Inquirer: Inmates sifting through trash is an ongoing problem
A Concerned Facebooker posted on her page recently a complaint about inmates on city garbage trucks tearing open bags and going through her trash and her neighbor's.
She included a video which is taken at such a distance that it's hard to tell exactly what's going on, but we'll put it with this column on our website.
Prisoners take our garbage in Columbus. Today I happened to notice it taking them super long to move along, so I peeked out the window. they were busting open my garbage bags and sifting through them on a tray made out of a blue tarp and a board. I saw one guy bust open a small grocery bag that had bathroom garbage in it, he started playing with my USED tampon as if it were a marionette. If They found something they liked, they saved it in a coffee can on the corner of the truck. After seeing this, I began recording. I feel very uncomfortable with them going through my trash and opening my garbage. Not only are they saving our garbage, but they are taking so much extra time to get the job done. They were in front of my house looking through our neighbors and my garbage for at least 5 minutes. Truck #6996. I called the city, they said a supervisor will call me back... Let's see if that happens.
Posted by Brianne Marie Cercone-Jackson on Monday, November 16, 2015
"Today I happened to notice it taking (inmates) super long to move along, so I peeked out the window," she wrote. "They were busting open my garbage bags and sifting through them on a tray made out of a blue tarp and a board. I saw one guy bust open a small grocery bag that had bathroom garbage in it, he started playing with my USED tampon as if it were a marionette."
Eww.
"If they found something they liked, they saved it in a coffee can on the corner of the truck," she wrote. "I feel very uncomfortable with them going through my trash and opening my garbage. Not only are they saving our garbage, but they are taking so much extra time to get the job done."
She said she took down the number of the truck and reported it to the city.
"They said a supervisor will call me back. Let's see if that happens."
Pat Biegler, director of Public Works, said in such cases, her department investigates the situation and if they find evidence of the inmates going through trash, they report them to the warden at the county prison, and they will be disciplined.
It is "absolutely" against the rules for them to go through trash, Biegler said, but it happens more than you'd think.
"It's more common than we'd like," Biegler said. "They're usually looking for medications, cigarettes and alcohol."
Drivers are responsible for stopping the inmates from poking through the trash, but from the cab, the driver can't see everything the inmates are up to behind the truck, BIegler said.
The drivers are also supposed to get down and walk around the truck to look for contraband once an hour. But if the inmates are up to something and see the driver climbing down from the cab, they can hit the compactor to get rid of the evidence.
"It's one of the challenges of working with inmates," Biegler said. "Inmates being inmates, that's what they do."
Another problem, though it's less common, is for people to intentionally leave inmates contraband in the trash, whether it's alcohol, tobacco and even cell phones.
"I heard of one guy getting a hamburger and a beer," Biegler said. "That's a felony, by the way."
It doesn't sound like the city will be able to completely stop some inmates from scavenging, so it's probably a good idea to run any papers that have personal information on them through a shredder before tossing them into the trash. But I wouldn't run personal hygiene products through there.
Seen something that needs attention? Contact me at 706-571-8570 or mowen@ledger-enquirer.com.
This story was originally published November 22, 2015 at 10:17 PM with the headline "Inquirer: Inmates sifting through trash is an ongoing problem ."