With Cigarettes Banned In Most Prisons, Gangs Shift From Drugs To Smokes

With tobacco products now banned by the federal Bureau of Prisons and the majority of state prison systems, the price of a single Marlboro inside now reaches twenty dollars. A policy intended to produce health benefits and reduce fire risk has created a cash cow for prison gangs like the Mexican Mafia and Aryan Brotherhood, and the guards willing to work with them.

By utilizing the smuggling methods developed to bring in heroin and other drugs (and aided by the ease of purchasing cigarettes on the outside) the gangs ensure prisoners can get a smoke anytime they want—if they are willing to pay the price. A pack of Newports or Camels can cost $200 while a pouch of rolling tobacco, like Bugler, which sells for a couple of dollars in the free world, can earn an enterprising inmate hundreds.

“When I first came into the feds in the ‘90s, cigarettes were used as money,” a prisoner tells The Daily Beast. “Let’s say you want a piece of chicken, that was one pack. Some weed or hooch to get you lit might set you back 2 or 3 cartons. That was how we did business.” With generic brand cigarettes sold in commissary for about a dollar each, packs were an effective unit of currency. “But when they outlawed tobacco in 2004, we started using stamps as money in here… Now if I want to buy a Marlboro or Newport to smoke, it’s like three books of stamps.”

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