"Daddy" Got Fired at Lowell CI! and Miami Herald Asked Why? "Martorias Secret"

[DC Consultant (Ret)]

Personal Note: Here we go again! Sec. James McDonough you must be laughing at the fools we have running this State. The reality is the WARDEN allowed it to go on. Come on JJ!!!

Womanizing assistant warden axed at troubled prison

By Julie K. Brown -
jbrown@MiamiHerald.com

01/22/2015 2:56 PM
| Updated: 01/22/2015 10:56 PM

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/spec...#storylink=cpy


Each day, the female inmates at Lowell Correctional Institution would line up at the back gate waiting to talk to “Daddy.’’

In the afternoons, the prisoners would take turns visiting his office, passing him slips of paper and asking for favors like special bunk assignments, chocolates or time to liaison with their female partners.

[B]Assistant Warden Marty Martinez[/B] had so many women who wanted to spend time with him that it not only interfered with the daily operation of the facility, it caused jealous fights for his attention among inmates, according to an investigation by the Department of Corrections released Thursday.

Lowell corrections officers told the department’s investigators that they were overruled, punished — and, in one case, even threatened — when they tried to discipline any of Martinez’s favorites.

Martinez, who was fired last week, is among 44 prison staff across the state who have been dismissed since new DOC Secretary Julie Jones took the helm of the embattled agency on Jan. 5.

“The Department has zero tolerance for misconduct of any kind,’’ department spokesman McKinley Lewis said in a written statement Thursday, adding that Martinez “failed to conduct himself in a professional manner and acted inappropriately toward staff and inmates.’’

Lowell has been in the spotlight since October, when 36-year-old inmate Latandra Ellington was found dead just 10 days after writing her family a letter alleging that a Lowell corrections officer — she knew him only as “Sgt. Q” — had repeatedly threatened to beat and kill her.

Daryl Parks, a civil rights attorney representing Ellington’s family, said if a high-level administrator like Martinez was able to abuse his authority so blatantly, it’s likely that other officers believed they could do the same.

“It clearly shows this prison is out of control and they need to do something to ensure the safety of inmates immediately,’’ Parks said.

Martinez’s dismissal capped a six-month investigation that involved interviews with dozens of inmates, corrections officers, commanders and other staff at the facility in Ocala.

The firing, for conduct unbecoming an officer, came to light Thursday, one day after the Miami Herald received a tip that Martinez had been fired and inquired about it.

“Nobody ever caught him in the act, but we all saw him locked in there with them,’’ a corrections officer, who gave a sworn statement to DOC investigators, told the Herald. It would be a crime for a prison staffer to engage in sex with inmates.

The 56-page inspector general report describes in detail how Martinez would spend extended periods talking to young, pretty white or Hispanic women on a daily basis. One sergeant talked about how Martinez would lean against a fence, chatting up inmates and would “grasp his groin and ‘adjust his boys’ [genitals].” Others described seeing him lying prone on a bench, commiserating with attractive prisoners. When guards counseled inmates known to be close to the assistant warden, the inmates would threaten to report the corrections officers to “Marty.”

Officers and inmates said he rarely spoke to inmates who were unattractive. He frequented the Wellness Center, where one of his favored inmates taught aerobics, several witnesses said. He often sat and watched the prisoners, clad in their gym shorts, participate in a Zumba class.

Martinez’s own staffers described how he squired a parade of young women around the compound and invited some of them into his office and locked both doors. The women, who were overheard calling him “Marty’’ and “daddy,’’ would stay in his office for between 10 and 60 minutes, the staffers said.

His behavior became so intolerable — and made some female guards so uncomfortable — that his subordinates reported his behavior to Warden Gus Mazarra, who, according to the report, stated it was news to him. But he did promise to look into it.

The probe was begun after one officer, John Meekins, went to the Marion County Sheriff’s Office and filed a police report. He said he had been threatened with harm after conducting a search of two inmates’ property, seizing an unusually large amount of contraband. The search, standard procedure, infuriated Martinez because, Meekins and other officers alleged, the two women were Martinez’s girlfriends.

“You’re going to get your ass beat in the parking lot after work,’’ Martinez allegedly told Meekins in front of two other officers.

Martinez told Meekins that all the officers and sergeants on the shift were “pissed off” at him and that they would retaliate by beating him up.

Lewis, DOC’s spokesman, said that the warden, Mazarra, remains in command at the prison.

“The department continues to review the circumstances surrounding these incidents to ensure that this type of activity does not occur again,’’ Lewis said.

One of the officers interviewed in connection with the case was Sgt. Patrick Quercioli, who in October was placed on paid administrative leave pending the outcome of an investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement into Ellington’s death.

Quercioli was the “Sgt. Q” Ellington claimed had threatened to beat her after she allegedly caught him doing something inappropriate.

Three inmates, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation, wrote letters to Ellington’s family claiming that inmates at the prison are routinely beaten by guards for sport, that they suspect that inmate “suicides’’ at the prison were really killings covered up, and that male guards sexually abuse and threaten inmates.

Two of the letters were very detailed, providing the last names of guards, the “cliques’’ they belong to and how they use inmates as “pawns’’ in their power struggle to control the prison.

“It was almost like a gang,’’ wrote one inmate.

At the time she died, Ellington, a mother of four, was to be released in seven months after serving a 22-month sentence for grand theft. She was in confinement — separated from the general population — at the time of her death because the agency, DOC officials said, had taken her family’s concerns about the alleged threats seriously.

A private autopsy conducted on behalf of the family showed she suffered blunt-force trauma to her stomach consistent with being punched or kicked, according to Parks, the family’s lawyer.

Lowell Correctional and its annex, under unified management, have had 39 inmate deaths over the past five years, putting Lowell near the top among correctional institutions that don’t serve as hospitals. The annex houses older inmates.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/spec...#storylink=cpy

[Unregistered]

Another idiot CO making us far more intelligent probation officers look bad. We need to separate from these idiots because I'm sick of being associated with this Neanderthal's.

[Unregistered]

Yes please, let us go to another agency whether it be local S.O. or FDLE. We cannot be associated we these idiots any longer. All state PO's are college graduates that chose this profession. We were not thrown into it because it was our only choice. We are in the public unlike the Prisons and this is down right embarrassing. When will our arrests start being questioned simply because we are with FDOC.

[Unregistered]

How does the warden keep his job? If he didn't know this was going on he just be relieved for gross negligence and if he did know it was going on he needs to go to. Either way, this warden needs to go. What a disgrace. Daddy?? LMAO!!!

[DC Consultant (Ret)]

Personal Note: I recently posted something about Sec. McDonough which after sometime lead me to remember something and a "Google". Just how much time DC spends fixing something then "Fuuking It Up" All Over Again!! If you don't know when Bedard got 'Tossed' fro DC she went to GEO as a Warden and still considers herself an "Expert" in Corrections although her "Blue Ribbon Report" called Sec. Jimmy Crosby a Consummate Professional.

DOC Deputy Secretary Volunteers
for Field Assignment

Laura E. Bedard, Ph.D. to Assume Warden Duties at Lowell CI

Tallahassee - Department of Corrections' Deputy Secretary Laura E. Bedard, Ph.D. will assume warden duties at Lowell Correctional Institution in Ocala, FL, on or about July 10, 2006. Bedard volunteered to become warden over the DOC's largest and oldest woman's facility.

"Dr. Bedard has extensive experience with female inmates and will bring great innovation to this area," said Secretary James McDonough. "I am sending one of my best people into the field in order to address immediate needs there. I expect her leadership will become a national example."

Bedard will be addressing housing and security issues as well as preparing women for their release back into society. In addition to her experience as the Deputy Secretary of the Department of Corrections, she has almost six years' experience working as an administrator in a county jail, as well as another five years with a state hospital, counseling and providing transition services for chronically mentally ill patients.

"I appreciate the Secretary's confidence in me. I am committed to meeting the Department's mission and look forward to working with the staff at Lowell CI. I see this as a way to make a positive difference in the lives of female inmates not only at Lowell, but in our entire system," said Dr. Bedard.

When Bedard finishes her mission at Lowell, she will return to Tallahassee and continue her role as Deputy Secretary.

Although Bedard remains the Deputy Secretary, for the period of time she is at Lowell she will function as any of the Department's wardens, reporting through a chain of command that goes from the Regional Director through the Assistant Secretary for Institutions, to the Secretary of the Department.

In her absence, Bedard's responsibilities in Central Office will be assumed by the acting Deputy Secretary, Tina Hayes, currently DOC Director for Research and Support Services.

Carol Starling, currently serving as warden at Lowell, will become warden at Hendry Correctional Institution.

"The warden position at Hendry CI has been vacant and the Department needs strength in that position," added Secretary McDonough. "Warden Starling will be able to meet these needs.

"As for Dr. Bedard, I have tremendous respect for leaders willing to move into the field and take charge."

[Unregistered]

"Whose your Daddy?" asked the FL DOC CO.
"You are sir" said the young attractive female inmate with firm breastes and buttocks.

To be continued

[Unregistered]

More needs to come out on "daddy." This guy was doing more than just "counseling" female inmates and if he was he needs to be prosecuted. Daddy dearest! LOL!!!!

[Unregistered]

I have been told by a rock solid source that there are 5 or 6 inmates in solitary whom magically became pregnant since arriving at Lowell??? Whose the Daddy?????

[Unregistered]

The majority of inmates are males and yet this scandal involves a male correctional officer and female inmates. I think the IG should starting looking harder because the female correctional officer having with relations of all kinds with male inmates is FAR more common. Is former state officer G reading this? Nope, she resigned and got promoted elsewhere at another agency. Go girl! (sarcasm). That said, they should prosecute Daddy to the fullest. DC allowed a lot of these creeps male and female to quietly leave the Department and move on. They should have been arrested and prosecuted.

[Unregistered]

More needs to come out on "daddy." This guy was doing more than just "counseling" female inmates and if he was he needs to be prosecuted. Daddy dearest! LOL!!!!

So the Birth Certificate says: Father: State of Florida ??? or Immaculate Conception ???