Peninsula Daily News and News Sources
Washington is among more than 25 states seeking permission to jam contraband cell-phone use by prison inmates.
South Carolina Corrections Director Jon Ozmint said a petition was filed Monday with the Federal Communications Commission seeking “to protect the public safety” by blocking cell phone signals emanating from prisons.
Officials with more than two dozen other state corrections agencies also signed the petition, which was filed two days before the U.S. Senate commerce committee began hearings on legislation that would waive a 1934 federal ban on telecommunications jamming for prisons and other exceptional cases.
Cell phones have been used in other state prisons and local jails to carry out extortion schemes, tax evasion plots, drug deals, credit card fraud, prison riots and escapes.
Clallam Bay
At the Clallam Bay Corrections Center, which houses about 850 inmates, one cell phone was seized earlier this year, said Denise Larson, spokeswoman at the prison.
“Prior to that, the last one we seized in 1999,” she said.
“The one from 1999 was found as a result of an attempted escape — so we know this was an issue.”
Larson said until signals can be jammed — which would prevent any inmate from using them — the state prison system is training K-9 police dogs to sniff out cell phones.
Eldon Vail, Washington’s prisons chief, would like to see the jamming proposal move forward, but it is unclear who would pay for it — or whether the FCC would grant permission to jam signals.
“From what I’ve seen, the technology works really well. We would like to have access to the technology,” said Vail in an interview at his offices in Olympia.
While only about a dozen cell phones have been found inside Washington prisons over the past two years, state prisons spokesman Chad Lewis said the figure is alarming.
“Cell phones are some of the most dangerous contraband for several reasons,” he said.
“They have a very high black-market price; some phones go for several hundred dollars to over $1,000.”
No inmate in Washington has been known to use a contraband phone to threaten somebody on the outside or to commit new crimes, Lewis said.
The penalty for inmates found with smuggled cell phones is stiffer than being caught with cigarettes and other contraband, Lewis said.
“I’ve heard offenders say that they would rather have a cell phone than their drugs,” Lewis said.
Lobbyists for telecommunication companies say that any weakening of antijamming legislation could become a slippery slope that could inappropriately limit cellphone use.
Law enforcement officials say that smuggled cell phones are a growing problem across the country, allowing inmates to make unmonitored calls.
In April, a federal jury in Baltimore sentenced Patrick A. Byers Jr. to life for using a cell phone from jail to order the assassination of a witness against him.
Often prepaid, untraceable cell phones are smuggled into prisons with the assistance of guards or visitors, or are thrown over prison fences.
Once the cell phone is inside, prisoners hide it among their belongings and often share it for a price.
California corrections officials reported confiscating 2,809 cell phones in 2008.
Mississippi officials found 1,861, and federal prison officials found 1,623.
The FCC can allow only federal agencies — not state or local authorities — permission to jam cell-phone signals.
“Jamming technology has come a long way,” said Ozmint.
“It used to be that you had to jam a large area.”
Now, Ozmint said, the range can be limited to just one facility without jamming the building or house next door.
