2 face new drug smuggling charges
An Eau Claire couple already accused of trying to smuggle a Suboxone-laced letter into the county prison face new charges for the same crime.
Matthew N. Ford, 30, and his girlfriend, Jamie L. Uber, 32, were arraigned Monday on the latest charges: smuggling and conspiring to smuggle a controlled substance into the Butler County Prison.
County Detective Tim Fennell filed the cases Friday, less than two weeks after he filed similar charges against the pair for using the same scheme.
Uber in both cases worked from the outside, sending letters disguised as legal correspondence into the prison. The mail was intended for her inmate boyfriend.
Ford has been jailed since Feb. 4, 2016, when he was booked for a parole violation stemming from a prior burglary conviction. Six months later, he was caught possessing Suboxone in prison and charged. He is awaiting trial in that case.
In the recent case, which involved authorities monitoring calls between Ford and Uber, prison officials on Jan. 9 intercepted a suspicious envelope.
The letter was addressed to Scott W. Braden, another inmate with ties to Uber, according to court documents. The envelope had the return address of a Pittsburgh attorney.
But the attorney, when contacted, told investigators that Braden was not a client and that he never sent any mail to him or to the prison.
During the investigation, Fennell said, Braden, 34, of Meadville, Crawford County admitted that he knew Ford was receiving Suboxone through the mail from Uber for 10 months.
Suboxone is a narcotic-based drug prescribed to treat addiction to heroin and powerful painkillers such as oxycodone. It comes in thin strips, which dissolve under the tongue.
“Braden stated that Ford 'sells' the Suboxone for $80 worth of commissary apiece,” according Fennell's affidavit. “Ford usually cuts them into quarters and sells them for $20 in commissary.”
Braden also acknowledged that on two previous occasions he had paid $300 to Uber on the outside in return for Suboxone that he claimed she smuggled into the prison for him.
Guards last month turned up three full Suboxone strips in an envelope that was under his mattress, documents said.Braden, who has been in the prison since July 11, 2016, after Butler police arrested him for driving drunk in a stolen minivan, is also awaiting trial on a charge of possessing Suboxone in prison.In an interview Wednesday he also told detectives that Ford had previously advised him to “keep his eyes open” for a letter that would be coming to him. That letter, allegedly from Uber, was to contain Suboxone.When Fennell on Jan. 11 checked the contents of envelope, he found it contained several pages apparently describing the county's drug court. A closer look revealed Suboxone strips hidden in between pages that had been glued together.Just a week earlier, detectives turned up 15 Suboxone strips hidden in the pages of a letter that came in an envelope, presumably sent by Uber to her boyfriend.The return address on that envelope also was bogus, documents said, and showed the name of a different Pittsburgh attorney. That attorney also told investigators that Ford was never one of his clients.District Judge William Fullerton arraigned both defendants. He added an additional $50,000 to Ford's bail.Fullerton also revoked Uber's $5,000 bail that she posted after the first set of charges. She is back in the county prison, this time on $50,000 bail.
