(Memphis) A prison kitchen worker faces charges for smuggling contraband into the Shelby County Correctional Center. Investigators say Danny Puckett confessed to doing it more than 100 times since November.
Police say Puckett told investigators he would stuff contraband in his pants and cell phones in his steel toe boots.
“All of the contraband he had poses a threat to the safety and security of the institution,” said Shelby County Correctional Center Director James E. Coleman.
The prison director says his internal investigators had suspicions about Puckett for a while and Thursday they discovered the arsenal of contraband goods in his car: 15 bundles of marijuana, 1 pack of cocaine, 10 hydrocodone pills, 10 cell phones, 100 xanax pills and numerous packages of tobacco. Investigators say Puckett confessed to smuggling contraband in the prison 100 times since November, the month he was hired, making about $10,000 off inmates.
“And his bond is $100,000 so he didn`t make enough to get out of jail,” said Coleman.
The busts comes six months after a Shelby County inmate posted a video on Facebook showing inmates living it up and stockpiling contraband in their cells.
“We said it then and we will say it again. We will always be very vigilant,” said Coleman.
Coleman says he hopes this arrest will make prison workers think twice before doing business with those on the other side of the bars. He also hopes Pucket, if convicted, won’t serve his prison time at the Shelby County Correctional center where he worked because most inmates there are serving less than six years. The prison director says Puckett deserves a longer prison sentence than that
