ST. LOUIS, MI — A prison food worker is accused of smuggling drugs after five St. Louis Correctional Facility inmates were found with heroin, cocaine, marijuana and tobacco, according to the Associated Press.
A Corrections Department spokesman confirmed the arrest Monday to the Detroit Free Press and said the Aramark Correctional Services worker was turned over to the Michigan State Police and is expected to face charges.
He told the newspaper that 39 packets of drugs and tobacco were found in a series of searches, the AP reports.
An Aramark spokeswoman declined comment.
St. Louis Correctional Facility houses male Level IV prisoners age 17 and older, according to the Michigan Department of Corrections.
The prison sits on 67 acres of land in the northeast section of St. Louis in Gratiot County and consists of separate buildings for administration, food services, education, maintenance, storage and prisoner housing, the department of corrections said.
There are six general population housing units and one segregation unit that houses up to 96 prisoners.
It's at least the second case of an Aramark employee being accused of smuggling drugs since the Philadelphia-based company began a $145-million contract with Michigan in December, the AP reports.
A former food services worker pleaded guilty Friday, June 13, for attempting to smuggle packages of marijuana into the G. Robert Cotton Correctional Facility in Jackson in March.
Russ Marlan, a spokesman for the Michigan Department of Corrections, confirmed to MLive.com in June that 71 Aramark employees have been placed on "stop orders" banning them from entering correctional facilities for violations of prison policy.
The state fined Aramark almost $100,000 in March for contract violations, including "overfamiliarity" with inmates and unauthorized changes to menus.
The Michigan Department of Corrections later canceled the fine months before the Snyder administration announced another $200,000 fine for the private prison food vendor.
The union representing the state's corrections officers, the MCO-SEIU, has also alleged the Aramark workers have endangered the safety of prisons through inappropriate behavior with inmates.
— Brad Devereaux is a public safety reporter for MLive/The Saginaw News. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and Google+