The Orleans Parish Sheriff is looking back at her first 100 days in office, and she says one of her biggest challenges has been sniffing out contraband in the Orleans Parish Jail.
"We've arrested a couple of people (and) employees who have been bringing contraband into this agency," Sheriff Michelle Woodfork said to WWL's Newell Normand. "If you bring contraband into this jail, I will arrest you no matter who it is."
Woodfork says her office has entered into a partnership with intelligence firm Bancroft Global to help track associations and connections between contraband smugglers and others inside and outside the jail.
"We don't want to simply just find drugs after they enter the facility: we want to identify that network that's moving those drugs and to stop it," Woodfork said. "It helps track associations and connections. Who is communicating with whom, and how those relationships connect inside and outside the facility."
Woodfork says this resource helped her track down suspects when she worked in the Orleans Parish District Attorney's Office. She believes it's a resource that will help her deputies immensely, especially as they combat an opioid epidemic that Woodfork says is impacting New Orleans and many of her inmates.
"This gives our intelligence and our investigative teams just another tool just to identify those connections and develop leads and work without law enforcement partners to take action," Woodfork said.
Woodfork told WWL's Newell Normand that anyone she catches bringing contraband into the jail or helping someone smuggle illegal items into the jail will face the full force of the law.
"I'm not just arresting just for news stories or to scare anybody. I'm doing this because I want to see you brought to justice," Woodfork said. "If you bring contraband into my jail, I'm not only going to arrest you, I'm going to see it fully through a conviction."
