Bloods inmates exploiting N.J. jails

TRENTON - In some ways, the Bloods gang wields more power in Burlington County's Albert C. Wagner Youth Correctional Facility than the corrections officers do, according to a former inmate.

Most of the inmates are Bloods. They smuggle drugs and cell phones into the Bordentown prison and extort protection money from other inmates. Corrections officers rarely bother inmates belonging to the gang; some even abet their crimes - and a few are Bloods themselves.

That's according to sworn statements given to a state official by an unnamed inmate who said a group of Bloods there held a glass shard to his throat, threatened to kill him, and forced him to pay about $300 in protection money.

A video of his testimony was shown as part of a five-hour statehouse hearing yesterday on a 20-month investigation revealing the ease with which incarcerated gang members exploit vulnerabilities in New Jersey's prison system.

The State Commission of Investigation found that despite hundreds of arrests in recent years that sent gang members to prison in record numbers, they were freely organizing crime from their jail cells. Weaknesses in the way prisons handle inmates' financial accounts and visitation policies, along with a small group of corrupt corrections officials, have allowed gangs to retain their power even with key leaders behind bars, investigators found.

Law-enforcement officials, SCI investigators and inmates (by video) testified yesterday to the agency's commissioners. The commission is expected to release a full report with recommendations early next year, and the state Department of Corrections already is enacting some reforms, the commission said.

The current system is "ripe for abuse," SCI Special Agent Kenneth Cooley told the commissioners. Gang members "can operate in the same fashion inside the prison system that they operated in outside the prison system," he said.

The investigation focused on the growing ranks of the Bloods in state prisons. Commission figures show Bloods went from 34 percent of incarcerated gang members in January 2004 to 51 percent in July 2008.

"These are horribly violent, evil people operating at a sophisticated level," said Gary Hilton, former deputy commissioner of the Department of Corrections.

New Jersey prisons have become recruiting grounds for the Bloods. Inmates who join the gang there usually stay gang members when they return to society, SCI officials said.

One inmate jailed for drug possession, for instance, was forced to join the Bloods while he was in prison, following an initiation in which four men gave him a broken nose and black eye, according to testimony shown at the hearing.

The reason he joined: "You really don't have a choice, because you are surrounded by them all day."

Stressing that most corrections officers perform a tough job well, investigators said a small number have been smuggling cell phones and drugs in for the Bloods either because the Bloods paid them off or threatened - often subtly - their families with violence.

Cell phones are one of the gangs' most potent weapons in prison, and they are a hotter item than drugs, sometimes going for as much as $1,000, officials testified. Gang members use the phones, smuggled in by visitors or prison officials, to call inmates in other prisons or gang members on the street to coordinate or order crimes.

Analyzing confiscated cell phones, investigators found that calls were going out across the state and the country, including to Los Angeles, where the Bloods gang took root in the 1960s and '70s. Inmates also have gamed the prison telephone system, in one case holding a six-way conference call that included inmates at other prisons.

Another concern: the state prison system's lax policies on inmates' financial accounts, according to officials. Each inmate has an account, in which money comes from friends and relatives or is earned through prison labor. But prison business managers approve almost every inmate disbursement, even when the ostensible purpose is suspicious, according to testimony.

And it is too easy, officials testified, for anyone to walk in and drop off a money order for an inmate's account. The SCI's investigation uncovered that between fiscal years 2004 and 2008, inmates at all 14 state prisons received $63.8 million in their accounts.

Some is money they extorted from inmates or their families. The inmate who was threatened at the Wagner facility in Bordentown, for instance, said he was forced to send money to an address given to him by the Bloods. The reason he gave prison officials: paying fines in Pennsylvania.