On a recent visit to Cook County Jail, a woman from Country Club Hills attempted to smuggle in contraband that ran afoul of the law in a starkly unglamorous fashion. Detained and charged is 47-year-old Nakeisha Andrews, who authorities report was caught with drug-soaked paper hidden within her clothing—a ploy to quietly breach the prison's boundaries with narcotics. WGN-TV notes that the deputies had been tipped off about the possibility of the illicit exchange, and upon her arrival on August 29, Andrews was thoroughly searched.
What was extracted from her person was no ordinary stationery; rather, it was an 8 x 10 piece of paper, wrapped in plastic and saturated with heroin and fentanyl. This comes at a time when officials are imploring the public to reconsider the lengths to which they go to smuggle such substances into penal institutions. FOX 32 Chicago reports that the Cook County Sheriff's Office has had to significantly ramp up the scrutiny of what comes across their threshold, with 59 charges filed this year alone in relation to possession or smuggling of drug-soaked paper.
Andrews now faces a Class 1 felony for her actions—a severe indictment that Cook County is not taking lightly. Testing by the Illinois State Police forensic lab was able to irrefutably confirm the presence of the potent drugs on the recovered contraband. It was on October 30 that Andrews found herself in the custody of sheriff’s investigators, her brief exchange with the law leading to an October 31 initial court hearing where she was ordered released from custody while pending trial.
Amidst this challenge, the office of Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart is working diligently to prevent further breaches of this nature. Dart's office is facing a persistent battle to not just only stem the flow of drugs into the facility but also uphold the sobering responsibilities that come with the custodianship of those within the jail's confines. "Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart says his office has filed 59 charges this year related to the smuggling or possession of drug-soaked paper at the jail," reports FOX 32 Chicago.
