Two weeks ago, several employees in the U.S. Marshals Service office in Chicago confronted their boss with an urgent complaint. Inexperienced deputies were escorting prisoners from federal court to their cells, the veteran workers said, increasing chances for an escape.
Chief Deputy Marshal Don Lamb, the office`s second in command, told the group that he would look into the matter, according to marshal employees familiar with the meeting.
Three days later, their worst fears were realized. A bank robbery suspect being transported to the Metropolitan Correctional Center overpowered a 23-year-old part-time deputy marshal, stole her gun, then fatally shot another deputy marshal, a court security officer and himself in the garage of the Dirksen Federal Building.
Jeffrey Erickson`s violent escape attempt has focused attention on a powerful government office that has sensitive duties-from transporting federal prisoners to managing assets seized in drug raids-but is little known outside law enforcement circles.
The informal gripe session came amid mounting employee frustration over an operation that for the past six years has been plagued by a lack of permanent leadership, internal rancor and allegations of impropriety, according to U.S. marshal employees and former federal agents.
Their concerns apparently went unheeded, further undermining office morale in the wake of the slayings. Lamb declined to comment on the meeting, pending the outcome of an internal investigation into the shootings.
How Erickson obtained the key that unlocked his handcuffs, allowing him to flee, is at the center of an FBI investigation. Some people who work for and with the agency are questioning whether strife within the U.S. marshal`s office contributed to an environment that allowed Erickson`s security breach. There has been no permanent U.S. marshal since 1986, when Peter Wilkes resigned after allegations of misconduct, including misusing evidence. He was replaced by John Adams, who served as interim marshal for five years but resigned last October when he was not appointed to the permanent position. The office still is awaiting a permanent chief.
Under Adams and chief deputy Edward Scheu, federal investigators probed a series of allegations. Companies that did business with the office complained to Washington about favoritism, anonymous letters alleged office corruption, and investigators searched workers` offices and subpoenaed records.
Some of the alleged improprieties led to a grand jury probe. No criminal charges were ever brought. But the investigations cast a cloud over the office, hurting worker morale and, some say, hindering its operations.
”The office has been in a state of disruption,” said a former high-ranking marshal official who asked not to be identified. ”Without a permanent marshal, there was always infighting about where the power was going to be. . . . It`s like having the vice president run the country for five or six years.”
”There`s no continuity, no permanent fixture,” said Robert Fuesel, head of the Chicago Crime Commission, a private group that monitors the local criminal justice system. ”Things have gotten lax.”
Jo Simpson, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Marshals Service headquarters in Arlington, Va., denied there has been any disruption in the Chicago office and said there has been ”above-average continuity” because both Wilkes and Adams had relatively long tenures.
But a spokesman for the office conceded that ”it has been tough.”
”When there are these allegations (of misconduct), you wonder what people are thinking,” said Edwin Borowiak, supervising deputy. ”You wonder what people know and don`t know, what they are expecting and not expecting. There`s not much you can do but try and get past the rumors.”
These pressures come at a time when the soaring crime rate has increased the Marshals Service`s workload.
The oldest federal law enforcement agency, the Marshals Service is responsible for federal court security, transporting federal prisoners, the federal witness security program and chasing fugitives. In 1984, it became responsible for cash and property seized in drug raids, a nationwide inventory currently worth about $1.4 billion. The Chicago office manages seized property and cash valued at $40 million.
Last year, its personnel escorted prisoners to court hearings and other meetings 471,799 times, more than double the number in 1985. The average daily population of federal detainees awaiting trial or sentencing jumped to more than 16,000 in 1991 from 4,000 in 1981, said Drew Valentine, associate director at the General Accounting Office in Washington.
”Probably the biggest challenge the Marshals Service faces is the tremendous increase in the number of people in custody on a day-to-day basis,” Valentine said. ”They don`t have that many more employees. There must be tremendous pressure on them.”
Full-time Marshals Service employment stands at 3,500, up from 2,000 a decade ago. To handle increasing demands, the agency has hired part-time workers to transport prisoners and contracted with private firms to provide courthouse security.
Richard Sheridan, district supervisor for court security officers whose ranks included the guard slain by Erickson, said marshal employees ”are being exposed to more danger all the time. They are hamstrung by lack of personnel. In my six years here, it`s tenfold or more the original responsibilities.”
The Chicago office has 43 deputy marshals, including three part-time employees. Terry Pinta, the deputy marshal who was disarmed by Erickson, is a former beautician who worked briefly as an intern with the Illinois State Police before joining the Marshals Service.
Employees in the office said Pinta was a friend of Marguerite ”Rudy”
Gabele, lockup supervisor, and that Gabele helped Pinta obtain her part-time post. Pinta and Gabele declined to comment. Marshals Service officials have defended Pinta`s actions and qualifications.
Pinta was guarding Erickson and eight other prisoners in the garage of the Dirksen building while her partner readied a van to take them to the correctional center. Pinta told investigators that Erickson put a choke-hold on her, knocked her to the ground and grabbed the gun from her holster. Pinta lay in a fetal position while Erickson began shooting.
Before the trial began, FBI agents warned the marshal`s office that Erickson was dangerous and possibly suicidal, according to federal sources. In addition, his attorney conveyed concerns from Erickson`s mother that her son might try to escape.
These cautions led to beefed-up security in the courtroom, where as many as seven deputy marshals and court security officers stood guard during Erickson`s trial. But security outside the courtroom remained less stringent. Sources within the office have complained that inexperienced personnel were all too frequently assigned to transporting defendants from prison to the courthouse.
Internal problems within the office first surfaced publicly in 1986, with the resignation of the office`s last permanent head, Wilkes, who was appointed chief U.S. marshal in Chicago in 1980.
Wilkes` departure followed an internal audit that found he may have used government-confiscated cars on dates with a former office clerk. The clerk also appeared in television interviews and accused Wilkes of taking confiscated pornographic films from evidence lockers and showing them to her when the two had lived together. Wilkes denied the allegations and said in a TV interview that he was the victim of a vendetta by office employees.
Wilkes was succeeded by Adams, a former chief deputy in Chicago who came out of retirement to take over the office. Adams` staff assumed he was just a caretaker who would soon be replaced by a permanent marshal, workers in the office said. Instead, he stayed on for five years and eventually campaigned for the position.
Traditionally, the job of marshal has been a plum to be dispensed by the political party in power. On his resume, Adams prominently displayed his association with the Republican Party. Yet, despite his loyalties, Adams never was nominated by the president, a required step in the appointment process.
”I got tired of waiting,” Adams said in a phone interview from his retirement home in Florida. ”My name was submitted by Congressman (Robert)
Michel,” the Illinois Republican who is House minority leader. ”The FBI ran a routine background investigation. But I never heard anything.”
It is unclear why Adams` appoinment stalled before reaching the Senate. But during his tenure, the Justice Department`s inspector general`s office investigated various allegations, including whether one of Adams` employees had solicited gifts from contractors to be given away at a golf outing, according to sources questioned in connection with the probes.
Adams said the office was free of misconduct during his administration. An audit Adams said he ordered early in his administration revealed that ”the only thing that couldn`t be accounted for was a set of jade earrings valued under $100.”
The day-to-day office operations were run by Scheu, a tough-talking former Marine. After federal officials received an anonymous letter alleging office misconduct, Scheu became the focus of a Justice Department
investigation, according to sources familiar with the probe. Only one charge was taken before a grand jury-an allegation that Scheu had falsified an accident report involving a government vehicle. But the charges never were substantiated, said Scheu`s attorney, David Schippers.
Still, the investigation had a disquieting effect on the marshal`s office, according to employees.
”He operated with the cloud continuously over his head,” said a former marshal worker. ”It`s hard to be a leader when you`re under an investigation for three or four years.”
When Adams resigned last fall, Scheu expected to be named to replace him. Instead, Marvin Lutes, chief deputy in St. Louis, was brought in as interim marshal.
Scheu was assigned to an office five blocks away from the Dirksen building and placed in charge of security for the occasional Midwest visits by U.S. Supreme Court justices.
An aide to Rep. Michel, Ray LaHood, said Michel recommended Du Page County Sheriff Richard Doria for the permanent post in February, and a background check is proceeding.
But it is unlikely that an appointment will be made before the presidential election. Democrats control the Senate Judiciary Committee, and political observers say the election is too near for confirmation hearings to be held on a George Bush appointee.
”These marshal positions take lower priority given there`s such a backlog with federal district judges, U.S. attorneys and appellate judges,”
LaHood said. ”The marshal positions are much lower down on the priority list.”
