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8 pages for “what happens if i get caught with a phone”

1. Drugs and contraband this is the one
   For the one going in / faq
   • Testing, phones, and getting paid in the wrong currency > What happens if I get caught with a phone?

     You go to the SHU for at least thirty days and you get a shot. You will likely lose phone privileges for at least thirty days on top of that. The written version is worse than the practical one. A phone is charged as possession of a...

   • Testing, phones, and getting paid in the wrong currency > What happens if I fail a UA?

     I never had one, so this is secondhand. It is a shot (a disciplinary write-up), with the usual sanctions attached — good time, privileges, potentially the SHU (solitary). Enforcement is uneven. Officers know perfectly well that tests get...

   • Testing, phones, and getting paid in the wrong currency > What if someone owes me and pays me in dope?

     Don't take it. You have just converted a money problem into a contraband problem, and the sanction for the contraband is now yours rather than theirs. Tell them to pay you on the books next commissary. This is one specific case of a...

2. Sentenced, waiting for designation probably this
   For the one going in / before you go
   • Getting your affairs in order > Digital

     This is the one that ruins people, and almost nobody warns you about it. Turn off two-factor authentication anywhere you can, or move it off a device you will not have; print recovery codes and leave them somewhere physical; give someone...

   • Getting your affairs in order > Legal and administrative

     Taxes, including the years you will be gone; mail forwarding to whoever is handling your affairs; benefits, insurance, and anything requiring annual re-enrollment; licenses and certifications that expire, and what reinstatement requires;...

   • Getting your affairs in order

     Everything in this section is a deadline. Work from the assumption that once you are inside, you cannot fix any of it, and the person handling it for you may become unavailable — through illness, distance, a falling out, or simple...

3. The economy maybe this
   For the one going in / while youre in
   • What it costs if it goes wrong

     Running a store, gambling, and bartering are all prohibited acts under the disciplinary code, notwithstanding that they are ubiquitous. Possession of contraband is treated considerably more seriously, and possession of a phone most...

   • Services

     The same warnings apply inside as out: paying non-lawyers for legal work. Phone minutes (your monthly phone allowance). Monthly phone time is capped, and people who do not use theirs sell the remainder. This is one of the more common...

4. Inmate Security Designation & Custody Classification maybe this
   Tools and rules / program statements

   • or utilized the telephone to communicate threats of bodily injury, death, assaults, or homicides; or utilized the telephone to conduct significant fraudulent activity (actual or attempted) in an institution; or leader/organizer who...

5. Phones, mail, and communication long shot
   For the one going in / faq
   • When the call will not go through > What if someone won't accept my calls?

     Then they will not accept your calls. There is nothing to do about it and it will hurt. Everything else

   • Minutes, limits, and the meter > What happens if I burn through all my phone minutes? Can I just buy more?

     Unofficially, yes, and men who do not use theirs sell the remainder. It is one of the most common transactions on the compound. There is measurable risk in it. Use of another inmate's account is a prohibited act, so understand that you...

   • Minutes, limits, and the meter > Can I three-way a call?

     Don't. It is a prohibited act, the system is specifically listening for it, and it is one of the easier things to get caught doing. Do not discuss it on a recorded line either, which is every line.

6. The economy at a low long shot
   For the one going in / security levels / at a low
   • Contraband phones

     Contraband phones exist at lows and they are expensive — substantially more than at a camp, often by a large multiple. Renting time on someone else's is the more common arrangement and considerably cheaper than owning one. The sanction...

   • Phone minutes and packs

     how you get around it, and it is unremarkable. One note: these arrangements are among the few that routinely cross the sex offender line, since the transaction is administrative and nobody has to sit down together. That is understood and...

7. Information and trust long shot
   For the one going in / while youre in
   • The telephone game

     The telephone game is played constantly in prison and it is played badly. Information moves fast, arrives distorted, and gains detail as it travels. Something you said quietly to one person in January will come back to you in March as...

   • Written material is not private

     Electronic messages (the inmate email/phone/money system, all monitored) are monitored and stored. Mail is inspected. Phone calls are recorded. And anything sitting in your locker — letters, notes, a journal — can be read during a...

8. Designated, counting down long shot
   For the one going in / before you go
   • Phones and messaging, tested in advance

     Phone time is capped monthly and calls are cut off automatically at a set duration. The monthly allowance has changed more than once in recent years; confirm the current figure rather than trusting anything you read online, including...

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