Published: May 16, 2008 04:22 pm            

PREF staff thwart trafficking attempt

PLAINFIELD — A Department of Corrections employee here thwarted a trafficking attempt earlier this week after seeing a woman throw a package over the fence at the Plainfield Re-Entry Educational Facility (PREF).

Tanya Huffman, 27, of Indianapolis, was arrested and charged with trafficking with an inmate, class A misdemeanor, after attempting to distribute tobacco to a PREF resident

PREF Superintendent Michael Lloyd said Public Information Officer Dalton Haney was returning home around 8 p.m. when he spotted a suspicious vehicle turning onto the facility’s perimeter road.

Haney followed the vehicle and watched Huffman run toward the fence and throw two black plastic bags over. The first landed on the ground, while the second got caught on the razor wire.

As Huffman was throwing the bags, Lloyd said a PREF resident ran toward the fence to retrieve them. Once he saw Haney approaching, Lloyd said the resident turned and ran in the opposite direction.

Authorities say Haney blocked Huffman’s vehicle with his own, while notifying PREF officers of the situation.

Lloyd said Huffman told authorities she had been asked to make the delivery to someone in the facility and had picked up the bags at a Safeway store parking lot.

Huffman said she didn’t know who she was delivering the bags to, but did admit that her boyfriend is a resident there.

Once the plastic bags were retrieved, officers found more than three pounds of loose tobacco and cans of chewing tobacco inside.

Lloyd said most people don’t think of tobacco as something people would attempt to traffic and be arrested for.

“But it’s still trafficking,” he added.

He explained that correctional facilities are smoke free and most of the residents in PREF came there toward the end of their sentence.

“Their real addiction is tobacco,” he added.

Huffman was taken to the Hendricks County Jail in Danville. PREF officers were also able to identify two residents involved in the attempted trafficking. Lloyd said they were given disciplinary actions and transferred to a high security facility.



amanda.roach@flyergroup.com

        

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