BALTIMORE (AP) - Thirteen people, including a correctional official, were indicted for plotting to smuggle the opioid addiction treatment drug Suboxone into a Maryland women’s prison, according to the state Attorney General’s Office.
“Six inmates and seven outside facilitators worked together to introduce large amounts of Suboxone strips” into the Maryland Correctional Institute for Women in Anne Arundel County between June 2020 and February 2021, prosecutors said in a statement Monday, according to The Baltimore Sun.
The five smuggling attempts covered by the charges included a scheme to send the drug through “specially prepared envelopes” in inmates’ mail and another to throw a Suboxone-filled orange into the compound, the state Attorney General’s office said.
Dietary Sgt. Linda Lomax tried to smuggle “hundreds of strips on her person and walk through the front entrance of the prison,” officials said. She is charged with misconduct in office and several drug offenses.
Suboxone strips purchased for $3 or $4 on the street can be sold for between $200 and $400 when they’re smuggled into the state’s prisons, the state Attorney General’s Office said. The office estimates that the investigation recovered between $140,000 and $280,000 worth of strips.
“These individuals, inmates, and a correctional employee conspired together to smuggle illegal drugs into a Maryland correctional facility,” Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh said. “Trafficking drugs in the prison system, where order is paramount to keeping inmates and staff safe, is illegal and dangerous.”
Attorneys for Lomax and co-defendant Angela Williams were not available for comment Monday, the newspaper reported. The public defender’s office, which may represent some eligible defendants, declined to comment.
Several other corrections officials have been charged with helping smuggle Suboxone to inmates at the state’s facilities in recent years, according to The Baltimore Sun.
Maryland’s Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services estimates that about 70% of individuals in the state’s jails and prisons suffer from substance dependance or abuse.
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