White Bears are Everywhere
How drugs really get into prisons.
Let’s try a quick experiment—
For the next minute only, do NOT think about a white bear.
Okay, go.
⏳️
You’re thinking about a white bear, aren’t you?
Don’t Think About It
The above psychology experiment, pioneered by the late Daniel Wegner, proves that our attempts to suppress thoughts often make them more persistent.
This is called the ironic process theory.
Trying not to think of something can paradoxically increase its presence in our minds—resulting in either better observation and understanding or increasing our anxiety, obsession, and self-control failures.
It depends on what you are “not” thinking about.
In my case, the state of life inside American prison is something that I have implored myself not to dwell on. Not because I don’t care (clearly I do), but because I have to function every day.
I flew to Texas last week, and as always, I left home with a bag of mixed thoughts. Even after years of doing this, flying to another state makes me feel like I have left my son at an abusive daycare—as if me being right outside the door would protect him anyway.
Leaving home just increases the odds that white bears will appear. White bears will come up in conversation with Uber drivers. I will pass white bears on my way to a hotel. And the damn heartless news cycle will show me dozens more.
Case in Point
“Everyone knows you can get more drugs in prison than you can outside,” said Michigan's House Rep Pothusky in a statement before a February 24th hearing on the condition of Michigan prisons.
“Do we know where they are coming from?” asked another Representative.
“I can tell you that they are not being parachuted over the walls,” testified a former MDOC employee.
Several former employees, as well as the man who independently oversees Michigan’s prison conditions, shared personal knowledge that drugs are—by and large—coming in through State employees. Covid proved that, they said.
More specifically, Corrections Investigative Officers were openly called out as known smugglers of contraband. State Investigators work for internal affairs—they are the prison system’s internal police. They exist to investigate misconduct, corruption, crimes inside facilities, and [sometimes, maybe kinda sorta] staff wrongdoing. They organize the K-9 drug searches, for goodness sake.
Just so we’re clear—
The people who are paid to ensure that the prisons are safe are the ones slipping illegal drugs into strategically placed mop buckets in said facilities.
That was the sworn testimony last week.
I watched that hearing on a flight after a friend from Michigan texted me the link. White bear, white bear, white bear. During much of it, I was shaking my head so violently that the man in the seat next to me must have thought I had a seizure disorder.
I met his eyes twice to assure him that I was okay.
But I was not okay.
As the committee sat through the testimony about prison conditions and drug smuggling, I was hearing LIVE on YouTube what my son has told me privately for years. I pictured him on his bunk. I pictured his junkie cellmate pacing the floor beside him.
And then I put my phone away and begged myself not to think about the white bear for a little while.
You Do the Hokey-Pokey
We all know that there are drugs inside our prisons, and that the problem is worse than it has ever been, but—
Do we know about the assembly line of fatal overdoses inside our prisons?
Do we realize that there are entire units standing like statues in fentanyl folds—right in front of the guards—and no one is doing anything?
*Watch The Alabama Solution to see it with your own eyes.
And while the DOC still wants us to believe that visitors and families are the main source of contraband, study after independent study has revealed that staff violations make up the bulk of contraband-related incidents every year.1234
As a family member, I can scarcely get a piece of lint past the guards when I check in.
I am not allowed to wear hoodies or jackets to the prison. My pockets are turned inside out. I take off my socks and hand them over. My shoes go through scanners. I walk through metal detectors, barefoot, and then get fully patted down (around the bra line and then a nice inner thigh to ankle rub). I open my mouth, lift my tongue, shake out my ponytail, and turn myself around.
Clap, clap, clap.
That’s what it’s all about.
Even if a family member could get one small piece of K2 paper past the hokey-pokey at the entrance, how we pass it to our loved one while under constant video and staff surveillance in our visit is beyond me.
I have to throw away all food wrappers before delivering food to my son from the prison vending machine. I am not allowed to bring him water in a cup. In fact, I have to stand at the drinking fountain and drink my own cup of water—no cups are allowed between us. I sit across from him at a low, see-through acrylic table for each visit and I am allowed only two moments of contact—one hello hug and one at goodbye—both closely watched by multiple staff personnel on either side of us.
When our visits are over, he is taken out and strip searched—the kind that requires a bend and cough. Every. Single. Time. Even if we had achieved the impossible to this point, there is no paper nor contraband making it beyond that point without guard approval.
Trust me, as a witness to this whole thing. It is far easier for an officer to be shady. And they have motive.
One single drug-soaked piece of paper can fetch upwards of $35,000 inside a correctional facility. These employees are making $50,000 a year to put their lives in danger every day inside a toxic and corrupt work culture where no one is watching them watching. This isn’t rocket science. Google “drugs smuggled by corrections officers in [your state]” just for fun—
I found that a New York prison guard was found to have 49 drug-laced pages on him and another day in the same month, another CO had an entire comic book of drug sprayed paper en route to his network of dealers inside.5
It isn’t the families fueling the drug epidemic in our prisons.
White Bear, White Bear, White Bear
As if on cue, on the day following the hearing that I had watched on the plane, there surfaced a news article about a man named Casey Wagner—an Arsenal Sargent at (yup) a Michigan prison.
The report detailed his arrest on February 20th. Another huge white bear sighting. Sgt. Wagner had been busted with over 196 guns, dozens of homemade explosive devices, and a whole bunch of stolen prison munitions, pepper spray, and riot gear.
Weapons and gear that, I will remind you, Michigan taxpayers bought.
As usual, I went down the side trails with my little red basket because my son lives in those twisted forests—and what a treasure trove of more bear droppings I stepped upon. Sargent Wagner was also found in possession of one ounce of methamphetamine as well as packaged, saleable marijuana—enough to be worth thousands of dollars inside.
This is a man who had been stationed at the front gates of an American prison for years, positioned perfectly to allow the free-flow of contraband. The DOC statement about his arrest is a cut-and-paste which assures us that the department is aware of this one bad actor. Except he’s not.
Here are just a few news stories from Michigan in recent months. Separate MDOC employees. Separate MDOC prisons. Separate dates. *Follow the links to read them.
Prison guard charged for trying to get drugs into UP prison
The estimated value of the seized items was approximately $443,000 per Michigan State Police.
15 sheets of suspected K2 paper, 50 A12 suboxone strips, 514 N8 suboxone strips, 74 grams of marijuana wax and 62 grams of methamphetamine were seized.
MDOC officer sentenced for smuggling drugs into prison
Employed by MDOC since 2000.
He pled guilty to nine felonies: three counts of delivering narcotics or cocaine, plus two counts of manufacturing or delivering a controlled substance and one count of maintaining a drug house.
Michigan Corrections Officer sentenced for smuggling drugs inside prison
He was caught smuggling 151 strips of Buprenorphine.
His charges carried a possible 12 years in prison—he got 90 days.
Whistle-blower alleges corruption at Michigan Department of Corrections
This source has named over 50 MDOC employees involved in drug smuggling activities including current and former prison guards, nurses, and “non-custody” staff responsible for inmate support.
Former Michigan Corrections Officer Charged with Drug Distribution
This officer had “54.8 grams of methamphetamine, 309 suboxone strips, 10.2 grams of heroin, five syringes of what was assumed to be liquid THC, a plastic bottle filled with marijuana wax, six Oxycodone pills and 5.86 grams of cocaine on prison grounds.”
He faced up to 90 years in prison. He got three (which is seven years less than my son got for some methamphetamine dust in a baggie).
Judge Dismisses Lawsuit Against Lakeland Correctional Facility
A Michigan mom sued MDOC after learning about a [known] drug smuggling operation that killed her son.
This case involved a female MDOC corrections officer, her inmate lover, and them smuggling drug-laden basketballs into the prison yard.
One man died and two were hospitalized (in one week) but no official action was taken.
And it’s not just in Michigan.
It’s everywhere.
There are so many white bears in the corrections world that even if you don’t want to picture them, you have no choice now.
Update: Parole
Please visit the chat for more about where we are this month. Prayers, please!
Update: Your Support
Black Sheep Mom is now one year old and subscription renewal season is upon us! If you signed up to support us last year, you're probably getting a notice to renew.
Your support has continued to allow my son basic necessities in prison, and you've given me the inspiration to keep writing. You’ve no idea how many times the words “you have a new subscriber” has brought me to tears. I can’t tell you how grateful I am.
Maybe you are able to become a Founding Member or maybe you can make the bump up to a yearly subscriber this time, but if a paid subscription is not possible for you right now, there are still so many other ways to share the love—your likes, comments, shares, and restacks bring more readers and support our way too. Please consider sharing my emails when you can!
As always, you can buy my son a one-time coffee HERE too. For reference: A four-ounce bag of coffee is about $10 and that lasts him five or six days.
Update: Misfit Lit Book Club
We are now more than halfway through Resurrection by Leo Tolstoy. You can find all of the book club updates in a separate tab on my home page. Click below:
Please plan to join us on Zoom on Friday, March 27th at 1pm (EST) through this LINK where we will discuss Resurrection in its totality and explore what we have taken away from this very underrated work. I will be there LIVE with tea and cake because this Zoom will be the week of my birthday and anyway, who needs an excuse for tea and cake?! Please bring your lovely self and all the treats you desire.
**Even if you have not read the book or are just a few pages in, you are welcome to join us! Always.
ICE Detention Centers story
A New York investigation
White bears are everywhere indeed. Thank you for writing and sharing all that you do. It was a special feeling this last week, sitting in the room while that hearing was happening knowing that there were others out in the wider world watching, talking about it, not forgetting🙏
I don't know if you would agree with this idea, but I'm thinking that prisons should be required to make all prison data public. That could include surveillance of prisoners and prison employees, locations of prisoners within the prison facility, numbers of prisoners, prison disciplinary actions, particularly when sentences are extended via prison administration, people in solitary confinement, etc. It seems that secrecy is the poison that corrupts prison operations. Why should there be any secrecy about anything in a prison? Also, it seems odd that prison administration can lengthen a prisoner's sentence without due process.