Original subtitles

[Tavon]

Baltimore City detention center...

Contraband, crime, gang issues.

Inmates could order violence out on the street.

We needed eye witnesses to the crimes being conducted.

[informant] Not just anybody. Can work with FBI.

[woman]

If you ever pick a wrong confidential informer, your whole case is gone.

Tavon was not shy to order violence.

He knew that she was weak

and he'd move right in.

We would have physical relationships in his cell.

He used them to remain the leader.

When we make enough money, I bought me a new car.

People were panicking, time was running out.

[Sarah] So much work needed to be done at that jail

to fix the deep rooted corruption that was going on there.

[informant] Everyday I prayed, it would be peace.

So, you had to do the takedown all at the same time.

[officer] Baltimore City police!

I'm Special Agent Sarah Lewis.

[narrator] This isFEDS.

[gunshots]

[Wendell] July 2007,

a horrible crime of murder occurred in Baltimore.

[Margaret] I just wish I was taken by somehow with me.

[sobbing] It's one thing I just wish so much.

[Wendell] Carl Lackl was a devoted 38-year-old father of three

who was shot and killed in his driveway

in what was probably one of the most horrific crimes to occur at that time.

He should have never died that way. [sobs]

That was a terrible way to die.

He was not a likely victim.

There were no criminal ties

that would make him a target of anyone

related to this type of activity.

The shooting happened in the Rosewood section of Baltimore City.

It's a quiet residential community.

We're not accustomed to having this level of violence occur

in that neighborhood.

So, people were alarmed.

What could bring someone to that neighborhood

to commit such a horrible crime.

There were no witnesses or suspects

identified at that time.

Just people responded

to apparent gunshots.

Police learned that Carl Lackl was a witness

to a homicide that occurred in Baltimore City.

In March 2006, Carl Lackl

was walking home to an alley.

He witnessed an actual shooting of a young man.

[gunshot]

[Wendell] He notified the police.

And he waited with the victim,

rendered aid to the victim as best as he could.

But subsequently, the victim died.

[siren wailing]

[Wendell] Carl assisted the police in the investigation.

And he also was able to get a description

of the shooter in that case.

Which ultimately identified a suspect, Patrick Byers.

And so, Patrick Byers was subsequently arrested and charged

in that murder case.

He became an inmate,

awaiting trial in Baltimore City detention center.

Carl Lackl planned to testify in that case.

But Mr. Byers found out

Carl Lackl's identity and where he lived

by the way of the defense witness list.

And a few days before he was scheduled to testify...

[gunshots]

Carl Lackl was shot and killed in front of his home.

I was his mom.

I gave birth to him.

And I should have had the right to hold him.

This was somebody who witnessed a crime,

was willing to testify and he got killed for it.

Sent shockwaves to a lot of people.

[Wendell] Was this the beginning of a trend

of violence coming to that community?

People were panicking and concerned about their own personal safety.

The police determined

that the shooting of Carl Lackl

was orchestrated by Patrick Byers, the suspect,

using a cellphone that he had

in his possession in the detention center.

Quite frankly, the correctional system

quite simply failed the public.

And exposed the public to threats

that ordinarily you would not expect them to be exposed to

at the hands of our inmate population.

So, my job was to find out what was wrong and to fix it.

But never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined

the level of misconduct,

the level of corruption.

The problem is we identified it was much larger than what we could have handled.

We needed a federal investigation.

I was formerly a high school teacher

and I taught science.

I was at my friend's wedding.

I was a bridesmaid

and retired special agent was one of the groomsmen.

And he said, "Why don't you go in the FBI?"

And I told him,

"They don't want me in the FBI. I'm a high school teacher."

And he said, "Sarah, they love high school teachers.

You're organized and you have leadership skills."

I had never shot a gun before.

I had never arrested anybody.

But I put in an application

and ten months later, I left for Quantico.

I got on to this Maryland prison task force

and was working with this senior agent

who was looking at the corruption throughout all of these prison systems.

We kept hearing over and over again

about the Baltimore City detention center.

That that was kind of the epicenter of trouble

that was happening at the time.

There was contraband smuggling, violence and gang activity.

Commissioner France was in charge of BCDC.

He said, "We need help.

There is pervasive corruption going on in the Maryland prison system.

And we need reinforcement."

So, I went to my supervisor

and I told her I wanted to open my own investigation.

I wanna focus on BCDC.

I was very excited to have my first investigation.

Just like reading the first page of a book.

You open the book and you

start the investigation and you don't know

where the story is gonna take you.

When I first started working this case, it was just me

and I had never been in a prison before.

I had a very minimal understanding,

so it was a new project for me to learn.

There was people being shot

based on what was happening in the jail.

I was not happy

to assign one FBI agent

and then expect that FBI agent

to manage this complex investigation.

Seemed sort of like an insult.

Mind you, I was wrong.

[Sarah] Pretty soon, it was apparent

that this case was needing more help from the squad.

And so, a task force officer was placed on to the squad

from the Baltimore City police department.

I was a correctional officer for 20 years and I retired from that.

And then, I was working for the Baltimore police department in 2012.

This jail case came up

and because I had knowledge of the jails,

by working on the jails,

I was requested to work on this case.

I never worked at BCDC.

I worked at another jail.

But I thought I knew everything

that was going on in the jail

until I went up there.

[Sarah] Commissioner France had told us that

one group of officers there were involved in contraband smuggling.

It was very shocking.

These were people who had state jobs

and had taken an oath to follow certain rules.

Your initial reaction is to go

and, you know, arrest the people

or to stop what they're doing.

But our focus on this investigation was to really

make a difference and to figure out the big picture.

So, our initial goal is to identify who was involved

and how were they making this possible.

One of the challenges of working

a jail investigation

is the ability to gather evidence.

So, it was really important in this case

that we form an ally with somebody that

had insider knowledge of the prison.

We needed first-hand information.

We needed eye witnesses

to the behavior, to the crimes being conducted.

But we knew that we had players that where working inside the jail.

And if they found out that investigation had been started,

it just would have imploded.

It would have just been catastrophic.

I identified a member of senior correctional staff

to serve as our informant

inside the jail system.

She was an independent spirit, sort of,

she was a loner.

You could never be sure. There was just no way.

But it was because I believe that she had those qualities

that I thought she was the best person to approach.

In 2012, I worked as a senior correctional staff

for the Baltimore City detention center.

I raised my right hand

in front of many people,

saying that I will protect,

serve the people

of the community.

When you raise your hand and you swear,

you're swearing to God.

You know, and that's who I live for.

And I honestly believe,

there's no one else that would have taken a oath

to do what I did the way that I did it.

Commissioner France had gathered some people together

in a big area.

And I remember him calling me out

and he wanted to speak to me.

And he asked me about being

on a prison corruption task force with the FBI.

I was overwhelmed.

Not just anybody can work with the FBI.

He put rules in front of me, regulations in front,

I'm gonna follow to the letter.

Say for instance, I come across my best friend in this investigation,

I'mma deal with you the same way I deal with anybody else.

[Sarah] When we first met with the informant,

we had to build this relationship together

where we learned to trust each other.

[informant] I don't trust many.

I don't.

I have my reasons because I put my life on the line everyday.

So, what I do, I just can't open myself up to everybody.

[Sarah] So, it was initially a slow going relationship,

but I would say, after we met a few times

we realize that it was the perfect match.

[informant] Once I was in it and I realized

how many people were actually in danger because of these individuals,

that I felt like,

I did the right thing, I made the right choice.

The informant's role was really to explain to the investigators

how the operation really functioned.

Who were the participants?

So that we knew who the targets were.

[informant] If by any chance,

you appear to be compromised to me,

I watched you like a hawk.

I did.

I distance myself

because I wanted to make sure I didn't become your target.

[Wendell] She placed herself in jeopardy.

She was taking the risk

that none of the rest of us had taken.

[informant] It was a little hard for me,

but I always pretty much tried to

stay focused,

keep my ears and eyes open,

so I can hear what was going on,

see what was going on.

It was rumored that a female officer had a tattoo

on her body

and it was an inmate's name.

And it was Tavon White's name.

It kinda blew me because

who puts an inmate name tattooed on your body.

[Wendell] Tavon White was being held in a pre-trial status,

waiting trial for an attempted murder.

I was hoping the corruption wasn't as bad as we were being told it was.

But when we understood that inmates were having sex with the officers,

we realized that it was absolutely worse.

I was absolutely incredulous

to learn that correctional officers

had inmates' names tattooed on 'em.

Absolutely incredulous.

[Sarah] If you're willing to enter into

a romantic relationship with an inmate,

you've lost your authority over that person.

They now, you know, know that you're willing to bend the rules.

[informant] This is when we start

looking into Tavon White,

trying to figure out who was this guy.

[Sarah] We wanted the informant of the jail

to do cell searches

or people searches on the officers

to find out more about what was happening inside of the jail.

[informant] I remember

one day, my job involved me to have to go

with my partner

to investigate the allegation of an officer in Tavon White cell.

My partner stands at the top of the tier

and I go to Tavon White's cell,

but he's not in it.

So, as I'm looking at his cell and I asked other inmates.

I said, "Where's White?"

And they was like, "Why?"

So, as they question me, they're actually walking up in my direction.

From the bottom of the tier and from the top of the tier.

My partner is still standing there.

He's telling these guys, like, "Stand down."

These inmates were still coming.

No correctional officer can really protect me.

So, out of nowhere, Tavon White appears

and tell these guys to stand down.

And immediately, they stood down.

I've seen him face-to-face.

This guy said one word

and the whole tier...

the whole tier

was silent as if he there was no man on the tier.

I knew he was somebody important. I knew it.

Because that silence spoke volumes.

[Sarah] When we opened up the BCDC investigation,

our original goal was just to look at the correctional officers

and their corruption.

But the more that we learned, the more we discovered

how important Tavon really was to that facility

and the way that it was being run.

Without him that jail would not have been that way.

So, it was very important to learn as much as we could

and gather as much evidence as we could against Tavon.

[Wendell] We know that Tavon White did not have anything to do

with the murder of Carl Lackl.

But believe me, Tavon White had the same capabilities

that Mr. Byers had

in the detention center of Baltimore City.

[Mike] 2012, Baltimore was like any major city in United States.

There were some gang problems.

And gangs just aren't in the street.

Gangs transfer into the jail

and they kinda inter-mix.

The group that seemed to have a chokehold on out system

was the Black Guerilla Family.

BGF, the Black Guerilla Family originated

in the California correction system.

They started off really as an organization

that was created to protect

Black and African-American prisoners.

They advocated for the inmate's rights.

They protected them against suppressive

or White supremacist organizations.

Sale of drugs in prisons was something

that was not part of the BGF philosophy when they were first founded.

But the reality for me and what I saw

was quite different.

They were about extortion,

assault, murders.

Sexual assaults.

Sale of drugs, distribution of contraband.

I consider them a very violent criminal gang.

[Sarah] Tavon was the leader of the Black Guerilla Family

at BCDC.

He was appointed by somebody from BGF

who had left the prison

and they put him in charge.

[informant] I started doing my own research

to figure out exactly what I've got into.

Exactly how do I

remain at least a couple of steps ahead of these guys.

I never really knew what I was getting into

until I actually got deep into it.

Not how violent they could be,

not how they would not even care to take a life.

And it's like nothing to them,

like, putting your pants on in the morning.

And they still could sleep at night.

[Sarah] One of he problems with BCDC was its location.

It was located in the center of Baltimore City.

But it's also sandwiched between four different housing projects.

Many of the employees that worked

at Baltimore City detention center

were from that area.

So, they knew the inmates before they were arrested.

Whether it was from high school

or whether it was from the community.

The inmates would know a lot about these individuals.

They also would know where their families lived.

So, if the inmates wanted something and the officer wouldn't comply,

they would threaten them

and offer threats against their families as well.

[informant] When I would get to work,

I would prepare for everything.

What if the lights go out?

What if there's a blackout in the jail?

What do I do?

In UNA, you have to survive.

Because when you go behind those prison walls,

it's not a guarantee you're gonna come home.

[Wendell] From the informant,

I knew that Tavon White had power in the jail system.

I knew that Tavon White was able to order violence.

He was a dual threat.

He posed a threat to our institution

and he posed a threat to the community.

[Sarah] It was just one example of how

important this case really was to stop violence

either on the street or within the jail.

[Wendell] Informant was able to identify

the officers who had inappropriate relationships with Tavon White.

And it was presented to me that Katera Stevenson had a relationship

and that we would have to modify her working assignments

without disclosing to her that we knew.

I mean, there's really no excuse.

There's really no excuse.

It was a disgrace to the uniform.

'Cause all you are to me

is an inmate in a wrong uniform.

There's no way I feel comfortable with somebody

wearing the same uniform that I'm wearing,

but your whole goal

was to have sex with an inmate.

I did have a tattoo at one time with Tavon's name on there.

I used to have Tavon's name underneath here.

I end up coming to work in corrections

because I just need a job.

It was a job that you can get with no...

Just with a high school diploma, no college

and they'll hire you right away.

And so, I was like, "Okay, I get a good job. I'm 20.

And it had benefits, it have a long-ending career."

That's what I thought.

Usually, when you have a sexual relationship with an inmate,

you're using the cell by yourself

and they'll put a sheet up

or the coat up at the grilling.

Another inmate will be looking out to make sure no one's coming around.

And another correctional officer will make sure,

like, no supervisor

or no one else is coming on the section.

We learned that there was not just sexual relationship

between Katera Stevenson and Davon White,

it was a business relationship as well.

[Katera] When I first met Tavon, he was actually quiet.

His presence when you're in Tavon's presence, like,

when he talk, it's just like, he talks like...

I'm not gonna say like a father, but like someone in authority.

I just started doing business with him.

First time I thought about bringing stuff into the jail

and I actually did it because

I had messed up on my check and I was short

and I needed to pay my rent.

I was thinking about at that time,

making sure me and my son had somewhere to live in.

I just was thinking, "Oh, I gotta do something fast

and just make sure that we're okay."

I knew that it was a need and supply work,

so I just went to the store,

I bought a $39.99 bag of tobacco.

And I just bring it in a solitude somewhere.

I wasn't pressured to bring anything in.

I did it at my accordance when I wanted to do it.

Once you sell it in the jail,

it either doubles or triples at price.

Bag of tobacco, depending on the ounces,

cost me between $29.99 to $39.

You can make, like, $400-$600 off of $40.

I mean, one week I made enough money, I bought me a new car.

We realized that the correctional officers and the inmates

had formed this strong teamwork system.

They were so inter-linked with each other,

we couldn't separate the two.

So much work needed to be done at that jail to fix the deep-rooted

corruption that was going on there.

[Mike] When you have inmates that are locked up and behind bars,

we knew we had to have a wait to hear what they were saying.

And to get that connection between them and the officers.

So, we would listen to jail calls.

-[man] Hello. -[man 2] Yeah, that's what...

Because we didn't have the ability to go in the jail

and walk around and talk to people,

these jail calls were huge source of information.

They were crucial.

[man on phone continues indistinctly]

[Mike] Every inmate call was recorded.

I could just log on and plug in an inmate's number

and listen to his jail calls.

[man] It is a nice car, but I like the Honda Civic.

We wanted something that we'd consider what we call dirty calls.

When you're talking about somebody smuggling drugs in.

Anything of that nature that could help us

move the case along.

-[man] Hello. -[man 2] Hello.

It was literally, literally...

hundreds of hours of jail calls that I listened to.

[man continues indistinctly over phone]

Felt like I was just spinning wheels,

that I wasn't gonna get anything.

[man continues indistinctly over phone]

-I'm going out. -[man chuckles]

The confidential form of sub course was giving us information all along.

And at some point in time,

we were told that Kimberly Dennis

is somebody we should probably take an interest in.

Because they heard that she was bringing in contraband.

Kimberly Dennis was just a regular correctional officer

who had pretty much the round of any section she wanted to go on.

Once we got the information about Kimberly Dennis,

we ran that number through the system,

then we started hearing inmates call her on that number.

[dial tone]

-[Kimberly] Hello. -[man] Hello.

[Kimberly]

[Mike] The very first...call

that I remember 'cause it was so distinct,

she was telling the inmate who made that call that she left

whatever it was she brought in, I wasn't quite sure.

But she left it in the cell.

They sounded just like two people on a street corner

that knew each other forever. "Hey."

You know, their terminology, "Hey, yo. I got the stuff.

I left it in the cell with New York."

"Okay, cool. Appreciate that."

I was so excited, I think I probably jumped up out of my seat

and ran to tell somebody,

"Hey, we got our first really good dirty call."

[Wendell] My belief at first

was that how correctional officers had in fact

created their own criminal enterprise

and were profiting from it.

I did not understand that they in essence were acting on the behalf

of a larger criminal organization.

They were just conduits

for the BGF.

[informant] Tavon White, we just started

listening to his conversations and he had none.

He only had six calls

on inmate phone.

He already had been there for years.

That's unreal

for any inmate,

even not to attempt to try to make a call.

It led us to believe that he had a cellphone.

[Sarah] We knew that there were contraband cellphones within the jail.

And so, our goal was

to get to Tavon via his contraband phone.

[Mike] The FBI required a certain threshold before we could get a wire.

We had to get a number.

We had to get some dirty calls to it.

It was of an utmost importance that we get up on his phone

as soon as we could.

Because he was running the operation.

We identify Kimberly Dennis as a pretty important part in this case.

She was a key ingredient

to learn more about Tavon's operation within the jail.

So, we decided to do a wiretap on Kimberly Dennis

to get the evidence needed to get to Tavon's phone.

[man]

[Kimberly]

They spend a lot of time, especially, at the beginning on Kimberly.

Because she was doing something almost everyday.

And she had several people at the BCDC

who she was bringing stuff into.

[Kimberly]

[Sarah] We learned that there's many different ways

that the officers will bring the contraband into the jail.

For example, they'll hide it in body cavities.

They'll hide it within their clothing.

Or in their hair.

[Kimberly]

We also learned that BCDC was unique with their front entrance requirements

where the officers can put things in their shoes

or in their food

because those items were not scanned.

So, they could bring in a lunch box

and put a phone in there, set it on the table,

walk through the metal detector

and then, grab their lunch box on the other side.

[Mike] One of the wires that we were listening to,

we found out that Tavon's half-brother

was gonna meet one of the correctional officers

to exchange drugs.

So, she could smuggle them into jail for Tavon.

They gave a time and a location

where they were gonna meet to exchange the drugs.

So, we went out there as quick as we could.

Try to capture that.

And setup in a covert location.

Every time, Mike, you and I would go out,

something would happen, that was always an adventure.

Always seemed like they would meet somewhere where we could see 'em.

-[Sarah] Yeah. -Which was fantastic, I mean...

It usually ended up being right in front of our car.

-[Mike] Yeah, yeah. -[Sarah] No matter where we parked.

[Mike] One time that we actually watched the transaction,

she was in uniform, getting ready to go to work.

There's three or four steps that led up to his porch.

The officer stood down below him.

I just see him handing her something

and then, she put it in her back pocket.

Based on what we had heard on the wire,

we had to assume that that was the drugs

that she was gonna take in to the jail.

We were very pleased with how the whole thing went down.

It was wonderful. It was what we needed to prove

there was a racketeering enterprise going on in that jail.

[phone buttons beeping]

[dial tone]

-[man] Hello. -[Kimberly] Hello.

[Mike] Kimberly was like our conduit to a lot of different people.

She would lead us to one person to another

and she eventually led us to Tavon.

[Tavon]

[Kimberly]

[Tavon]

[Kimberly]

[Mike] Just based on that one call,

we knew that she was bringing in a lot of stuff

as she was making $2,000 in a week.

It showed that she was working with Tavon to bring stuff in the jail.

So, that allowed us to get a wiretap on his phone.

We were very excited about getting up on Tavon's phone.

That was the goal from the start of the wiretaps.

Listening to his phone

was really crucial to the investigation

if we wanted to uncover the full ring of people

involved in contraband smuggling.

But then, we were informed that Tavon was scheduled to be

moved out of the jail.

[Mike] The administration there,

other than Commissioner France,

knew that Tavon was a problem.

And that they knew he was running the BGF.

What they didn't know was,

we were doing a federal investigation.

Moving Tavon, really, would have pulled the plug on

a ton of work that had been done.

So, keeping Tavon at BCDC

until we finished our investigation

was critical.

We knew that if Tavon White go out of the prison,

somebody else would be in charge.

And we'd kinda have to take a step back and start over again.

[Wendell] Tavon should have been moved.

He had been held at the detention center

longer than he should have been.

But all the work

that we had done to this point

to build a case against him,

that would have been, almost a year's worth of work

down the tube.

We just couldn't afford to move him.

so, I talked to the court

to see when his new trial is gonna come up.

And I managed to orchestrate have him remain there.

We had to be as careful as possible

not to disclose what we were doing.

If he were aware that we were holding him

because we had an investigation,

there was a risk that they would retaliate.

Try to find out who the co-operators were.

And then, people would end up getting hurt or killed.

[Sarah] One of our primary goals at FBI is to

stop gang violence

and to make Baltimore a safer place,

so not only was this prison angle very important,

but if we could use Tavon's phone calls

to help stop violence out on the street,

I mean, that would just be another bonus of listening to his calls.

One day, a call came where Tavon was talking to his grandmother

that made me realize how broken things were inside of the jail.

[Tavon's grandmother]

[Tavon]

[Tavon's grandmother]

[Tavon]

[informant] Jennifer Owens was a correctional officer

who had a relationship with Tavon White.

And was currently pregnant by him.

[Tavon's grandmother]

[Tavon]

[Tavon's grandmother]

When I was pregnant, no one was surprised.

But me and Tavon stopped talking,

maybe when I was, like, three months.

I never was in love with Tavon.

I mean, I have a lot of love for him now.

Only because I have a child with him.

Other than that, I had never been in love with him.

[Tavon]

[Tavon's grandmother]

[Tavon]

[Sarah] You know, initially, there is some disbelief.

He had the ability to not only date one,

but four different correctional officers at a time.

So, it was very valuable evidence to show

the kind of hold that he had on these women

and how loyal they were to him.

Willing enough to become single mothers with his children

while he served out the rest of his time.

Tavon needed these girls to run his contraband operation

and he was manipulating them.

He used them like he used everyone else

to get what he wanted

and to remain successful as the leader.

[dial tone]

[Tavon]

[woman]

[Sarah]

[Tavon]

The call really brought out all of the problems within the prison.

[Tavon]

Tavon was in charge.

You heard it with your own ears.

[Sarah] Tavon was not shy to order violence on somebody

who was not obeying the rules or who was causing problems

or was bringing too much attention.

They would make threats against their family

or against the officer themselves.

[Tavon]

We knew that he was ordering and controlling things in the street

from the jail.

He was controlling the salt in the community

as well as in the prison.

[Tavon]

[Mike] He had people working for him that would

physically go out and get people if you needed 'em to go out and get 'em.

[Wendell] Tavon White had the capabilities

to create environment of fear and intimidation

back in the communities.

We would not wanna repeat a Carl Lackl ever again.

But the risk was very high.

If they're able to smuggle in

a number of cellphones and other types of contraband that they were getting in,

it was only a matter of time before they try to get a gun inside the facility.

One day I heard doing, like, one of these searches,

they have found a part of the gun.

But they didn't find the rest of the gun on one of the sections.

They got it out of the jail.

But I do think that the rest of the gun was somewhere else in the jail.

[gunshot]

[informant] Oh, my God.

If there was gun in the jail, one bullet...

and a gun is detrimental.

We don't have guns in the jail.

So, if a inmate have a gun in the jail,

it... that means we are already outnumbered.

[Wendell] The whole paradigm would change

if they were able to manage to get both pieces of a gun

and reassemble it once it's inside the facility.

If they had a gun, they would have a clear advantage

over our staff and over the facility.

It just reinforced that we were doing the right thing.

Tavon had perfected his ability to...

to reign in there.

I did feel time was running out.

The majority of the officers that we knew of that were smuggling contraband

were females.

Tavon White had the ability to find out what was going on

in their life at that time.

And found out how he could help that person.

In turn, the officer would become faithful to him.

[Tavon]

They were having pillow talk.

I mean, staff were talking to him about who's running things,

which shifts people work.

We needed to draw the investigation to a close.

Because of the risk that posed to the informant.

[Mike] The plan for this investigation was

to find as many officers that were involved in this corruption as possible.

Find as many inmates that were involved in this as possible.

Planning the arrest was a major undertaking

just based on the number of people that were being arrested.

25 people, 13 of which were correctional officers.

We needed to arrest the inmates,

the officerso n the outside, the players at the same time.

So that nobody could tip the person off.

So, there was a lot of pressure.

It seemed like it was yesterday.

Everything comes flowing back to you right away.

Once they called us and told us it was time to go,

we got in our vehicles and we rolled right down to Kimberly's apartment.

When we knocked on the door, we didn't get a response.

We heard talking, so we knew people were in there.

We'd consider a high-risk entry because

her boyfriend might have been armed.

So, we used the ram one time

and the door popped open and that's when we went in.

We're yelling for Kimberly to come out.

And then, her boyfriend ducked into the bathroom real quick

and tried to flush some drugs down the toilet.

Kimberly complied and she was pretty non-chalant.

I let her know then that this isn't the city,

and this isn't the state,

this is the FBI.

Her demeanor changed.

She just... There was no smile.

There was a blank look, like...

"What's gonna happen next?"

[siren wails]

[Katera] They came to my house.

They didn't make a whole bunch of noise

'Cause my neighbor had let them know that my two kids was asleep.

And they let me call my mother, come pick them up.

They let me put 'em in my mother's car.

Put their bags into my mother's car.

And then, they handcuffed me.

I actually felt relieved.

Because then, I knew, like, "Oh, I'm not gonna be doing this no more."

I just felt like...

[sighs in relief] You know what I mean? It's over now.

I wasn't expecting a court date that day but I do know that

one way or another, you're gonna have to reap

the repercussions from doing bad things.

Like, you have to answer to stuff that you do.

[informant] In the jail,

it was done wee, wee, wee hours early in the morning.

Cells was popped.

Went in.

They woke up to a flashlight in their face.

Someone was even caught with cellphones at their ears.

[Mike] There was, like, 20 or 30 of them.

They were lined up in the hallway.

And that's the first time I physically saw Tavon White from head to toe.

And I was amazed at how little he was.

How short he was.

You would think, he was like, 6'4", 280.

And he's maybe, 5'8", 5'9".

And I'm thinking, "How does this guy

run the BGF."

I just remember once we arrested the last person,

just feeling this really great sense of accomplishment.

I felt like I deserve to be at the FBI.

And it was just a really great feeling.

It was really exciting when we found out

that Tavon was one of the very first people

to offer to co-operate.

It was like a mini victory. Right?

Because he was the king of the castle.

And he was gonna come in and tell us the secrets.

[officer] Baltimore City police!

[Sarah] Based on the evidence that we got,

we were able to do a second indictment.

And arrest an additional 19 people,

14 of which were correctional officers.

[officer] Behind! Come on!

[Mike] I was so happy for her, proud of her that

all the hard work she did,

that we got the conclusion we were after.

You know, I'm sure I gave her a hug

'cause it was a long fight, but we made it.

In total, this investigation, we indicted 44 individuals

and 41 of those were found guilty or plead guilty.

Tavon White was sentenced to 12 years in federal prison

in 2015.

[Katera] I got a sentence to 24 months.

I have hit rock bottom.

But I definitely would not take back my past

because my past is who makes me who I am today.

I'm actually about to be in LPN program

to get my license in practitioner nurse.

I'm just working on a better me.

[informant] I took a lot of risk.

I mean, I've had threats made on my life.

But it didn't matter 'cause I did the right thing, I made the right choice.

End of the day, I'd rather stand for something

than fall for anything.

And I'm gonna stand for what I believe in.

[Mike] Sometime in 2015,

the governor commanded that BCDC to be shut down

and eventually, tore down.

And that's what happened.

My personal opinion was...

It needed to go because of what it represented.

So, I wasn't sad to see it go at all.

[Sarah] After this investigation concluded,

the Department Of Public Safety And Correctional Services

started major reform in Maryland.

Prior to this investigation,

phones in a jail were a misdemeanor

and afterwards, it became a felony with an automatic five-year penalty.

So, that was huge.

[Wendell] The homicide of Carl Lackl suggested

that we needed to shut down the use of cellphones

that were being used to intimidate,

threaten people back in the community.

And while we could not determine

if Tavon White was involved in ordering any homicides

from in the detention center,

this investigation created

a new awareness to the problem.

It really had a ripple effect

in helping to stem the tide of violence

both inside the prison system and back in the communities.