Jess Dunn Employee Worried About Losing Job Over Letter He Wrote

An employee at Jess Dunn Correctional Center in Taft tells News On 6 a letter he anonymously wrote to state lawmakers got the former chief of security fired.

Now, he said he's worried that letter will cost him his job, too. Sergeant Jarrod Fry admits he wrote the letter on behalf of his coworkers at Jess Dunn Correctional Center.

"They couldn't stick up for themselves the way they needed to apparently, so I stepped in," he said.

The DOC confirms Jones was fired. Now, Fry says he's being punished for a Facebook post. It's a "10-year challenge" photo where Fry used a funny picture of one of his coworkers as if it were him.

"Nobody had an issue," he said. "We're friends. It's nothing."

But Fry said the administration accused him of bullying.

"I know the warden stated right after I sent that letter out, that he was going to fire whoever wrote that letter," Fry said.

Fry isn't the only one under fire; his supervisor at Jess Dunn said she's in trouble for commenting on the post.

"You know the laugh 'til you cry emoji, where they're laughing and it's got the tears running down its face," Lieutenant Melissa Balthis said. "That's all I posted."

Now, Balthis fears she could end up jobless.

"So yeah, it's personal. Yeah, I'm upset about it," she said. "And I'm going to fight tooth and nail to make sure it doesn't happen to anybody else."

DOC Spokesman Matt Elliott said they take bullying very seriously, and investigated the incident, saying in a statement, "Our understanding now is that it's been resolved. Nobody's been disciplined. We see it as a closed matter."

Fry said he's prepared to take legal action if necessary.