Drugs continued to flow into Virginia prisons amid pandemic, raising concerns about corrupt staff

By
Ned Oliver -
May 24, 2021

For years, prison officials in Virginia have focused on visitors as they sought to crack down on the flow of drugs and contraband to incarcerated people.

They strip-searched children, banned menstruating women from wearing tampons and limited the number of people prisoners could put on their visitors list.

So when the coronavirus pandemic hit, halting all in-person visitation for more than a year, did drugs suddenly become scarce behind bars?

Not really, according to data tracked by the Virginia Department of Corrections. The records show the rate of positive drug tests ticked up while the number of drug seizures and overdoses dipped only slightly.

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Total drug seizures logged by the department went from 967 in 2019 to 871 last year, when visitation was cancelled 10 weeks into the year as the pandemic began. That represents a 10 percent drop, but it also came as the department saw the number of prisoners it was housing fall nearly 20 percent.

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