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Rikers Officer Charged With Selling Pot, Placebos To Inmates
By
Garth Johnston
Published Oct 4, 2012
Modified Oct 4, 2012
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By
Garth Johnston
Published Oct 4, 2012
Modified Oct 4, 2012
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Is it shocking when a prison guard is arrested for selling drugs to inmates? No, it (and worse) happens. Still, you'd expect them to know better at this point. Which brings us to 38-year-old Lashar Williams of Brooklyn, a 13-year-veteran of the Department of Corrections, who is being charged with taking bribes from and sometimes selling drugs to inmates on Rikers Island. Guess his base salary of $76,488 wasn't enough?
According to the New York City Department of Investigation, it appears that Williams has been smuggling drugs into the Anna M. Kross Center (AMKC) on Rikers since at least the start of the year. According to "covert operations" in both February and March he brought $200 worth of weed into the Center, at which point the DOI got wind of his side gig. So:
In April 2012, the defendant provided two suboxone strips (a drug used to treat opiate addiction) to an inmate in AMKC for $100; and on a separate occasion in April, the defendant received $700 and a delivery of pills purported to be oxycontin that were actually placebos, which he then smuggled into AMKC.
Yup, placebos. The man was busted for selling pot and placebos to inmates.
Williams now faces a 27-count indictment that includes charges like bribe receiving in the third degree, promoting prison contraband in the first degree, criminal possession and sale of a controlled substance in the fifth degree and receiving reward for official misconduct in the second degree. Before his indictment Williams was transferred to the Transportation Division on Rikers Island where he was prohibited from inmate contact. He has now been suspended without pay.
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department of corrections
Lashar Williams
placebos
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Rikers Island
Garth Johnston
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