on the labor,” because it was my goal that if they were going to spend this kind of money, you might as well have the contractor do everything.

MR. : And all my hopes and dreams got killed because they saw the number and wanted to cut some fat and - but --.

EFTA00125387

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

60

MR. : No problem. See on the bottom, it says - it was - the document "Signature Offer Steven Smith." It looks like you signed on 09/21/2018 and that's - he works for SigNet Technologies. And Line 31A that’s - looks like U.S. Government, that’s Freelon Peyton (Phonetic Sp. *1:01:38), and that was signed on 09/21/2018, and he’s a Section Chief FAO.

MR. And the delivery date on Line 20 up here, it says, “Estimate” - well, I don’t know if it’s estimate, but it says, “Delivery date is on 09/28/2018.” It says, “MCC New York camera system: provide services in accordance with SFS, SOW, and technical proposal.” And it looks like GSA, GS07F-0322T. It looks like the contract number’s in here too. It looks like based - looking at this, the contract, the estimate was - I mean, the contract states that the delivery for all that equipment and everything that was ordered was scheduled to be delivered at the MCC on September 28, 2018.

According to your recollection, do you recall if all these items were delivered to the

EFTA00125388

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125389

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

62

days get done. Delivery date I think is when they delivered the contract to the contractor. But to answer your question, as of February 14th of 2019, my last day there, there was not a single camera on-site there --

MR. : That place, absolutely. But I could tell you this much, two things wrong with that. Number one, it was my impression that the contractor when they received all the cameras and got all the cameras in stock and everything was on-site and they had all the equipment on-site and everything was in stock, they were bringing it with them. I didn’t - I don’t know if they were going to dropship that or not and have the stuff delivered directly to the institution and then come afterwards. But even if that was the case, somebody would have

EFTA00125390

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

63

to had gone to the rear loading dock where that stuff comes in and there’s a logbook back there and they would’ve had to sign for that delivery and it would’ve had to been somebody in the facilities department.

impression that SigNet was supposed to bring all that equipment with them when they come in to install?

so to me contractually wise there would have been too much liability there to have the stuff shipped directly to the institution and then call the contractor up and say, “Hey, come in, all the stuff is here,” because if something was missing or broken, because the contractor didn’t have chain of custody of that equipment the whole entire time, they could blame us. We had a lot of liability on our hands and we

EFTA00125391

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

64

myself. And he states, "Hey, . I wanted to send this to you in regards to the question you asked regarding if they had new gear on-site. Attached is the PO that we received on 09/21/2018. The gear was delivered around 30 days after that and on 11/01/2018 I sent over

EFTA00125392

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

65

the paperwork for the site to submit for the IP addresses needed to install the system. I will forward the email traffic as well."

It looks like based on what he stated - let me see if I can get this. Actually, this is the contract itself. It looks like he’s stating that by 09/21/2018 that’s - the contract was signed, and it looks like within 30 days all the gear was delivered. But you’re stating you don’t believe the gear was delivered?

MR. : Well, that's my problem is he doesn't clarify what gear means. I don't know what gear means. Does gear mean just the cameras? Does it mean just the wire? Does it mean the entire contents? I don't know what he - does it mean just the recorder. He's not clarifying what gear means.

EFTA00125393

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

66

could tell you that unless somebody signed for something without my knowledge and didn’t tell me about it, there was no cameras on that.

There was no gear. They were just hanging conduit when I leave there and that was conduit that we owned that we didn’t even purchase. It was already there. So --.

MR. : If gear was delivered, where would it have been delivered to at the MCC if the items - all these items were delivered?

MR. : So it would’ve had to gone to the rear dock. The rear gate they called it. And then there’s a Shipping and Receiving personnel there, staff, and they have a big cage that’s in that loading area, so all the deliveries go in there and then they would write down who had deliveries, call those departments and say, “Hey, you need to send somebody to come pick up your stuff. You got stuff here.” So whoever that person was to go there to pick up the stuff would have to sign the logbook saying that they picked up the stuff.

But you’re talking about a truck loading stuff that wouldn’t even have fit in that cage.

EFTA00125394

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

67

It would’ve been like pallets and stuff like - it would have been huge to store that stuff. It would’ve had to have, you know - and then, you know, it’s all electronic stuff. That’s why I don’t recall that stuff being delivered prior to the - but I was under the impression the contractor was coming with that stuff. I was not under the impression that that was going to get delivered separately, and if did it wasn’t to my knowledge.

I never saw a single new camera while I was there or recorder or anything like that and somebody would’ve had to have signed for that. And then we would have had to have - there would have had to have been inventory taken to put that in storage and somewhere in the Facilities Department.

So like I said, going back to the contract, they awarded it on the 21st and wanted it done by the 28th, that's just totally unrealistic and irrational. I don't --

EFTA00125395

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

68

material as well that your staff members would have been using to run the conduit and wiring and things? Is that part of that purchase order or is that something you were going to be receiving yourself and --?

MR. : So I was under the impression that SigNet was going to wait until they had all their equipment, wherever they get it from or whoever they’re buying it from or who their supply is, when they have everything they need to do the job that’s within the scope of work of the contract, they were going to come on-site with everything and begin doing the work themselves. The only that --

MR. : The only thing my guys - yeah. The only thing my guys were going to do was install the conduit. The wiring if I remember correctly was purchased separately through that GSA Advantage website and it was through - I remember it was through a vendor that they had purchased from previously in the past, the comm shop, for regular supplies and

EFTA00125396

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

69

stuff. It was just like a regular cabling/wiring company that had a GSA schedule on that site. And that would have been delivered directly to the institution.

the people listed. It’s dated on April 1, 2019. Subject is Anixter TP-120, 240, and SigNet Tech. It says, “Good afternoon, Ms.

After reviewing my CORS Report for the Central Office supplies samples, I went ahead and asked our comm tech on the status of these particular PO’s and he advised me that they haven’t been able to receive the fiber cable and without the cable they cannot - they can’t proceed with the camera systems. He mentioned that the company’s requiring some sort of documentation and he would be - he should be able to provide you with the details. Sincerely, Financial Program

EFTA00125397

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

70

MR. : -- it just tells me that - it verifies what I said, that there was no cameras or wiring or anything on-site there at the time that I left. It was just not there. But it also makes sense that if these - the wiring isn’t there, they can’t hook up the cameras. But what got me - where I’m concerned, I guess, with this is who were they talking to here because this would have to be a problem with SigNet. If SigNet’s installing - connecting the wires to the cameras and everything like that, I don’t know who they’re really addressing in that email.

MR. : It looks like it’s more internal email, right? And they’re trying to figure out what exactly - why the camera systems have not been installed yet. It looks like told them that the status of the fiber cable is not in, like the fiber cable or cables have not been delivered, right? I’m sorry. And without the cables they can’t

EFTA00125398

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

71

EFTA00125399

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

72

EFTA00125400

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

73

MR. : It says, "Chris, I didn’t want to leave you hanging, so this is what we know so far. It appears that FedEx might - must recycle tracking numbers. The order was placed on 09/27/2018 from SigNet to Qognify. Nice and Divisional PO shows it was shipped directly to the site, MCC New York. It shows that it was scheduled to ship on 09/30/2018 from Qognify. We currently don’t have the tracking that shows when you exactly received it but best guess is seven to 14 days, which would put it on your dock around October 14, 2018, and it was installed the week of August 16, 2019. We will try to continue - we will continue to try and find the tracking information for when it actually hit your dock. Let me know if you need anything else."

MR. : Yeah. So that was going to be my next question is: Where is any tracking information on this? And then if FedEx does recycle tracking numbers, that’s definitely news to me. But also, when this email - what are they saying they shipped?

MR. : It looks like it was a

EFTA00125401

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

74

EFTA00125402

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

75

MR. : Hey, just scroll above to the email that I sent. It’s specifically with regard to Nobile. He said that it’s the camera system that was installed on the 19th. I mean, and if you don’t know, Nobile was the acting facilities manager from February through March of - or May of 2019 and then became the permanent facilities manager or facility manager.

EFTA00125403

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

76

EFTA00125404

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

77

EFTA00125405

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

78

contract. If it was delivered, it should have been delivered attention to you according to the contract, right?

MR. : That’s - should have - exactly that’s how that should have been done if things are done the way they’re supposed to be done, but I never was made aware of any of that stuff. I mean, like I said, it’s been a long time, but I never - I don’t think there was any - there’s no way.

MR. : And before - just on a side note, as far as the conduit that needed to be run, how long should’ve that taken your people to run?

MR. : It would have taken a very long time because the department was severely understaffed, and the institution came first. The daily operations of the institution came first. So if you had lights out, you had phones down, you know, stuff like that the tradesmen had to go ahead and take care of work orders and stuff to maintain the institution first and then they would come back and on their downtime and stuff and do work pertaining to this.

EFTA00125406

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

79

MR. : Okay. About how many man hours do you think it takes though, I mean, if they actually had worked on it?

MR. : It’s kind of hard to tell because I don’t know the total picture of the routing of where all the cameras were going in addition to the ones that are existing there, but I can tell you that when this whole thing was going on every - we were all short-staffed. There was a constant flip over of staff, and then you had augmentation going on.

My guys were working housing units more than they were in the department and working mandated overtime. So they were covering augmentation was like you would act as a CO and go up in the housing unit for the shift, and then some of them would get stuck doing overtime for another shift. And then depending on how that fell, they went up there all day working the housing unit, got told they had to work all night, then they were banging on me in the morning because they worked a double before that.

So - but I mean, man hours’ wise, I really couldn’t tell you. I know there’s a book out

EFTA00125407

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

80

1 there, electrical code book out there that tells you the standard amount of feet of conduit that can be installed within an eight-hour period, but I mean, it just - that stuff doesn’t apply to a prison, especially MCC New York. There are just too much operational changes and stuff on a daily basis that prevented these guys from dedicating 100 percent of their work to something like that. Especially being that they already had something in place that was semi-functional.

MR. : So that log was kept in the cage where the packages were - be delivered at. So inside that - they had one officer dedicated that had one key for that cage back there and that was their job. R & D it was called, they

EFTA00125408

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

81

were part of that crew, and they would just go ahead and you get delivery, UPS, FedEx, they would all come in, put all that stuff in a cage, and they would write in the book who it was addressed to, what department, and then they would call you and let you know you had something or send you an email, however the officer chose to do it, and you would go there and sign for it and pick it up.

MR. : If I recall correctly, I saw two different versions of the book. One was a binder, a three-ring binder type with a pre-filled out form, and then also there was a have you ever seen those little green government logbooks that are just plain? You know, there was one of those back there at one point.

EFTA00125409

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

82

tracking information, of course, you know, because I believe the three-ring binder part of that - because that’s the other thing is if something is getting delivered to me, if I ordered something out of the department, I don’t care what it was, a case of light bulbs or, you know, a truckload of conduit or whatever, when that stuff ships this way, the vendor’s sending me an email with tracking information letting me know when to accept it because they know it’s coming to a secure institution where the truck and the driver are subject to screening and there’s only certain hours that they can deliver during the day.

So it’s not like a wide open 24/7 warehouse obviously. They can only deliver during certain hours. So I would make sure and let everybody know you need to give me the tracking information and I need to know what day that this stuff is coming to me because I need to make sure that I have the arrangements in place to get this delivery accepted and not turned away.

MR. : Were you - back then were you in constant communication with SigNet or was

EFTA00125410

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

83

EFTA00125411

EFTA00125412

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

85

MR. : So basically, he did all the financial stuff for MCC New York. He was the guy that was on-site in the budget office and then all that paperwork, he was technically, like, an employee of Fort Dix. He was working with them in the contracting and budgeting office of Financial Services.

MR. : Yeah. So any time I want to purchase anything, it doesn’t matter what it is, he would get the paperwork and then the rest of it’s between him and the contracting staff at Fort Dix, the CO at Fort Dix, whoever that CO is.

So sometimes with stuff like this, I have seen in other instances where people will look at this contract and they don’t - they just see a name and they just put it on there and send them stuff. But I would also like to think that if or even , the

EFTA00125413

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125414

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

87

EFTA00125415

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

88

overstock.

But also, every single department in the institution, didn’t matter who you was, human resources, trust fund, facilities, everybody had their own separate cages in that warehouse as well to keep overstock supplies for their departments as well. And has its own loading dock, trucks go in and out of there every day, all day with deliveries and all kinds of stuff, and if it’s something that they can’t fit at the institution, it goes to Building 4. You can have the driver take it to Building 4.

But in this case, I would have never allowed that because I - the supervision and the oversight, there is none out there. At least there wasn’t at the time that I was there. There was just one guy running the whole show over there with a handful of inmates.

EFTA00125416

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

89

because we covered a lot of details. Bear with me one minute.

MR. : Sure. You guys owe me lunch, I could tell you that.

MR. : You just threw us for a total loop because we’ve been proceeding this whole time with the knowledge that these have - were on-site, so that’s where we - you’ve kind of blown our minds here not knowing about it.

MR. : Yeah, I just - I told - I - when Agent Daniels gave me the initial phone call, I was like, wow, 2018. That was like - I just had no - we were still waiting on everything. And even if - I would have expected the contractor to be with them. But I know there was delays with the wiring. The wiring was crazy. They had some crazy delays with wiring.

And to be honest with you, something like this just the way that institution was ran, there was just way too many hands in the pot. It was just - two wardens, two AW’s, two comm techs, two facility managers it sounds like. There’s just too much stuff going on, too many people involved.

EFTA00125417

90

EFTA00125418

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125419

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

92

used to - I had a problem with that equipment being in the same office as my comm tech. You go to any other institution, that equipment is under SIS control and if they need a comm tech to look at it, SIS calls for the comm tech and then SIS stays there and provides oversight, an escort the whole time that they’re working on that equipment.

Here at MCC New York, and I’m only assuming because MCC New York’s the oldest building I’ve ever worked in - I think it was built in the late ‘60s early ‘70s. But I just was not used to that equipment being in the office of the comm tech. Everywhere I’ve ever been that was always in SIS, but these were all newer buildings. I think every other institution I worked in was much newer, but I just wasn’t accustomed to that equipment being in - it was just unreal to me. I just, you know --.

MR. □: Can you explain that to me one more time? So my - our understanding is there’s a SIS office, then there’s a video --

MR. □: Yeah.

MR. □: -- monitoring room, right,

EFTA00125420

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

93

EFTA00125421

EFTA00125422

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

95

EFTA00125423

EFTA00125424

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

97

MR. : -- for like the night supervision, like if they had supervision access, they could log in and view cameras off their computer system?

MR. : I don't know. If they had any kind of access like that, I wasn't aware of it.

MR. : I always - I just had a hard time - I just never seen that before. They shouldn’t - you know, the only time a comm tech is dealing with camera stuff is when there is there’s a repair or maintenance involved. You know, they shouldn’t be able to, at least in my opinion and from what I’ve seen at other institutions, be able to just hit a power button and turn on a monitor and see footage, whether live or recorded.

And then the fact that that was in their office, you know, was just astonishing to me. It was new to me, and the only thing that kept me somewhat at bay was that it was - the comm techs were the only trade in the whole entire department who didn’t have inmates working for them because of this - the equipment they had

EFTA00125425

98

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

EFTA00125426

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

99

to you if we have more questions?

MR. : We’ll probably do it via email just so that we’re not taking more of your time and then you can have a moment to actually review it and then just send us something back, so we’re not going probably interview you again or anything like that.

MR. : Yeah, that's fine. I just - like I said, the - you're saying I threw you guys for a loop. You guys threw me for a loop. I mean, some of that stuff on that paperwork is just - I mean, reading it as it is, it just - I don't know, but yeah, I guess if you need me again just give me a shout, send me an email, or whatever the case may be, and I'll send you the bill for lunch.

MR. : If you think about anything, if you feel like you thought about something that popped in, your memory got refreshed while you’re sitting there, you want - send me an email.

EFTA00125427

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

100

and we are turning off the recorder.

EFTA00125428

LIMITED OFFICIAL USE

101

## CERTIFICATE

I hereby certify that the foregoing pages represent an accurate transcript of the electronic sound recording of the proceedings before the Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General in the matter of:



EFTA00125429