Corrections officers at a South Carolina prison intercepted a covert package dropped by a drone containing a selection of indulgent fare and banned substances.
Guards unwrapped the package to find steak, marijuana, crab legs, an abundance of cigarettes, and to spice it up, a tin of Old Bay seasoning.
The illicit meal was dropped into the Lee Correctional Institution in Bishopville, S.C., by a drone, the South Carolina Department of Corrections said on X on Monday, with the caption, “seems some folks were planning an early holiday Old Bay crab boil and steak dinner along with their marijuana and cigarettes — all dropped by drone at Lee Cl.”
Prison officials said they are investigating and that no arrests have been made.
“I’m guessing the inmates who were expecting the package are crabby,” said prison spokesperson Chrysti Shain, The Associated Press reported.
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Keeping contraband out of state prisons is an ongoing battle. Until drones came into play, people would throw or catapult items, including cellphones, drugs and other prohibited items, over the fence until the fences were raised and netting was added on top.
Flying a drone over a prison in South Carolina is a misdemeanour punishable by up to 30 days in jail, while dropping contraband into a prison is a felony that can lead to a 10-year prison sentence.
The problem also persists in Canada. In February last year, staff at Warkworth Institution, a medium-security prison southeast of Peterborough, Ont., seized an edged weapon, cellphones and accessories estimated to be worth $24,000.
“This seizure was the result of a suspected drone drop,” Mike Shrider, Correctional Service Canada’s regional communications manager, said.
It was the second reported drone incident at the prison that month. A few weeks prior, two people were arrested for flying a drone carrying cannabis and cellphones, according to the Ontario Provincial Police.
In Quebec and British Columbia, drone flyovers above prisons are also a regular occurrence.
Statistics from Quebec’s public security minister show staff reported 274 drones flying over provincial centres between January and March of this year, slightly more than three per day. That doesn’t include the 10 federally-managed prisons in the province.
The provincial figures show 195 of the 247 drones were seen dropping packages. Most of them — 69 per cent — were reported as seized. The province also seized 896 cellphones.
To try to combat the issue, the federal government in March announced a pilot project that will allow correctional staff to use radio-frequency jammers to block wireless communication to drones and cellphones in federal and Quebec detention centres.
Meanwhile, according to a 2023 report, drones made daily drops to all eight B.C. medium- and maximum-security institutions, sometimes delivering packages right into outstretched hands through prison cell windows, John Randle, regional president of the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers, told Global News.
Frédérick Lebeau, the national president of the union, said the rise in drone drops in correctional facilities has been “exponential” in recent years.
He said that if drops occur when inmates are in the yard, packages are quickly snatched up and hidden in body cavities or elsewhere. Drones are sometimes flown directly to windows where inmates have dismantled the bars.
He said the presence of contraband — including drugs and weapons — can create debts among inmates and allow criminal networks to operate, resulting in increased violence for detainees and corrections staff.
— With files from Global News, The Associated Press and The Canadian Press
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