GREENFIELD — A woman was able to sneak two sandwich baggies full of pills containing methamphetamine into the Hancock County Jail after she was arrested, officials said.
Authorities didn’t realize the drugs had entered the jail until three days later, when they saw several other inmates who appeared to be high.
Now, Brooke Pegan, 28, Knightstown, who in the meantime had been released from jail as part of the county’s new pretrail release program for low-risk prisoners, faces new charges. She is back in jail.
Pegan had been booked into the jail on Dec. 31 on a meth-possession charge. Like all inmates who enter the jail, she went through standard search measures, which included a pat-down and digital screening, said Maj. Bobby Campbell, chief deputy of the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department.
Occasionally, images taken by the screening unit can be hard to read, particularly if the person reading the images might be new or doesn’t have much experience reading them. That is what happened with Pegan, Campbell said.
“Not everything is a big silhouette like a handgun,” Campbell said.
The sheriff’s department did not identify the jailer who handled Pegan’s screening.
According to court documents, this is what happened next: Days later, multiple women inside the jail tested positive for methamphetamine. One of them, Amber Jones, told officials Pegan had given her the drugs. According to Jones, when Pegan first came into the jail, she appeared to be under the influence of drugs. Jones figured Pegan wanted to sleep it off, so she offered Pegan a spot in her cell.
Pegan accepted and said she had come prepared, indicating she had drugs in her possession.
Pegan later distributed some of the meth pills to inmates, including Jones, who with others crushed the pills and snorted the drug. Jones said Pegan requested no money in exchange for pills.
Another inmate, Savannah Sturm, told officials she saw a woman going around passing out meth wrapped in pieces of paper to inmates in the block. Sturm said Pegan didn’t ask for anything in return and told Sturm they would settle up later.
In total, five prisoners tested positive for methamphetamine. But by the time officials found out about the issue, on Jan. 3, Pegan had already been released as part of the county’s new pretrial release program.
She was arrested again on Jan. 20. In addition to her pending charges, she now also faces two Level 5 felony counts of trafficking with an inmate and dealing in methamphetamine as well as a Level 6 felony charge of possession of methamphetamine.
The fact Pegan had smuggled drugs into the jail was not known until after she had appeared in court and was allowed to be part of the county’s new pretrial release program.
Pegan technically did not commit another crime while she was on pretrial release, but she was charged and arrested for the new crime, which makes her ineligible for pretrial release, said Wayne Addison, head of the pretrial release program.
Pegan is currently set to have a jury trial in July.
