Alabama: After a technical glitch, the Marshall County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) website erroneously indicated that over 7,000 detainees and prisoners were released from the County lockup in Guntersville on May 31, 2026, leaving just 11 in custody. WHNT in Huntsville said that the jail actually holds about 300 in a space built for just 193, though the MCSO is halfway through a two-year, $35 million expansion. Sheriff Phil Sims quickly issued a public clarification and apology via Facebook, blaming the error on the website provider’s database host.

Alaska: Former Alaska Department of Corrections (DOC) guard Jalooni Blackshear, 43, was sentenced to 150 years in prison on June 2, 2026, for murdering his 35-year-old wife, Raechyl, and 14-year-old daughter, Jayla. The Anchorage Daily News said that Jayla reported her father for sexual abuse just before he fatally shot both her and her mom in the head in April 2022. The guard then used his dead wife’s cellphone to text her surviving children that “mommy missed them.” As he fled to New York, Blackshear submitted a resignation letter to the DOC.

Arizona: Newly hired Maricopa County Jail guard Emmanuel Reyes Carreon, 37, was arrested by Chandler police on May 28, 2026, and booked into custody on suspicion of child sex trafficking, a Class 2 felony. According to the Arizona Republic, Reyes Carreon messaged the social media account of a 15-year-old and arranged to pay $100 for sex. The account belonged to an undercover Chandler cop, however, who found him waiting in his vehicle at the designated meetup site with the cash and a male enhancement pill. He had only recently graduated from the detention academy in April and was assigned to the Lower Buckeye Jail in Phoenix. Following his arrest, the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office placed him on paid administrative leave.

Arizona: A video released in mid-May 2026 from the Arizona State Prison Complex in Lewis showed a guard beat-down of prisoners, which was also the subject of a lawsuit filed in state court later that month. KNXV in Phoenix said that a guard’s use of force to sanction a prisoner for an untucked shirt touched off the incident, which escalated when tactical units from the state Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Re-entry (DCRR) deployed chemical agents and pepper balls against non-violent prisoner bystanders. One of them, prisoner Kelly Lipsey, suffered a concussion, permanent memory loss and blurred vision. An internal DCRR review found the initial use of force was unnecessary and faulted the unnamed guard, a sergeant, for failing to de-escalate the situation. A total of 30 prisoners filed suit in state court on May 26 alleging that the unprovoked attacks, targeting predominantly Black prisoners, were racially motivated, according to their attorney, Benjamin Taylor of Taylor & Gomez, LLP, in Phoenix.

California: A judge granted a temporary restraining order (TRO) against an unnamed state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) guard on May 27, 2026, after rapper Daystar Peterson, 33, said that he was threatened with transfer to a more dangerous housing yard at the California Men’s Colony. He is serving a 10-year sentence for shooting fellow musician and former girlfriend Megan Thee Stallion in the foot, telling her to “dance, Bitch!” According to court documents obtained by USA TODAY, the guard’s threat was issued to Peterson, whose real name is Tory Lanez, in retaliation for a $100 million lawsuit he filed against CDCR officials over a near-fatal 2025 stabbing. The TRO restricts the guard’s contact with Peterson/Lanez, also mandating that prison staff preserve all related video, logs and electronic communication. Stallion, whose real name is Megan Pete, now 30, recovered from the injury, which occurred outside at a party at the home of reality TV celebrity Kylie Jenner in 2020.

Connecticut: A cell shakedown at Cheshire Correctional Institution ended in a melee that left six state DOC guards injured on June 1, 2026. The Manchester Journal-Inquirer reported that prisoner Sherod Hackett, 29, stormed a guard station after an altered hot plate was confiscated from his cell, punching two guards in the face and injuring four others who rushed to intervene. Four of the six guards required emergency hospital treatment. None was named. Hackett was charged with second- and third-degree assault, breach of peace and failure to provide fingerprints. State Correctional Ombudsman DeVaughn Ward promised to investigate “how one incarcerated person, publicly listed as 5-feet, 9-inches tall and approximately 160 pounds, allegedly injured six correctional staff members where no weapon has been reported.”

Florida: On June 1, 2026, the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida sentenced former federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) guard Karen Torres, 50, to a year and a day in federal prison, WFTV in Orlando reported. She had pleaded guilty on February 4 to charges of receiving a bribe as a public official, after she admitted taking $43,550 in payments from prisoners to smuggle contraband, including marijuana, cigarettes, and “K-2” synthetic marijuana, into the Federal Correctional Complex in Coleman between May 2022 and March 2025. Torres was ordered to forfeit the full amount in bribes that she took and pay a $100 special assessment. See: United States v. Torres, USDC (M.D. Fla.), Case No. 5:25-cr-00135.

Georgia: The Sumter County Sheriff’s Office (SCSO) arrested a guard at the County lockup after a shakedown uncovered cellphones, cigarettes, and makeshift weapons on April 21, 2026. Javian Blake, 29, now faces felony charges for operating a lucrative black-market ring behind bars, WGXA in Macon reported. Investigators determined that he purchased the contraband and smuggled it into the lockup to sell to detainees for profit. His felony charge—providing prohibited items to incarcerated individuals—carries a mandatory 10-year prison sentence. The SCSO said that additional arrests were expected as the investigation continued.

Georgia: On June 3, 2026, a federal jury acquitted two former Augusta State Medical Prison guards accused of criminal negligence in the death of mentally ill prisoner Thomas Giles. The former guards, Robert Roberson and Marcus Phillips, were found not guilty of violating the constitutional rights of the mentally ill prisoner, who died from smoke inhalation on October 28, 2020. Their 2025 indictment accused them of leaving the 31-year-old locked inside his cell to die in a smoldering fire that he had set. But jurors cleared them of the charge. Roberson was also acquitted of falsifying a logbook to conceal the incident. See: United States v. Phillips, USDC (S.D. Ga.), Case No. 1:25-cr-00054. Giles’ estate sued and reached a $5 million settlement with the state DOC in November 2023, as PLN reported. [See: PLN, June 2024, p.52.]

Georgia: Former Dade County Jail Cmdr. Joseph William Chambers, 52, was arrested and charged with theft by conversion and violating his oath of office on June 4, 2026, WKWN in Trenton reported. A routine review of jail financial records revealed “concerning purchases” that he had made with county funds, prompting Chief Deputy Tommy Bradford to request a Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) probe on May 28. Following the GBI’s preliminary findings, Chambers was fired on June 1 and booked into his own jail three days later after his arrest.

Kentucky: A former BOP guard at the Federal Medical Center (FMC) in Lexington faces up to 20 years in prison after pleading guilty on May 19, 2026, to deprivation of a prisoner’s civil rights and falsifying reports. The Lexington Herald-Leader reported that Ryan Carnahan, 32, admitted to entering a Special Housing Unit cell in June 2025 during an argument with the unnamed prisoner inside, slapping him and returning punches when the prisoner—who was unrestrained— retaliated. Carnahan then fabricated a disciplinary report that falsely claimed the prisoner slipped out of handcuffs to attack him. BOP investigators unraveled that yarn, however, leading to the charges against him and his guilty plea. See: United States v. Carnahan, USDC (E.D. Ky.), Case No. 5:26-cr-00050.

Louisiana: After tipped-off Iberville Parish sheriff’s deputies searched her car parked outside the Elayn Hunt Correctional Center (EHCC) and recovered marijuana, state Department of Public Safety and Corrections (DPSC) employee Denyshia Williams, 25, was arrested on June 5, 2026, WBRZ in Baton Rouge reported. The amount was minuscule—1.7 grams of pot inside a plastic baggie. Nevertheless, Williams was jailed on a $10,000 bond and charged with introducing contraband into a prison. She was also promptly fired by the DPSC, which didn’t say exactly what her job had been at the prison.

Louisiana: Another EHCC guard, Jaunya Spiller, 30, was arrested on June 15, 2026, after a routine screening upon arrival at work turned up an extra cellphone and drug-laced paper that tested positive for cocaine, both apparently bound for prisoners. WAFB in Baton Rouge said that DPSC investigators also uncovered a loaded firearm inside his vehicle. Spiller’s tenure lasted barely three months after he was hired as a cadet in March. He is the fourth employee at the prison arrested for smuggling contraband this year.

Louisiana: Four East Baton Rouge Parish Prison guards were federally indicted for orchestrating a campaign of violence at the jail, The Advocate reported. Two former supervisors, Cpl. Kenyaki Domino, 29, and Cpl. Lionel James, 30, along with training officer Aaron Johnson, 29, and guard Darius Powell, 24, were charged with civil rights abuses, conspiracy and witness tampering. Prosecutors allege the guards escorted handcuffed, unresisting detainees to surveillance camera blind spots, where they staged brutal assaults. In one bizarre instance, a detainee was repeatedly struck with a metal folding chair. The violence was concealed with falsified incident reports until investigators discovered conspiratorial text messages that the group shared. A fifth former guard, Christian Morris, 29, pleaded guilty on June 2 to failing to intervene during the assaults. See: United States v. Johnson, USDC (M.D. La.), Case No. 3:26-cr-00073; and United States v. Morris, USDC (M.D. La.), Case No. 3:26-cr-00057.

Maine: According to the Bangor Daily News, a former high-ranking DOC official was sentenced to five years in prison on May 12, 2026, for his role in a massive, decade-long kickback scheme. As PLN reported, Gerald Merrill, 64, the former deputy superintendent of Mountain View and Downeast prisons, pleaded guilty in March to using state-issued credit cards to charge nearly $2.4 million in goods and services from Florida vendors controlled by co-conspirator Melanie High between 2014 and 2023. Nothing was ever delivered, though, and High kicked back most of the money to Merrill’s personal accounts. [See: PLN, Apr. 2026, p.11.] In addition to his prison term, Merrill was ordered to pay $502,130 in restitution. High received a six-month jail sentence on June 8, plus two years of probation and a $100,000 restitution order.

Massachusetts: The former deputy superintendent at the Norfolk County House of Correction in Dedham, Tom Brady, 54, pleaded guilty on June 10, 2026, to federal charges of witness tampering and using interstate facilities to commit bribery and extortion, the Boston Herald reported. Brady admitted to coercing subordinate maintenance staff at the jail to perform work at his private home during jail hours. After one vulnerable employee reported that he complied out of fear of retaliation, Brady sent a phony letter to misdirect investigators from the State Ethics Commission, falsely signing it as the whistleblower. The FBI ultimately foiled the attempted cover-up by matching his fingerprint and DNA to the envelope’s stamp. At sentencing, Brady faces up to 20 years in prison, three years of supervised release and a $250,000 fine.

Mississippi: WDAM in Moselle reported that Forrest County Jail guard Ryan Donivan Lich, 28, was arrested while clocking in for work on June 10, 2026, and taken into custody by cops from Covington, Louisiana, on felony charges including indecent behavior with a juvenile, child grooming and computer-aided solicitation of a minor. Forrest County Sheriff Charlie Sims immediately terminated Lich’s employment. The arrest concluded a joint investigation involving Mississippi and Louisiana authorities, after they caught the guard making an online solicitation of a child who was actually an undercover cop. Lich was booked into the Lamar County Jail before being extradited to Louisiana, where the “victim” lives and the crime allegedly took place.

Nevada: A jailer with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department (MPD), Quincy Brown, 34, was arrested and booked into the Clark County Detention Center on May 21, 2026, KVVU in Henderson reported. An unnamed woman reported seeing a man masturbating in a car that cops traced to Brown, finding his cellphone video camera recordings of prostitution transactions and sexual acts involving unsuspecting women and minors. A South Tower Bureau guard employed by the MPD since 2017, Brown was suspended without pay. He was being held without bail on 17 charges, including 10 counts of soliciting or engaging in prostitution, six counts of open and gross lewdness, plus one felony count of open and gross lewdness in the presence of a minor.

Nevada: High Desert State Prison’s 2026 death toll climbed to 11 on May 8, 2026, when two prisoners died hours apart, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported. The Clark County coroner said that Jonathan Latorre, 38, succumbed to multiple stab wounds, ruling the death a homicide. That same day, John A. Garcia, 21, died in an apparent suicide. Latorre was transferred to the prison in February 2026 to serve a 10-and-a-half-year sentence for possession of a stolen credit card and attempted lewdness with a child. Garcia was serving 12 years for home invasion and conspiracy to commit robbery. Nevada DOC spokeswoman Teri Vance confirmed the fatalities.

New Hampshire: According to Foster’s Daily Democrat, former Strafford County House of Corrections guard Patrick Schaeffer, 44, was sentenced to one year in jail on June 12, 2026, after pleading guilty to three misdemeanor counts of official oppression. His plea agreement let Schaeffer evade more serious felony charges for sexual exploitation at the Dover lockup. As PLN reported, multiple prisoner allegations against him went nowhere until former detainee Jennifer Duckworth, 39, went public in April 2023 with her claim that he coerced sex from her with bribes—including extra peanut butter. An investigation was launched, leading to charges against the former guard, who now lives in Texas, that he abused his authority to solicit sexual favors from detainees and demanded that they expose themselves for his gratification.

New Mexico: Over 100 guards from the Bernalillo County Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in Albuquerque packed a County Commission meeting on June 9, 2026, as their union, Local 2499 of the American Federation of State and County Municipal Employees (AFSCME), presented a no-confidence vote with 1,000 signatures against Warden Steven Kai Smith, the Albuquerque Journal reported. The move followed a violent May 7 incident in which detainee Stewart Artis, 38, held two unnamed guards hostage in a shower with a shank that he then used to assault an unnamed fellow detainee before additional guards arrived and subdued him with pepper spray, KOAT in Phoenix reported. Despite pressure from the AFSCME, County Manager Cindy Chavez maintained her support of Smith, telling the station, “I’m not letting him go.”

New York: Former state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS) guard Jonah Levi was sentenced to 25 years in prison on May 27, 2026, for the fatal beating of prisoner Messiah Nantwi at Mid-State Correctional Facility in March 2025, WSTM in Syracuse said. As PLN reported, Levi was convicted by a jury the month before of manslaughter, gang assault, conspiracy, and offering a false instrument for filing, for his role in Nantwi’s killing. Co-defendant Caleb Blair, 28, agreed to accept an 11-year sentence when he pleaded guilty to first degree manslaughter in May. Another co-defendant, former guard Francis Chandler, 24, was sentenced the same month to four years in prison for his guilty plea to a gang assault charge. A fourth co-defendant, former guard Thomas Eck, pleaded guilty to filing a false instrument to cap his upcoming July sentencing at one year in jail. [See: PLN, June 2026, p.41.]

New York: Another former DOCCS guard, Sgt. Glenn Trombly, was sentenced to two years in jail on May 27, 2026, for his role in the fatal beating of prisoner Robert Brooks, 43, at Marcy Correctional Facility in December 2024, according to Advance Local Media in Syracuse. The 20-year veteran admitted that he stood by and failed to intervene during the assault, later directing subordinates through multiple drafts of phony use-of-force reports to “get their stories straight.” Trombly pleaded guilty to falsifying business records and reckless endangerment. He also testified about a “beat up squad” at the prison in exchange for the short cap on his sentence. Trombly is one of 10 former guards convicted in Brook’s slaying, as PLN reported. [See: PLN, Feb. 2026, p.46.]

New York: On May 16, 2026, DOCCS guards discovered another Marcy prisoner bleeding and unconscious in a bathroom. WHEC in Rochester reported that Terry DeMonstoy, 45, was taken to hospital and placed on a ventilator in the intensive care unit, where he died two days later. He was serving a brief sentence for grand larceny and was just three weeks away from his scheduled release. State Police and the Office of state Attorney General Letitia James (D) suspect that he died in an altercation with a fellow prisoner and are investigating the incident as a homicide.

North Carolina: A state Department of Adult Correction (DAC) guard recently retired from the Western Correctional Center for Women was jailed on May 27, 2026. WLOS in Asheville reported that James Allen Mathes, 66, was arrested after a month-long probe uncovered a sexual relationship that he maintained with an unnamed prisoner. The investigation was triggered by a complaint made under the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA). It was referred for criminal prosecution, and Mathes was charged with a felony sexual act by a government employee.

North Carolina: According to WITN inGreenville, former Pender Correctional Institution guard Lt. Rannie Lee Boney, 48, was arrested by the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) on May 27, 2026, on felony charges of embezzlement by a public official, obtaining property by false pretense and uttering a forged instrument. She is accused of forging timesheets to claim almost $35,000 in unearned pay between March 2024 and November 2025. She was jailed on a $20,000 bond. It was unclear when she was separated from employment with the state DAC.

North Carolina: Two Rockingham County Jail guards were charged with felonies on March 16, 2026, for an assault that left an elderly prisoner hospitalized, the Raleigh News & Observer reported. After they were asked to look into the incident by County Sheriff Sam Page, SBI agents determined that guards Jonathan Montanez-Figueroa, 35, and Damion Matthew Gage Brown, 20, engaged in a violent altercation with the unnamed prisoner, 71, who suffered injuries requiring emergency hospital transport. Both guards were arrested and charged with felony assault inflicting serious bodily injury. Their bail was set at $250,000 each.

Ohio: As of March 19, 2026, Lorain County Jail guard Lori Blaze, 42, faces six misdemeanor charges, including conducting an improper search, obstructing official business and falsification, WOIO in Cleveland reported. The charges stem from a warrantless November 2025 cavity search that she conducted on a suicidal prisoner, whom she targeted over an unauthorized bar of soap, which is sometimes used to coat cell windows. Jail surveillance and an audio recording captured the guard as she commanded the detainee to “squat and spread” his buttocks for the search. County Sheriff’s Office Inspector General Ryan Kolegar stated that Blaze subsequently examined the prisoner’s genital area—in blatant violation of Ohio law, which requires a warrant for cavity searches—and then falsified reports in an attempted coverup. Kolegar also reported that the bar of soap was subsequently found stuck to the bottom on the prisoner’s bunk.

Oregon: An internal security breach exposed tens of thousands of sensitive files at Oregon’s largest prison for months before it was discovered during a sexual misconduct investigation into Demetre Gennette, 37, a former library worker at the Snake River Correctional Institution. The Oregonian reported that he executed an unauthorized “data extraction” in July 2025, and by the time it was discovered during the January 2026 misconduct probe, Gennette had illicitly accessed over 33,000 files totaling 7.5 gigabytes of data. He was terminated by the state DOC on January 5 and charged on June 5 with aggravated first-degree theft, first-degree official misconduct, second-degree custodial sexual misconduct and supplying contraband.

Pennsylvania: The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania announced that former BOP guard Michael Jefferson, 43, was sentenced to 360 months in prison on May 18, 2026, followed by 10 years of supervised release. Jefferson pleaded guilty in December 2025 to aggravated sexual abuse and deprivation of rights under color of law, stemming from a July 2024 incident in which he entered the cell of a prisoner at the Federal Detention Center in Philadelphia and forcibly assaulted her—leaving her injured, as PLN reported. [See: PLN, July 2025, p.67.]

Pennsylvania: The fatal stabbing of detainee Tyrone Good, 44, at the Allegheny County Jail (ACJ) on May 13, 2026, triggered the suspension of an unnamed guard, KDKA in Pittsburgh reported. Good was assaulted by multiple fellow detainees less than an hour after being transferred to a new housing unit. The unnamed guard on duty was placed on unpaid leave and escorted from the lockup. County Jail Oversight Board member Bethany Hallam warned that a steady population surge since 2020 has compromised jail safety. Once incarcerated herself at ACJ, she demanded aggressive jail population reductions.

Pennsylvania: For a brazen smuggling attempt at the U.S. Penitentiary in Lewisburg, James Hampton-Smith, 38, was sentenced to 15 months in federal prison on May 15, 2026, The Daily Voice of Chambersburg reported. Guards using thermal imaging technology one night in August 2024 observed Hampton-Smith scaling the prison’s perimeter fence wearing a “ghillie suit,” a form of camouflage clothing designed to mimic foliage like grass, twigs, and leaves. When they recovered a duffel bag he left on the recreation yard, it contained a haul of contraband, including cellphones, vape pens, cutting tools and synthetic marijuana. Hampton-Smith, with a prior criminal record including drug offenses, conspiracy to commit first-degree assault and burglary, is now serving time at the Federal Correctional Institution in Fort Dix, New Jersey.

South Carolina: The state DOC recently fired and arrested two guards for taking bribes from prisoners, The State reported. Former Manning Reentry/Work Release Center guard Allyssa Jasso, 29, was arrested on May 29, 2026, and accused of accepting $2,500 via cellphone from a prisoner. She faces nine counts of bribery, misconduct in office and computer crimes. Three weeks earlier, former Turbeville Correctional Institution guard Laura Leigh Patterson, 32, was charged with bribery, misconduct, computer crimes and securities fraud for allegedly accepting $18,743 from a prisoner between 2020 and 2021. Both former guards were then released—Jasso on a $50,000 bond and Patterson on a $2,500 personal recognizance bond.

Texas: Former Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) guard Diamon Dunn, 28, was sentenced to 10 years in prison on May 28, 2026, for her role in a smuggling operation at the Boyd Unit, KLTV in Tyler reported. Dunn was arrested in August 2025, as PLN reported, after meeting an undercover officer at a Tyler gas station and—while still wearing her TDCJ uniform—accepting 71 grams of methamphetamine, along with a $2,500 cash payment to smuggle the contraband into the prison. [See: PLN, Oct. 2025, p.68.]

Washington: Former Spokane County Jail guard Drew Seiffert, 35, was sentenced to six months in jail on May 15, 2026, for his guilty plea to second-degree custodial sexual misconduct. Seiffert admitted to coercing an unnamed detainee to have sex with him between October and December 2022, according to The Spokesman-Review. Another detainee who witnessed it alerted supervisors. Though the victim claimed the acts were consensual, prosecutors successfully argued that Seiffert violated public trust and posed a safety risk to the jail’s population.

Wisconsin: Former state DOC guard Brandon Jeanpierre, 35, was sentenced to two years in prison and five years of community supervision on April 9, 2026, for sexually abusing a prisoner at Oshkosh Correctional Institution. According to the Wausau Pilot and Review, the unnamed victim said that Jeanpierre groped him inside a cell and forced him to have oral sex in a laundry room. The guard pleaded guilty to third-degree sexual assault after DNA evidence sustained the allegation. Noting that the victim complied for fear of retaliation, prosecutors persuaded Winnebago County Judge John Jorgensen to reject Jeanpierre’s requested jail sentence in favor of prison time, to deter other guards from exploiting their power imbalance against prisoners.

Wisconsin: On May 29, 2026, Dodge County Circuit Court Judge Brian Pfitzinger slapped a $500 fine—but no prison time—on former state DOC guard Lt. Brandon Fisher, 31, whose negligence contributed to two prisoner deaths at Waupun Correctional Institution, the Wisconsin Law Journal reported. As PLN reported, Fisher and eight other staffers, including former Warden Randall Hepp, were arrested in June 2024 on felony charges stemming from the dehydration death of prisoner Donald Maier, 62, and the fatal stroke of fellow prisoner Cameron Williams, 24. Both died the year before during a 15-month-long lockdown, when guards failed to enter their cells and conduct vital welfare checks despite urgent medical warnings. Two others charged also got off with minor fines—$500 for Hepp, 64, and $250 for former guard Sarah Ransbottom, 36. [See: PLN, July 2024, p.36; and June 2025, p.40.]  

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