<red>UPDATE: SC inmate contraband scheme used SCDC food distribution centers, Statehouse grounds to smuggle cellphones, drugs into prisons; 17 indicted</red>
COLUMBIA, SC (WIS) - South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson and a group of other officials said 17 people, including South Carolina Department of Corrections inmates, worked in and led an “extensive, sophisticated, and very lucrative” black market for desired contraband.
The indictments, unsealed and released to the public on Friday, contain 69 counts, consisting of 106 charges against 17 defendants, including the family members, partners, and former inmates who helped get the contraband into the hands of inmates and into prison facilities in what officials dubbed “Operation Cash Cow.”
The most-sought contraband included cellphones, cellphone accessories, loose tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, and synthetic marijuana, Wilson said. Additional contraband smuggled in includes meth and other narcotics.
“The indictments allege that the conspiracies were run by inmate leaders who ‘essentially employ[ed] people both inside and outside the prisons to assist in obtaining and distributing the contraband,’” Wilson said.
The indictments allege four methods by which contraband entered the prison system:
Throw-overs
Smuggling through prison dairy facilities at Wateree Correctional Institution in Sumter County
Smuggling through bread runs to a bakery in Columbia
Smuggling through use of the State House inmate work crews
The indictments contend that “SCDC’s food distribution network was used against itself to facilitate the contraband trade.”
But the main reason the scheme started, officials said, was because of inmate access to cellphones.
“The indictments contend that ‘[t]he contraband trade in the prisons drives not only a lucrative black market but also contributes to gang power, gang rivalries, and gang violence among the competing factions within the prison walls,’” Wilson said.
http://www.wistv.com/2018/11/30/watch-live-ag-wilson-announce-major-state-grand-jury-indictments-arrests/