New cases of attempted aerial drops of contraband into prison grounds have been thwarted on both sides of the Atlantic, with police in the UK and Canada moving fast to confound illicit drone activity within restricted jail airspaces.
As DroneDJ has reported in the past, use of drones to deliver prohibited items including drugs, tobacco, and smartphones into prisons has been on the rise around the world in recent years. Indeed, the illegal ferrying of contraband has expanded to become a constant plague for correctional authorities – fueling the growth of booming black market jail economies, and sparking periodic explosions of violence between competing inmate operators.
Read more: Illicit drone delivery of contraband to global prisons soared in 2022
The first recent case of that illegal activity arose in Canada in late August, with a pair of would-be contraband delivery pilots caught as they sought to fly a drone over the Collins Bay Institution prison in Ontario. Police alerted to the flight apprehended the two suspects in possession of what was described as a large payload of tobacco, marijuana, and hashish.
The two were booked on various charges – including attempted distribution of contraband to a correctional facility – but not before they helped inch up the drone stats at Collins Bay. According to official figures compiled by the Canadian Broadcasting Company, the prison was the scene of 99 attempted or successful UAV deliveries last year alone.
Though one of Canada’s hottest jails in terms of UAV drops, Collins Bay is just one of the scores of the country’s prisons and detention centers battling the rising traffic of drone delivered contraband . Though authorities last year promised $6 million in preventive tech, reports indicate those assets have only been installed in a single Quebec penitentiary – which is still testing the solution to boot.
Read: Report on contraband drone drops to a Canadian prison offers peek into wider global scourge
The second incident took place across the Atlantic near the UK’s Erlestoke Prison in southern England, where cops staged an arrest of three people in the wee hours of September 1.
The trio was nabbed after throwing a drone from their car as they sought to escape arriving police, who’d been alerted to a package dropped earlier into the Erlestoke grounds suspected of containing contraband.
Read: $2.6M (in drugs) will get you 31 (years) for illicit drone deliveries to UK prisons
Comments from local law enforcement authorities did not provide information on what illegal substances or quantities may have been involved.
Still, use of a drone for suspected contraband deliveries to a relatively modest and calm facility like Erlestoke offers an idea of the far greater and increasingly audacious operations that have become recurring events at larger UK prisons.
“Officers have done an excellent job in locating and seizing a drone and arresting three individuals so quickly after receiving the initial call,” said Sgt. Steve Edwards of the Wiltshire Police Volume Crime Team. “Conveying prohibited items into a prison will not be tolerated and we take reports like this seriously. We have a positive and proactive relationship with colleagues at (UK prisons) and we will continue to work closely with the staff there as part of this investigation and to prevent further incidents of this nature taking place.”
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