This article discusses the new $25 fee charged to inmates’ visitors at the Arizona DOC facilites. In the article, Wendy Baldo, chief of staff for the Arizona Senate states, “”We were trying to cut the budget and think of ways that could help get some services for the Department of Corrections.” We at meshDETECT have a better idea. Rather than charge families to visit inmates, why not offer a secure cell phone service that generates […]
Prison Cell Phones
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This article discusses the potential pitfalls of VoIP prison local number services offering cheap jail calls and used to bypass long distance charges for prisoners calling friends and family. One mother is quoted as saying, “I’m not able to call my son. He has to call me.” With the meshDETECT secure prison cell phone service, not only are all calls the same price regardless of distance, but families can call their incarcerated loved one directly, […]
According to this article, the going rate for a smuggled contraband cell phone in the Metropolitan Correctional Center in lower Manhattan is $2500. Update (7/03/12): An ex-jail official was sentenced yesterday to four months on the other side of the bars for helping an inmate smuggle cellphones and drugs into the federal lockup in downtown Manhattan. Nydia Ciancioso, a former case manager at the Metropolitan Correctional Center, sobbed in court as she apologized for taking […]
The main source of contraband cell phones in prison is the prison staff, including guards. They smuggle cell phones because the demand for wireless phones is so high that they can charge as much as $1000 per phone. This officer only received probation after being caught smuggling two cell phones. The threat of as many as three years in prison did not dissuade him from bringing contraband cell phones into his jail. A former corrections […]
The smuggling of cellphones into California prisons continues, even as the legislation to criminalize contraband cell phone smuggling moves forward in the legislature. Staff at Avenal State Prison last week found cellphones, cellphone batteries and chargers and tobacco after a sergeant noticed a security fence breach on the south of the facility. The discovery on Friday came one day after a key legislative committee approved Senate Bill 26, which would criminalize smuggling wireless devices into […]
The Washington State Department of corrections has asked Facebook to remove inmate Facebook pages. It joins California in trying to stop the social media activity of prisoners. Internet access on smuggled cell phones is not thought to be a major contributor to the problem, but over time this will change. Facebook, which has become the ultimate time killer, will likely no longer be permitted for people serving time. The Washington state Department of Corrections (DOC) […]
Even a person with a long history of crimes committed wants to keep in touch with and talk to her children. This person paid to use a smuggled cell phone to call family members. Now due to being caught with the contraband cell phone, she will spend more time in prison. There is a legitimate need for meshDETECT’s secure cell phone service in prisons. A woman serving time in the Accomack County jail who was […]
The following article discusses the contraband cell phone legislation now moving through the California legislature. According to the article, a guard who was caught smuggling cell phones into prison, “boasted that he made more than $100,000 a year selling mobile devices to inmates.” A typical guard makes $60,000 per year in salary. A phone can net up to $1,000 on the prison black market and 6,000 were been found during the first five months of […]
This editorial on the increase in prisoner call rates in Michigan in order to fund jammers to block smuggled contraband cell phones contains some interesting statistics. Michigan’s 44,000 prisoners make 13 million phone calls — nearly 300 per inmate. It also points out that prisoners cannot receive incoming calls. With the meshDETECT secure cell phone service, they are able to receive calls from loved ones, while reducing the contraband value of smuggled cell phones. The […]
This article on the trial of five prison escapees raises the issue of whether a contraband prison cell phone can be considered dangerous contraband. Certainly a smuggled cell phone can be used to plan crimes or harass witnesses, but is the contraband cell phone, in and off itself, dangerous? The defense attorney states, “a cell phone, something that you give your children, something that our middle schools are filled with, is not in it of […]