Former California Police Officer Chats New Book, Badge Under Fire

Summary

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Ballast Book Launch Podcast – Episode Summary

Episode: Former California Police Officer Chats New Book, Badge Under Fire
Host: Andy Symonds, Ballast Media Group
Guest: Corporal Chad Jensen, Pomona PD (Ret.), Author of Badge Under Fire
Date: June 11, 2026

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Episode Overview

This riveting episode features Ballast Books CEO Andy Symonds interviewing retired police officer Chad Jensen about his harrowing ordeal as the target of a high-profile federal prosecution. The discussion centers around Jensen's newly released book, Badge Under Fire. Chad recounts his nearly decade-long legal nightmare, delving into the fateful incident at the LA County Fair that sparked his prosecution, the subsequent state and federal investigations, media frenzy, and the institutional forces that nearly destroyed his life. Throughout, both guest and host explore disturbing issues of legal process, law enforcement culture, and government accountability—while also highlighting Jensen's resilience and the power of truth-telling.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Incident at the LA County Fair (01:43–13:18)

• Setting: Pomona PD is contracted to provide security at the LA County Fair, which presents “the Wild West,” especially at night.
  • Quote (02:29, Chad): "The carnival area, unfortunately, nightly is taken over by thugs … but the security does the best they can and the police are there to back them up."
• Incident Detail:
  • In 2015, during a routine overtime shift, Jensen and his partner are summoned to help with crowd control after officers arrest two drunken men trying to steal beer after closing.
  • A 17-year-old (son of one of the arrestees) breaches the crowd barrier and approaches the officers. Jensen attempts to stop and pat down the teen.
  • Physical altercation occurs; Jensen strikes him twice with his elbow in the solar plexus while trying to keep distance, and the teen resists before being subdued and tasers are threatened (not used).
  • Quote (08:54, Chad): "So then I jump up a little bit ... try to be nonconfrontational ... All I'm trying to do is, hey, back off, man. ... So of course, I spend probably 15–20 seconds kind of slowing him down..."

2. Aftermath and Escalation: From Routine IA to Federal Indictment (13:18–42:43)

• Administrative Review: Routine use-of-force review clears Jensen at every level, including the chief and deputy chief.
  • Quote (15:26, Andy): "Deputy chief says, yep, no issues there."
• State Charges: The teen is charged with resisting arrest (“148 PC”), but case is dismissed. Defense attorney starts media campaign, labeling it “child abuse at the fair.”
  • Quote (19:20, Chad): “I thought what was going to happen here... ‘No harm, no foul.’”
• Federal Involvement: Defense attorney initiates contact with the FBI, seeking a federal civil rights prosecution (“consent decree”).
• Grand Jury Manipulation:
  • First grand jury returns "no indictment" after extensive evidence (several weeks, 40 witnesses; 41:56–42:25).
  • DOJ/FBI re-convene a second grand jury, reducing evidence to a two-hour summary by a single agent. This jury indicts Jensen within 40 minutes.
  • Quote (44:13, Andy): “…First grand jury, month — we don't need that...”

3. The Ordeal: Indictment, Arrest, Psychological Toll (36:42–54:46)

• Indictment and Arrest:
  • Jensen is blindsided by his indictment and initially plans to turn himself in to avoid an FBI raid on his home (36:42–39:31).
  • Process is made intentionally humiliating; he and two colleagues are separated and isolated during processing.
  • Quote (39:44, Chad): "[The FBI] made it as humiliating and public … It was a signal. We're the FBI, and we're going to smash you."
• Isolation and Career Impact:
  • Jensen is placed on administrative leave, stripped of his badge and gun, ostracized from colleagues, and left in legal limbo for months.
  • Quote (50:09, Chad): "...all of your friends that you've just been working with the last 20 years cannot call you. They can't contact you."

4. The Legal Battle: Two Federal Trials, Government Misconduct (54:53–67:31)

• First Trial:
  • DOJ brings in a “civil rights expert” from DC specifically to prosecute him.
  • Prosecution relies on inflammatory media footage, frames Jensen as attacking a "child."
  • Jury deadlocks 11:1 (for conviction), with serious concern about prosecutor tactics and hidden exculpatory evidence.
  • Quote (56:04, Chad, about partner offered a deal): "They said, 'You're looking at 40 years in federal prison or 18 months probation.' [He] goes, 'Well, I'm not going to do it because that's not what happened.'"
• Second Trial:
  • Before second trial, defense discovers buried exculpatory evidence (“FBI 302” interview forms) showing even the alleged victim's own relatives exonerated Jensen.
  • This critical evidence, and expert work by Jensen’s legal team, exposes government misconduct and leads to a full acquittal by jury.
  • Quote (63:13, Andy): “…with those additional documents by going on the offensive, obviously, 12 jury members found you innocent."
  • Emotional conclusion: Jensen and codefendants exonerated; Judge storms out without acknowledging their acquittal.

5. Aftermath: Vindication & Retaliation, Civil Litigation (72:41–90:05)

• Barrier to Return:
  • Despite exoneration, Jensen’s chief sidelines him for months, invents new IA investigations, and blocks his promotion.
  • Only after appealing to the city manager is disciplinary action reversed (76:13–80:09).
  • Quote (78:00, Chad): “… He just wants to step on my neck, right?"
• Continued Professional Targeting:
  • Given dead-end menial tasks, denied overtime, ultimately squeezed out of career.
  • Retires after a second officer-involved shooting, even when new incident clearly justified by body cam (82:35–85:53).
• Civil Lawsuit:
  • Joins lawsuit against department for retaliation and unfair promotion practices, confirmed by HR as “the most clear cut retaliation case I’ve ever seen” (88:08).
  • City drags case for years, spends millions on defense, settles just before trial.

6. Systemic Corruption, Systemic Impunity (90:38–92:17)

• No Accountability for Federal Actors:
  • Judges and agents face no discipline; DOJ/FBI prosecutors and judge involved even appeared to benefit professionally.
  • Quote (90:38, Chad quoting attorney Nicole): "You know the difference between God and a federal judge? Simple — God's not a federal judge."
  • Quote (91:23, Chad): "You hang a cop, that's a surefire ticket [to a judgeship]. ... It's all about ambition."
• Complaint Process Barriers:
  • No practical avenue to file complaint about DOJ/FBI actors; even the Attorney General's office is nonresponsive.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• On the American Grand Jury System (44:13, Andy): "First grand jury: month — we don't need that ...just in insanity..."
• On Prosecutorial Ambition (91:23, Chad): "You hang a dirty cop — that's how you become a federal judge ... It's all about ambition."
• On Emotional Toll of Indictment (36:42, Chad): "You walk in the back door and it just, like, hits me like a hot wind ... I'm sitting on the floor in my freaking living room ... I’m indicted."
• On Personal Integrity (56:05, Chad): "There is not a man of higher character on the face of the planet, in my eyes ... that's stones."
• On Systemic Injustice (90:38, Chad): “God's not a federal judge. … The only person that hires and fires federal judges is the President … DOJ prosecutor becomes a federal judge? You hang a cop. That's a surefire ticket.”
• On Emotional Victory (69:44, Chad): “We the jury ... find the defendant, Chad Jensen, not guilty. ... Just tears. Unbelievable.”

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Timeline & Timestamps for Critical Segments

| Segment | Timestamps | |-------------------------------------|----------------| | The Incident at the Fair | 01:43–13:18 | | Internal Affairs & Initial Fallout | 13:18–25:25 | | Federal Involvement Ramps Up | 22:44–42:43 | | Indictment & Arrest | 36:42–41:44 | | First Federal Trial (Hung Jury) | 54:53–58:18 | | Second Federal Trial (Acquittal) | 59:12–69:44 | | Post-Trial Retaliation & Lawsuit | 72:39–90:05 | | Systemic Corruption Discussion | 90:38–92:17 | | Writing & Publishing the Book | 92:50–104:12 |

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Writing the Book: Motivation & Process (92:50–104:12)

• Motivation: Inspired by Eddie Gallagher’s The Man in the Arena; desire to tell the full truth for first time.
• Process: Family support was decisive; hired ghostwriter Steve Johnson. Collaboration lauded as “match made in heaven.”
• Catharsis: Writing was healing and brought closure.
• Style: Crafted as “a book for non-readers”: compact, accessible, and emotionally raw.
• Collaboration with Publisher: Ballast’s author-forward process highlighted (COVID art story).

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Key Takeaways

• The machinery of prosecution can, and sometimes does, operate on ambition, narrative, and institutional incentives over facts and fairness.
• Media, federal agencies, and internal politics can conspire to criminalize otherwise routine, even exonerated, law enforcement actions.
• The legal, professional, and personal costs of being targeted (even wrongly) by the government are staggering and enduring.
• Systemic means of redress or accountability for prosecutorial and judicial misconduct are nearly nonexistent.
• The power of storytelling, as evidenced by Jensen’s book, continues to be one of the only means for the falsely accused to “set the record straight.”

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Final Word (Chad Jensen, 69:44):

“We the jury... find the defendant, Chad Jensen, not guilty. … Just tears. Unbelievable.”

Buy “Badge Under Fire” everywhere books are sold.

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Transcript

[Andy]

Way it's supposed to happen. He wasn't guilty. That's not what this was.

[Chad Jensen]

A 20 year cop. I didn't even take an attorney. I literally had nothing to hide. The FBI and the DOJ will find a sub suspect and then they'll build a case around instead of finding a crime. This will not end up well for you.

[Andy]

It wasn't even a threat, it was a comment.

[Chad Jensen]

Hey, they indicted you. Who? What? I walk in the back door and it just like hits me like a. Sitting on the floor in my freaking living room. No crime occurred. Have a nice day. Oh, well, that's cute. We'll just impanel another grand jury. They don't answer to anybody. You're looking at 40 years in federal prison or 18 months probation. I'm not signing that. That's not what happened. I'm not going to do it because that's not what happened. There is not a man of higher character on the face of the planet. In my eyes, you're at the edge. You're done. There's nothing more you can do. I've exhausted everything I can do. And it's the Lord's will. They've broken you for all intents and purposes. Defendant Chad Jensen, not guilty.

[Andy]

Welcome Corporal Chad Jensen, author of Badge Under Fire. Happy to have you here in studio for the Ballast Book launch podcast.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes, sir, that. Pleasure to be here.

[Andy]

Yeah. So you have a crazy story. I know you, you probably wish you weren't here. At least that's the sentiment of a lot of. Fortunately or unfortunately, we end up working with a lot of people who have been in just crazy, awful situations like you have. Maybe start there. If you can just give our, our, our, our viewers and listeners a recap of as in 30, if you can, in 30 seconds left of the crazy hell that really, that the government put you through about between, I guess, what, nine years or so ago it started.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah, it's. It's been a minute. So we started. The original incident was 2015, and then I was exonerated in January of 2019. Yeah. So years of. Years of your life runtime and that. Yeah, I mean it all started in 2015. Working an overtime shift, you know.

[Andy]

You're a police officer in Pomona, California.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah, I'm a 20 year cop out of Pomona PD down in Southern California, which is the easternmost city in Los Angeles County. Okay. The Los Angeles County Fair, which is like one of the biggest ones in the country, is run there every year. Right. And they hire the Pomona police to come in and secure the place, basically.

[Andy]

Because it is not the. It is not the fair of. Of American literature in the Midwest with Ferris wheels and cotton candy.

[Chad Jensen]

Bingo. Perfectly well sedated. Well stated. Yeah. It's not Americana, you know what I mean? Some of it is obviously the petting zoo and stuff like that, but the carnival area, unfortunately, nightly is taken over by thugs. Yeah. Like all the local idiots that come in from the Pomona area, eastern LA and stuff like that, they come out there and they just wreak havoc in the place. Yeah. You know what I mean? But the security does the best, best they can and the police are there to back them up, basically.

[Andy]

And you've been. Sorry, you. You've been. You've been patrolling at the fair for years, right?

[Chad Jensen]

Yes, sir. Yeah. At that point, I was a cop in 97, so. Yeah. I mean, it's almost 20 years. Yeah. I mean, and we worked out every year. I mean, it's an overtime gig and, you know, you make a little extra money, which is nice. You get a check at Christmas time, covers your. And stuff like that. But you knew what to expect. Absolutely. And you know that working the carnival, you know, this. This is. It's going to be rock and roll. Right. It's going to be the Wild West. Yeah. Especially on a weekend. And that's what was crazy about this. And again, in Badge Under Fire, I go through this, that it's a Wednesday night. It's a. Like a concert night. Because they have concerts at the. At the fair. Yeah, it's a Wednesday night. I picked up this overtime shift because somebody else called in sick and I was like, Prince Hutchinson was my going to be that partner that night. And again, it's not partners in the sense, like Cagney and Lacy or Star Skin Hutch. It's not like that. You just get. I get paired up with Andy working the fair that night. You know what I mean? So I dig it because I'm a social cat. Right. Like, if I don't know you and we got hooked up to work the fair together, I'm going to talk your ear off because I want to hear your story. Yeah. You know what I mean? And that's what I dug about that. So it was an opportunity. I'm like, prince. I've met Prince, and so cool. So we start working. We start talking the whole night. We're talking having a grand old time. And then sure enough, closing time comes around. A call goes out. Two of our officers are making an arrest of somebody drunk in public, of two people drunk in public. Okay. So they call for help just with the crowd. They're. They're okay taking them into custody, but they need help with crowd control.

[Andy]

And they weren't just drunk in public, though, right?

[Chad Jensen]

They.

[Andy]

It went a little farther than that.

[Chad Jensen]

Oh, ab. Absolutely. I mean, again, it's. I've said this before. I'll say it one more time, but there's so many layers to this story that we would be here six hours if I went into everything, right? So they make this arrest of these two knuckleheads, and they're not knuckleheads. They're grown men, okay? They're grown men. They asked for help. So myself, I just want to make

[Andy]

it clear what these guys done. They weren't just drunk in public. They tried to jump over a beer tent or something, right? And.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes.

[Andy]

Or basically steal beer after it was already closed.

[Chad Jensen]

Right.

[Andy]

When the police came up.

[Chad Jensen]

So, yeah, basically, they're. They're emptying out the fair, right? Everybody's funneled down to one, One kind of this major thoroughfare through the Fairplex, which is called Broadway. Right? They funnel all the people out that way. And you just control. We just stand there and make sure everybody leaves, right? And so they're, like, walking past one of the beer stands, and the guy's like, hey, give me two beers. She's like, sorry, sir, it's closed. You know, it's 10 o'. Clock. You have to go home now. Fudge that. I'm getting a fudgeing beer.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

So being the knucklehead that he is, he hops over the fence and he goes to try and pull a tap down to pour a beer. Obviously, she's closed him off. She's, you know, she's upset about it. She calls over security. Security goes over there, and immediately these two guys want to have some type of physical confrontation with security. That's not what security is there for, right? So security then waves over the two cops that are standing over there and like, hey, can you come talk to this guy? These two cops w up and these two guys, Doran and Dawsey, these are cool cats, man. There. We don't want any problems. It's 10 o' clock at night. Yeah, Andy, I want to go home.

[Andy]

Right?

[Chad Jensen]

I don't want to be sitting here for two hours writing a report about some crap that just happened. So, like, hey, man, just go home. Just go home. Yeah, okay. You, man, you know what? I. I've been. I was at the hospital when diamond went there, man. You're gonna end up like him, you know what I mean? And he knew exactly what he was saying, right, this cat, Right? Yeah. And so.

[Andy]

And diamond was.

[Chad Jensen]

Sean diamond was a team member of ours on our SWAT team that got killed in the line of duty.

[Andy]

You know, I got guys threatening, telling them they're going to end up like they're dead.

[Chad Jensen]

Fellow police officer. And again, as. As a police officer, every time somebody pushes your red buttons, you. You can't react. Right. If you do that, if you do that as a cop, you're going to have a very long career or short career. Or short. Exactly. Because you can't let people get your goat. You know what I mean? People will, quote, unquote, talk until the cows come home. Yeah. And. And you can't really react to that. You know what I mean? Yeah. Does it make you mad? Does it piss you off? Absolutely. Was Sean a good friend of mine? Absolutely. You know what I mean? So they end up making this arrest. They take him into custody because they just won't leave. They're just complete. Being complete turds. So they make the arrest. Crowd forms around them as they're getting ready to leave. And obviously, you know, they're. They're chipping away at the cops. The crowd starts chipping away at the cops. So that's why they need backup, right. Help. So my. My partner Prince and I, we get. We walk straight there. We start getting ready to push all the crowd back, you know, because these two are walking the arrestees, we'll call it, northbound down Broadway. And they need somebody to watch their backs.

[Andy]

Sure.

[Chad Jensen]

Right. Because how. What happens all the time? You're walking in a restie and somebody's throwing something at you, whether it's a. A chair, a trash can, a bottle or a hamburger, who knows, right? Happens all the time. So my job and Prince's job as rear security is to make sure nobody gets between me and the backs of my officers, right? So I get there. Prince gets there immediately. Everybody stops. Slow down. Back off like this. Everybody backs off. There's probably between 40 and 50 people, right, that have created a semicircle around this arrest party, okay? So push back like this. Everybody stops. Except one guy. That guy on the COVID of the book, right?

[Andy]

So this is purposefully blurry, by the way, the COVID this is intentionally blurry, this photo, right? Because this is as good as it gets, right?

[Chad Jensen]

And. And it's in that. That photo and the alter to that, the ulterior to that photo, the 180° of that photo. Right. Is pivotal in our Federal case later on down the road, right? So this knucklehead, Carlos Alvarez, that's the name, right? We'll call him that for today, okay? He breezes right by me, right? And I'm like, I go to turn around to kind of just grab a hold of him and again, and he's

[Andy]

going towards your two fellow officers making the arrest.

[Chad Jensen]

And I have no idea who this guy is. Yeah. What? He's just some guy, 5, 885 pounds, 20 years old, probably walking faster than the rest of the crowd because everybody slows down, right? This guy keeps going. I reach around to grab him. I can't grab him. He's just out of my grasp. So then I jump up a little bit and he's now fast walking. So I go to put my arm on and grab and said, hey, can you guys step over here for a second? Again, not being some freaking jerk head. Hey, you know, none of that. I'm like, hey, can you guys step over here for a second? Try to be non confrontational. Trying to be as cool as a cucumber because I don't want any problems. I'm not looking for a fight with this guy. All I'm trying to do is, hey, back off, man. Okay? You can't be that close. You know, you want, you want to videotape, I don't care. You just do it from a safe distance. That's all you got to do. So of course, I spend probably 15, 20 seconds kind of slowing him down. Everybody else is kind of slowed down. Then we go into an alcove, and I'm just going to check him for weapons. Just going to do a quick cursory search of his waistband for guns, knives, bombs, bazookas, whatever he's got. So as. Just as I go like this to go to his waistband, boom, he starts to turn like this. And so as soon as somebody turns on you when you're putting hands on him, well, the fight's on. Yep. So then we spin around like this. And as we spin around, a fist comes up right by my face. So at that point, well, now the emotions changed a little bit more, you know what I mean? So I then have a hold of him. So I take a cross check with my elbow, right his upper solar plexus. I didn't want. I didn't want to punch him, so I didn't punch him right elbow to the solar plex just to get him away from me and knock him away from me. It's all I want to do. But as I do that first one, guess what? He grabs a hold of me. So now he's pulling me. When I'm pushing him back with my elbow, he's pulling me into him. And that's with the picture you see here, you know what I mean? So he's pulling me like this. And so as I come down, I take a second elbow to the solar plexus to get him away from me. That's when you see Prince Command. My partner wraps him up, rolls in like this, and then a third officer comes in with baton from left field, you know what I mean? And cracks him in the bottom of the shoe. So you hear a loud crack and you go, ooh, like this. But it's the bottom of his shoe, so there's no injury. Right? Right. So they go down to the ground. He's. He scrambles around on the ground, just passively resisting, you know what I mean? Being a turd. But you expect that. So finally, sergeant comes over, arcs a taser. Doesn't taser him, but just arcs it. So he hears it, he gives up. You know, we get handcuffs on him standing up. And what do you think? The first thing he says?

[Andy]

Didn't do nothing.

[Chad Jensen]

No. Y' all hit like. Yeah. So. Right, right. So that's the caliber of individual that you're dealing with on a nightly basis at the LA County Fair. Right. All right. That in a nutshell. We deal with that dozens of times a day.

[Andy]

And just.

[Chad Jensen]

And.

[Andy]

And he ended up being the son of one of the arrestees. So that's where he was. He was making a beeline for his father, who is in. Who is in handcuffs.

[Chad Jensen]

Exactly.

[Andy]

Just to give you an idea of what his intent probably was. Right.

[Chad Jensen]

None of you knew that, but that

[Andy]

was probably his intent. Intent. You know.

[Chad Jensen]

Right. You have no idea what his intentions are. You have no idea what he's capable of doing. Yeah. You know what I mean? So my responsibility is to make sure that you don't get between him and me. Y. You know what I mean? So anyway, fast forward. He goes down to the little substation we have at the fair. They find out that he's a minor. Right. But unfortunately, how old? He's 17. Okay. He's 17 again. 5, 885 pounds. He plays football in high school. You know, he's. He's not a child, which the federal government keeps referring to him, the child at the fair, you know, but. So they ended up taking to the hospital because there was a use of force. It's kind of a long convoluted Police related issue.

[Andy]

Just a rule, right. If a gun comes out, you have to go to the hospital whether there's an injury or not.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes. So they take him to the hospital, take all these photos of him and he has boo boos on his elbows and on his knees from beyond the asphalt. So they end up site releasing him to mom. And then I go, I write my, you know, two and a half or two and a half paragraph supplemental to Prince's original report. Right. For the arrest of delay and obstruct an officer. So we charge him with 148pc which is delay and obstruct. So that's it. Low level, Right. End of the night, nothing.

[Andy]

End of the night, go home.

[Chad Jensen]

This is a zero, this is a negative one on your radar.

[Andy]

Often is is how often does something like that where we even have to go hands? Is it daily?

[Chad Jensen]

Daily. Nobody. I would never put it this way. I've never, I don't think in my entire 25 year career come up against somebody at the LA County Fair who's drunk. Right. Overserved, it's hot. It's 108 degree that day. It's probably 96 degree at 10 o' clock at night. Yeah, right. They're, they're irritable. You don't ever go up to somebody and they go. And you're right, I've had too many beers. All right. You know what I mean? That never happens.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

Nobody wants to go to jail. Most of the time you do your best to try and talk them into handcuffs. You do. Most of the time it's like, hey man, listen, relax. It's six hours, there's no citation, there's no charges. You go into the drunk tank, you sleep it off and we send you on your way. Yeah. Okay. So most of the time you can talk people down because their immediate reaction is especially in, you know, this time, 2015, 2016, 2017, this is the height of the, you know, the police, right. And we're anti police defund the police. This is nobody's friends with the cops, especially in that area, right. So that's, we get through all that and they, we go probably the next two days later we get some, an, an email from this sergeant that was there that night that just wants to make sure because anytime there's a use of force, our department will two things. There's an internal affairs investigation which everybody's heard that you've seen that on tv. Right. And then we have what's called an admin insight, okay. Which the sergeant on scene, conducts his own little brief investigation as to the use of force. And was, in his opinion, was a use of force acceptable, and was it necessary? Okay, and what can we learn from it if. If not, or if it was. So he does his thing, comes back, everything looks great on the admin. Use of force. Right. Signs off, goes all the way up to the chief. Everybody's happy with it. Great, great, great, great, great.

[Andy]

Well, and then not just the chief, because I think it's important for later in the story. The deputy chief.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes, sir.

[Andy]

Deputy deputy chief as well, I think. A little foreshadowing, but.

[Chad Jensen]

Right.

[Andy]

Deputy chief says, yep, no issues there.

[Chad Jensen]

Right. So everything kind of goes silent probably six months later. This is September. In late april, I get a call from the juvenile d. A. Hey, can you come down here to the office? We're coming up on this 148trial for your juvenile suspect when the fair time

[Andy]

for his trial for his resisting or correct.

[Chad Jensen]

Yep. So I'm like, do you even remember it? I have no idea what you're talking about, man. You know what I mean?

[Andy]

So you're just another day, another.

[Chad Jensen]

Just another guy. And again, this is a zero, you know what I mean? It's a zero on the radar because there's no injuries. There's no injuries to cops. There's no injuries to him. You know what I mean? There's no victim, per se. So I'm like, this is a zero. So she pulls me in here, she goes, all right, do you remember this guy, you know, xyz? I'm like, no, ma'. Am. All right, well, I have some. I have some discovery here, so let's. Let's go over this. So she plays this video, and I'm like, holy cow. That. That's me. That's me. But that doesn't look. What the hell. So this video, There was a cell phone video that captured some of the interaction that night. Obviously, it doesn't capture the lead up. It only captured things to a physical. Right. That original video I had seen probably a month after the incident, and it was a dark, grainy cell phone video from, like a 2000 era flip phone. Right. With a fisheye lens. Yeah. It was very dark because we were in an alcove that had no inside lighting. It was all ambient lighting from, like, ferris wheels and stuff like that. Right. So it was dark in there. You couldn't really see that. Well. But now I'm looking at this video that's totally been enhanced. Like, you know what I mean?

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

FBI lab enhancement or something like that. So it looks like High Noon. And that's why I'm like, I don't even recognize that because that's not what I've seen before. So then we're looking through it, and I'm like, reading my report, and my reporter says that, you know, his right hand came up to my face, and I'm like, that was the fist that I thought that came to my face. But it turns out it was his left hand, not his right hand, which. And she's like, that's okay. It's fog of war stuff.

[Andy]

You've never been in a fight. You can't exactly remember all that.

[Chad Jensen]

And. And that's what's so hard for people to not understand. People that have never been in a serious physical confrontation or anything like that. You don't have this HD video camera playing in your mind that you can start, stop, start, stop, and recall this

[Andy]

or worse, you do have it, and it's not even correct. Somebody else sees exactly differently.

[Chad Jensen]

Right. And if it's just like this, if you and I watch the same video, you're going to see something a little bit different than what I see. Right. And people don't understand that. Yeah. And that's what defense attorneys use to exploit you on the stand. Okay. So I see this video. We get through it. She's like, okay, well, no problem. I mean, you likely can see, you know, you go back like this. So it looks like I'm going, oh, shit, I'm going to get popped. Yeah. You know what I mean? And then. Okay, the two forearm blows, but okay, all right, well, then we'll move forward with the trial. And. And I just want to say one thing. At this point, I have been a cop for 20 years. I've probably arrested for 148. I probably arrested a hundred different guys for delaying obstruct, Officer. Not once has that ever been filed by the D. A. It's usually a lower charge, like, say, you know, you're running from the police or something like that. We get into a fight at the end of this call or at the end of this thing. Yeah. You know, I put on there where you're fleeing. Right, right. And then we have that delay and obstruct at the end. Usually they just go with the fleeing, and then we just kick the delay and obstruct at the end. Okay. Or usually it's like, hey, the DA's, you know, I don't got time to do all these 148s. It's going to Be time served. He was there for six hours. Let's just go, you know, you go your way, we go our way. No harm, no foul. And that's what I thought was going to happen here.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

And then she ends up filing the case. So I go to court in May and the day before, the night before, the judge trial for the 148channel4news runs a piece on it, right. Runs a hit piece, right. You know, child abuse at the fair, you know what I mean? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Trying to get as much clickbait and media reaction as they could. And of course, the still photo they have is of him like this, the millisecond before my elbow makes contact here, right. And if. And in that blurry picture, it looks like I'm going to, you know, go punch him in the face. So obviously they color it any way they want to make it look as poor and bad, so the rest of it, absolutely swinging it. Yeah, they wouldn't want to do that, right? That's contrary to, you know.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

Media, Right. So anyway, I end up going to the court, I testify, and then he's held the answer on that. A week later, we. We appear for the, the judge trial where it's actually. Now we're bringing in evidence, witnesses and stuff like that. The defense attorney or. Yeah, the defense attorney that the family hired. We'll call him Gaines. Right. He. He is a guy from LA county in that area who worked for the Gargos and Gargos law firm, if you've ever heard of them. They're. They're pretty much notorious and they're just

[Andy]

funny and they're just. And he's just gunning for cops 100%.

[Chad Jensen]

And that's what they do. And they're good at it. They make no mistake. They're. They're professionals. You know what I mean? So he comes in, get on the stand. His job is to blur between reality and my perception that night, what I saw that night, and the reality of what happened. All he has to do is create something to where they don't match up, like you see here. Well, okay, you said it was his right hand in the report, but actually everybody can see. See, it's his left hand. Yeah, right. And.

[Andy]

And all he's trying to do, ostensibly at this point, though, is get his

[Chad Jensen]

client off 100%, which.

[Andy]

Okay, all right. That's what a defense attorney's job is.

[Chad Jensen]

Okay. Yes, sir. And. And that's. That's cops and robbers, right? You know, that's what they do. Yes. And that's the 100%. So no problem. And I got. I got no reason to lie, you know, I don't care. This case doesn't mean that it's not. Not anything to me. But, you know, so then he's like. Well, sitting here, would you say then that he didn't try to punch you that night? There was more like a flip, a flailing arm that came up to your face. I said, that's. That's reasonable. I mean, given that's not what I saw that night, but it's reasonable. So judge goes, okay, case dismissed. Everybody go their way? Yeah. Like, okay, great. So I go my way, he goes his way. Probably four months later. And during this time, the Internal affairs investigation has taken place. All right? And that's where Michael Nederbomber, who is the IA Sergeant, okay, who is the one that's made my interview doing the internal affairs investigation. I had already done all that. 99% of his investigation is clean. It's clear. It's 100%. It's gone, you know, all the way up through the chain. Just hasn't been signed off by the chief yet. Everything has been up. You know, it's. Meet standards. You know, use of force is good to go. No problem. XYZ. So that investigation is 99% done. Unbeknownst to me, the FBI had made contact with him and said, hey, we're doing investigation, and we need all the files on Chad.

[Andy]

How'd they get wind of it, do you think?

[Chad Jensen]

Oh, easily the defense attorney that the family hired. All he's trying to do is make a name for himself, right, and get some public recognition. And how you do that, you get what's called a consent decree against the department. Consent decree to say basically says that, you know, Andy, you're a police department. You're. You're running a crooked organization. Therefore, the I is going to come in here and we're going to run your organization for you for a year, okay?

[Andy]

And so that's how an FBI agent, that's how they get. They work their way up. Promotions. You got that?

[Chad Jensen]

This is all you have.

[Andy]

This, you know, this politically motivated defense attorney, or maybe he's ideologically motivated as well, just hates the police. And so now he. He's a professional at this. He has a direct line to the FBI. The FBI, they're motivated. They're politically motivated. Hey, I can get, you know, I can make my bones. I can get a promotion within the FBI if I go after this police department and I get a consent decree show this is a dirty police department. It doesn't matter if they are or not, but it'll help my career if I can say they are.

[Chad Jensen]

And it's all ambition. Yeah. It's all on every side. It's ambition.

[Andy]

We see this. Yeah, we see.

[Chad Jensen]

You see that covers your walls.

[Andy]

Exactly. You have Eddie Gallagher's book.

[Chad Jensen]

Right.

[Andy]

Right behind you. Yeah. It happens so often. It's astounding how.

[Chad Jensen]

How. And. And what's frustrating is there's no recourse. You know what I mean? That's like in my next book that I'm going with balance books, right? The next thing. Good. Plug book number two when it comes out, because that's the frustrating thing. There's no recourse. Right. You know what I mean? And anyway, back. Back to this real quick. So we. We finish up that trial. IA Gets notified by the FBI. Hey, we're poking around here. We're looking around. We want to see what's going on with this.

[Andy]

This is what, a year after the incident or so?

[Chad Jensen]

Within four, five, six months.

[Andy]

Okay.

[Chad Jensen]

Oh, I'm sorry. Of the incident? Yes. Of the incident, yes. This is about four or five months after the court is what I'm talking about coming up.

[Andy]

About a year.

[Chad Jensen]

Coming about a year.

[Andy]

Okay.

[Chad Jensen]

So the FBI says, hey, we're poking around about this IA sergeant. We need the files on Chad Jensen and Prince Hutchinson that worked that night. Ria. Sergeant Mike Niederbomber is. He's a very educated guy, right? Has his juris doctorate, He's a law degree and stuff like that. So he understands that, you know, just because the FBI comes in, you don't just turn over and hand them everything. They still have to play by the rules. That means that they have to get a warrant, okay? Or at least they have to get a judge to sign an order that says that you now have the. As the FBI, you have the right to look at my private personnel files. Okay, well, the FBI didn't want to hear that. And the FBI goes, well, we're going to need them. And he goes, well, if you give me a letterhead or anything from the. From the judge, I'll be more. I'll collate it for you. Yeah.

[Andy]

So Internal affairs is not what we see on TV always where it's this. You know, they're the enemy to the working to the beat cop. They're. They're actually there to make sure that the truth is. Is shining.

[Chad Jensen]

Well, it's just like anything else, right? You have Internal affairs sergeants that are for cops, okay? You. Because I've been a victim of those guys as well. Yeah. Nita Bomber is a special individual and he's featured. He has. His statement is.

[Andy]

And he paid the price for doing the right thing, just like everybody in the store.

[Chad Jensen]

That, that is the true craziness of this whole thing. Prince and I were involved that night. We were hands on. I understand that. But I, years later, have come to find out the full story as to why he got indicted. Well, it's very simple. They didn't want him to be able to be called as a witness in my case. Because think about it, right? You are now the expert as having interviewed all these different people. What better person to call in my defense than the person who's literally interviewed all these people? Yeah, well, if they indict him, I can't use him as a witness.

[Andy]

And it, it paints this picture of a corrupt policeman. If you're saying, hey, internal affairs is in cahoots with this. So the internal affairs who's supposed to be policing the police, they're actually in cahoots with this guy who beat up the little boy with the teddy bear and the red balloon at the, at the fair.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes.

[Andy]

And so, yeah, you know, in learning your story and reading Badge Under Fire.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah.

[Andy]

You look at it and go, okay, well why is, you know, why was this guy invite indicted? But so he pissed them off, it sounds like, because he didn't just roll over and show his belly when the FBI came wanting your, your records.

[Chad Jensen]

The last thing that that agent said on the way out the door, when he basically said, hey, sorry, you know, I'm not playing that game, she said, this will not end up well for you. That's insane. Yeah. An FBI agent says that to an internal affairs investigator. That's simply saying, I'm protecting rights and following the law, the rules and the law protecting. Because we have rights too. Yeah.

[Andy]

It wasn't even a threat, it was a promise.

[Chad Jensen]

And she, she held it. She held it 100. So. So this investigation goes down. There's. And, and again I go into the, you know, imagine the fire going to it in depth. The FBI goes down these crazy rabbit holes. I mean, there was a making up, lies, making up complete and total lies. Because it's all about a narrative. It's about I find a suspect. Okay. So we got this white cop at the LA county fair. Okay. Yeah. He beats up a Hispanic kid. Oh yeah, we can sell this. Yeah. You know what I mean? And so they go to work with the narrative. That's where you find that the sentence that goes, that the FBI and the DOJ will find us, find a sub suspect, and then they'll build a case around them. Yeah. Instead of finding a crime. Well, was there a crime here? Okay, there's a crime. Okay. Who are involved parties? Let's do an investigation. Let's see where the evidence goes. That's not the case here, you know, so. And then, you know, so a year and a half goes along. I'm still at work, mind you. The FBI is snooping around, getting. Gathering all this stuff, doing all these investigations. Prince and I are still. And Mike are all on the clock. We're all working every day.

[Andy]

So, you know, what was your fear level at this point?

[Chad Jensen]

Did it. Zero.

[Andy]

Zero.

[Chad Jensen]

I had zero.

[Andy]

So it wasn't even increasing.

[Chad Jensen]

Zero. When I went. This is how crazy this is. When I got notified to go talk to internal Affairs, I didn't even take an attorney. Right. Okay. Because I. I literally had nothing to hide. I mean, I wasn't worried about. Damn, maybe you shouldn't have done that. You know what I mean? Like. Oh, God, you know what I mean? Like. Like my wife, you can ask her. I. If I go home at the end of the day, I'm like, dang, that was a rough stop I had today, you know? I mean, maybe I should have said that. You know what I mean? Right. Because that. That's how you feel. I'm a human being. Your cops are human beings too.

[Andy]

You know, to be 100 of the. We're not.

[Chad Jensen]

We're not machines. We're not robots. Yeah. So I had zero. So I go talk to native armor invert Internal affairs again. Comes back, everything's up above board. Everything's no problem. FBI sneaking around, something about possibly a consent decree. And I'm thinking, well, man, it can't be about me. Yeah, that's crazy. No. Okay, well, finds out then that the, you know, the mother of the suspect here had filed a complaint, you know, oh, excessive force and blah, blah, blah. So the investigation comes along, goes along. I get a phone call. This was a very interesting point. This is kind of a turning point in my life, if you will. Okay. I get a phone call from the internal affairs sergeant. Says, hey, I'm sorry, the internal affairs investigator who says, you know what? The FBI wants to talk to you. Well, talk to me. What are they talking to me for? You know. Okay, well, all right. Well, sure, yeah, I'll go down and talk to him. Sure. No problem. So I then go, you know what? Maybe I better call ldf. Legal defense fund. Get a hold of my attorney. I call. I call Michael Schwartz, my attorney, and I said, hey, Michael, it's got a call. FBI wants to talk. You know, come down. So when, you know, when do you want me to set up an appointment? He's all hard. Stop.

[Andy]

Were you close to not calling him?

[Chad Jensen]

No.

[Andy]

You know, at this point. Okay.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah. At that point, the spidey senses kick up, and you're like, yeah, maybe I might not want to do this again. I'm still, you know, bubble gum and. And cheesecake. Every life's great. I don't really have that big a deal because I didn't do anything wrong. Right. I have nothing to hide. Okay, so Mike's like, hard. Stop. Do not talk to another person. Do not answer the phone. I'm on my way from Malibu, and I'll be there in two hours. Do not move.

[Andy]

Okay. So. So your attorney comes once. Once you get word that the FBI and the feds want to talk to you, you decide it's prudent to reach out to your attorney. That's.

[Chad Jensen]

It's.

[Andy]

It's afforded you by your. By your union. What did your. What did Mike, your attorney, say?

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah, he was very, very clear. And what I loved about Schwartz is he's very direct. You know, he's always a under promise, over deliver guy. Yeah. So he always gives me the bad news up front. He wants. Gives me worst case scenario. So his. His statements to me were very clear. We don't talk to the FBI. We don't talk to the feds. Okay. For one simple reason. Because they control the narrative of any interview that they do with you. Right. They don't video, audio, tape it. You're not allowed to have any representation with you during any interview with them. And I don't know if you know, the way that the FBI conducts their interviews. Like, say I wanted to go down and talk to the FBI. Right. I sit down with the FBI. There's three agents in on every interview that they have with anybody. Yep. One agent ask the questions, one agent writes down the notes, and the third agent writes the report from the notes and the questions that the other agents

[Andy]

fast with no video, no audio.

[Chad Jensen]

And do you know why they do that?

[Andy]

Yeah. Because they don't want the truth to come. They wanted to paint their own narrative.

[Chad Jensen]

100. Yeah. Plausible deniability. Yeah. Well, I have three agents that sat in this room here, Mr. Jensen, and all heard you say this. And they're not liars. You're a liar. Right.

[Andy]

And they won't even allow your attorney in the room with you.

[Chad Jensen]

Oh, and that is insane. It's. It's just I could not. When I heard that, I could not believe that this is 21st century America. Yeah. You know, I mean, as a patrol cop, I get a call to Walmart for a shoplifter. You know, somebody shoplifted xyz. I got to go in there, I got to conduct an interview with you as the suspect. Right. I have to advise you, your Miranda rights afford you an attorney if you can't afford one.

[Andy]

Right.

[Chad Jensen]

And then I have to audio and videotape that interview. Yeah, but the feds don't have to do that for what's considered, you know, felony crimes. Yeah, that's insane, because it's very simple. They answer to nobody. Yeah. And so you took his advice? Absolutely, 100%. He contacts the FBI, says the FBI, tells them, respectfully, you know, we decline an interview with you guys, and we declined to appear in front of the grand jury. Yeah. Because another thing. Okay, well, let's. Let's keep it chronological.

[Andy]

Okay, so now do we know at this point that a grand journey has been convened?

[Chad Jensen]

No, still do not know that.

[Andy]

Okay.

[Chad Jensen]

So now they're just. They're just gathering evidence. Now. They've talked to probably 25 or 30 different cops already. So we had gotten some. You know, some people come back like, hey, man, I went down talk to the grand jury. They were talking about this night at the fair. You know what I mean? Blah, blah, blah. And I'm still kind of like, man, that can't be me. You know what I mean? It's crazy. So, sure enough, once they want to talk to me as their last person, I get then declared a subject. I'm no longer contacted as a witness. I'm now contacted as a subject of the investigation. So once that happens, everything turns off. Right. At that point, you're like, okay, now the fun time's over. Now you're being investigated. Okay. But what's crazy, Andy, is I'm still at work. I'm still working. Okay, so I'm in the back of your head going, man, it can't be that bad if I'm still working. You know what I mean?

[Andy]

So what's your fear level at this point?

[Chad Jensen]

Okay, we'll call it a one. You got concerned. I don't want somebody digging through my trash. Yeah. You know, but so we go on the interviews, they do all these different interviews, and then probably six months later, there's still nothing after that initial contact from the FBI, nothing Is. It's quiet for six months.

[Andy]

So now we're a year and a half or so. Okay. A year and a half after the incident.

[Chad Jensen]

This 2015, it occurs. We're now into 2017. Okay. Halfway through 2017, everything's quiet. So we're thinking, well, they're just gonna make it. You know, they're gonna do their due diligence, and then they're gonna just. Everything will just kind of fade off, and we'll. We'll get notification one day. That's nothing. Yeah. Okay, cool. So again, I'm at A1 level, a fear of one, right? October 25, 2017. I'm driving home from work, and at this point, I'm assigned to the training division at the Pomona Police Department, and I'm doing backgrounds for potential new hires. I'm no longer on patrol, but I got a special detail, right? So I work Monday through Friday, bankers hours. So I'm driving home, I get a phone call from Michael Schwartz. Huh? Okay. Hey, what's up, Mike? Hey, you know, just. What's up?

[Andy]

Like, did your heart skip a beat when you see.

[Chad Jensen]

Again, it had been six months. Really?

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

And, you know, I. I'm like, hey, what's going on, Michael? Hey, what are you doing? And I said, just driving home. He goes, okay, well, call me when you get home. No, no, no, no, no. What's going on? Hey, they indicted you. Who? What? What? They indicted you. And I'm thinking to myself, wait a second. Indicted me? This is crazy. Okay? I'll call you when I get home. So then I had probably a mile and a half till I got home, right? I get home, turn the car off, get in, and I walk in the back door, and it just, like, hits me like a hot wind, you know what I mean? Just. You. You immediately start crying, you know, I'm like, I'm getting indicted. You know what I mean? So I. I'm sitting on the floor in my freaking living room, you know, My wife comes in, she goes, what's the matter with you? And I like, I'm indicted. You know what I mean? And again, nobody really understands the gravity of what that means, you know? So I get together, gather together. I call Michael Schwarz. I go, well, what's going on? He goes, hey, I just want you to be prepared that tomorrow is going to be the worst day of your life because you have to go down to the Roy Ball building in la. Well, sorry to turn yourself in.

[Andy]

I just want to back you up, because that was actually better than the alternative. You going to turn yourself in was better than the alternative because they were planning something else.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes, unbeknownst to me. And again, this is stuff I found out further down the road when he and I were just debriefing stuff he's. We found out that the FBI had the warrant basically because I got the gate and to gained an indictment. And that's a whole different ball of wax we'll talk about in a minute. Yeah, but once they gathered that indictment from the grand jury, they were assembling a team to come and arrest me. That means that they're going to come

[Andy]

up there with your house full of.

[Chad Jensen]

They're going to come up, they're going to, you know, surround the house with lights and sirens and guys in cool little FBI raid jackets and megaphones and Chad come out of the house, you know what I mean? And the walk of shame, it's just like when I read that in Eddie's book, it gave me chills.

[Andy]

Yeah, they did the exact same thing. He wasn't even there.

[Chad Jensen]

Right.

[Andy]

And they pulled his kids out and they knew.

[Chad Jensen]

That's what's crazy is they knew he wasn't there.

[Andy]

Well, they knew he wasn't there because they had him already in custody when they hit his house.

[Chad Jensen]

And it's. Nobody ever. Nobody ever pays for that. You know what I mean? And. And it's like that's exactly what they wanted to do with me. My wife and my kids want us to do the walk of shame coming out of the house. Like we're, you know, cartel members or something. Right. So we end up. He's like, I. Michael ended up getting a call from one of the senior agents at the FBI office in West Covina and said, hey, did you know that your client has a warrant, that they indicted him? He was absolutely not. Oh, okay. So then Michael calls back the agent in charge and says, hey, do you have an indictment on my client? And she goes, yes. He goes, please don't go and arrest him. Allow me to have him turn himself in tomorrow. Okay. So I did, you know, with. He called and he said, I'm able to get you to turn yourself in tomorrow morning, 9 o', clock, Roy Ball building in downtown Los Angeles, which is the federal lockup. Right. So, but he.

[Andy]

Even with that, he warned you, you have to go do that tomorrow morning. Be there at 9 o', clock, and it's going to be the worst day of your life.

[Chad Jensen]

100%. All the guns, ammo, everything out of your house. Can't have anything like that in your house. Call friends, go store it all at their house. Yeah. So I go down to the federal building. The next morning, I take my wife and my oldest son with me. And this is again, I go into such depth. I know we're kind of glazing over this stuff right now, but yeah, it's, it's all on badge under fire, 100%. And it's, there's so much emotion behind all this stuff because then you're talking to, you know, this is a 20 year cop. I'm now going down to turn myself in. So we're standing there, Michael comes up, he says, hey, I'm going to take you over to the agents right now. We're in this big, huge concourse in the middle of the federal building. And like Michael's like, hey, you're going to be, be prepared because this is going to suck.

[Andy]

And they, the whole thing.

[Chad Jensen]

So, you know, turn. They walk me up, hands back, you walk your back. Take me outside the women's restroom, freaking do the whole nut sack search, rubber gloves, everything.

[Andy]

And they made it as humiliating and public.

[Chad Jensen]

Absolutely, 100%. This was a signal. This is a just like, hey, we're sending you a signal. We're the FBI and we're going to smash you.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

And this is what they do. This is their. Else is all in their mouth. Yeah. Their modus operandi is to outspend you, you know, and basically smash you. Yep. So at this point, I go in the Marshalls, you know, you get, you get the whole thing. Fingerprinted, photographed, all this stuff. Mug shot. I get sent into a. The last thing that really kind of just really irked my ME about the FBI was as soon as I'm done being searched out, photographed, fingerprinted, Niederbomber and Prince are kind of walking in behind him. We were like 10 minutes.

[Andy]

They arrested you all at the same time.

[Chad Jensen]

All three of us got arrested the same day. So they. Then the FBI agents are getting ready to walk out and they turn around and they go, hey, no. No contact with these guys. Like the three of us wouldn't be allowed to talk to each other. Yeah. So I go, I'm here in handcuffs, you know, and I'm like, what are you talking about? We worked together for the last three years, you know, what's the difference today? I understand. And so sure enough, I had to go be put in my own little administrative segregation box, which is like a little four foot by four foot, you know, room with the glass panels right here like you see in the, in the movies. Where they have the phone, where they talk to their attorney through the window. Yeah, it's. I sat in there chained to a stool for about seven hours. Okay. Yeah, that whole long story. The indictment comes lay out on.

[Andy]

Got out on bail that day, though.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes. Yeah.

[Andy]

Okay.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah. So we got out and then I had to go back to the police station and turn my gun and badge after that. Actually turning.

[Andy]

Okay. Because I want to go into what got the indictment. Which are. Which are the grand jury. And again, this is stuff you don't find out until a lot later.

[Chad Jensen]

Right, A lot later.

[Andy]

But so in order to get an indictment, the way I understand the. In the way you explain it, I think it.

[Chad Jensen]

Right.

[Andy]

You have to go to grand jury. They have to indict grand jury. They have much lower thresholds for indicting somebody than like a jury has for finding somebody guilty.

[Chad Jensen]

100%.

[Andy]

So they. So at some point in time, they convened a grand jury and they presented the case to the grand jury.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes.

[Andy]

And what did the grand jury say?

[Chad Jensen]

This is, this is what's incredibly chilling about this, is that when they, you know, paneled the first grand jury, that first grand jury took a month, almost a month, like three and a half weeks. That grand jury took. They reviewed hundreds of pages of evidence. They talked to over 40 witnesses. That means they had. That grand jury, had 40 people come down. Yeah, I was there that night. This is what I saw. This is what I heard. Blah, blah, blah.

[Andy]

They were interested in getting what really happened.

[Chad Jensen]

They wanted the facts. Yeah. And guess what. That grand jury number one, no indictment. They sent back to the DOJ and the FBI. No crime occurred. Have a nice day. So the DOJ and the FBI go, oh, well, that's cute. We'll just empanel another grand jury.

[Andy]

So there's no double jeopardy here. You can. They can just. They can just keep sending to the grand jury until they get the result they want.

[Chad Jensen]

Bingo. You know why? Because they don't answer anybody. Yeah, they don't answer to anybody.

[Andy]

Unreal.

[Chad Jensen]

Okay. So they impanel a second grand jury. But you know, that second. This is how brilliant the FBI, the DOJ are. The FBI and DOJ go, hey, well, tell you what, grand jury number two, we just had a grand jury in here, but it didn't work out. Instead of bringing, like, all those 40 witnesses and hundreds of pages of evidence, we're going to have one FBI agent that she's going to come in here and she's just going to kind of tell you guys, you know, summarize everything that all the witnesses and all the documents brought the other grand jury, and she's just going to explain it to all you guys. So she's in there for two hours spinning this whimsical tale, you know, of leprechauns and spaceships right to this grand jury. And mind you, a grand jury, there's no defense in a grand jury. The defense is all prosecution, and you're not required to bring evidence to support your allegation. Right. So I could say anything I want to say as the prosecutor. All I'm trying to do is entice the jury to go. Grand jury to go. Okay, let's make an indictment. Because an indictment doesn't mean you're guilty. An indictment just simply means, hey, Andy, you and I, we got to go to court and we got to find out what happened. Yeah. Okay. So when they issue, she. The FBI goes in, agent goes in there, talks for two hours, 40 minutes later, they have an indictment.

[Andy]

So first grand jury month, we don't need.

[Chad Jensen]

Right.

[Andy]

It's just in insanity. So that's what led to. Led to that indictment.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes, sir.

[Andy]

Okay. And so now we're back after. After the arrest, out on bail. You have to go to the police station. You have to turn on your. Your gun and badge. What was that like?

[Chad Jensen]

That was very surreal. That was hard. That was really hard. It was kind of bitter pill to swallow, because this is a place you've gone to for, you know, 20 plus years every single day. And now I'm walking in the front door. You know, I'm not coming in the employee entrance in the back. Yeah, I'm coming in the front door. My wife and I, we go up to the second floor. We're sitting outside of the chief's office, and again, this is all stuff that I've never had to do. I go in there, and the chief at the time, he was my original squad sergeant. When I got off of probation and training 20 years prior, he was my first sergeant that I had. I had a good working relationship with him. You know, we didn't see eye to eye on certain things, but, you know, we had a good working relationship. And the deputy chief at that time was, you know, we were on motors together years ago, and we all. We came up through, you know, time together. He promoted quickly, so he got the deputy chief. And at this point, I was just a corporal, so. Which is the next step below sergeant. Right. And so they're sitting there, they say, hey, you know, blah, blah, blah. You know, the. You know, the Drill, you know, you're on admin leave, blah, blah, blah. You can't leave the seven Southern California counties, you know, sorry. You got your match. Yeah.

[Andy]

You. At this point, you still think they're both part of the team? Right? They. They saw the whole investigation a year or two earlier. They both said, absolutely, there's nothing. There's nothing here. The chief, who is going to be retiring soon, still was. Still understood nothing had happened.

[Chad Jensen]

But the both of these people were intimately aware of everything that went on that night at the fair.

[Andy]

And they knew.

[Chad Jensen]

No. And just a quick, real quick rewind, you know, when I told you that, you know, Channel 4 News did a hit piece the night before the state trial. Yeah. Right. So the next morning, after that hit Pico hit piece goes on, I go into the deputy chief's office and I said, hey, did you see the news last night? Yeah, I saw the news. I said, is this something that I need to be worried about? You know, is this going to be. Probably the very words I use. Is this going to be problematic for the department? He goes, no, I watched it. I will defend that. Seven days out of seven, you get. You mix it up with the cops at the fair, and this is what happens. Yeah. You know, when he literally said those words straight to my face. Know what I mean? And you was. Because he said, you are on and you are off. You know, you notice in the video, when you watch the video, you can see it's immediate on and immediate off. This is not Rodney King. This is not George. Nobody's in here doing gratuitous.

[Andy]

You know, by the way.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah.

[Andy]

Little nugget. You arrested Rodney King once?

[Chad Jensen]

Yes, years, years, years ago.

[Andy]

Sorry to detract, but maybe quickly. For what? Hopefully not pcp.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah, he was just. He was high. He was high. He was up at the. Up at Ganesha park, up on the north side of our city. We got a call, you know, about a male black, blah, blah, urinating or flashing his genitalia or whatever like this. So we get a vehicle description, we get a license plate. One of his family's family members lived out on the west side of our city. So I just start floating that direction. Me and another partner of mine, we start floating that direction. Sure enough, there he is standing on the sidewalk.

[Andy]

Before or after the.

[Chad Jensen]

Oh, this was long after. This was long after. Rodney King's already gotten his money and blown it all on hookers and cocaine and all that. So this is just Rodney King, Joe Citizen.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

Okay. Okay. So, yeah, he's standing on the curb. He's obviously high as a kite, you know what I mean? And like he's standing there like, please

[Andy]

don't let me take my baton out.

[Chad Jensen]

Right. And so we get out and he's, he's, he's pretty passive, but again, he's just high. You know what I mean? And as soon as the, I'm standing in front of him and my handcuffs, like just put handcuffs on him and then he butts me with his head like this. Oh. So. But he didn't hit me. So then we're like, oh, crap. Because I, I didn't really did you

[Andy]

know it was him after that? No, but before that when it happened,

[Chad Jensen]

you know, just another, another. No, no, because it came back to that address on West 9th. So we just roll out that direction and we're like, well, the family lives there, so he might be there. Yeah. And then. Holy, that is him. And again, he doesn't look like he looked. When you remember him in the 90s on TV, he doesn't look like that anymore. Yeah. You know, he's lost a ton of weight. He looks totally different. You know what I mean? So. And he's, he's kind of, he was kind of slow, you know what I mean? Really?

[Andy]

Because a few shots to the head.

[Chad Jensen]

Well, not only that, he's just had a life of altering, mind altering drugs. You know, when you take, you take narcotics your entire life, you're different.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

You know what I mean? So that was that. It was nothing crazy.

[Andy]

Sorry to.

[Chad Jensen]

I have those in my, my man cave at the house. That's cool. You know what I mean? But.

[Andy]

Yeah, but.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah, well, we, we had re.

[Andy]

Rewound just to, to show that the, the chief and deputy chief, they, they, they, they were on your side. But now we're, now we're. We went over how the indictment came about. That farcical display. And now we're, now you're. I guess you're prepping for trial. I mean, you've turned in your gun and badge and you're.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah.

[Andy]

Prepping for trial.

[Chad Jensen]

And at this point, again, a large part of the book. Right. If you will. Badge under fire. A large part of what I talk about here is when all of the music stops, all of the commotion stops and the world starts to slow down. Okay. Because when you're a cop for 20 years and you're used to high energy, everything is go, go, go all the time. Yeah. You're used to going to work, you're talking to your friends, you're talking to Your co workers, you know what I mean, about different things that have happened. Pursuits. Oh, this fight, this blah, blah, blah,

[Andy]

blah, blah, from a nine to a one, right?

[Chad Jensen]

You're getting all these dopamine hits, right? Because you're getting these cool stories. And now you're indicted, okay? You turn your gun, your badge, you're going home. Guess what? All of your friends that you've just been working with the last 20 years cannot call you. They can't contact you. Right?

[Andy]

Just the parallels of all these other stories.

[Chad Jensen]

It gets so quiet. And thankfully, I had bought a horse about a year before. Nine, Six. Nine months before I bought a horse, because I always had this affinity for horses, but was never, never had the opportunity to buy a horse. Yeah, a friend of mine, Eli Sanchez, lived down the street from me, Incredible horseman. So he would take me riding from time to time on his horses.

[Andy]

So that was your therapy.

[Chad Jensen]

That was. And so I'm glad that I had Chevy, my horse. I still own him today. You know what I mean?

[Andy]

But.

[Chad Jensen]

And during that time that I'm home from October of 2017 until the first trial in November of 18. So this is more than a year later now.

[Andy]

We're three years after the incident, and that's when obviously we said the first trial. So we know.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes, we know. There's cats out of the bag. There's two trials.

[Andy]

How, how that one ends.

[Chad Jensen]

First trial was. Is. Is kind of crazy because again, think back to Chad's fear level. Right? I was at a zero, right? I have nothing to hide. They've been grasping at straws. I've been hearing these.

[Andy]

So even at trial, your fear level is low.

[Chad Jensen]

I'm walking in the first day of trial. This is how naive Chad was. Okay, I walk in to the first day of trial. We sit down there. It's a federal courthouse, and you have the prosecution, the doj. The DOJ flew in a criminal. I, I a. Oh, God, I hate being old. A civil rights expert. Okay, there's the. There's a DOJ prosecutor that's a civil rights expert. They brought him in from Washington, D.C. just to prosecute our case. Okay, so all these people are lined up. You got this. The whole gallery on that side is full of agents. Okay? This is the United States of America. When you look at. And you see on your case, on your charges, right? It says, the United States of America versus Chad Jensen. That. That. That should give you shivers. Yeah, you should feel scared because that's United States of America versus me. Yeah. So I'm. See I got some resources and I'm still sitting here. Got Michael Schwartz here, Nicole Paari, the co counsel, Prince and his two attorneys right here. And I still thought this was the good guys. I still thought the FBI was the good guys. The DOJ is good guys. Andy. They have TV shows about these people. Everybody you see on these TV show, these are fantastic people, Right. They're there to find the truth in truth. And, and it is not about that. It's not about the truth. It's about narrative. Yeah. You know what I mean? It's all, it's about and, and getting an indictment and getting a criminal prosecution at any cost.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

Okay. So I've sitting there thinking that this is going to come out in the wash at any second now. They must have got bad info, you know what I mean? Because I know I didn't go talk to them. So once, you know, once they hear my side of the story, everything's going to wash out. Dismissed. Things are piece of cake. We're going to be out of here. So they get up there, the opening statements from the federal prosecutor. It makes my stomach turn to sit here and even think about it. It was so disgusting. Just painted a. Oh my God. All they do is they play the video from the news, right? And a locked frame on that one picture that the media uses and they leave it up there, right. And he and Corporal Jensen was out of control. And they paint this picture that I picked some little boy out of the crowd. A child. They keep calling him a child because he's 17, right. So they keep calling him a child all for one reason, because it's all theater. All these jurors up here are sitting there slack jawed going, what?

[Andy]

So did your fear level start going up?

[Chad Jensen]

When Michael turned to me right before the prosecutor got up, Michael whispered to me, he goes, listen, you're not going to like what they're going to say about you. Don't react. Do not react. Right. Same thing with Eddie. I remember reading that in his book. He gave me a legal pad with a pen. He says, I want you to draw as many little circles as you can draw.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

Okay. Don't make eye contact that dirty and just take it. You're not going to like it. And I'm like, dude, this was insane. And they're pulling things out of their ears, armpits, whatever. Nothing. It is complete fabrication and bs, okay? All it's meant to do is inflame the juror. That's it.

[Andy]

And it worked.

[Chad Jensen]

And it absolutely works.

[Andy]

And it worked.

[Chad Jensen]

So so we get through the first trial. On our first trial, we're playing defense, right? Okay, well, let's go.

[Andy]

Let's go to the verdict. And in the first trial.

[Chad Jensen]

First trial, what do you feel?

[Andy]

So they call you back in. Verdict is in. Where's your fear level at this point?

[Chad Jensen]

My fear level is probably a six.

[Andy]

Okay.

[Chad Jensen]

I'm not even.

[Andy]

But you're facing 40 years.

[Chad Jensen]

We are, but again, you knew, you did. This was a nothing case. They have nothing. I mean, they don't have a smoking gun. You know what I mean? Yeah. And again, just some real quick backstory. Real quick. Unbeknownst to me at the time, the feds had gone to Prince, my partner, like a week before the first trial, and said, hey, Prince, you're looking at 40 years right now. If you sign this statement that we prepared for you, okay? You sign this statement, we'll recommend 18 months summary probation for you. A statement saying that Corporal Chad Jensen was out of control on this night. He threatened me, he coerced me to change my. Change my report and lie on his behalf because he was out of control and he lost his temper. And Prince reads it and he goes, I'm not signing that. That's not what happened. And she's like, you're looking at 40 years in federal prison or 18 months probation. And he goes, well, I'm not going to do it because that's not what happened.

[Andy]

Stand up guy.

[Chad Jensen]

You know what that is?

[Andy]

That's.

[Chad Jensen]

Stand up guy is. That's. That's stones. Yeah. I mean, that is. There is not a man of higher character on the face of the planet in my eyes. Yeah. You know what I mean? Because he had no skin in the game. Right. You know what I mean? But for him to do that, and. And again, I found this out later on down the road. Okay. But. So anyway, there's a whole nother portion here. Again, I hate to keep belaboring this, man, but you gotta. You gotta read the book. Y. Okay.

[Andy]

Oh, yeah. There's so many more.

[Chad Jensen]

There's so many layers here that we're skipping through. I mean, you know, our juror and one of the jurors.

[Andy]

Yeah. So let's.

[Chad Jensen]

So let's.

[Andy]

So let's go. The verdict. The verdict comes back.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes.

[Andy]

And basically it's a hung jury. Not basically. It is. It is a jury. And what do we find?

[Chad Jensen]

So we.

[Andy]

They don't tell you what the vote is, or ultimately we get it.

[Chad Jensen]

So they come back. We can. We assemble in the jury, in the. In the courtroom. The jury comes out and again, I'm kind of lack relaxed about it. I'm not really feeling. This is going to be crazy, you know, Judge says, yeah, we have a deadlock jury. It's 11 to 1 comes up, it's 11 to 1. Oh, okay.

[Andy]

So you're like, man, one holdout thought that I was guilty. You believe one guy thought I was guilty.

[Chad Jensen]

There's one anti cop guy in.

[Andy]

One anti cop guy.

[Chad Jensen]

So you leave and no, no, we, we're still sitting in court.

[Andy]

Okay.

[Chad Jensen]

So the DOJ lead prosecutor goes, your honor, we'd like to pull the jury. Okay, so they stand, they get the jury four person to stand up. And they said, okay, you know what, what is, you know what, what's 11 to 1? What's the breakdown? Oh, it's 11 to 1 for guilty. And it was like the entire room just stopped, you know, I mean all the blood drains from your body and you realize, I was that one person away from that close. So.

[Andy]

So it was 11:1. Did you find out who the one juror was who.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes. Who actually found out who he was. But we have since then were never able to find him. Yeah. Because after the trial was over, I was like, I would love to just, hey, thank you for. But you. And I looked. He doesn't exist. There was three different places that he had said that he had worked at, contacted all three of these places, not all three of them. Never heard of that name before.

[Andy]

Never saw him again.

[Chad Jensen]

Never saw him.

[Andy]

Never saw him again. So it is like a guardian angel.

[Chad Jensen]

And I truly believe that.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

100 with all my being, I believe that. Yeah. And so fast forward after that, immediately. The feds refile. Yep.

[Andy]

Right. So now they have another whack at it.

[Chad Jensen]

Yep, they have another whack at.

[Andy]

And how long until the next trial?

[Chad Jensen]

January of 2019. So two months. All through the holidays, we're preparing for trial. There's two key pieces of evidence that we did not know about in the first trial. The feds, in their infinite wisdom, very smart on their part. The DOJ. The Friday before our first trial started, they dropped 30,000 pages of discovery. Okay. In a normal court proceeding, a normal trial proceeding. Right. The defense, any or the prosecution, anytime the prosecution gets paperwork or evidence, they have to provide it to you as the defense. So then you can read it and digest that prior to trial.

[Andy]

Right. I think it's important to note the prosecution, the government has a legal obligation. If they find anything exculpatory that can help your case, they have to legally Give that to you. So basically, what they did to. To surmise, summarize this is that Friday before the trial started on Monday, they dumped 30, 000 worthless pieces of paper on your legal team.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes.

[Andy]

Excuse me, 29, 998 worthless pieces of paper.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes.

[Andy]

With two very important pieces of paper in there. They rightfully assumed that you would not. Your legal team would not be able to review that before the trial.

[Chad Jensen]

And they didn't.

[Andy]

And they didn't. So they didn't know about it. Now suddenly, how did it come about? Somebody finally found these two very important pieces of paper, which we just say what those two important pieces of paper were that were buried in there.

[Chad Jensen]

These were FBI 302 forms, which are FBI interview forms. Okay. The night that this incident occurred, remember, we pushed the crowd back. One guy goes through, he had two other people with him, a brother and a cousin. So there was a three of them at the fair that night with his parents, his mother, and whatever. So the interview, the FBI interviewed those two. Okay. Didn't notify us that they interviewed them.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

Provided the documents within the 30, 000 pages.

[Andy]

So they were trying to hide the interviews with these 100.

[Chad Jensen]

They concealed it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They knew exactly what they were doing. So inside of those two 302s, his cousin and his brother both said, hey, he was a knucklehead. He interfered with the cops. Yeah. I, you know, we had no problem with what the cops did. Yeah. You know what I mean?

[Andy]

Yeah. That's his hire.

[Chad Jensen]

And obviously, had we had those documents in the first trial, it would not have ended up 11 to 1. Right. You know, so the only reason. And again, God bless Michael Nederbomber, because the only reason we found those two, three pa, those two documents is in day two of the second trial. Okay. We didn't even have those prepared. Trial. No, we didn't know. We didn't know they existed. So, second day of draw trial number two, Michael Niederbomber, who bifurcated from us when he was indicted and we got set trial, he bifurcated. So Prince and I are in one trial, and Michael Niederbomber's in a second trial by himself. Right. So when our first trial went on, Nederbomber's legal team said, hey, you know, it's probably not good for you to go to the Jensen and neither and Prince's trial because you don't want to poke the FBI bear. You know, the DOJ don't poke the bear. So neither bomber's okay. Again, Niederbomber knows that this is a nothing case. They have nothing. So he felt comfortable that we could, you know, get through this on our own.

[Andy]

So did he just assume that you had those? He knew about them, but assumed you had them.

[Chad Jensen]

Well, when he heard 11 to 1 for guilty, right.

[Andy]

He was like, something possible.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah, I know. I read, you know, I know all this stuff. So then he goes home during that time of Christmas break. That guy reads all 30,000 pages.

[Andy]

Jeez.

[Chad Jensen]

So then in the second day of the second trial, when he's present, and he's like these two kids that just testified right now, the FBI interviewed them. You have documents, Chad, that will impeach their testimony. Okay? Until. Because obviously they got up there, the DOJ pro, all the prosecutors prepped them to say, oh, you know, this cop is scary. He's going to kill somebody.

[Andy]

Now, two and a half years later, there's craziness. But you can go back with, hey, here's your interview with the FBI. Here's what you said right after. Right after the incident.

[Chad Jensen]

You're giving me chills. Stop talking like that. Yes, it was, it was awesome when we found those pages. And I mean it just. The next morning we found that we got those pages. Second night, second trial. The third day of the second trial. Walk in. It's like the heavens were parting, man. There was sunlight in the grow in

[Andy]

the courtroom, and the tide had the. And it was just. And you said before in the first trial, you guys were on the defensive. This one you went on. Went on the offensive 100%. And, and, and just to fast forward to the end of it, I think everybody knows because you're, you are sitting here, not Colorado.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes.

[Andy]

With those additional documents by, by going on the, on the offensive, obviously, 12 jury members found you innocent.

[Chad Jensen]

That's. It's, it's. Let me real quick. Just when the, the. One of the big points in my life is when I had to choose not to testify. Yeah, right. So the defense is resting, getting ready to rest. We presented all our evidence. And I remember Michael taking a break. We walked back into the little rooms about this size. And we're sitting there, both legal teams are. We're sitting there. And Michael says, chad, at the end of the day, I work for you. Okay? We're going to rest. This is the last chance you'll have if you want us.

[Andy]

And he's advising you not to testify.

[Chad Jensen]

Absolutely, he says, but it's your choice. He says, I think we've got enough wins here today. And over the Last two days we had some serious wins where we exposed the fact that the FBI obtained a fraudulent court indictment on us using fraudulent. And absolutely lied on the. On the stand. Right.

[Andy]

You caught them red handed lies on the stand this time.

[Chad Jensen]

And one of the, one of their key witnesses. We caught them in the middle of a lie. You know what I mean?

[Andy]

Like, we got this.

[Chad Jensen]

Do not. There's so many wins. He said, I don't feel you going on the stand and, and possibly getting yourself entrapped into something because these federal prosecutors, these guys are professionals. You know, he's like, I don't think you should do it. And I just remember digging deep down in my guts going, I mean, if you got to give it up to the Lord, man, you got to say, hey, I've done everything I can do. And I think going up on the stand is just not the greatest idea. You know what I mean? So we rest and I remember walking back into the chair the next day. They do closing statements. It goes to the jury. Right. So then we're walking around the courthouse doing laps around the freaking floor at the courthouse, waiting for the jury to come back. They come back with the first.

[Andy]

How long were they out for?

[Chad Jensen]

Two days.

[Andy]

Two days.

[Chad Jensen]

I think two days. And so they came back like the end of the first day, towards the end of the first day they had it. They come back with a question. The question was, we would like the full unredacted court transcripts from the state trial of the juvenile. Okay. This is awesome news because that's part of what again is in the book, is that the FBI and the DOJ redacted hundreds of pages of my testimony where I explained my state of mind the night at the fair and what I saw.

[Andy]

And they would not share. They wouldn't give it.

[Chad Jensen]

Share the unredacted.

[Andy]

Right. They only shared cherry picked few sentences.

[Chad Jensen]

100.

[Andy]

So, you know, it's a good sign when the jury hey, well what. What's all this black ink? Why can't we read this? What are you the government trying to hide from us? So, you know, that's a good question.

[Chad Jensen]

So that. That makes you feel good. Yeah. Knowing that they're thinking that direction, or at least that argument is occurring back there. Okay. So then the judge says, this is the beauty of it. The judge says the unredacted version of the statements are not admitted as evidence and therefore will not be provided to you.

[Andy]

Yeah, dude, that, that's.

[Chad Jensen]

I just, I cannot express to you how screwed up that is. Yeah. To me, a jury Is the finder of facts. Right. You, as a juror, should have at your disposal everything from my birth certificate to my driver's license and driving registration of my car, Everything that occurred in my life should be at your disposal. Yeah, but the judge doesn't see it that way. And federal trial operates differently.

[Andy]

This jury.

[Chad Jensen]

Yep. At 12. Oh, they come back. It.

[Andy]

They. Yeah, it told them, hey, they're hiding something.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes. And again, there's other parts in here. Like, the FBI had a cell phone specialist that they had called to testify but didn't use him. Well, we called and used him because we found out that there was information that he had that was beneficial to us, that the FBI was going, yeah, maybe we shouldn't use that. Right. You know what I mean? So anyway, different trials time away. Totally different time around. But again, we're sitting downstairs, My attorney gets a phone call from the court clerk. Court clerk says, hey, we have a question. You know, there's another jury question up here. And she goes, okay, let's hustle up to the courtroom. So we're all hustling up to the courtroom on seventh floor, and as I'm walking through the double doors, my attorney walks up, white as a ghost. And he said, it's a verdict. And I'm like, boom.

[Andy]

Where's your fear level?

[Chad Jensen]

It's 10 2, man. Yeah, it's a 102 for sure. And when he says that, and he's ash, and I mean, he's washed out.

[Andy]

I can't even.

[Chad Jensen]

And so I turned to my wife, and I, you know, I give her a kiss and hug, and I'm like, man, this is crazy, you know? But here we go. This is it. And at that break right there, Michael leans over to me, and he goes, hey, I want you to know I did everything I could do. Yeah. And I was like, what? Oh, my God. He realized, obviously, you could have knocked me over, man. With a feather, with a breath, you could have knocked me over. Because I felt like he was saying to me, I got a bad feeling about this. Yeah. You know what I mean? And again, like I said, Michael's always. I called him black licorice.

[Andy]

Right.

[Chad Jensen]

Because you got, you know, red licorice is really good. And then black licorice. Oh, my God. I don't know. He's kind of hard to take sometimes. That's Michael, though. He's always under liver, under deliver. I mean, under promise, over deliver. So he tells me that, and I'm just like, I'm. I'm sick now. My knees are Trembling, the jury door opens, they walk in. Usually when the jury walks in, you'll get a couple of eyes from people. You know, you make eyes, nobody nods at you or anything, but they make eyes with you, right? Not a freaking person looked at me. Not good sign, Not a good sign. And I'm just like, oh my gosh,

[Andy]

can I make a break for it?

[Chad Jensen]

I mean it's, this is it, you know, And I had a really bad feeling, man. And I really thought this was it. And you did your life. When they say your life slashing before your eyes. It's not so much my past left by my future life, you know what I mean? What's my future life going to look like? You know what I mean? And I remember they come in, they sit down, they get the jury, you know, verdict comes up. And I remember looking up at the judge because again, this guy sits up on this high pedestal right above everybody and I remember him going slap, slap, slap. Like he's slapping pages and he looks pissed. He doesn't look happy. So I'm like, this is going to be cool. If this works out, this is going to be awesome. If not, man, this is really going to suck. So sure enough, you know, we, the we the jury and the above entitled action as you count one, you know, abuse on the color of authority title xyz, blah blah blah. Find the defendant, Chad Janet Jensen, not guilty. And it's like, look at that dude.

[Andy]

Yeah, I can't, can't even, I can't even imagine. I'm asking Amy, your wife, off, off camera, what was his, what was his reaction?

[Chad Jensen]

Just tears. Unbelievable. And I could just see him and, and I just was crying, dude. I couldn't stop crying. I had like tears just rolling down my face and. And then I remember Nicole sitting me, Nicole Pafari as her co counsel. She was cool, man. She was hip. In the book, I talk about her, she's funny as hell and she's an excellent attorney. Yeah. So anyway, she's sitting there and I just remember my head being down like this and tears are literally dropping out of my eyes. And I asked her and I said, is it, is it over? I mean, is it over? And she goes, yes, it's all over. She puts her arm on my shoulder and I was like, oh my God. But she's like, they're still dealing with Prince right now. And then Prince came back 100% not guilty. Full exoneration. Everything's up. As soon as, as soon as they finished with like not guilty on the last Count the judge up and boom, outside of the courtroom didn't thank the jury for their service. Like, hey boy, have a nice day. You did a great thing. He was up and out of the room.

[Andy]

So, so one thing that I think that, that Weaver, I've done a bad job here because, because we, because we are pressed. Right. You get this is a six hour story. That's why you have the whole book. But I think in telling a story, we haven't really expressed the level of institutional corruption that went on here from the FBI, from the judge, from. And you really have to reach badge on fire to get on, to get underneath that. So I think if you just tell the story the way that we're telling it, people might think, okay, this is a misunderstanding. They, you know, the prose, an overzealous prosecution. Maybe he was. It all turned out well. This turned out well in the end. This way is supposed to happen. He wasn't guilty. Great. People do get found innocent all the time. Somewhat true, but not in your case at all. That's not what this was. This wasn't a case of, oh, you know, six, doesn't want six, one half dozen, the other. There was a deep, deep. And from your, from your. We alluded to that deputy chief earlier, who now was the chief of police. So I want to get it. So we're great.

[Chad Jensen]

You're.

[Andy]

You're not guilty. You go back to work, you can go back to, you know, being, being a police officer. You do that for a little while, but they still have it out for you. And there's a. Maybe go into a little bit what the environment was like, but then leading into. At some point, the people need to be held accountable for this because they didn't, they didn't really stop there. We keep talking about Eddie and his story. It's like after he was found not guilty, they went after his trident. And it took President Trump saying, enough, leave this man alone. Let him retire with his. So they kind of did a very similar thing to you. So maybe talk about that and then we can get into the final. Some people were held accountable.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes.

[Andy]

So talk a little bit about that.

[Chad Jensen]

Amazing. The comparison. I just, when you just said that about, you know, going after his trident and stuff like that, it just, it just clicked with me how my city manager was the one person like Donald Trump, the city manager was the one person who stood up here and said, that's enough. Yeah. You know, I've had it with the way you've been treated. Right. Since you came back. Blah, blah, Blah. So Anyway, January of 2019, on Friday, we get the not guilty, right? So I go, I'm calling my internal affairs lieutenant on the way back to town, and I'm saying, hey, man, did you hear a full exoneration? Not guilty, man. I can't wait to get back to work on Monday, man. It's been a long three years. I want to get back to work. You know, he's like, hey, you know what? I just talked to the head of the internal affairs for Los Angeles county and asked him, because this is not something that's normal. Most departments don't, you know, don't deal with somebody who's federal indicted and then found not guilty. Yeah, okay. Most of the time, when the feds get an indictment, 96% their conviction rate, I believe, is in the 90s. Yes. So that he calls internal affairs guru for LA County. What do we do with this? I don't know. I mean, we're piddly little Pomona pd. What do we do? The internal affairs guru says, hey, these guys were fully exonerated. Get them back to work. When you get exonerated, you got to act like it never happened. Yeah, okay. Not guilty is not guilty. It never happened. Get them back to work. I hear that. I'm going home, man. I am over the moon, Andy, because you're going from the depths of looking over. One more quick rewind. When I'm waiting for the jury in the second thing, one of my very, very close friends comes up to me and he says, chad, how are you so calm right now, waiting for this second jury verdict, having just gone through 11 to 1. How are you so calm? And it's like, because you're at the edge, you're done. There's nothing more you can do. I've exhausted everything I can do. And it's the Lord's will. And once you get to that point, you. You can't fight it anymore. You know what I mean? They have. They've broken you for all intensive purposes, you know what I mean? And again, by the grace of the Almighty, I'm sitting here today 1200, right? So go back. I'm going back. The IA guy goes, hey, get him back to work. Monday morning. I, you know, meet with the IA Lieutenant before the chief gets in. IA Lieutenant's like, hey, you know what? Look great. We're looking forward to getting back to work, blah, blah, blah. And then chief comes in. So we walk down, former deputy chief, now chief. Chief, you know, sits down, and this is the guy, by the way. That said, I will back you seven days out of seven. You mix it up with the cops, with affairs, what happens, Blah, blah. You did nothing wrong, xyz. That's this guy, right? So we sit down in front of him, and I signed my PA form, personal action form. Get my gun back. My gun, my gun, my badge. And I'm fully reinstated as a police officer in the state of California. Get out back, man. Great. Hugs, kisses all ever. And then I'm like, okay, well, where am I going, Chad? I. I'm just not ready for you to go back to work yet. And I'm. Whoa, what do you mean not going back to work? You know, I'm exonerated. I'm ready to go 10, eight, you know, back in service, and I'm just not ready for it. So go park him upstairs. And so they. Iowa lieutenant walks me over to upstairs conference room. There's a computer in there. And he goes, I just. Just. Just chill here for a while. Do nothing. Just do nothing. Okay, well, how long is this gonna last? Yeah, I don't know. We'll. We'll try him again tomorrow, the next day and see what's going on. So I'm kind of like. I figured it maybe. Maybe we caught him off guard and

[Andy]

he wasn't quite easy into it.

[Chad Jensen]

Well, in all actuality, I come to find out later that that chief had already prepared documentation and press releases for me being guilty. Sorry, I'm a curse, but that's so jacked up. Yeah, you know what I mean? That he is fully prepared for me to be found guilty. So I. I truly think it shocked him when we were found not guilty. You know what I mean? And I have my own feelings about him and the FBI, you know, dude, that's a whole different side pencil. That's a slight thing. Yeah. But anyway, so he parks me up there. I'm up there now for two weeks, and finally I'm like, dude, I'm going crazy up here. He goes, well, Niederbomber's trial is in April, so let's just leave you here till April. Then we'll figure out what to do with you. And man alive, dude, that's when my blood pressure just kind of goes crazy. I end up having, you know, a minute mini panic attack. Like, my blood pressure is like 165 over 114 or something like that. So they go put me on some blood pressure medication, come back to work. April Niederbomber comes back from his trial, he's found not guilty. Then the department Says we need to move furniture. So, Chad, Mike, you guys are going to move furniture for the next six months, because that way we don't have to pay a moving service to come in here and move it, because then we got to do background checks on all those people because it's sensitive police files. Right? Yeah. So I do that for six months. Meanwhile, the entire time, all of the other employees are coming up to me going, dude, what is the chief doing to you? Why. Why are you guys being made to do this? I thought you were found not guilty, you know? Well, so he hires chief. Hires some other retired lieutenant from Irvine to come in and do another internal affairs investigation. Talk about double jeopardy, right? There was no new information gleaned in the federal investigation.

[Andy]

Found innocent.

[Chad Jensen]

Innocent. But it's just his way to step on my neck, Right? Right. So at the end of this, you know, fraudulent IA investigation that he did, which was totally biased and slanted. You can totally see when you read it, they come back and they found me in violation of unknowingly omitting factual evidence from a report. Yeah. Unknowingly omitting. And that's a double. Like a double.

[Andy]

Right.

[Chad Jensen]

How's that? Class? Don't. I don't know.

[Andy]

I still don't understand that one.

[Chad Jensen]

So they're saying, I did not. In my report. I did not put my. Say that. I put my hands out. Okay? So Schwartz comes in. I skelly this. There's a whole other layer of deceit by. On behalf of the chief where he tries to get.

[Andy]

But you take it to the city manager

[Chad Jensen]

and who was nice enough and had the forethought enough that we were innocent until proven guilty. Because during this whole year, three years, I was on the books. Prince was on the books, Nita Ma was on the books. So we got our paychecks every week and our. Our insurance. Those were big items, and she didn't have to do that. So I go and appear in front of her. Schwartz still, you know, gives his side of the story. She in her. She was just awesome. We took five minutes on the complaint portion. Like my investigation. The internal affairs took five minutes. She's like, okay, I got that. Can you tell me, Chad, what happened? Again, she doesn't know. She's at city hall. Yeah, but for her, that was the first time, dude. And it broke my heart. Like, I got emotional about it because she cared enough to ask me. My own freaking chief, deputy, chief, captains, lieutenants, not one of these people asked me nothing. But she did. You know what I Mean, because I think she just was a. A true good human. She wants the truth and I wish I could use her name, but I don't have contact with her, you know, so anyway, I tell her the whole story, fast forward. I'm three weeks later. She sends back, you know, reverse all discipline. Because they were trying to give me two days off for unknowingly.

[Andy]

Right.

[Chad Jensen]

Omitting punishment. Right. Yeah. So she says, no, we're not doing that. She said, the only thing she said is, hey, next time, take a little more care when you're writing a report. Yeah.

[Andy]

So the last. Your last things vindicated.

[Chad Jensen]

Yep. I got. Yeah. So that all got taken away and then I finally got to go. 10, 8. August 5th of July, 2020 19. Wonderful day. I'd be against the advice of my wife, my attorney, my family, which were all after the federal trial, everybody's take your win, retire. And retire leave. You know what I mean? And I'm not going out like that. Yeah, I. This is. I love this job. I love working for the city po. I love being a police officer. You know what I mean? I totally enjoyed it. So I go back, I'm working in service, take patrol calls. Fast forward March 30th of 2020. I get a call of a man with a sword, you know what I mean? And at this time, I now have body cams, full body cams, patrol cams. We didn't have those cams when this happened. 2015. Right. If you had, we wouldn't be here. Yeah. We wouldn't even know each other. Right, Right. So fast forward this. I go to this call, the call. This guy, he's like 30 years old, tries to cut his brother's head off with a samurai sword. Okay. So I get the call, go there, make contact with victim, see the suspect running, haul ass down there, trying to block him in. He runs around this building. Instead of going over it or into it like I thought he was, he jumps out of the bushes and starts advancing at me. Pulls his sword out like this, these katana style, you know, officer involved shooting occurs, unfortunately, passes away, you know, so he forced the decision. I took two steps back and I wasn't going to take. I'm not going to let him chase me around. Right. You know, I mean, so it occurs. He ends up passing away because of that. And then again, this is Los Angeles County. So what do you think? The next day, they're out there with signs at picket signs at the front of the police station. Chad Jensen's a murderer, blah, blah, blah. Blah, blah. And real quick on the investigation of that. When I had my body cam running and everything like this, I go sit down at the station. The leso detectives are coming to investigate the shooting, right? Because outside agency comes and investigates all the shooting. They said, hey, this is all a body cam. Do you want to watch your body cam? I'm like, oh man, remember what happened last time I looked, I watched a story that I thought I remember what happened, you know what I mean, in that DA's office.

[Andy]

So is there a little doubt? Like, wow, I thought before was my left hand, my right.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes.

[Andy]

Boy, I hope I remember this.

[Chad Jensen]

I hope this is what I remember because again, this is a very unusual circumstance. Yeah. Somebody pulling a samurai sword, walking up on a cop with a gun pointing at him. It's. It's a classic suicide by cop type scenario. Yeah. But it's not, it's very irregular, right? So the sure enough, they play the video and it's crystal clear. It's, you know, there's a link to it that I have. You know what I mean? But you can watch it. The, Our department did a whole workup on it and it's crystal clear, Right. You know what I mean?

[Andy]

So buy the book.

[Chad Jensen]

Clean.

[Andy]

Clean, shoot.

[Chad Jensen]

No, nothing. Everything is up and up, up and up. Probably three weeks later, I go back to work. A week after I'm back to work. This is now probably late April, early May, I get a call of a man with a machete. I'm the only one that's available to go to the call. I'm going to the call. And in the back of my mind, I'm praying that this guy's going to be gone when I get there. But there's no victim. There's no. He didn't hit anybody. He's. He's hitting it on cars, on an off ramp at Fairplex, right? So I roll into the area. You got a little bit of, you know, I say ptsd, but you do. You get that. I mean, nothing compared to what these, these guys compared. You know what I mean?

[Andy]

I don't know.

[Chad Jensen]

It's on a different level. But you still, your heart's racing. You're. You're up in your throat and you're just like, man, is this going to happen again right now? You know? And so for sure enough, he's. He's gone. He's gone. There's no way. There's no victim. I'll go back, watch manner calls me. Backstation wants a debrief on what happened. Contact watch, banner hey, Nothing. The guy was utl. He was in the wind when I got there. There was no victims. Everything was anonymous. And so, yeah, nothing. So I walk out of the watch commander's office and I bump into the now deputy chief, right? I'm like, hey, what's going on? Hey, Chad, I just want to let you know, you know the sword guy that you ended up having the officer Ball shooting with? Yeah. He goes, yeah, they. They retained the prosecutor from your federal case. And I'm like, oh. I said, well, I'm not happy about that, obviously, but I'm not scared because everything's on body cam. It's in crystal clear hd. So I'm going to hope that somebody from the city is going to be out there on the front steps of the police station showing, hey, it's all on video. The police officer did nothing wrong here. It's unfortunate and sad. Any loss of life is sad. But the suspect forced his hand. He had no choice. Oh, Chad, you know we can't do that. Yeah. And that was my last day of work.

[Andy]

And so at that point, you. You go home and you were given an ultimatum, aren't you? I mean, and you alluded to the high blood pressure. You know, this had. This had taken its toll on you.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes, sir.

[Andy]

As Amy said.

[Chad Jensen]

And so the job and that. That day. Yeah. So I end up going home and telling my wife about it, and it's just like, at that point, enough's enough. Yeah. You know, I mean, she's. She's supported me 100 out of a hundred times. But at this point, you know, you're done because I'm done. You know what I mean? And that's. That's one thing that's also in the book. I hate to keep saying that again, but is the fact that the repository of all information is your wife, you know, and when I come home every day, I debrief her on everything I've gone through that day. You know what I mean? And they hurt, too. They don't want to see you sitting. Oh, yeah.

[Andy]

Can't even imagine what she went through. So that was the book end in the career, but not necessarily. And this is the last, last part of the story, not the book end of the story. Because as we. As. As I said before, I don't think we've done the corruption and the.

[Chad Jensen]

The.

[Andy]

I don't know what, what the word is for the deceit that went on to make this even happen. But finally you said, enough's enough.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes, sir.

[Andy]

After you weren't getting Overtime. They took so much from you. So only a lawsuit was. It was in order.

[Chad Jensen]

Right. And this was something that I really had a lot of trepidation about doing. And I felt that when I came back to work, finally, when I was back in service after a totally clean shoot and everything like that, everything. Everything was going to be great. And then I just realized that the chief's got his foot on my neck and it's. He's never going to promote me. Yeah. You know what I mean? So I'm basically at terminal. I. I don't. I can't go up any further. You know, half a dozen officers or, you know, or command staff from our department were filing a lawsuit against the chief for, you know, unfair promotions and stuff like that and just whistleblower activities. Because we basically exposed that the way the city, you know, was doing promotions or not way the city, but where the police department was doing promotions was. Was totally fraudulent.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

You know, it's the good old boy system, if you will, instead of based on merit. So we blew the whistle on that. And everybody that was involved in that lawsuit, it just was similar, similarly dismissed, basically. And that's unfortunate that the, you know, chief made me move furniture, you know, stood on my neck, wouldn't promote me, even though I tested number one for four years in a row. You know what I mean? It was. It was just crazy. But, you know, you can't. You can't give people character. You can't give people, you know, courage. And that's, unfortunately, what our chief lacked, was courage. Yeah. You know what I mean? So, and.

[Andy]

And so with that lawsuit, in the end, you were again, vindicated, I think.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes, sir.

[Andy]

They said you. They settled the day before the trial. Because didn't somebody say to the. To the. To the city like you have you. This is the most clear case you're going to lose so badly.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes.

[Andy]

That they spent $3 million on. On their legal fees.

[Chad Jensen]

More than that. More than any I went prior to me jumping in the lawsuit. I had, you know, I didn't want to jump in the loss. I wanted to continue to be a cop. I was gonna be a cop another five years. Right. So when I had them make that decision because they were gonna file their lawsuit in December, end of November, I go to hr. Right? Isn't that the answer? Right. Everybody gives that, hey, is this. If you're having problems at work, go to hr. Right. Okay. Well, luckily, I had worked in the training division hiring officers. Right. So I worked hand in hand with our hr and I Knew them very well. Right. So I went to one of the senior analysts that I knew very well, and I kind of asked her for a closed door advice, you know what I mean? I'm not coming to you as hr. I'm coming to you as a friend. Yeah. Because on one side I have, you know, these people involved in the lawsuit, like Chad, this is a dead bang. They violated your rights like crazy. You know, I mean, I want to go to the horse's mouth. I want to go to the person who knows, you know what I mean? So she's like, she gets up, close the door, she goes, don't tell anybody we're having this conversation. But this is the most clear cut case of retaliation, workplace retaliation that I've ever seen. So do what you want, you know what I mean? But please don't out me because I'll get fired, you know what I mean? So that was solid advice, you know what I mean? And I appreciated her being solid on that. Yeah. You know, so civil case ends up getting settled. They the city of Pomona pushed it out five years and unfortunately, this is a whole, this is our second book. We're going to talk about me and you later on about the civil issue and how the city just basically wasted, you know, $7 million defending against our civil suit.

[Andy]

Unreal.

[Chad Jensen]

It was, it was crazy. And they knew they were wrong. They pushed it out five years a week for the trial. The judge says, you half city, you have to either go to trial or, or settle. And they settled.

[Andy]

And so as I'm, you know, reading Badge Under Fire.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes, sir.

[Andy]

The, the question that kept coming back to me that I want to make sure that I asked today, and this is the last one about the story, then I want to talk a little bit about the, your, your writing process and publishing process. But all these corrupt players, the judge, the Barbie, FBI agents all. Was anybody ever held accountable to your knowledge? Were they at least denied promotions? Was there, Was the judge admonished at all for how he ran, that, ran that trial?

[Chad Jensen]

Unfortunately not, because there's a statement in this that my attorney Nicole made. She's like, you know the difference between God and a federal judge? Simple is God's not a federal judge. Yeah, that is very telling. The amount of power that a federal judge wields is second to basically to the President of the United States. Yeah. Because that's the only person that hires and fires federal judges is the President. Yeah. Okay. And you know how a DOJ prosecutor becomes a federal judge? You hang a cop. That's a surefire ticket. Just like your agent. Right. How does an FBI. How does an FBI agent become a senior agent or get a cool assignment? That's very simple. You hang a dirty cop. Right. It's. It's just. It's all about ambition.

[Andy]

I figured that was the answer, but I was. I was hoping that someone would be held accountable. So I guess you just have to, you know, live your life happy that you're. You're vindicated, found not guilty. Every step of the way you were. You were vindicated. I mean, that's the reality of it.

[Chad Jensen]

NER bomber actually filed a lawsuit against the FBI with the Attorney General's office. Right. Because that's the only person. Do you know you can't make a complaint about the FBI? Did you know there's no complaint form to accept a complaint about the FBI? Yeah.

[Andy]

Unreal.

[Chad Jensen]

Isn't insane. If I. If you want to complain about, you know, Broward County Sheriffs or wherever, you want to complain about that deputy that was on a call, they have to have it available in 10 different languages at the department. Right. But the FBI doesn't own a form. Yeah. You know, so he ends up filing a suit. The Attorney General, Merrick Garland, gets it and says, yeah, that's entertaining. Yeah, we see it a different way. Go away. Of course. Yeah. Because they don't answer anybody. Yeah.

[Andy]

It's unfortunate. Well, it's a. It's a crazy, sad, sometimes inspiring, uplifting. I mean, you know, the. The just, the. The never quit mentality. You just had to keep. Had to keep going. So glad that you were, you know, vindicated in the end and that you are not sitting in Colorado supermax. So, you know, we first, I don't know, probably a year, even two years, we started talking about this book together. And, you know, the first question we ask every prospective author is, you know, what are your goals for publishing? What do you want to get out of this? And for you is you. You wanted your. You wanted the tr.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah. At.

[Andy]

No, at no point had the full truth ever really been revealed. And you were finally able to do it under. Under badge, Writing badge Under fire. So tell us a little bit about that process. Why did you decide to write the book? What was writing the book like?

[Chad Jensen]

Right. There's a couple of things. Number one, I had read Eddie's book. Eddie Gallagher's book. Right. The man in the Arena.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

And I'm not a reader. Okay. I've. I think I've told you before, I've read two books in my life. You Know what I mean? I just am not a reader. I read his book and at. At that point, I mean, there's so many parallels on, you know, in different arenas, if you will, his in the military and mine and law enforcement. There's so many parallels down to, you know, when he returned from court getting, you know, ostracized by his command and stuff like that. Same thing. There was so many parallels that occurred between our stories. It's like, man, that'd really be neat to write a story, right? And to tell my story, because it's never been told, even in the civil arena or the criminal arena. So I ended up meeting a guy at an airport, Jarrett Le Master from the Babylon be of all places. Okay, we're sitting in the airport, dfw. This is a few years ago, right? And we were waiting on a plane, weather was bad and all this. And he's sitting there and we start striking up a conversation that was originally about Trump, right? Of all things. And back three years ago, you kind of had to Trump, you know what I mean? So he was a friendly voice and we kind of started back and forth and blah, blah. Something about law enforcement came up. And I was like, dude, you want to. You want to hear a funny story? Let me tell you a quick 1, 2, 3, about the FBI. So we were there two hours waiting on a flight we had got delayed. And I tell him the whole story and he's like, dude, you got to tell your story. You need. People need to hear that, right? And this is kind of at the very beginning of the. The, hey, I don't know if we trust the FBI. It may not be all they're cracked up to be. I think there's some bad FBI tactics going on here. This is that Peter Strock guy and all that garbage going on. So I'm like, ah, that sounds great. I'm going to go home and I do it. I tell my wife, I'm going to tell my story. And I get about a page into it and I cannot, you see how I talk fast, right? And like, I have fire hose of information coming out right now, and I can't. I don't have the ability to, you know, put all that down. So I stopped doing it, talked to my daughter about it, and she's a sophomore in college at the time. And so she's like, you should write it. I don't have. Yeah, blah, blah. A year later, comes back on December of whatever year this was. She comes back on college break for winter. She goes, hey, you're Going to write that book. I go, sweetheart, I tried. I just don't have it. And she goes, well, why don't you hire a ghostwriter? And I'm like, I don't even know what a ghostwriter is. Okay, all right, cool. So Eddie's book sitting on our coffee table. So we pick it up and she looks at it and she goes, you call these people, like the ballast publishing. You just call them, you know. So then she gets on, you know, Google's ballast publishing, goes through and then finds the whole page, says, hey, do you want to write a book or something like that as your, you know, submit your book. Right, Submit your book idea. I submit that. And it was like, wow. And she helped me write the whole little synopsis. And I had sent it to you.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

And then I think I get an email back from you the next day, like, hey, let's get together for a Zoom. Let's talk. This, this is a good story. Tell it. And then, you know, we talk about, you know, X, Y and Z and whether I, I can just need help or if I need a true ghostwriter. And then you hooked me up with Steve Johnson, and it was a match made in heaven. He did a great job.

[Andy]

And you're a ghostwriter that Steve Johnson.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah, and just a great guy. The whole process took about nine months, but it was partially me because we would meet once every 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 days on Zoom. We'd have a conversation and then he'd send me like, hey, this is what I, you know, surmise from their talk, blah, blah, blah. You can proofread it. And at the time I'm like, oh, man. And then I'm going through a lot of self doubt. I know I don't carry, maybe I don't carry myself that way, but I have a lot of like, imposter syndrome. Have you heard that before? Yeah.

[Andy]

So there, there are two types of authors, and they're both right and they're both wrong. The first type thinks their story is completely meaningless. Nobody wants to read it. The second type think, thinks that theirs is the most important story in the world, that everybody in the world is going to read it. There's no middle ground. Those are the two types of authors. And they're both right and they're both wrong.

[Chad Jensen]

Right.

[Andy]

Some people are going to be fascinated by your story. Some people are not going to give a crap at all. And that's, that's for both pieces. So it sounds like you're the.

[Chad Jensen]

I, I was that guy. I had a lot of self doubt. A lot of like, I just remember telling my wife, I'm just like, I don't think anybody's going to give two craps about this, to be honest with

[Andy]

you, because it's astounding to me that you would think that.

[Chad Jensen]

I know, but it's just I am so. And part of it, too, to be honest with you, Andy, I was so tired. I was tired, man.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Chad Jensen]

You know what I mean? And going through all the federal stuff, then through all the civil stuff. I'm now in Texas. I had to leave California. I had to move. I always wanted to move Texas anyway. But we moved as soon as it was all done, you know, and I was my last day at work, But I just. I wanted to get out of California because I couldn't take everything reminding me of all the. That I went.

[Andy]

So was it Cathartic to write 100?

[Chad Jensen]

Absolutely. And I remember having my initial speaking. My initial, like, consult, if you will, with Steve. And I'm telling him this whole story. And it's. I totally appreciated that. He came from kind of a law enforcement background, his old man.

[Andy]

Yeah. We wanted it.

[Chad Jensen]

Right.

[Andy]

We always work hard to make sure we're matching the. The ghostwriter with the right background to the right. To the right author.

[Chad Jensen]

Perfect. And he was like, everything hit. And when I would tell him something I wouldn't have to, like, explain to, you know, if I'm talking a little bit of cop jargon, he's getting it. He understands what I'm saying. And so we had a great time doing that. And then once it's all done, and we then ship it over to the editing team. Yep. Right. And I had the. The first content editor, I believe is that. I think that's the word I'm using. She reads it and she. She sends me back the red copy. Right. Like this.

[Andy]

We always warn you, no matter what, there's going to be a lot of red.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah.

[Andy]

It doesn't mean it's bad.

[Chad Jensen]

But Journey had said, be prepared.

[Andy]

Journey is your production editor.

[Chad Jensen]

Yes. She said, don't. Don't get your feelings hurt, number one, because this is. We are trying to make it as palatable as possible. Yeah.

[Andy]

That's mainstream possible. That's our job.

[Chad Jensen]

And so I'm like, hey, cool. So I'm reading it and it's like, wow. Because she had always told. My wife, had always told me. She goes, why don't you explain more when you're talking, like, what are you feeling? You know what I mean? Because as a cop, you're used to testifying. Right. I'm used to. You ask me a question and I give you an answer. Yeah. I don't add color. You know what I mean? And that was hard for me to not.

[Andy]

Well, you guys did a great.

[Chad Jensen]

Well, we wanted. We want to.

[Andy]

We want the reader to employ all five senses. We want them to sight, smell, feel everything. And you and Steve did a great job in there, just emoting, feeling, putting the reader in the courtroom with you, putting the reader at the fair with you that night. A really good job of the, of the narrative of what happened and putting the reader there.

[Chad Jensen]

So I'm glad you say that, man.

[Andy]

Yeah, you guys, you guys were very happy with.

[Chad Jensen]

And the COVID art too, man, that was, that was really a cool experience, just going through all that. I mean, we started at craziness and it wound up here. And I love the COVID Know what I mean? And it just. Yeah, it's good.

[Andy]

The, the COVID process. Like, everything's very collaborative, back and forth.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah.

[Andy]

I remember when we were going through the COVID me looking at this and, you know, I'm. I'm still involved in the background. Right. I'm not reading every edit. I'm not going through all. But I see the mockups and, and, and I think Journey was like, hey, this looks like the. This is going to be the final cover for Chad's book. And I look at it go, why is this so blurry? Can't we get a better.

[Chad Jensen]

And.

[Andy]

And then she's like, no, do you. I'm like, oh, oh, right. That's the whole point. But that was working with you and that was important. You're like, no, I want this blurry photo on the COVID because that's the point that tells the story. And so that. I think that is a good example of what our process is like when it's being, you know, it's. It's author forward. Right. You know, you're hiring us for expertise in publishing, but at the end of the day, just like your, your attorney told you, we work for you, we're going to tell you whether you should testify. We think you should or shouldn't testify. But in the day, it's your life. You get to decide. And that's a really good example there. And I think it turned out really well because of that. And then obviously, you're in the marketing phase after that.

[Chad Jensen]

Yeah. And I love the fact that this is a book for non readers. Okay. Truthfully, because, like, I'd have a hard time. I got through Eddie's book Because I just couldn't put it down, you know, I mean everything was just like, we are, we are. Yeah, it's 400 and some pages or something like that. And when I looked at there's no way I'm going to read all this book. But then I started like, oh my gosh. Then I go, you know, going about, I got through it, you know what I mean? But this book I loved about it was for a non reader like me. That doesn't scare me. Looking at that book doesn't scare.

[Andy]

It's digestible.

[Chad Jensen]

Right.

[Andy]

But still complete.

[Chad Jensen]

Correct. And it's just like. And I've gotten a lot of feedback from people about especially a lot of my like law enforcement type people that will read, they'll call me or they'll text me or email me like, hey, I appreciated that I could get through this in like two days. Yeah. You know what I mean? And that's cool because you know, you lose the listener sometimes. Like if you're, if I don't have pictures to look at. Right. Or something like that.

[Andy]

There's some pictures.

[Chad Jensen]

There's pictures in there. Yeah. And that was the other whole other thing was, you know, picking what pictures I'm going to put in there. But yeah, the whole process. And, and just I, you guys did a great job. You know, I mean from, from yourself that, that first day that we talked, you know what I mean? You really gave me a lot of. You got rid of a lot of my self doubt because you're a professional, you do this for a living. And for you to go, no, Chad, listen, this is a good story and you need to tell your story, you know what I mean? All the way through Steve, you know Steve again, I. Big shout out to him if anybody ever gets him. You're, you're, he's two steps ahead of everybody else. He's, you know, he's doing two journeys for us was awesome. You know, going through the whole process and, and then getting the audiobook because I wasn't certain I want to do an audiobook. And then talking to Kent, let's. I believe, yes. He was like, yeah, you can do it. You know, you can, you can do it. And because I listen to my own voice and I'm like I sound horrible. You know, who would want to listen to me? And he goes, send me a sample and I'll be honest with you. Yeah. You know what I mean? And he was straight up. He goes, no, you sound great. Yeah, you know, I mean just try not to sound too robotic. You know what I mean? And as you speak, you get more relaxed, and then as you relax, we can come back, we can retape chapter one or whatever, you know? I mean, so. But that's, you know, June 9th, man. It's all done, and it's ready, and it's. It's coming out. Yeah. So I can't wait.

[Andy]

Yeah, we're excited. It's a. It's a fascinating story. There's so much here. Badge under fire. Chad Jensen. You can get it everywhere. The books are sold.

[Chad Jensen]

Thank you so much for Abby having you come in and.

[Andy]

And. And travel all the way from Texas to good old southern Florida.

[Chad Jensen]

Oh, I love Florida, man. You guys are lucky out here. But I appreciate it, man. It's been an honor. Yeah. Truthfully.

[Andy]

Thanks, Chad.