ZAMBOANGA CITY – The Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) has suspended the visiting hours at the San Ramon Prison and Penal Farm here for a week effective Monday to cleanse the facility of illegal drugs.
The suspension came after BuCor guards foiled an attempt by a 64-year-old woman to smuggle suspected shabu into the penal farm.
“It is one of the actions taken to check and cleanse the entire compound of illegal drugs,” Senior Insp. Edgardo Mendoza, the facility’s deputy superintendent for administration, said Monday.
BuCor guards arrested Aharayam Jaidi, 64, after she tried to sneak in some 2.7 grams of shabu packed in three heat-sealed plastic sachets worth PHP18,360 while visiting her husband at the penal farm around 5 p.m. Saturday.
Col. Alexander Lorenzo, Zamboanga City Police Office (ZCPO) director, said a lady BuCor guard discovered one of the three sachets hidden in the brassiere and the other two in the underwear of Jaidi.
She was placed under the custody of ZCPO Station 9 for proper disposition.
Jaidi’s husband is among the living-out convicts assigned to the handicraft-making section of the penal farm.
Mendoza said an investigation is underway to determine other convicts involved in the sale and use of illegal drugs inside the penitentiary. He said seven of the eight convicts subjected to an earlier drug test have yielded positive results.
One of the seven found positive for drug use was Jaidi’s husband that rose the suspicion of the jail authorities about the existence of the illegal drug trade in the facility.
Mendoza said the drug test was conducted after four of the eight were caught by their cell leader having a pot session.
As a consequence, Mendoza said the good conduct and time allowance of all those positive of illegal drug use was suspended for a year.
“That is a big loss for their supposed early release from prison,” he said, adding that all seven drug-using inmates are currently housed at the isolation detention cell of the penitentiary. (PNA)
