HOJJ AND THE GATES OF HELL --PART 1

0500 hours: October 1^st, 1987. Los Angeles. I kissed the wife, hugged my two year old son and drove to work that morning like I did every other morning over the previous 2 years, as a young strapping Los Angeles County Deputy Sheriff assigned to the Hall of Justice Jail in downtown LA. The Hall of Justice, built in 1925, was an imposing structure. Concrete, granite and steel, along with its grey exterior and ornate interior conveyed a sense of justice and importance. Floors 8 through 15 housed 2,000 of the most vicious, unrepentant, violent and high security criminals in the county. HOJJ had been featured on such shows as Dragnet, Perry Mason, Get Smart and Cagney and Lacy. Charles Manson and Sirhan Sirhan resided there. Eighty percent of the inmate population was on trial for murder. The HOJJ was the epitome of a true maximum security facility and all who worked and lived there knew it simply as the, “Jail that time forgot.”

0620 hours: Day shift briefing concluded and I took one of the service elevators to the 15^th floor to start my shift as the “Kitchen Gate Officer”. The Kitchen gate area was a traffic hub for employees and service satff for movement around the jail. It was a busy place; One that required a deputy sheriff. Every deputy was required to rotate through the KGO assignment, primarily because it was not considered a pleasant place to work and nobody ever volunteered to do it. Nobody. The month of October was my turn.

The Kitchen Gate Officer had one very important job; that job was to Lock and unlock the security gates that provided go through access for inmates going to and from the kitchen and other areas of the 15^th floor. Three different elevators arrived in the Kitchen gate area dozens of times throughout the day and each time the KGO had to personally close the security gates(also called the dead line crash gates) to lock inmates out and then unlock the elevator gates to allow personnel in and out of the elevators, while maintaining the highest level of security. It was considered the most tempting location in this maximum security facility for anyone who might attempt a brazen escape because two of the elevators travelled below the jail floors and exited into the unsecured Lobby of the building. It was the Achilles heel of the facility and the KGO was the one holding the keys to freedom for hundreds of potential escapees. Working the KGO position sucked by any definition of the word and nobody wanted to be the one working there the day somebody attempted to escape. This would be my first day. I had no idea that this day would live with me forever.

0735 hours: A pregnant female civilian was escorted by deputies to the kitchen gate area and left under my supervision/protection while she waited for an elevator. She was a diminutive black woman with whom I had frequent contact and had developed a friendly rapport. From prior inquiries to her about the status of her gestation I knew that she was getting ready to bear child soon. We were joined by an elderly priest who was dropped off into my care just moments later by another two man deputy team. I also knew this man of the cloth from several prior encounters. (So this priest, a pregnant woman and a cop walk into a bar………..) Anyway back to the story.

0742 hours: After a couple of minutes exchanging pleasantries with my new company, I noticed the first of two elevator alarm lights go red. This was my first warning that an elevator was approaching and I needed to secure the kitchen gate area before it arrived. I closed the first deadline blast gate and walked across to secure the other when the concrete floor below me disappeared.

I landed on the floor with a bone jarring thud and heard the unmistakable high pitched sound of a female screaming. I was dazed and off balance. The concrete seemed to be flowing back and forth under my body like the fluid in a lava lamp and I could sense the horrifying reality that the entire building was swaying back and forth! I tried twice to get back on my feet but was immediately sent crashing back to the concrete each time. Chaos ensued. I began crawling toward the second crash gate in order to close it. I wasn’t thinking with any real clarity for several seconds initially but instinct told me that I better close that gate before I contemplate anymore about what was happening. And what was happening became frighteningly apparent in an instant.

October 1^st, 1987 at 0742 hours was the precise moment the Whittier Narrows earthquake struck the Los Angeles basin.

I barely managed to close the 5,000 pound gate. I was locked into an area with a very pregnant woman and an elderly priest. I began to take account of the situation while listening to the chaotic radio traffic on my portable sheriff’s radio. There was damage everywhere in the building and countless people were injured and in need of medical care. Telephone lines were down. The elevator shafts had warped and trapped people inside them, suspended between floors. I could hear frantic people screaming for help in the elevator shaft. Inmates began forming into large groups outside the crash gates, confused and scared to death about what was occurring. Everyone was looking at me; the inmates, the priest and the woman……….who was frozen in a state of primordial fear.

When the building finally resumed its composure and everything that was going to collapse, fall or break had done so, I checked on the priest and the woman, both of whom had backed themselves into a corner area as if it was somehow safer there. The elderly priest was trying to remain calm but his shaking betrayed his demeanor. The woman was taking big gulps of air and trying to calm herself down but it was apparent that she, the priest and I all shared the same horrific understanding. We were at the very top of a 60 year old concrete artifact of a building. The fear that the building may suddenly drop out from underneath our feet and kill us all in the most gruesome way was excruciatingly real and I discovered a new appeciation for the fear that is is the horrific uncertainty generated when one is faced with the potentially immediate conclusion of ones own life. it was a feeling of helplessness heretofore never realized in my life to that point. Order, routine and process had in a split second been replaced with pandemonium and utter chaos.

I knew my wife was enroute to college and my son was in a daycare near ground zero when the event began. Were they hurt? Were they killed? Are they okay? I could not communicate with anyone and they could not communicate with me. Cell phones did not exist yet. The land lines were down. The radio was all I had and it was for emergency traffic only. I could not know if my family had met with tragedy and the fear took on an almost surreal feeling. People were hurt, people were dying and I was about to experience a life changing scenario that played itself out in different forms all over the Los Angeles area.

 And the day was just beginning……………….