EX-GUARDS PAID INMATES TO ATTACK 'RAT,' HEARING TOLD

Local News - A Kingston Penitentiary guard who told police about drug
dealing and drug use by other guards was shunned and threatened, and former
guards paid inmates to attack him in revenge.

Rick Noble told a hearing in Kingston yesterday that he suffers from
post-traumatic stress disorder and has not been back to work since police
told him last September of the contract against him.

He was testifying at the hearing of Jamie Renaud, one of eight prison
guards who was fired after an undercover police investigation into
corruption among guards at the ancient institution. Renaud is appealing his
dismissal.

A "rat code" that discourages officers from testifying against other staff
or taking an inmate's side in a dispute has been a contentious issue
throughout the hearings.

Testifying against a guard who he said sold him cocaine, Noble, a 13-year
veteran, described an environment more reminiscent of a war zone than a
workplace.

He spoke to police in a March interview and as a result of admitting to
buying and using cocaine, he was suspended for 20 days. When Noble returned
to work, officers who either knew or suspected he'd talked to police
shunned him.

Noble, who admitted he is a recovering alcoholic and cocaine addict,
testified other guards "put him on the dummy," meaning no one would talk to
him and people stopped talking when he approached.

His signature in log books was defaced by other guards writing "rat" or
"junkie" next to his name. He and his wife started getting ominous
telephone calls in the middle of the night with callers with muffled voices
whispering threats such as, "Die, rat."

Working in a gun tower one day, Noble found another guard had scrawled,
"Noble's a rat goof," in marker on a cupboard shelf.

"I worked on that for a half hour with an SOS pad," Noble testified, saying
he didn't want young guards to see it.

"I went from being a very likeable person with virtually no enemies within
the institution to [a situation where] people stop talking when you walked
into the room.

'Try And Deal With Me'

"I didn't know if someone was going to try and deal with me in the parking
lot."

Prison managers were so concerned about Noble's safety that they gave him
their private cellphone numbers.

The last straw came when a member of the Penitentiary Squad told him that
former guards had paid inmates to attack him.

"He had received allegations that payment had been made by an ex-staff
member to have me roughed up," Noble testified.

Noble told the hearing that in Canada's largest maximum security prison,
disputes aren't settled with fists.

"I've been a guard for 13 years and no one ever gets roughed up [in
Kingston Pen,]" he testified. "Inmates aren't just going to give you a
couple shots in the head."

He said, based on his experience, that he could expect far worse than a
beating. In his police interview, Noble said he feared being stabbed by an
inmate with an infected needle.

"That's my biggest fear," he said in the March interview, where he alleged
other guards were selling and using cocaine.

"To have one of these [expletive] jam a needle in me, it's not about being
stabbed or punched in the face or whatever. [From that] I'll heal."

The last guard Noble knew who had a contract on him had his throat cut by a
prisoner, he said.

Noble went on stress leave from the prison, suffering from paranoia,
post-traumatic stress disorder and other problems. "I just couldn't take
it," he explained.

The contract is still being investigated by police.

In his statement to police, Noble alleged that guards Dave Perkins and
Jamie Renaud each sold him a gram of cocaine. Perkins killed himself in
December 2000. Renaud was fired.

Noble, who said he had problems with cocaine earlier in his life, claimed
he used the drug only twice in 2000. He bought a gram from Renaud for $80
or $100 in early July at the apartment of another guard who lived near
Cataraqui Town Centre.

"It was a writeoff," he said of the quality of the drug. He testified that
he complained about it to Perkins, who knew about the transaction, but
never complained to Renaud.

When police made public their two-year undercover investigation in March
2001, Noble was called for an interview. He gave a lengthy statement.

"I was at a point in my life when I needed to be honest and tell the
truth," Noble said yesterday.

"I have been trying to get clean for several years and it struck me that
this was what I needed to do."

Noble knew he was breaking the guards' code and he testified that on the
way home from the interview, he pulled over his car to cry, knowing he
would be subject both to discipline from prison managers and revenge from
colleagues.

In cross-examination, defence lawyer Angus MacLeod asked why it took Noble
about 40 pages worth of transcript to admit he bought drugs from other guards.

"I was still trying to stay true to the code and not rat on a fellow
officer," he replied.

"I'm a guard and I've worked in the system and I've lived and believed the
code."

MacLeod accused Noble of trying to mislead police and, in a lengthy
cross-examination, he disclosed Noble's history of promiscuity, drinking
and drug use to cast doubt on his credibility.

"Have you kicked the dishonest lifestyle you were talking about?" he asked
at one point.

"Yes sir, I feel that, ah, I feel that this is behind me," he answered.

Noble also denied he got a deal from police or prison management in
exchange for his testimony.

Warden Monty Bourke denied that Noble got off lightly with a 20-day
suspension, adding if he had suspended a guard for any longer, termination
would have to be considered.

He said Noble's admissions, and the fact he was in treatment, were
mitigating factors. He compared it unfavourably to Renaud, who has denied
either using or selling drugs.

While Noble admitted he had a problem, Bourke argued that Renaud would be
at the mercy of convicts who knew he had been accused of selling drugs but
never admitted to it. Bourke said he wouldn't want Renaud back as a guard.

"Inmates can be merciless when they spot a weakness in an officer or the
system," he said.

Under cross-examination, MacLeod hammered the warden about conflicting
accounts of what may have happened. He noted neither Corrections nor the
police had any physical evidence on his client.

Noble modified one fact in his earlier statement to say he bought the drugs
from Renaud in the apartment of a third guard, who had been investigated
for wrongdoing. He had previously identified it as Renaud's apartment but
Renaud lived with his parents.

The other guard rented the apartment and witnessed the deal. Prison
authorities didn't have enough evidence to uphold internal charges against
that guard when they investigated him.

In a twist, Bourke said from the stand yesterday that based on a new piece
of evidence at the current hearing, that investigation would be reopened.
The hearing continues today.