Stan Faddis-Probation Officer, Part 1

A number of months back I decided I wanted to write a book about my years as a

probation worker in Santa Clara County. I started off strong and then lost interest. I don't know if I will ever finish the book but I already have too many interesting things written down to not share them with others. As a result, I have decided to post some of those chapters here on the blog. The working title of the book is “Diary of a Probation Officer.” Following is the beginning of the book:

And So It Begins - Part One Working in Juvenile Hall

This book is a memoir of my years working for the Santa Clara County Probation Department. My tenure ran from October 1984 to April 2011 and I held a number of job titles and assignments during those years. The book is a true account of my work experiences and observations at the Department. Only some names of my former coworkers have been changed in order to protect their privacy. Those whose true names are used gave me permission to do so. All names of juvenile and adult offenders have been changed in order to protect myself.

My career at SCC Probation began after I finished earning my Bachelor’s degree at San Jose Bible College and was almost accidental. My goal was to work in a church as a youth pastor. However, I was unable to find such a position and with a wife and young son (Daniel) to support, I was willing to take any job I could find. One day I was talking to my friend and former college roommate, George Gardner, who said he had heard that Juvenile Hall was looking to hire some extra-help employees. The title of the position was Group Counselor and it paid $9.00 an hour to start. As we later learned, the title is somewhat a misnomer and a more accurate name for it would probably be Correctional Officer. We and another college friend, Mark Thompson went down to 840 Guadalupe Parkway to apply.

A few days later, Mark and I were called in for an interview. Upon arrival at the Hall (as it is referred to by most everyone associated with it) and were escorted to the office of Dexter Albright, a Probation Manager, who greeted us warmly. There were some very nice scenic photos hanging on his well which I commented about. Mr. Albright said he had taken the shots and then we spent the next half hour talking about photography. As we talked about it later, Mark and I began to wonder to ourselves when we would be be called into the interview with whoever would perform that task. 

Then, Mr. Albright said, “Okay, call me tomorrow and I’ll let you know when to come in for the mandatory eight hour observation and to pick up your keys.” He gave us his direct phone number. I responded by saying, “What about the interview?” He said, “This was the interview and I’ve decided to hire you both.” Wow! Talk about informal and easy. It also lacked in us learning anything about the job duties we would expected to perform or the hours we would work. 

Nonetheless, I was very excited to get the job and being paid $9.00 an hour on top of that! At 8:00 the next morning I called his number but he didn’t answer and there was no voicemail. I called every half hour but the phone just rang and rang. Mark was also calling from his apartment with the same results. Needless to say, I was impatient and angry that Albright failed to pick up. Finally, at 3:30 in the afternoon a female answered my call. I asked to speak to Mr. Albright to which she said, “I’m sorry, Mr. Albright no longer works at this facility. He was transferred to the boys ranch in south county.” What? I thought, “This cannot be happening!” I needed that job and now I didn’t know if I was going to get it. Fortunately, after explaining to her why I was calling, she gave me the number of another manager who I contacted about the position. I found out later that Albright had done something (I never did hear any specifics) that got him demoted and reassigned. 

Upon making contact with the other manager, I was scheduled for the aforementioned “observation” which was set for the following day. So, on October 31, 1984, yes, on Halloween night  I went to Juvenile Hall for the 3 p.m. to 11 p.m. shift to learn about the job. The full-time Group Counselor I first spoke to advised me that, since it was Halloween, “The kids might be a little more misbehaved than usual.”  No joke! Those kids were going wild, yelling out their room windows, making scary noises and acting out in a number of ways. Honestly, I almost changed my mind about working there because of this. I was accustomed to church kids who, could also get wild and crazy, but were not as scary and out of control as these kids were. However, I survived the shift and decided to give it some time, and work there until I could find a church to hire me. I planned to give it no more than a year and I hoped it would even be less than that. Well, I finally left the Probation Department on April 1, 2011- 27 years later. George was also hired around that time and he also stayed for 27 years before retiring. 

After the three of us (Mark, George and I) had been working there for six weeks or so, we began to hear about an annual Christmas party that was hosted by one of the Juvenile Hall nurses, Lavonne. We did not get an official invitation to the party, but we reasoned that no one told us specifically that we couldn’t go. We decided to attend and our goal, being the “new guys” was to make a splash. We knew that everyone would be dressed up, so we decided to arrive wearing togas. We found out the location of Lavonne’s house and the time the party was to begin. We deliberately planned to arrive at least an hour late so we could get the most bang out our surprise. Prior to heading to the party, we stopped at Juvenile Hall and borrowed some white bed sheets. Using safety pins, we made togas and put them on. Our ensembles also included boots and hats that any cowboy would have been proud to wear.

As we approached the house, we heard the party going in full swing. We knocked on the door and Lavonne answered it. The look on her face said, “Who are you and what do you want?” Presumably, she did not recognize us, but after all, we were the new guys. She invited us in. As we entered the living room, we saw all the nicely dressed people staring at the three toga wearing idiots. I said, “We were told this was supposed to be a toga party! The joke’s on us!” It worked - we had made our mark and everyone thought it was great. 

Working as an Extra-Help employee did not necessarily mean part time work. Almost immediately, I began working 40 hours a week, earning $700 in a two week pay period. Soon, I was working 60 to 80 hours a week and earning up to $2100 a month. I scrambled to get hours because the more I worked, the more I earned and the better I could support Linda and Daniel.  Our financial situation was made better by the fact that we managed an apartment building at 781 South 11th. Street and paid no rent.  As a result, Linda, who had worked the previous three years to put me through college, was able to stay home and be a full-time mom. 

Extra-Help workers did not get benefits; however, a few weeks after I took the job, I was offered a “provisional” position working in B1 which did include benefits and in June 1985, I was hired full-time. It was a Union job and I became a member of Local 1587 which meant a good raise to about $13.00 and hour and full Kaiser, dental and vision benefits as well as a life insurance policy. This base salary equaled about $27,000 a year, but there was a lot more to be made from all of the overtime that was available to me. During my 13 years in the Hall, I worked many 70 to 80 hour weeks as I was driven to provide the best living I could for our family. Heather was born in August 1985 and Holly in May 1987. Speaking of Holly, I thank the Lord for Kaiser insurance. She was born six weeks prematurely and spent the first month of her life in the Intensive Care Nursery. She weighed less than four pounds when she was born. It was estimated that our hospital bill would have been over $100,000 for that stay, a debt that would have been financially crippling. Because she was covered by my Kaiser benefits, the bill was zero dollars.

The Job

The shift I observed on Halloween was not paid, but within a day or so I was scheduled to begin working for pay. I was issued a key called an MK-1 which opened most of the facility doors including the rooms of the minors, exit doors to the outside exercise yard, the inside courtyard, the cafeteria and the nearby school classrooms.  

As stated earlier, although we were called Group Counselors (GC’s) the job was more that of correctional officers, or as some people referred to the job, Turnkeys. Our primary job was to protect the kids, also called “minors,” under our care, from hurting themselves or others. These others  included one another, nurses, teachers, kitchen workers, custodians and us GC’s.  

For the 13 years I worked as a GC in the Hall, I mostly supervised 16 and 17 year old boys. My extra large body and ability to act tough really helped me to do the job. My sense of humor was also a valuable tool, particularly my biting sarcasm. For each eight hour shift, I worked with two or three other GC’s to run the unit, depending on the population of that unit. Most of my years were spent in Units B1, B2 and B3, the “B” designation it as a boys’ unit. B1 was the unit where the minors who had committed the most serious crimes were housed. These included violent crimes such as rape, armed robbery, mayhem and murder. Also housed in B1 were any minors who were waiting to go to the California Youth Authority (CYA) for committing felonies. CYA was prison for minors up to age 25 could be housed at there. A minor had to have been committed to CYA prior to turning 18, but could stay until their 25th. birthday at which time they usually were released on parole. 

Some of the more heinous offenders would be sent to the California Department of Correction on their 25th. birthday. One of them was Anthony Broussard whose crime is described in this  Wikipedia article:

Marcy Renee Conrad, 14, was killed on November 3, 1981 in Milpitas, California by 16-year-old Anthony Jacques Broussard. Her body was transported in Broussard's pickup truck into nearby hills and dumped in a ravine. An autopsy confirmed that Conrad had been raped and then murdered by strangulation.

After the murder, Broussard invited friends from Milpitas High School  to view Conrad's corpse. Reports indicate that Broussard bragged about her death at school, and showed the body to at least 10 people. After two days, two students finally broke ranks with the others and notified police. When the other Milpitas students were asked why they had not alerted police, they responded that they "did not want to get in trouble."

Broussard pled guilty and was sentenced to 25 years to life. He was denied a new trial in 1985, and has repeatedly been denied parole. As of April 2013 Broussard is still incarcerated at California's Folsom State Prison. 

Broussard was housed in the Santa Clara County Juvenile Hall while he was being adjudicated. Subsequently, he was transported to a CYA facility in Stockton, California where he stayed until age 25, after which he was sent to state prison. This all happened before I was employed there.

Co-Workers

On my first paid day on the job, I worked the 3 to 11 shift in B3. As I walked down to the desk to meet my new coworkers I saw two men who I estimated to be in their late 30’s or early 40’s. standing behind the unit desk which looked like a four foot high bar. One was big and the other one was short. Both looked to be Hispanic. As I approached the desk, I smiled, held out my hand and introduced myself. The shorter of the two put out his hand to shake mine and said, “Hi, my name is Joe G. Martinez.” The big guy looked at me, did not offer to shake my hand and said, “Sir, do you see that hallway down there?” He pointed back to the hallway I had just walked up. I said that I did see it to which he replied, “It’s all yours for this entire shift. Stay down there, look into the rooms every15 minutes, sign the watch sheets on the doors that have them and let kids out of their rooms one at a time when they knock to make a head call (use the bathroom). Last, do not come up here to this desk without first asking one of us for permission.”

I found out later that his name was Tim Valdez. He was a Native American and Mexican.  He, like Joe G. was a veteran GC. They had both been there over 15 years, working in the “trenches” as they referred to it. They took great pride in running a tight ship, keeping even the toughest kids in line and were highly respected by the minors and the other GC’s. I was taken aback by Valdez’s gruffness and felt like he was treating me like a third class citizen. However, I quickly learned two things... I was being trained by by the best and Tim Valdez was a teddy bear.  The way they did their jobs made B3 a very safe place for everyone to be and I was lucky to work them many shifts. Their motto was “Tough, But Fair.” The kids feared and respected Mr. Valdez and more than once I heard a minor tell a newcomer to be careful not to “piss off” Mr. Valdez because he was one of the fiercest GC’s there and that he could really hurt a kid if he “restrained” him. 

To explain... sometimes when things got out of hand, like during a fight or when a minor completely refused to move from Location A to Location B, GC’s had no choice but to physically lay hands on the offender(s). This was done by placing the minor in a wrist lock or a rear wrist lock and applying pressure on the wrist and/or elbow joint until the minor complied with the order to do what he was told to do.  About a year after I started working in the Hall I one day asked Valdez why the kids were so fearful of his restraints. I was curious because I had never seen him lay hands on one of the minors. Tim chuckled and explained that the whole thing was just a legend. He said he had restrained some kids early in his career and the reputation was set in place. He estimated he had not had to touch a minor in more than five years. 

I will stop here, but look for future excerpts of my story as a probation worker.