b"how can I put it. This is my second marriage. So, when I re-married, I knew where the potholes were. I knew what to avoid.So, I knew how to stay on the good side. I know if the union doesn't like you on the job, you have problems. I'm not therefor them. I'm there to do my job, I don't have no problems. If I want problems, I can stay home [laughs].Did the union ever have to represent you for something?Yeah, there were a few things. I wasn't an angel all the time. There were a few things here and there. I always had thedesire to be a baker all my life. An opportunity came up within the Department of Correction.There is a bakery on RikersIsland. Other people don't know there is a bakery there. They bake the bread and the cakes. So, it started out as overtimefor me. They ask one of the cooks because the bakery was right next to the jail. You can get four hours overtime in a day. I used to get off at seven o'clock in the morning and then go to the bakery and work four hours. I loved it, I always wantedto be a baker. I worked in the bakery on Rikers Island for two and a half years.I transferred over there, because an opening opened up. I took the interview. The woman said: Mr. Hepbourn, you've already worked here, you know the routine, okay. I got the job, well, it was more or less a transfer. I went over and I worked there two and a half years.You were there from 1994 to 1999?Yeah, in the midnight shift in the jail, OBCC, Otis Bantum Correctional Center.That was the name of the jail I was in. Then I got this opportunity and ended up working for the bakery. I worked 10 a.m.to 6 p.m., no more nights and no more night differential. Working midnights, you make more money. I could be at homeon weekends working in the bakery, but making a little less money. During the time I was working at OBCC on midnights, some of the cooks had grievances with management and theystaged a wildcat strike. I said: Listen, that's not the way to go about doing things, you don't stage a wildcat strike, you gothrough channels. [They said] Oh, Hepbourn, you don't know what you talkin about. [I said] Listen, I been in otherunions before. You stage a wildcat strike; you can be fired. I remember when John DeLury was the president of the sanitation union. The sanitation workers staged a wildcat strike, and those guys got fired. I say: You don't do that; you go through channels. You slow down, you don't stage a wildcat strike. They did what they wanted to do. I said: Listen, I don't even have three months on the job, I cannot do that. I said: Listen, you guys are gonna have to do what you wantto do, but I can't support you. I'm still on probation. Oh, they didn't like that: No, you supposed to [be] with us. I say:No, I can't do that because I have a family to support. I'm sorry I can't support you. It lasted for about a week. The firstday it happened, it was four a.m. and I'm like: Where is everyone? Then I got a phone call from a captain in the controlroom telling me that all the other cooks called out sick. He said: You're the only cook here, we need you to start lunch. I hadn't been there three months yet. I had to do it. I had the inmate workers work and the captain. One of the kitchencaptains came to me. He said: Hepbourn, what do you need to get this meal out? I said: I want you to leave my midnight crew down here, with me.I'm used to these guys, we got along well. I said: You'll get your meal, just don't bother me. What time you want it? No problem.177 "