CLEVELAND, Ohio – A Northfield man is facing several federal charges, accused of sending drug-infused letters to inmates at a federal prison in South Carolina.
Frank Gordon III, 64, of Northfield, appeared in court on Thursday on charges of conspiring to supply and possess prohibited objects in federal prison; conspiracy to distribute and possess with the intention of distributing controlled substances and analogues of controlled substances; two distribution counts for a controlled substance; and two distribution counts for a controlled substance analogue.
Shawn Gilreath, 45, a prisoner at the Federal Correctional Institute in Edgefield, SC, is facing the same charges, according to prosecutors in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern Ohio District.
Gordon pleaded not guilty on Thursday and was released on $ 20,000 bail. Gilreath will make his first court appearance on March 23.
Court documents say Gordon occasionally sent Gilreath drug-infused letters at the Edgefield prison in exchange for payments. The letters were full of drugs like synthetic cannabinoids, the documents show. Payments were generally hundreds of dollars.
The letters could be divided into smaller pieces and ingested or distributed to other inmates, court documents show. Gordon is accused of sending several of the letters to Gilreath and other prisoners between March and December 2020.
The investigators seized the letters and found that they were infused with drugs. The letters had the return address of Gordon’s home in Northfield, the documents show.
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