Note: The following Op-Ed is reprinted in its entirety, without permission of the Oakland Tribune. As a matter of policy, Paco excerpts and attributes outside sources within Fair Use guidelines. In this case, the editorial is SO on-the-mark, I opted to risk the wrath of the editors.
In that context, PLEASE click any one of the links provided, in the hope the extra traffic convinces the folks at the Trib to leave Paco be. Barring that, I am forced to note the following is ODDLY similar to what Paco has been saying here for MONTHS. Is Paco saying the Oakland Tribune Op-editors plagiarized this blog? Let's just say he's content to let it go if they are...
Editorial: California parole officials should stop bureaucratic dance on Phillip Garrido case
MediaNews editorial
AT A CERTAIN point, the bureaucratic response of public officials is simply not enough. Unless and until our government leaders own up to their mistakes and accept responsibility, they are destined to repeat them. Sometimes that's just unacceptable.
Such is the case of state parole officers' failure to unmask that sex offender Phillip Garrido and his wife were hiding kidnap victim Jaycee Dugard in their backyard near Antioch for 18 years. For the last 11 of those years, state parole officers were responsible for monitoring Garrido.
They visited him at least 60 times, yet they never noticed that something was amiss. They never bothered to read the previous federal parole file on Garrido. They never noticed the compound at the back of the property where Dugard and her two children fathered by Garrido were being held. They never saw utility wires that had been strung to the hideout. They failed to talk to neighbors or local law enforcement. They ignored information from the GPS monitor on Garrido that showed him straying too far from his home. They failed to act on information showing Garrido had violated the terms of his parole.
It was just a combination of Garrido's own stupidity and an alert police officer at UC Berkeley that eventually led to his capture. In the end, Garrido's parole officer played a role in his arrest. But that doesn't excuse the complete breakdown up to that point in the supervision of Garrido.
As we now know, thanks to an in-depth review released last week by the state Office of the Inspector General, parole agents in the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation completely bungled the Garrido case.
It's appalling that soon after Garrido's arrest in August, Corrections spokesman Gordon Hinkle was bragging about the parole agent's role. "We're very proud of the work he did in uncovering this mystery," Hinkle said at the time, adding that the agent had operated "by the book."
We might be inclined to cut the department some slack now if it was showing signs of acknowledging fault in the face of the new information about its conduct — and recognizing that the case suggests widespread systemic problems in the organization. Instead, the response by Corrections Secretary Matthew Cate smacks of bureaucratize and denial. While acknowledging in his official response to the report that "further improvements in our system of parole supervision are needed," Cate then goes on to talk about the need for more money to supervise parolees.
Secretary Cate, your folks messed up — and no amount of extra money would have changed that. They visited the site 60 times. If they didn't notice something was amiss after that, they should be fired. And if you don't recognize the need to shake things up, Gov. Schwarzenegger should fire you. At a certain point, lack of money is not an excuse.
Consider, in contrast, the tone of the response by Contra Costa Sheriff Warren Rupf, whose deputies in 2006 failed to properly follow a tip that could have led to finding Dugard nearly three years ago.
"We should have been inquisitive, more curious, and turned over a rock or two. There are no excuses," Rupf said soon after Dugard was found. "... I can't change the course of events, but we are beating ourselves up over this and are the first to do so."
Whether its curing an addiction or fixing a bureaucracy, the first step to healing is admitting responsibility. Cate would do well to learn from the sheriff.
