Contraband Phones Get Into Prisons: Top 5 Ways

 1. Employees

Prisoner advocates claim most cell phones make it into prisons by staff or contractors. Unfortunately, corruption is a legitimate problem. In 2009, 300 California prison employees were suspected of trafficking cell phones to prisoners. For some, the motive is financial. Some inmates pay up to $1,500 per cell phone. In 2011, two employees at a prison boasted they made $100,000 smuggling.

Some staff get involved in personal relationships with inmates. For them, a cell phone is a communication method to keep in touch while not at work.

2. Deliveries

Having contraband phones delivered requires coordination with someone outside the facility. If the inmate already has access to a phone, this is made even easier. The accomplice can stash phones inside the delivery containers or on delivery vehicles.

In October of 2015, an officer in Maryland noticed a delivery truck with magnetic boxes. He found the boxes to contain contraband cell phones as well as 3 more trucks carrying contraband.

Cell phones are hidden in everyday objects such as a plastic peanut butter jars. This also makes it difficult for dogs to detect. Cell phones arrive at correctional facilities through mail concealed inside objects. Instead of a file in a cake, inmates get phones inside hollowed-out loaves of bread.

3. Visitors

The vast majority of visitors do not cause problems. Studies have shown that inmates in contact with family on the outside are less likely to reoffend. But some visitors smuggle in contraband, including cell phones. The volume of visitor traffic makes it impractical for facilities to search everyone thoroughly. Staff must rely on observation, intuition and subtle guilt cues. But there is little doubt that visitors are a source of contraband phones.

In 2014, California Department of Corrections arrested 546 visitors for bringing in phones and drugs.

Legal representatives are not above suspicion either. A Florida attorney was arrested in March 2015 for smuggling a smartphone into jail.

4. Over the Wall

Some contraband phones go over the prison walls. They cut open a basketball, fill it with contraband and re-stitch the basketball. It looks normal. And they throw it over the wall to blend right in. The prisoner knows when to expect it so he just walks out into the yard and picks it up.

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5. Drones

Drones are a new and growing threat to prison security. Inexpensive drones can fly outside of the prison walls to deliver contraband. Drones fly over most facilities undetected and drop the contraband package in a matter of seconds. The civilian drone industry has grown from almost nothing in 2013 to over $1 billion a year.