Inmates Say They Saw Deputies Burn Cross in Jail Area

Three long-term inmates testified Thursday that they saw Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies burn a cross in a section of Men’s Central Jail used to house members of a black street gang.

The three prisoners, Daryl Ransom, Raye Simmons and Mark Harris, were called to testify at a Civil Service hearing for two sheriff’s deputies who are fighting their discharge for allegedly setting fire to a cross in a module where inmates belonging to the Crips street gang were assigned.

After a lengthy investigation, the two officers, Brian Kazmierski, a four-year veteran, and Richard Bolks, a deputy for about three years, were fired for purportedly setting fire to a makeshift cross in Module 4800’s control booth at some point between Dec. 26, 1987, and Jan. 11, 1988.

Sheriff Sherman Block disclosed at a June press conference that “a number” of deputies faced disciplinary action in the burning of two crosses in the jail. The first incident occurred in March, 1987, near a cell area housing members of the Bloods street gang, he said.

Block declined to speculate on what might prompt jailers to burn crosses, other than to suggest it was “complete stupidity.”

Thursday’s Civil Service Commission hearing was held in the jail because of security concerns.

In a brief opening statement, Sgt. Susan Weekly, representing the Sheriff’s Department, said that by “igniting a cross,” Kazmierski and Bolks had forfeited their rights to be deputy sheriffs.

“The incident might have escalated into a riot,” she said.

Attorney Richard Shinee, representing the two deputies, said a cross was never burned and that the incident had been exaggerated by gang members “to get the deputies in trouble.”

Shinee admitted that his clients had participated in “unprofessional conduct” by igniting an aerosol can to burn cockroaches. He insisted, however, that their actions were “horseplay.”

The inmate witnesses were brought into the hearing room with their feet--and, initially, their hands--secured with chains or handcuffs.

Ransom, who bitterly protested being “shackled like an animal,” testified that he saw Kazmierski wrap toilet paper or tape around what might have been metal mop handles, spray what looked like a cross with a disinfectant and then set it afire against a window.

Ransom, who has spent nearly seven years in County Jail for murder and described himself as a former Crips member, said that after the cross was burned, he helped circulate a petition signed by more than 400 gang members reporting the cross burning.

But, he said, nothing was done about the inmates’ complaints for a year.

Recalling the time when he said he saw a cross burned in the Crips module, Simmons, a Crips member, said deputies began playing loud heavy-metal music over the intercom a few hours before he saw Bolks place a small cross against a window.

He testified that Kazmierski sprayed the cross, which he thought might have been made of toilet paper, and set it afire.

Harris, a County Jail inmate for about two years and a Crips member, said on the day of the cross burning someone turned out the lights in the cellblock, played heavy-metal music and yelled racial slurs over the intercom.

Harris testified that he saw a deputy walk along the inside of the control booth with what appeared to be a burning cross in his hands, but he said he could not identify the officer.