’60 Days In’ extends run with new undercover team

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Donna Thornton @GT_DThornton

Mar 8, 2020 at 3:21 PM

The big news from the “60 Days In” finale was this: It’s not the end.

The show, recorded in the Etowah County Detention Center last year, will have additional episodes from a second phase of the undercover operation: “Special Ops.”

Etowah County Sheriff Jonathon Horton said several weeks passed before producers put another group of undercover inmates in the jail. During the time between filming the sheriff’s office worked to address the problems divulged during the first phase, Horton said.

Horton met with producers after the three volunteer inmates who survived their 60-day stints in the jail had been pulled and debriefed in the show that was expected to be the finale, titled “Was It Enough?”

The sheriff’s response was mixed. Some of the inmates provided excellent intelligence, he said, but half seemed to be “fish out of water,” just appeasing themselves to do their time.

Of course, some of the originial seven fell “like flies.” One didn’t make it out of intake; another lasted a few days. Two more fell by the wayside after weeks in, and one was pulled eight days early because inmates seemed to have pegged her for what she was: a police officer participating in “60 Days In.”

The program’s salvation, Horton said, had been Fulton County, Georgia, corrections officer Tony, who came in late but was able to use his background in corrections and his commanding presence to gain good information for Horton and Chief of Corrections Keith Peek.

A new team of undercover inmates will go into the jail, with one familiar face. For the first time in the history of the A&E show, a participant will go back into the same jail. Tony will return to do another 30 days in the Etowah County Jail.

Along with Tony, participants will be an narcotics detective, the commander of the county jail, a firefighter with eight years experience in corrections and a retired police sergeant.

Episodes will continue, with “Special Ops,” set to air at 10 p.m. Thursday.

Speaking earlier this week to Downtown Gadsden merchants, Horton revealed the plans to continue the show. Episodes already had been recorded when the new team went in after allowing some time to work on the problems reported by the first group.

The sheriff had a spoiler.

“And you know what happened — they came out with a laundry list of other things” that needed to be done, Horton said.

That has been the value of the exercise, he said: Demonstrating the severity of the issues and giving an inside view on how some things should be fixed.

Horton said training for corrections officers has increased, and the X-ray machine being used to scan inmates has found contraband that would elude even a good patdown. Broken cell door locks have been fixed as have broken windows.

The jail annex is slated to open soon, and what was the Substance Abuse Prevention Program, reinvented as the Impact program, will be located there. Horton said he expects it to improve the success of the program.

As it’s been operated, inmates in SAPP would go to classes to help them stay off drugs, then go back into a jail population where drugs were easy to get.

“It was like running a drug rehab in a crack house,” Horton said.

Each of the remaining inmates was debriefed about what he or she learned in the jail.

Dennis was able to buy “ice” and a shank from other inmates. Peek and Horton looked at the shank; it was made from a construction nail.

“That’s from our renovation work,” Peek said.

Tony bought clone, cocaine, “ice,” a razor blade and two shanks by paying money for some things, trading commissary items for others. He flushed one shank to avoid discovery, the other he turned over to the sheriff. It was made from metal off a dust mop, Peek said.

After a big commissary purchase, Tony told them he made about $400 selling food to other inmates.

Dennis told them his cellmate brought in drugs, hidden in his “jail pocket.”

Jennifer told the sheriff she was not checked well at intake. Other female inmates come in with layers of clothing on, she said, and each layer contains drugs — enough to feed the addictions of many inmates.

While cell doors would lock, she said, one female inmate was able to squeeze water from a bottle into the locking mechanism and disengage it.

Tony stressed the need for better training and better equipment for corrections officers. He said after an inmate was stabbed, the CO didn’t spray anybody, didn’t cuff anybody and as far as he saw, didn’t call for backup. He said officers have to rely on training to deal with that kind of situation.

Equipment was another issue. “They don’t have enough stuff on that belt to do the job,” Tony said. He said he heard an inmate ask a CO why he didn’t spray someone. The CO took his can of OC spray and shook it, showing the inmate it was empty.

“Why would he tell an inmate it’s empty? Tony wondered.

With the special ops team, Horton expressed the hope in the finale that the new phase will provide more information -- not only that drugs are coming in, but exactly how it’s happening.

He said they expected the special ops team not just to observe and report, but “to get their hands dirty.”

When the jail’s involvement with the A&E show was made public, Horton said it was the ultimate transparency.

Without the information provided by cameras and the undercover inmates, he said he wouldn’t have known about activity that led to some CO dismissals and resignations.

Six corrections officers were terminated, Horton said, and 11 resigned. Most of those who left or lost jobs were involved in contraband, but at least one was found to have used excessive force with spray in the jail.

Another detention deputy violated policy by keeping inmates on lockdown, Horton said. Additional training is designed to prevent that now.

“We’re making COs do their jobs correctly,” he said.

After the additional episodes air, Horton said he plans to have an open house in the jail — to let people who have seen how the jail was to come and an see how it is now.