One Prince George’s County corrections officer has been arrested and another suspended for allegedly distributing cell phones to inmates in the county’s Upper Marlboro jail, county officials said Thursday.
Pfc. Pierre Sailsman, 22, a two-year veteran, was arrested when he arrived at work Thursday afternoon and charged with three counts of delivering communication devices and three counts of conspiracy to deliver them. Pvt. Frank Yeboah, an 18-month veteran, has been placed on paid administrative leave for suspicion of being involved in Sailsman’s enterprise, said Vernon Herron, Prince George’s County Public Safety Director.
The news comes about a week after former county police officer Keith Washington, who was convicted last month of involuntary manslaughter and other charges after he shot two deliverymen in his home last year, was found with a universal handcuff key in his shirt pocket while being stripped down before a move to a state prison from the county jail.
How Washington obtained the key remains under investigation, however, Herron said. “It was either smuggled in by a prisoner or a corrections officer,” he said.
Herron couldn’t go into specifics regarding the latest incident since it’s still under investigation, but he said officials had been tracking the cell phone distribution activity for several weeks.
Inmates aren’t allowed to have cell phones because, unlike the hard lines they can use to contact friends and family on the outside, cell phones can’t be monitored, Herron said.
“Who knows what an inmate might do with a [cell phone],” he said. In order to maintain security in and outside the jail, officials must know what inmates are saying on the phone. There’s the threat that inmates could organize criminal enterprises if they’re allowed to freely communicate, he said.
Prisoners who have been found with cell phones will be referred to States Attorney Glenn Ivey who will make the decision on whether to prosecute them for possessing contraband, Herron said.
The two officers suspected of distributing the cell phone are the focal point of the investigation, but Herron did not rule out the possibility that others could be involved.
