Probe Begins on Report of Jail Cross Burnings

The Sheriff’s Department is investigating reports that white deputies burned two crosses in quarters housing black gang members in the Central County Jail.

Capt. William Hinkle, who commands the jail, said in an interview Monday that the sheriff’s internal investigations bureau was called in to question deputies and inmates after an allegation of cross-burning was raised by a deputy at a county Civil Service hearing Jan. 6.

“We asked for an immediate investigation, which is currently under way,” Hinkle said. “From what I can see, this will be a very lengthy and detailed investigation.”

Hinkle said his jail staff is also investigating the cause of a disturbance created by members of the Crips gang. Sources told The Times that the incident earlier this month was touched off by white deputies who used racial slurs on a public address system. Hinkle said a lieutenant had been assigned to investigate the allegation and would not elaborate further.

The two cross-burning incidents allegedly occurred a few months apart in 1987 and 1988, Hinkle said. The captain said it has yet to be determined when, or if, they actually occurred, how they happened or who was involved.

Reports that deputies had burned a cross in the jail were first mentioned publicly when Deputy George Ricks, an 18-year veteran who has worked at Central Jail for about three years, testified at a Civil Service hearing.

Ricks was called to testify in the matter of Eugene Harris, a former probationary deputy who had been fired on charges that he had taken a candy bar and a hairbrush from inmates.

Asked About Cross Burning

Under questioning by Harris’ lawyer, Laurence B. Labovitz, Ricks was asked whether in the last year or so there had been cross-burning incidents in Central Jail.

“Yes, there was,” Ricks replied.

“Was it done by deputies?” Labovitz asked.

“Yes. Yes.”

The Sheriff’s Department’s advocate, Susan Weekly, questioned the relevancy of the testimony, and Labovitz was ordered by the hearing officer to reword his question.

“Have there been numerous incidents of deputy misconduct on the fourth floor at the Central Jail within the past year and a half to two years?”

“Yes,” Ricks said.

“Was the cross-burning incident involving deputies assigned there?”

“Yes, it was.”

Sources who spoke on condition that they not be identified told The Times that the first incident occurred in late 1987. They said mop handles had been fashioned into a cross and set afire as gang members emerged from the fourth-floor gang module.

Sources alleged that the second incident occurred early in January, 1988. They said four white deputies set fire to a cross in a closed walkway within a fourth-floor gang module, turned out the lights and played heavy metal music.

Sheriff Sherman Block said Monday that he, like other department officials, first learned of the incidents as a result of the Civil Service hearing. Block wondered why the incidents, if true, had not been reported before.

“The first question is, did it occur? Secondly, if it did occur, who knew about it? If they knew about it, why didn’t it make its way up (the chain of command) as it should have?”

Central Jail has 293 Crips members and 271 members of the rival Bloods gang in its gang modules. Many other gang members who are considered less dangerous are housed in the general inmate population of the jail, which holds about 6,500 prisoners.

The Sheriff’s Department began segregating black gang members from the general inmate population of Central Jail in 1983 after repeated complaints that knots of gang members were victimizing other inmates. Gang members who were regarded as likely to incite violence or rob inmates were divided between two modules, one for Bloods, the other for Crips.

Fights and crimes among Crips housed in small cells became so prevalent that last October jail officials moved the Crips module to another section of the jail that consisted solely of one-man cells.