Cell Phones
April 21, 2012
CMF cell phone issue concerns grand jurors
California Medical Facility in Vacaville should have a plan to control unauthorized use of cell phones among inmates, the Solano grand jury recommended in a report issued Friday.
The jury, which regularly reviews and reports on various government institutions, said its concern is that inmates' can use unauthorized cell phones for illegal purposes which poses a threat to staff and inmate safety, according to the report.
"CMF staff stated there is a problem with cell phones being smuggled in by staff members and vendors for inmates' illegal use," the report noted...
LINK - TheReporter.com
April 16, 2012
CA prisons system tries new method to stop contraband cell phones
State corrections officials say they have come up with a no-cost plan to stop the illegal use of cell phones inside prisons by inmates, a problem that has plagued the prison system for years.
Corrections officials announced today that Global Tel Link has been awarded a contract for inmates to use the company's service to make calls from each prison's authorized telephone system.
The company will receive revenues from those phone calls and will use the proceeds of that deal to install systems to block unauthorized cell signals at prisons, including phone calls, text messages, emails and attempts to access the Internet...
LINK - blogs.sacbee.com
March 29, 2012
City employee investigated for smuggling to Calipat inmate crews
Officials say Saul Sandoval has been placed on Administrative leave.
Sandoval was arrested by Brawley Police and booked into County Jail on charges of possession of Narcotics. He is also being investigated for passing contraband to a Calipatria State Prison inmate on a work crew in the city.
Details of that investigation are very sketchy. Brawley Police announced the investigation, but have said very little...
LINK - KXORadio.com
March 7, 2012
Dog teams swarm 2 Northern California prisons
More than two dozen dogs and their handlers from around the state swept through two Northern California prisons Wednesday, searching for drugs and cell phones.
California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation statewide canine coordinator Sgt. Wayne Conrad said the prison sweeps coincided with a routine gathering of dog teams at the training academy in Galt.
"Headquarters wanted to seize on the opportunity of having all of the dogs in one place," Conrad explained...
LINK - News10.net
February 28, 2012
CA prisons using cell-phone sniffing dogs
More than 700 million people use Facebook – among them are some of California’s most-hardened prisoners.
“For the guys that we catch, it’s one of the most popular things they use in here,” said Sgt. Anthony Roman of the increasing number of inmates getting caught with cells phones.
Under state law, prisoners are forbidden to use mobile phones.
CBS2’s Jeff Nguyen recently visited the California Rehabilitation Center in Norco and Chino State Prison to see how inmates are accessing the internet and social networking sites from cell phones...
LINK - LosAngeles.CBSLocal.com
February 7, 2012
Dogs take bite out of big cell phone business in prison (Kern Valley)
Kern Valley State Prison is one of six maximum security units in California. But inside, prisoners run a lucrative business that extends beyond prison walls.
"If you have an Internet ready phone or smart phone those can go anywhere from $700 to $1500," corrections officer Brandon Long said....
LINK - KGET.com
November 8, 2011
CDCR’s Matt Cate: Interview with CorrectionsOne on re-alignment, cell phones, hunger strikes, etc
This month CorrectionsOne interviewed a corrections administrator whose feet are always to the fire. In just the last six months, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation Secretary Matt Cate has dealt with two hunger strikes, a walloping cellphone epidemic, and a court-ordered realignment of more than 30,000 prisoners.
Cate has been Secretary of the country's largest correctional system for almost four years. He was appointed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2008 and retained by Governor Jerry Brown last year.
Cate knows both sides of the law, as he has been a prosecutor in Sacramento County and was formerly with the Department of Justice as a state prosecutor...
LINK - CorrectionsOne.com
October 7, 2011
Uninformed former (sloppy) journalist opines on cell phones, CCPOA - and gets it wrong - again
Gov. Jerry Brown today signed an executive order and legislation intended to deal with the problem of cell phones being smuggled into the state’s prisons, but he artfully ignores the main source of those contraband phones, the employees who guard the prisons, and the main political obstruction to reform — the union that represents most of the state’s prison guards, the California Correctional Peace Officers Association.
Executive orders are toothless by nature, but this one carefully avoids tackling the problem head on, even as it calls for some reasonable reforms:
IT IS HEREBY ORDEREDthat the CDCR use existing budget resources and pursue all available grants to conduct more thorough searches of people who enter prisons; to increase the number of random searches of inmates’ cells, prison property, and employees; to increase penalties for inmates in possession of contraband devices and anyone who illegally provides contraband devices to inmates; and to increase the use of canines and state-of-the-art technology to find and confiscate contraband cellular devices...
LINK - UnionWatch.org
October 6, 2011
KSBY Exclusive: CMC contraband search filmed for first time ever
69 grams of tobacco and about three grams of methamphetamine were seized in San Luis Obispo early Tuesday evening, but it wasn't on the streets or even in someone's house. Instead, it was inside a place that is supposed to be clean.
It's one of California's best-known medium-security prisons; at California Men's Colony, even the simplest things can be dangerous, and therefore, forbidden.
But it doesn't mean they aren't there. KSBY News cameras got unprecedented, exclusive access to CMC during a search for contraband early Tuesday evening...
LINK - KSBY.com
October 6, 2011
Governor Brown Acts To Protect California Against Criminals and Prison Gangs
SACRAMENTO – Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. today signed SB 26 and Executive Order B-11-11, to help deprive criminals and gang leaders in California’s prisons of one of their favorite means of organizing criminal activity: the contraband cellular phone. Brown said these measures would help “break up an expanding criminal network” that uses cellular phones to plan crimes both inside and outside of prison walls.
“Prisons exist to remove individuals from our communities who would otherwise do harm to their fellow citizens,” said Governor Brown. “When criminals in prison get possession of a cell phone, it subverts the very purpose of incarceration. They use these phones to organize gang activity, intimidate witnesses and commit crimes. Today's action will help to break up an expanding criminal network and protect law-abiding Californians.”
Existing law prohibits all unauthorized communication with inmates in state prison and provides for accumulation, loss, or denial of time credits based on inmate behavior. SB 26 by Alex Padilla (D-Pacoima) strengthens this by making it a misdemeanor to deliver or attempt to deliver a cell phone to an inmate, punishable by six months in jail and up to $5,000 in fines per device. Furthermore, the bill specifies a loss of time credit for inmates found in possession of phones, and facilitates deployment of technologies to block or disrupt unauthorized cellular transmissions from prisons...
October 6, 2011
Gov. Brown signs cell-phone bill and executive order to reduce prison contraband
Gov. Jerry Brown signed legislation this morning toughening restrictions on illicit cellphones in prisons, and he ordered prison officials to step up efforts to confiscate smuggled phones.
Senate Bill 26, by Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Los Angeles, makes it a misdemeanor to deliver a cellphone to a prison inmate, among other things. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed similar legislation last year, saying it was too soft on inmates who carry phones and on guards and others who smuggle them.
Brown also issued an executive order instructing the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to increase physical searches of people who enter prisons and to develop a system to interrupt unauthorized cellphone calls...
LINK - SacBee.com
September 12, 2011
Avenal Prison Staff Collect Over 500 Cell Phones for Soldiers
In recognition of the ten year anniversary of the 9/11 tragedy, Avenal State Prison is donating 515 cell phones to the Cell Phones for Soldiers program
“The job of our troops is never ending.” said James Hartley, Avenal State Prison’s Warden. “They remain in foreign lands as peacekeepers, guarding those who wish to realize the liberties of freedom. Our servicemen continue to be removed from their family units and limited in their abilities to maintain their family ties. As such, Avenal State Prison wants to support the troops by giving them the opportunity to hear that precious and familiar voice when they call home.”
The phones being donated are comprised of phones both donated by staff and those recovered during interdiction efforts. Approximately 450 of the cell phones were recovered either in drops outside the prison that were intended for inmates or in the inmate housing units wherein no suspects could be tied to the cell phones...
LINK - KSEE24.com
September 9, 2011
Former inmate caught smuggling cell phones, chargers, heroin, meth, SD cards, etc into New Folsom
Two men, including a former inmate, were arrested earlier this week for attempting to introduce contraband into California State Prison, Sacramento in Folsom.
On Sunday, Aug. 28, the Investigative Services Unit at the prison arrested two men suspected of delivering contraband to inmates inside the facility, said Sgt. Tony Quinn, public information officer at California State Prison, Sacramento.
Harley Schroeder, 29, a former inmate, was allegedly attempting to deliver contraband inside the prison when he was arrested by prison officials at 12:10 a.m...
LINK - EDHTelegraph.com
September 9, 2011
Jerry Brown gets bill targeting cell phones in prisons
Legislation aimed at cracking down on contraband cell phones in prisons is headed to Gov. Jerry Brown's desk.
Under Senate Bill 26, by Democratic Sen. Alex Padilla, any person caught smuggling a cell phone or wireless device into a prison could face six months in jail and fines of up to $5,000 per device. The bill also increases penalties for inmates caught with the devices and includes provisions to support the implementation of new technology to block unauthorized calls, texts and emails sent and received within prison confines...
LINK - SacBee.com
September 8, 2011
Assembly passes bill to ban cell phones in prison
A bill that would make it a misdemeanor to smuggle cell phones to California inmates is one step closer to the governor after it unanimously passed the Assembly.
The Assembly approved amendments to SB26 by Democratic Sen. Alex Padilla of Los Angeles on Wednesday. The bill now heads back to the Senate.
Democratic Assemblyman Henry Perea of Fresno, who carried the bill in the Assembly, says inmates with access to cell phones can order murders, organize drug deals and terrorize victims from prison...
LINK - MercuryNews.com
September 2, 2011
Proposal Would Block Cell Phone Transmissions in California Prisons
Aiming to crack down on illegal cell phone use by inmates, a bill is moving forward in the California Legislature that would authorize the use of “managed access technology” to block wireless transmissions in California prisons.
The bill would allow the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) to use technology to identify unauthorized cell phone signals and disrupt incoming and outgoing calls, text messages and e-mails within a prison’s perimeter.
Sponsored by Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Pacoima, the bill, SB 26, also punishes those who smuggle a cell phone into a prison with a fine of up to $5,000 per device and six months in jail...
LINK - GovTech.com
August 30, 2011
Avenal correctional staff intercept cellphones, tobacco, etc
Staff at Avenal State Prison last week found cellphones, cellphone batteries and chargers and tobacco after a sergeant noticed a security fence breach on the south of the facility.
The discovery on Friday came one day after a key legislative committee approved Senate Bill 26, which would criminalize smuggling wireless devices into prison facilities.
According to the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, the discovery netted two bags filled with...
LINK - SacBee.com
August 26, 2011
Senator Padilla’s cell phone bill passes Assembly Appropriations, headed for floor vote
Senate Bill 26, authored by Senator Alex Padilla (D-Pacoima), was approved by the Assembly Appropriations Committee Thursday with unanimous bipartisan support. SB 26 would crack down on the smuggling and possession of cell phones and other wireless communication devices in California prisons. The bill now goes to the full Assembly for consideration.
Padilla’s bill imposes tough penalties for both smugglers and inmates. It also facilitates the deployment of managed access technology to prevent illicit cell phones from sending or receiving communications within the secure perimeter of a prison...
LINK - CaliforniaNewsWire.com
August 10, 2011
Four arrested in attempt to smuggle drugs, cell phones into Corcoran
Four people were arrested in four separate attempts to smuggle drugs into California State Prison Corcoran, officials said.
The first happened on Saturday morning. Jeanine Orcutt of Apple Valley arrived at the facility just after 8 a.m. to visit with an inmate.
The prison Investigative Services Unit had been monitoring her talks with the inmate, and served a search warrant when she arrived to search her, her car and the hotel room where she was staying, prison public information officer Teresa Cisneros said...
LINK - HanfordSentinel.com
June 2, 2011
Senate passes cell phone smuggling bill, sends legislation to Assembly
The Senate voted unanimously Thursday to make smuggling a cellphone into prison a misdemeanor crime with up to a $5,000 fine - a bill similar to one that former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger veteoed as too weak.
The senator who carried last year's legislation, Los Angeles Democrat Alex Padilla, is also carrying this year's version, Senate Bill 26. It was sent to the Assembly on a 39-0 vote.
Prison authorities annually seize thousands of contraband cellphones, and law enforcement officials have worried aloud that they are being used by inmates to plot criminal activities outside the walls. Visitors and prison employees are generally viewed as major sources of the illicit devices, and authorities say the going price for a phone approaches $1,000...
LINK - SacBee.com
March 23, 2011
Latest on cell phones in prison legislation and “walk-time”
California prisons confiscated more than 10,000 cell phones last year. This year, officials at Corcoran State Prison found a cell phone with a camera in possession of convicted serial killer Charles Manson. It was the second phone found on Manson in two years.
In 1996, four men gang-raped a 15-year-old girl. They were convicted. But in 2008, the ringleader called the victim from his prison cell. "To our horror," Alameda County District Attorney Nancy O'Malley said at a press conference Tuesday, "there was nothing we could do about that."
In dysfunctional California, it is not illegal to smuggle a cell phone into a state prison...
LINK - SFGate.com
March 23, 2011
More on cell phones in prison legislation
A bill intended to deter the increasing smuggling of cell phones into state prisons has cleared another hurdle.
Prison inmates have used smuggled cell phones to plan attacks, coordinate drug movement and sales, direct street gangs, communicate with other inmates and the public, videotape guard tactics, and arrange escapes, correction officials have said. Convicted killer Charles Manson, who is doing time at Corcoran State Prison, was twice caught in possession of cell phones in the past two years.
Current law does not provide any criminal or financial sanctions for smuggling cell phones to state prison inmates, according to Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Pacoima, who is sponsoring the bill. Senate Bill 26 would crack down on the illegal proliferation of cell phones and other wireless communication devices in California prisons by including tough penalties for both smugglers and inmates, according to Padilla's office...
LINK - DailyBulletin.com
March 10, 2011
Cell phones in prison - new technology for CDCR?
California's top prison official revealed Thursday that the state is testing new technology to block inmates' cell phone signals.
Earlier this month corrections officials installed at an undisclosed prison location devices that block all calls made from nonauthorized cell phone numbers.
"In our first 24 hours, we were able to identify 400 cell phones at one prison that were trying to utilize the cell phone towers," Corrections Secretary Matthew Cate told KCRA 3...
LINK - KCRA.com
February 11, 2011
Fight against Calif. prison cell phone smuggling continues
Another attempt is under way to pass a new state law trying to deter the increasing smuggling of cell phones into state prisons.
Corrections officials have confiscated thousands of phones from inmates in recent years — just last year more than 450 were uncovered in California Institution for Men at Chino.
Current law does not provide any criminal or financial sanctions for smuggling cell phones to state prison inmates, according to Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Pacoima.
Padilla's bill would include tough penalties for both smugglers and inmates...
LINK - DailyBulletin.com
February 6, 2011
LA Times says CCPOA to blame for inmates with cell phones?
Lawmakers struggling to keep cellphones away from California's most dangerous inmates say a main obstacle is the politically powerful prison guards union, whose members would have to be paid millions of dollars extra to be searched on their way into work.
Prison employees, roughly half of whom are unionized guards, are the main source of smuggled phones that inmates use to run drugs and other crimes, according to legislative analysts who examined the problem last year. Unlike visitors, staff can enter the facilities without passing through metal detectors.
While union officials' stated position is that they do not necessarily oppose searches, they cite a work requirement that corrections officers be paid for "walk time" — the minutes it takes them to get from the front gate to their posts behind prison walls...
LINK - LATimes.com
September 30, 2010
Schwarzenegger vetoes prison cell-phone bill
September 30, 2010 - Despite threats posed by skyrocketing cell-phone use by prison inmates, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed legislation Wednesday to make furnishing them such devices a misdemeanor.
The governor also rejected a measure that would have lowered the fine for motorists who make illegal right turns at a red light, saying the change from $450 per violation to $220 would send "the wrong message to the public that California is tolerant of these types of offenses." Cities, many of which use video cameras to enforce red light violations and charge the higher fine for turning right at a red light without coming to a full stop, had pushed for the veto...
LINK - SacBee.com
Related news - just a couple weeks earlier...
Attack on SC prison guard renews phone-jam debate
September 13, 2010 - South Carolina authorities who have helped push for permission to block cell phone signals inside prisons say an officer in charge of keeping out contraband was nearly killed at his home - in an attack planned with a smuggled phone.
Corrections Department Capt. Robert Johnson was getting ready to go to work at Lee Correctional Institution about 50 miles east of Columbia one day last March. Around 5:30 a.m., a man broke down the front door of Johnson's mobile home, shooting the 15-year prison veteran six times in the chest and stomach...
LINK - AP.Google News
June 19, 2010
Soledad prison cell-phone smugglers meet K-9 match
A metal locker is covered in rust, the cord of a small television hanging on its side.
In a dimly lit bunker at the California Training Facility, about a dozen of these lockers stand next to a set of bunk beds. The room is unassuming and quiet, except for the heavy panting of a black German shepherd.
The dog sniffs the worn mattress, then moves past a box filled with paper. After its handler, Officer Oscar Covarrubias, opens one of the rusty lockers, the German shepherd pokes its head in and immediately sits...
LINK - TheCalifornian.com
April 14, 2009
Prisons press fight against smuggled cell phones
Drugs were once the contraband of choice of prisoners. These days, corrections officials across the country are on the lookout for a more high-tech scourge - cell phones.
Cell phones have been used to help at least two inmates escape from minimum-security conservation camps. Prison investigators fear they also are being used by gang leaders to order assaults on other inmates and employees and to coordinate the timing of prison uprisings.
Richard Subia, California's associate director for adult prisons, called cell phone use in state prisons "one of the most severe security issues that we have right now…"
LINK - MercedSunStar.com
April 14, 2009
Cell phone problem in prisons target of legislation
When prosecutors revealed last month that a Baltimore man accused of using a contraband cell phone in jail to order the killing of a witness was again caught with an illegal phone behind bars, the judge's jaw dropped. He couldn't fathom how this keeps happening. It's "amazing," said U.S. District Court Judge Richard D. Bennett.
But jail administrators will tell you it's not. Cell phones are smuggled into prisons in Maryland and around the world by the thousands through visitors, corrupt guards and, in Brazil, carrier pigeons. They're thrown over barrier walls, carried in body cavities and delivered by UPS. Inmates use them to run drug operations, intimidate witnesses, plan their escapes, harass victims' families and pass the time, calling girlfriends and grandmothers without fear of officers listening in. A single jail phone, passed from one inmate to another, can rack up thousands of calls per month…
LINK - BaltimoreSun.com
March 2, 2009
Former guard at downtown Waco jail pleads guilty to supplying phone to inmates
A former guard at the privately operated McLennan County Detention Center on Columbus Avenue pleaded guilty today to a charge of giving contraband to inmates at a secure facility, a third-degree felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
Michael Ray Hamilton III, an 18-year-old former jail guard known as "Big Mike" to inmates, was indicted for allowing two prisoners, Morgan Dyer and Chris McWilliams, to use his cell phone to make calls in October, authorities said. The use of cell phones by inmates is prohibited in detention centers, according to records filed in the case…
LINK - WacoTrib.com
November 24, 2008
Cell phones hard to find on death row
If you think smuggled cell phones in Texas prisons are easy to track down, think again, say officials involved in the seemingly endless search.
In recent months, phones been found tied inside plastic bags and buried in a jar of peanut butter. And secreted inside the tiny vent atop a shower stall. And hidden in a hollowed-out spot in the binding of a law book. Even stuffed inside a sock, pushed way up out of view inside a narrow crack in a concrete wall.
And, in at least two cases, they have been found in a plastic sack inside someone's rectum…
LINK - Statesman.com (The Austin American Statesman)
August 21, 2008
What’s it like… Sniffing for cell phones in prison
In the dangerous cat-and-mouse game between inmates and prison guards assigned to watch them, dogs are now serving in a new crime-fighting role.
Illegal cell phones have been used for years inside the wire at state institutions to orchestrate witness harassment, call out hits on rivals, run gang operations on the street and coordinate drug smuggling into locked down facilities, said Captain Peter Anderson of the Division of Correction.
In other states, they've also been used to plan successful escapes…
LINK - FrederickNewsPost.com
July 25, 2008
Can You Hear Me Now? Cell Phones in Prison?
When AT&T came up with the ad phrase "more bars in more places," they probably didn't mean behind the walls of a prison. But contraband cell phones are being found in rising numbers at the California State Prison Solano.
More than 600 cell phones have been confiscated in the last year, most smuggled in on the black market at $500 to $600 each.
"Inmates can be very smart and clever when it comes to getting something they're not supposed to have," said Solano assistant warden Tim Wample…
LINK - News10.net
July 20, 2008
Dogs learn a new trick — finding cell phones in prison
We could all use one from time to time: a dog that can find the darn cell phone. Maryland has three. Their job is to sniff out phones smuggled into prisons.
"Seek," Sgt. David Brosky told his dog Alba last week, offering a public demonstration at the former Maryland House of Correction in Jessup. Alba made her way through an unoccupied prison cell until she came upon a rolled-up pair of jeans on a bed. She sat, a signal she had found something.
"Good girrrrrrrrrrl," said Brosky, a corrections officer, handing the dog a ball, a reward for finding the black cell phone tucked in the pants…
LINK - Chron.com (The Houston Chronicle)
July 10, 2008
Prisons enlist dogs to keep out phones
Dogs have long been used to find drugs in prisons, but the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services has found a new use for them: sniffing out cell phones.
Three canines were specially trained by Division of Correction K-9 Unit officers to detect cell phones as part of stepped-up efforts to stop contraband from getting into state prisons. In the past few years, Maryland inmates have increasingly been caught with cell phones, which in some cases have been used to arrange drug deals or even killings from behind bars.
The new unit is part of a larger plan to find contraband. Other efforts include increased intelligence staff and technology at prison gate entries…
LINK - BaltimoreSun.com
June 15, 2008
Cell phones pose threats behind bars
As technology advances and cell phones become ubiquitous, correctional facilities are facing an increase in security risks from phones smuggled to inmates.
Guards or visitors smuggling banned items like tobacco and drugs into prisons is nothing new. However, there's been an increase in contraband cell phones brought into California State Prison-Solano in Vacaville,, according to a Solano County Grand Jury report released last month.
"Cellular phone usage by inmates poses a security risk, as it circumvents the monitoring process used by prisons," said Paul Verke, an information officer for the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. "This is definitely a problem that the (department) is looking into…"
LINK - TimesHeraldOnline.com (Times-Herald - Solano/Napa Counties)
December 27, 2007
Virginia: Prison Search Reveals Cell Phones
A surprise shakedown this month at Virginia's only private prison turned up a half-dozen cell phones. Larry Traylor, spokesman for the Virginia Department of Corrections, could not provide details yesterday but confirmed the phones were discovered during an unannounced search by state officials at the Lawrenceville Correctional Center on Dec. 7…
LINK - InRich.com
April 1, 2006
No More Cell Phones
Editor’s Note: This article was reprinted from the Winter 2005 edition of TechBeat, the quarterly news magazine of the National Law Enforcement and Corrections Technology Center, an NIJ program. Analyses of test results do not represent product approval or endorsement by the National Institute of Justice, U.S. Department of Justice; the National Institute of Standards and Technology, U.S. Department of Commerce; or Aspen Systems Corp. Points of view or opinions contained in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice.
