By Noelle Crombie
oregonlive.com
PORTLAND, Ore. — The Oregon Department of Corrections has moved to fire three corrections officers at the state’s largest prison who sent a flurry of racist, antisemitic, homophobic and sexist texts, videos and images on a group text made up of the prison’s tactical team, records show.
The explosive findings are detailed in Oregon Department of Justice records obtained Friday by The Oregonian /OregonLive in response to a public records request.
The Snake River Correctional Institution employees, Thomas White and brothers Steven and Samuel Main, were placed on paid leave in December 2023 and continue to be paid.
The group text included four videos where the N-word was used. According to the records, one of the videos shows a prisoner and another shows a house party attended by prison employees, including supervisors. Someone can be heard on the video shouting an expletive followed by the N-word. A member of the tactical team texted the clip to others on the team, according to records obtained by The Oregonian /OregonLive.
Samuel Main, the records show, sent the group a “video that depicts a male on TikTok being called” the N-word “repeatedly while playing video games.”
The employees serve on the prison’s tactical team, which extracts prisoners from their cells and responds to serious security incidents inside the prison.
The Department of Justice investigation centered on “bias related speech, videos, and photos,” and included “videos of prisoners within the facility to hate speech being used at off duty staff gatherings.”
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Corrections Inspector General Gary Ninman reported the conduct to the Department of Justice, the records show.
Corrections officials learned about the group text from a corrections officer, Fernando Rangel, who was himself the subject of a criminal investigation related to misconduct allegations on the job, according to records.
The records show that Rangel provided a corrections investigator “screen shots on his personal cell phone” of “racist and homophobic content” among Snake River employees.
The Justice Department records show multiple Snake River employees declined to cooperate with the criminal investigation, including one who cited the risk of retaliation.
The records detail the images and messages shared on the group chat. One photoshopped image showed a Snake River sergeant’s face imposed on the body of a nude Black man.
“The body of the male including his penis is sitting on-top a photoshop picture of George Floyd’s head,” the report states. Steven Main sent the image to the group, according to the investigation.
Richard Moore, a corrections inspector, was along on the group text and at one point, records show, sent a GIF of a Black man with a caption that included homophobic slurs.
Records show Moore was placed on administrative leave in December 2023 as a result of the investigation. He has since returned to work and continues to work as a corrections inspector, a spokesperson confirmed Friday.
The Department of Corrections released its “pre-dismissal letters” for the men on Friday in response to a public records request from The Oregonian /OregonLive. The letters describe crude and demeaning texts among the three, who referred to new hires in sexual terms and used racist and antisemitic language, images and memes.
In his letter to Steven Main, Snake River Superintendent Joe Woodland cited a text Main sent to the group of corrections officers that included “a photograph of a naked man crouching over George Floyd, who is shown lying on the pavement with his head held down on the pavement.” The image shows a photograph of Steven Main’s face superimposed on the naked man, Woodland said.
Corrections Director Michael Reese issued a statement Friday saying agency leadership requested a state criminal investigation after learning about the group text messages.
He called the employees’ actions “reprehensible” and said they constitute an “abuse of power, exploitation of adult in custody images, and discriminatory behavior rooted in homophobia, misogyny, and racism.”
“It violates our core values and erodes the trust placed in us by the public, our staff, and those in our care,” he said. “Trust is not optional — it is fundamental to our mission.”
Last month, corrections leaders scheduled meetings to discuss termination and then rescheduled them for later in June at the employees’ request; the men then each took three months of “protected leave” and did not attend the meeting, an agency spokesperson said. The leave can include family or medical leave.
Snake River Correctional Institution in Ontario houses about 2,700 prisoners.
The employees continue to receive salaries. Steven Main is paid $91,740; Thomas White is paid $101,616; and Samuel Main is paid $89,184.
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