Jackson Jambalaya

Gov. Bryant should use the lawyers and investigators in the Governor's Office to open an investigation or ask the Attorney General to do so. The PEER committee or legislative oversight committee should also take it up and make recommendations for its reorganization. If the Governor has been the de facto head of MBN all this time, it will come out unless M. Fisher falls on his sword.

This is serious stuff. Comments like "I will fuck you up....I will change your zipcode" are no doubt accurate representations as that has been the administrative mantra at DPS and MDWFP for decades. Nothing new there at all. Only it's documented now, albeit anonymously.

State law enforcement has been dragged into the 21st century finally.

The state expenditure on these birds this year is $15,819,323.05. Give a trooper the reins, sell off their building, and put them under the DPS.

Damn fine jumping to conclusions here by the commentators on this site. This "letter" is great allegations by a disgruntled employee. Many of the accusations are made - without substantiation of course - but are one person's opinion. We don't know who the person is, or what axe(s) he has to grind.

Open an investigation? Based on one person's bitching? I would bet that questions have been asked - and answered - but an investigation by Governor's staff, AG, and PEER? Get real here.

This kind of letter comes in from most every agency (State and Federal) fairly regularly. In every large governmental organization there are disgruntled employees - and they change from administration to administration. Those that are "in" and those that are "out". The in's become out's and viceversa at admin changes. And the out's bitch. What keeps the agency running is the group in the middle that do their job.

Go thru the letters and pick out the issues that are actually "wrong" rather than those that are bitching because the writer thinks it should be done differently. Then look and see if there is documentation for it. (i.e. - staff salaries, Set by Personnel Board. Retired employees rehired as contract workers, a policy set by legislature and is throughout DPS; reassigning employees - management decisions that often have basis unknown to the general workforce, etc.)

Sorry - I just don't jump to the conclusion that all is terrible because some anonymous employee bitches.

7:23 am
I agree with you in general.

One may get many of these letters but that doesn't mean all of them are baseless.

When a letter offers specific information which can be rather easily checked with a few phone calls or requests for information from someone on the Governor's staff, and contains such serious allegations, a day or two of work doesn't strike me as a waste of time.

If such phone calls indicate the person is accurately describing problems, then a full blown investigation would be warranted.

And, this person is now clearly going to the media after going through channels or else KF wouldn't have copies of this letter.

The media can do what the Governor failed to do...starting with calling a few Sheriff's.

Were I at the Governor's office, I'd now be having to scramble instead of being able to have already checked out enough to bring the letter into doubt by letting the media know what actions to verify the Governor had taken.

Such complaining letters may be an annoyance, but it seems to be part of the job of a Governor and his staff is to evaluate the credibility of complaints not assume all complaints are baseless on their face.

7:32; While you are suggesting people not 'jump to conclusions', that's all you have done. You immediately dismiss the letter as 'one person's bitching'. That's what the process of investigation is for. There's too much smoke in the complaint for there not to be at least a brush fire. And based on personal experiences I'd bet at least a toe that there's considerable fire.

You may or may not remember the days of the Highway Patrol and DWFP before they had black troopers and game wardens and the asses of troopers and wardens were routinely 'sent to other zipcodes' at will by heavy handed supervisors whose position was 'we don't need any negroes in these jobs' and "I run things around here". In part, investigations led to a turnaround of those policies, practices and supervisory methods.

"I don't like the way things are done" is never a basis for investigation; however, these and other similar complaints go quite a few levels deeper than that.

8:48 and 11:24 - no, I am not jumping to conclusions. I don't know whether anybody has made the "couple of phone calls" suggested by 848. And neither does anybody else, including the bitching employee. Do either of you know if there has been any investigation? I didn't think so. I certainly don't claim to know. But if there has been those "phone calls" (I would actually suppose it has been more than that) who would know? The "anonymous bitching employee"?

I don't agree that there is too much smoke in the "complaint" - I would actually call it "allegations" -

Yes, I do remember the days from the 60's and 70's. But that was four decades ago! Many agencies still today, at both the state and federal level, move people to other zipcodes. I can name two fed agencies that still today tell you that you should report for duty at "xxx" next week, because that's where your check will be sent. But such is not always unwarranted - and when you take these positions, mobility is a requirement, like it or not.

BTW, I don't find anything in these allegations that brings up the race card that 1124 throws up, all I find is a disgruntled employee.

As a retired MBN Agent, I can personally attest to the validation of all the information in the letters that were submitted. I have long thought of writing my own letters but knowing how nothing ever changes at that place except the faces, I have felt that there is no hope for positive change to take place at MBN. It is much worse than even implicated in the letters. Information that many current Agents and former Agents have is TRUE and VERY CREDIBLE, the Agents have every reason to be grasping for help from the taxpayers because their cries for help and change from the Administration including the Governor's office have gone unaddressed and the Agents who have made complaints have been targeted and retaliated against in various ways.

What the taxpayers need to know is that all of the Administrations at MBN for the past 20 years have participated in illegal activity that if the tax paying citizen were caught doing any of the many things done, they would be incarcerated for indefinite amounts of time. MBN is the only state Agency that has the authority to conduct Title III (wiretap) investigations. The bill that made Title III's possible was the work of another retired MBN Agent. When used within the confines of the law, it is a great investigative tool and has been used to take down many drug trafficking organizations. What the taxpayers don't know are about the many falsified affidavits that have been pushed thru by MBN Administration to get the signature of the appropriate Circuit Court Judge to start the Title III. A lot of these were done by an MBN Administrator or MBN in house Attorney writing an affidavit and then calling in a unsuspecting Agent who is told by the Administration and MBN legal team, that the Agent was going to be the case agent on the Title III and ordered to go and sign the affidavit before a Circuit Court Judge. Many of these Agents had no idea of the validity of the information in the affidavits and broke the law by signing the affidavits. There are a lot of men and women in prison because of falsified Title III affidavits. For taxpayers to think that the laws are put in place to protect them is a joke in itself. There are a lot of laws on the books that make it easy for the corrupt political law enforcement regimes to wrongly investigate and ultimately incarcerate innocent people. Some of these people targeted may have actually been committing crimes, but it does not give any law enforcement entity the authority to break the laws in order to make the Administrations look good. MBN is notorious for having to produce good arrest and seizure statistics to the legislature, who ultimately decides the budget for MBN. When the MBN Administration is in bed with most of the powers that be in the legislature, they are able to get some of what they need as far as funding. That is the reason that when honest Agents, that took their oath of duty serious, make complaints about the internal wrong doing to members of the State legislature because their chain of command is too concerned with protecting their own asses, nothing is done. These letters being given to the media, are the Agents screaming to the taxpayers for help. Most of the taxpayers in Mississippi are good, honest, hard working people. If it weren't so, these Agents wouldn't be risking their lives everyday and night to try and rid the streets and communities of the despicable criminal element that is ultimately protected by the high level political machine on the local, state, and federal levels.

MBN had always been a place where only "yes" men or women could hope for promotion. The majority of the hierarchy at MBN from Lieutenants up thru the level of Lieutenant Colonel are filled with people who gained popularity with the Administration for doing what they were told by higher ups and not rocking the boat. Even when rocking the boat, is the right thing to do!

My previous blog was cut short due to character limit. This is the remainder of comment:

I will continue to post on many of the injustices that are carried out by the MBN Administration, as long as I can confirm that MBN and any Federal agency doesn't start tracing the URL of the ones that post on this forum. These are sick and twisted people, and they will stop at nothing to protect there cushion ass jobs and keep their political overseers protected from those who know the truth and know that what is and has been taking place for the last 20+ years is wrong and should be stopped immediately, even if it means dismantling the MBN and restructuring a new Agency to combat the drug element, that has no political ties.

That too many drug dealers continue to escape punishment certainly lends credence to your post 6:00 pm

Internal Affairs Investigations have been done. Mississippi Department of Public Safety did them. The allegations {theft of over $7,000 dollars in ABA money, tearing up tickets, Strip tease, Misuse (Claiming Meth. Overtime when they did not work meth or have anything to do with it) of Meth. Grant funds} in this letter and the last letter were found to be true, and the investigation was brought to the Attorney Generals Office. Numerous meetings and phone calls were held and placed between the AG’s Office and MBN Officials.
The force of the offices of the Director of MBN, Deputy Director, and Enforcement Commander came to bear on anyone they believed to have given information during the Internal Affairs investigations. It was easy for these people to attack the agents that were called to testify during the IA due to the fact that the command for them to be interviewed by DPS came from DPS to the MBN Director and Enforcement Commander then to the Major and finally the Major, Captain or Agent to be interviewed.
The Directors office and the Enforcement Commander targeted these people. Those that were known to have the most firsthand information were transferred around, written up for anything possible, and some were let go, so to speak.
The ABA held meetings about what to do. The Director’s Office sent MBN’s Legal Department to set in on the meetings, thereby pressuring the board members to do nothing. The Director, Enforcement Commander and the Deputy Director had asked for the money but had been turned down. They wanted to buy mouse pads, coffee mugs, challenge coins and neck lanyards to hand out (basically to try to keep their jobs in the upcoming election). They then went to a person that could access the account and took out $1000 dollars at a time so that no red flags would go up. You see, if there is more than $1000 dollars taken and spent from the ABA account, it must go before the entire body ABA for an open vote. This little structuring withdrawal trick allowed the afore mentioned people to steal the money without it being known until it was spent. So they bought their stuff in excess of over 700 coffee mugs, pads, challenge coins and lanyards. Now, after that was done they could, would, and did use the power of their offices to pressure all the Agents not to take criminal actions against them for fear of retaliation. They then gave a bag containing one of each item to all MBN employees. There are around 112 sworn Agents with the MBN. Not all are ABA Members. So where did the other 588 bags of items go? Let’s give them credit and say they handed out 200 to MBN employees and sold another 100 at raffles. Where is the other 400? Handed out to all kinds of people for small favors? Who cares? They stole the money. If you stole over $7000 from your job or the people that work for you, do you think you would go to jail for this felony? At the very least, would you have a job?
MBN Officials pressured the Attorney Generals office into not taking any criminal actions for fear of the black eye it would have on Law Enforcement. There….swept under the rug and all that know about it have been talked to, threatened, or gotten rid of so that it l would look like a case of “disgruntled employee.”
At some point things must change. Check into this!!!

As a former prosecutor who worked daily with MBN, during the Melton years, (and before and after), all I have to offer is that March 16 @ 5:58 pm and @ 6:00 pm. seems to know about that of which he/she speaks.

I believe that he/she has more to offer by the accuracy of his/her recollections of his/her years with that agency.

What happened to the guy who said this was all only about an employee or two bitching because they didn't like the way things are run?

Knowing what I do about agency structure (in general) in this state, I can assure you that beginning Monday morning we'll have agency directors and command staff ordering personnel officers to pull current and old personnel files of those they think are involved in 'daylight'.

Strip those files with a fine tooth comb and find what we can to turn those people into worthless malcontents. Kick the asses of those who are still employed and discredit those who are retired. And every one of those files will have 'entries' in them Wednesday that were not there when the process begins Monday. Circle the wagons and order lunch out.

How about our state leaders stop playing political games, kissing ass, and do something about our state agencies that continue to use and misuse state money and intimidate employees trying to do the right thing, i.e. their job. Even the agency I work in keeps saying they have no money for raises, yet continue expanding and hiring more employees, and buying new computers, furniture, etc. We are not stupid, but we are in need of jobs and hope to get our state retirement one day for working in such BS environments of continuous lies and money-wasting, so we can't speak out loud to our "superiors".

It would be so wonderful if our governor, lt governor, AG, SOMEONE, would actually gather the information needed to fire these state employees who profit from their jobs at the taxpayers expense.

Yeah, I know, things will never change, but you know, they actually COULD change if our overpaid, over-perked people in jobs of authority would just do the job they were elected and/or were appointed to do.

The current gubnor cut his teeth in that environment and knows it well. He may have spent more time in state government than any (or most) former governors. Dealing with this situation would certainly be on-the-job-training for Bryant. But, what would make one think he will address it since he's watched it for decades. I won't say he's participated, but he damned sure hasn't addressed it either.

Correction - "Dealing with this situation would certainly NOT be OJT for Bryant". He knows this snakepit well.

4:55 a.m., I'm here. Just have a real life and a job - not just responding to anonymous commentators who often speak of nothing that they know. I don't live my life on JJ or anywhere else - but do occasionally look and comment when I have something to offer.

I don't back down from my earlier comments - don't know that anything here changes those comments, other than if one of the comments is correct it appears that the proper process worked until it got to the AG's office. Not that I believe that, but.......

If DPS conducted an investigation and found "All to be true" and that the AG killed the issue, then there is another problem. But it would confirm that "investigations" have been held and that the various people being accused of ignoring these letters were not at fault.

Frankly, I don't believe that everything was found to be "correct as charged" and that "illegalities" were uncovered but ignored by the AG. (And I am certainly no fan of the AG.)

I do know (firsthand) that a couple of the "allegations" have a bit of truth to them. I also believe that some of the others are not "illegal" but just a difference in opinion of what is proper and/or good management.

While I know that several of the allegations are nothing more than bitching by disgruntled employees, I also agree that over the past two decades some of the directors have been absolute dictators and have run very poor operations.

I stand by my premise that those that are disgruntled under the current administration probably were the ones on top in previous rules - those on the fringe tend to switch back and forth between administrations. Same is true at DPS, as well as most other Executive Branch agencies.