The indictments unsealed Tuesday alleging widespread gang operations aided by corrupt corrections officials in Maryland prisons is the latest in a series of such cases that stretch back at least ten years.
The charges followed a familiar pattern: the female correctional officers smuggled cell phones to gang members, who used them to place orders for marijuana, drugs and other contraband with gang members on the outside. The correctional officers then smuggled the Xanax, Percocet and other drugs into the prison for sale. Money flowed in and out of the prison by the use of pre-paid debit cards, known as green dot cards.
Here is a timeline of some of those indictments.
APRIL 16, 2009
Federal officials unsealed indictments against 24 persons associated with the “Black Guerilla Family” gang, including four prison employees. The indictments charged that BGF members distributed heroin and ecstasy as well as tobacco, marijuana and other contraband—including cell phones—inside and outside a number of Maryland prisons. According to a search warrant affidavit, BGF members at the Metropolitan Transition Center also smuggled in food and liquor, including champagne, vodka and seafood.
July 6. 2010
US Attorney Rod Rosenstein filed charges against 15 more BGF members as well a correctional officer in a continuing investigation of Maryland prisons. The charges include conspiracy to violate federal racketeering and drug trafficking laws and to launder money, armed robbery and illegal possession of a gun or ammunition.
APRIL 23, 2013
In the most recent indictment, federal prosecutors charged that the Black Guerilla Family gang had established a lucrative smuggling operation inside the Baltimore Detention Center that dealt in marijuana, prescription pills and cell phones. Among the 25 who were charged with racketeering, drug dealing and money laundering were 13 female correctional officers. Four of those women had been impregnated by Tavon White, known as “Bulldog,” and two of them wore tattoos with his name.
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November 2, 2011
Twenty-two defendents were charged with “conspiracy to participate in a violent racketeering enterprise known as the Dead Man Incorporated (DMI).” DMI started as a prison gang allied with the BGF in 2000. By 2006, DMI was independent, although it still worked with BGF in some prisons at the time of the indictment. The charges state that DMI eventually expanded beyond prisons. Defendants were accused of drug smuggling, murder, drug trafficking, and extortion.