Cell phone smuggling is major concern at state prisons

By Eric Woomer, Visalia Times Delta -- Gang members are using cell phones to orchestrate crime from behind the walls of California's most secure prisons, law enforcement officials say.

Cell phones have been smuggled into prisons via cereal boxes, shoes and body cavities, officials say. Sometimes they're broken into pieces and reassembled by prisoners.

"Cell phones have become the contraband of choice, California Corrections Secretary Matthew Cate said last year.

State Attorney General Edmund G. Brown Jr. said this week that gang members in Pelican Bay State Prison use cell phones to relay orders to Nuestra Familia associates on the outside. Some of those associates are in Tulare County.[continue reading...]