New York State Police and corrections officials are investigating an incident that sickened three corrections officers and two members of the National Guard on Sunday.
It happened at the Mohawk Correctional Facility in Rome, when authorities allege that Shondrea Taylor, 53, of Syracuse tried to bring in papers soaked in an unknown substance.
Officials with the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS), said that staffers at the prison intercepted the contraband. But the correction officers and National Guard members began to get ill from the exposure to the papers.
The three correction officers were taken to a Rome hospital. One remains in critical condition and the others were treated and released. The two National Guard members were evaluated as a precaution and also released.
Bryan Hluska is Central Region Vice President for the New York State Correctional Officers and Police Benevolent Association (NYSCOPBA).
He is concerned about what he said is the growing presence of dangerous contraband being brought into state prisons.
“They're getting more sophisticated on bringing things into the facility the way they smuggle them in,” Hluska said. “There are certain types of illicit substances that they're using and spraying that is not detected in a regular drug test, it poses a grave danger to our members, because you never know what you're getting in.”
Hluska called on state officials to put a stronger focus on efforts to stop contraband from getting into prisons.
A statement released Monday from DOCCS said that the agency’s Commissioner, Daniel Martuscello, “has zero tolerance for contraband,” and it added that “the difficult challenge of preventing contraband…is constant.”
Shondrea Taylor, the Syracuse arrested by State Police in connection with Sunday’s incident now faces two misdemeanor charges of promoting prison contraband.
New York State Sen. Joseph Griffo (R-53), released a statement calling for an immediate shutdown of contact visits at Mohawk Valley correctional facilities so that officials “can get a better handle on this situation.”
Griffo called for improved procedures and protocols, including required screenings of visitors by drug-detecting dogs, mandatory body scanners and stiffer penalties for those delivering dangerous materials to incarcerated individuals in the state’s prison system.
