00:00Christmas ornaments, drywall and Jerry Epstein. Name three things that don't hang
00:07themselves. That's what the American people think. That's what the American
00:13people think. And they deserve some answers. And I know that you're not in
00:20charge of these investigations. Yes sir. But you talk to the people who are. And I
00:27need you to take a very respectful message today. Tell the American people
00:37what happened. And don't rush it so that they don't do a thorough investigation.
00:43But you and I both know they can make this a top priority and get it done more
00:50quickly than they normally would. As I indicated in my opening statement I
00:54wanted to talk about the death of Mr. Epstein. Do you concur with the opinion
01:01that it was a suicide? That was the finding of the coroner sir. Okay do you
01:05have any evidence suggest otherwise? I do not. How could this have happened?
01:10Unfortunately sir this thing is this the death and the whole situation is still
01:15under the investigation of the FBI and the inspector general's office. And I'm
01:19really not at liberty to discuss specifics of this case. I can discuss
01:23issues around institutional operations but I can't specifically talk about that
01:28particular issue. Okay. Well the case this high profile there's got to be
01:35their major malfunction of the system or criminal enterprise at foot to allow
01:40this to happen. So are you looking at both? Is the FBI looking at both? If the FBI is
01:46involved then they are looking at criminal enterprise yes. Do we have people in in
01:50custody today of this high profile nature? Have we done anything to adjust since
01:56Mr. Epstein's death? Sir we take every inmates life very seriously in the Bureau of
02:01Prisons. A high profile inmate is no more important or significant in terms of our
02:06operations than just the average inmate that comes our way. What do I mean high
02:09profile? Somebody's on a suicide watch. I would like to explain our suicide watch
02:13system if I may. I can't talk specifically about Epstein but we have
02:17different tiers of response if we identify an inmate who appears to be
02:20having suicidal thinking. And I came into the Bureau as a psychologist. I worked with
02:24lots of suicidal inmates. I was warden in our psychiatric facility in Butner and I
02:28know how difficult it is to always be able to predict who's suicidal and who is
02:31not. But once an inmate is identified as potentially suicidal we have a
02:35suicide watch operation that we can place them in. It's a very stark very
02:39difficult setting where everything is stripped from the room except a
02:42mattress. They get a coarse gown like to wear that cannot be twisted in any way
02:47that they could hang themselves from it. They have one mattress and one blanket and
02:51they are watched constantly. There's nothing else in that room. Is Mr. Epstein on
02:54suicide watch? Yes he watched. However the average time on suicide watch is only
02:59about 24 hours because it is such a stark and actually depressing situation. We
03:03then can move them to another tier of observation which is called
03:06psychological observation. Did that happen in this case? I can't speak
03:10specifically but I am sharing this with you so that you understand our
03:13procedure sir. They then can move to another tier which is suicide or
03:17psychological observation where they get their clothes back. They're in a more
03:21normalized setting. They are watched and scrutinized every moment of the day but
03:25that is a much more normal environment. Do they have roommates?
03:28And once, I'm sorry sir? Do they have roommates? No they do not when they're on
03:31suicidal, psychological observation because they're being watched
03:33continuously. Did Mr. Epstein have a roommate when he allegedly committed suicide? No he
03:38did not. Okay. They move into psychological observation. Psychologists see
03:45them routinely, interview them repeatedly, and once it's determined that the
03:50threat of suicide seems to have passed, then that inmate can be returned back to
03:54open population. Well clearly it didn't work here so with we await the report
04:01because all the victims of Mr. Epstein have to have their heart ripped out. I
04:06still never see justice. Dr. Sawyer can you think of any other incidents in the
04:13history of the BOP that have caused as much crisis for public trust for your
04:17institution as Epstein's death? I can only speak for the since 1976 when I joined the
04:23Bureau. I don't know prior to that but I would say it's probably gotten the most
04:27public attention. There are lots of taxpayers and citizens who've never
04:30thought about the BOP and you have lots of good patriotic hard-working folks
04:33there. I get that. But in terms of a crisis of public trust in general but also in
04:38terms of your workforce, this death happened in the middle of August, early
04:42August. It's Thanksgiving and you're here to testify today and you say you're not
04:46allowed to speak about this incident. I think that's crazy. Can you
04:50distinguish among types of investigations at least for us? Because I'm aware of at
04:54least three Epstein investigations. You get a whole bunch of women who were raped
04:57by this guy. This is a sex trafficking ring in the United States. This guy had
05:02evidence. He's got co-conspirators and there are victims out there who want to
05:06know where the evidence has gone. Can you tell us a little bit more about the
05:11different investigations? I understand there's at least one that you're directed
05:14by Maine Justice not to speak about but there are at least three
05:17investigations. Can you unpack them please? There are there are two
05:20investigations that are ongoing. One is the FBI's investigation and the other is
05:24the Inspector General's investigation. Both inside BOP but there's a third one
05:27outside which is why Epstein was in your institution to begin with. Yeah and that
05:31sir is completely out of my... I get that. There's there's a lot here where DOJ has
05:36failed. There's a lot here that BOP has failed. Let's just be clear so we have a
05:39level set for everybody in this room. You're in your job because of this crisis.
05:43Right? You come here today and you say you can't testify about it but the reason
05:47your director now is because the last guy got fired, right? Senator, I can't tell you
05:51what I don't know. I have received no information from the FBI investigation yet
05:55nor no information from the Inspector General. Once those entities go into one
05:59of our facilities we are forbidden from talking to anybody in the
06:02institution. We can send in a team and look at wherever there might have been a
06:06security flaw or something but we are not allowed to talk to anybody in our
06:10institutions about anything that happened over the Epstein... With all due respect you
06:14still have an obligation to speak to the girls who were raped by this guy today.
06:18You may not have to speak about every particular of the guards that were
06:22arrested last night but the fact that there is an ongoing attempt by the United
06:26States government to find out if there's still any evidence about the
06:29co-conspirators you do have an obligation to speak to those girls who were
06:33raped today. You may not speak about the specific of the charges against the
06:37specifics of the charges against those two guards this morning who were taken
06:41into custody but more broadly you should be able to unpack have we changed any
06:45processes about how cases like this are handled. It's been more than 90 days and
06:49you said, I think your quote was, we treat every inmate the same. We believe in
06:54America that every individual has equal dignity but not every inmate has equal
06:59value for future criminal investigations. Jeffrey Epstein was still to testify in a
07:04case. Somebody who's already been convicted who may be on suicide watch,
07:08there are lots of good reasons to not want that guy to be able to kill himself.
07:11This is different because it isn't just about the individual inmate who might kill
07:15themselves, it's about the fact that that bastard wasn't able to testify against
07:20his other co-conspirators. So it is wrong as a management matter for you to say we
07:25treat everybody the same. We should be treating people who are yet to testify
07:29against other felons, against other rapists. They have a lot more priority for
07:34your institution, don't they? Senator, all of our, pretty much all of our inmates that are
07:38any of our jail facilities are pretrial. They're still yet to testify, to be
07:42involved, to share information on other cases. I don't know what evidence you're
07:46asking of me. If you're saying was there any evidence in his room, in his
07:49possession at the time, that was all confiscated by the FBI. In his brain and in
07:53the cameras and in the tapes that the American public well understands appear to
07:57not be urgent enough for the Department of Justice. No, it's very urgent for the
08:01Department of Justice and it's all been confiscated by the FBI and it's all part
08:04of their investigation. That's why none of that is shared with the director of the
08:08Bureau of Prisons or anyone in the Bureau until the investigations are
08:11completed. Once those are completed, I'd be very happy to come up here and talk
08:15with any one of you that want to hear everything about we glean from those
08:18investigations. But until I have that information, there's nothing I can tell
08:21you. If I don't have the information, I cannot share anything with you.
08:25Then how widespread is the problem of sleeping on the job? There are lots of people in the
08:29public who think this seems a very convenient excuse. And so tell us, is it
08:34a systemic problem? Do we have a lot of people who sleep on the job when they're
08:37supposed to be guarding federal inmates? We have a few, sir, and we have been
08:41monitoring the cameras that are existing in every one of our institutions to
08:45determine how well and how effectively our inmates are, I mean our staff members,
08:48are doing their rounds and counts in the institutions. We have found a couple of
08:52other instances and we have immediately referred those to the inspector
08:55general's office. And I'm encouraging that if people just chose not to do their
09:00job, we're hoping the U.S. Attorney's Office will pick up those cases and
09:03prosecute them for us because we don't want those people in the Bureau of Prisons.
09:07They are dangerous to everybody, the inmates and the staff. And so we are
09:11zealously going about trying to determine which of our employees are good
09:15employees and who do their job. And that is the vast majority of the prison
09:19staff. But we do have some I know out there who obviously choose not to follow
09:24policy, choose not to do their job, and we want them gone. I do not want them in
09:29our institutions and I am exploring those very, very carefully to identify them
09:33and get them out of our system. Now if it's a training problem and they didn't
09:36know what they were supposed to do, that's our problem. That's management's
09:39problem. We have to do a better job training our staff. But if someone is
09:42well-trained, well-experienced and chooses not to do their job, we want them
09:47gone. I assure you of that. I'm at time, so I'll just give you a preview of
09:51something I'm going to ask you for the record after the event. You made a really
09:54important statement about drone drops of different kinds of contraband into
09:58your institutions. That's obviously a new and hard problem. That's a problem
10:02against which we have to play defense, but there's also new opportunities for
10:05offense. And so what's your long-term strategy is inside the institution about
10:09cameras is something that I think a lot of us would like to hear more and I'll send
10:12you a letter with some questions. Because Epstein's hallway should have still
10:16been monitored by cameras even if his guards were asleep and we don't have
10:19information about whether or not there were adequate cameras there. And so I
10:22think a lot of us would like to understand where technology dollars are
10:25going. Absolutely. Thank you, Dr. Schwerer. Thank you, Senator. Senator Blumenthal is next, but just
10:28follow up on this. Will there be an IG report regarding what happened? There should be.
10:33Usually after the Inspector General's Office investigates, they do come out with a
10:37report. If people are pending criminal charges, we're not going to interfere in their
10:40cases. But if there's an IG report, I promise you we'll get fully briefed by the
10:44committee here. How can I put this? Christmas ornaments, drywall, and Jerry Epstein. Name
10:58three things that don't hang themselves. That's what the American people think.
11:03That's what the American people think. And they deserve some answers. And I know that
11:11you're not in charge of these investigations. Yes, sir. But you talk to the people who are.
11:17And I need you to take a very respectful message today. Tell the American people what
11:30happened. And don't rush it so that they don't do a thorough investigation. But you
11:37and I both know they can make this a top priority and get it done more quickly than
11:43they normally would. Subscribe to One India and never miss an update. Download the One India
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