Jury Convicts Former Corrections Officer of Bribe-Taking, Destruction of Evidence and Attempted Smuggling of Contraband

John E. Murphy, Acting U.S. Attorney announced that this afternoon in Midland, a federal jury convicted 21-year-old Jacob C. Guzman of Pecos, Texas, a former prison guard at the Reeves County Detention Center, of accepting bribes, attempted destruction of evidence and attempted smuggling of contraband to federal prisoners.

Guzman faces up to 15 years in federal prison when he is sentenced on August 29, 2009.

Testimony at trial established that on two occasions in 2008, Tennessee relatives of a Reeves County Detention Center inmate wire transferred a total of $600 to Guzman in Pecos, in exchange for Guzman’s agreement to smuggle cell phones, tobacco, and mp3 players into the facility, where they were illicitly disseminated to inmates. Federal rules prohibited all of those items inside the facility.

In 2008, the Reeves County Detention Center exclusively housed federal inmates pursuant to a contract with the Bureau of Prisons.

On September 10, 2008, Guzman was discovered to have several pouches of tobacco safety-pinned inside his pants when he entered the facility to begin a shift. When the contraband was discovered, Guzman fled to the men’s room, and attempted to flush the tobacco down the toilet before it could be seized as evidence by security personnel.

The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Department of Justice—Office of Inspector General and security officials with the Reeves County Detention Center. Assistant United States Attorneys John S. Klassen and Sandy Stewart are prosecuting this case on behalf of the Government.

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