‘My son was hazed to death.’ California must fire toxic and racist prison guards

“My son was hazed to death.”

These are the words of Valentino Rodriguez Sr. His son officially died from fentanyl intoxication — as his family sees it, however, Valentino Rodriguez Jr. was killed by a toxic culture of hazing inside California’s prison system.

Rodriguez Jr. wasn’t an inmate. The West Sacramento resident was an officer with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. He worked as a prison guard at a state prison in Folsom, which is where fellow officers harassed him past his breaking point.

“Officers repeatedly called Rodriguez Jr. a gay slur, made fun of his weight and taunted him, saying that his wife was cheating on him with Black men, according to text exchanges on his phone,” wrote Wes Venteicher of The Sacramento Bee. “Rodriguez Jr. said in texts that the harassment came even as he worked harder than his coworkers and performed his work well.”

Texts from the dead officer’s phone, shared with Venteicher by Rodriguez Sr., reveal an openly toxic culture of racist, sexist and homophobic bullying at California State Prison, Sacramento, also known as New Folsom.

“New Folsom has a security level of 4, the highest in the state’s classification system,” wrote Venteicher. “It houses some of California’s most dangerous inmates — murderers, rapists and a group of mentally ill patients deemed too dangerous for the state’s mental hospitals.”

Rodriguez rose quickly at the prison, earning a promotion to the elite Investigative Services Unit. The 20-officer unit investigates “drug trafficking, gang activity, contraband items, violent crimes and suicides inside the prison,” wrote Venteicher.

His fellow officers began deriding him as soon as he joined the unit.

“The officers called the newcomer ‘half-patch’ in group texts, suggesting he wasn’t worthy of his position, and called him a gay slur when he discussed work or shared photos from his personal life, the texts show,” wrote Venteicher. “In August 2019, he shared a photo of a large buck his friend had harvested from a Rodriguez family property hours earlier. He wrote, ‘Who likes venison steaks and jerky?’ Officer Daniel Garland responded: ‘You f--!!! Send a picture of your girls ass!!!’”

Rodriguez Jr. told prison officials that officers in the unit engaged in open racism, calling Black inmates monkeys and using the n-word. He also described a workplace in which his fellow officers played video games instead of carrying out the investigations for which they receive taxpayer-funded salaries.

“The officers ordered him to complete menial tasks and made him do their work while they played video games, slept or left their shifts early,” wrote Venteicher.

Rodriguez Jr. told an internal affairs investigator that his boss, Sgt. David Anderson, warned him not to report the unit’s dysfunction to anyone.

“I was singled out and told ‘if you say anything or open your mouth I’ll f---ing replace you like that,’” Rodriguez Jr. said in a text to Internal Affairs Sgt. Brandon Strohmaier.

The stress and pressure took their toll on Rodriguez, Jr. Suffering from depression and PTSD, he said he suffered a breakdown at work and took a leave on Jan. 28, 2020. He started working at his family’s swimming pool surfacing business. In Oct. 2020, he married his longtime girlfriend, Irma.

Three weeks later, he was dead. His funeral took place in the same place, the shop of the family’s business, where he had just held a wedding reception. His death came one week after a meeting with New Folsom’s warden, Jeff Lynch, on Oct. 15.

“Tomorrow they want me to write a memo,” Rodriguez Jr. told his wife. “And i don’t know what ima do.”

He also told his wife some of his fellow officers had been calling his phone.

“It’s out now that I told on the team,” he texted his wife.

Later that evening, his wife found him dead on the floor of their home.

Rodriguez Jr., 30, did not live to write the memo, but the text messages and notes on his phone expose the hell he endured as an employee of New Folsom. CDCR says it launched a full investigation of his allegations.

The results of this investigation will come too late to save Rodriguez Jr. But it’s not too late for CDCR to do better for others by fixing its toxic culture, improving whistleblower protections and providing real support for officers like Rodriguez Jr. when they come forward.

California must hold his tormentors accountable and rid CDCR of the toxic, bigoted and dysfunctional officers who pushed him past the brink. If Rodriguez’s allegations are true, these officers clearly do not belong in uniform. By removing them, CDCR can send a message to other problematic officers that there is justice on both sides of the bars.

This story was originally published April 16, 2021 at 5:00 AM with the headline "‘My son was hazed to death.’ California must fire toxic and racist prison guards."