COLUMBUS – Federal prosecutors say a South African woman was the brains behind a scheme to smuggle dozens of packages containing drug-soaked sheets of paper into prisons in Ohio and elsewhere.
According to a criminal complaint, Tanya Baird purchased synthetic K2 and suboxone from China, soaked the drugs onto legal paperwork, and mailed the paperwork in packages to individuals in the U.S. who then provided them to inmates.
Baird, 46, was arrested Thursday as she arrived at John Glenn Columbus International Airport and appeared in federal court later that day, according to the office of Kenneth Parker, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio.
According to court documents, Baird allegedly mailed at least eight packages, each containing 30 pieces of saturated paper, to an inmate in an Ohio prison in June 2021.
She has been charged with importing controlled substances, a federal crime punishable by up to 20 years in prison.
A message was left with attorneys who represented Baird at her initial court appearance.
Authorities say an individual in the U.S. received packages from Baird containing privileged legal documents that had been saturated in K2 and the individual would then send the documents into Ohio prisons and receive payment from inmates, which was then forwarded to Baird via CashApp or PayPal, Parker’s office said.
In total, Parker says import records showed 69 packages being sent into the U.S. between June and August of 2021, 34 of which were destined for prisons in Ohio.