2 more arrests made in drug smuggling scheme at the Harris County Jail

HARRIS COUNTY, Texas (KTRK) — Two more people were charged for their alleged roles in the drug problem plaguing the Harris County Jail.

Toney Jones, 31, who also goes by Devone Caldwell, and his girlfriend Ashley Sharpe, 33, are charged with engaging in an organized criminal activity.

Kimberly Smith, a prosecutor with the Harris County District Attorney’s Office Public Corruption Division, said Sharpe provided drug-soaked papers to Robert Robertson, a now former detention officer, who smuggled them into the jail to Jones.

Robertson was also charged with engaging in organized criminal activity in late November and has since posted bond.

In mid-November, Smith said someone reported that there was a shank in the jail.

“Then a cell search was conducted,” Smith said. “No shank was found, and then that’s when they found the laced papers, and then they brought the inmate in for an interview, and of course, he admitted to receiving the papers from the detention officer, and that’s how everything kind of unraveled.”

Jones appeared in court Tuesday morning for an arraignment on his new charge. Judge Ana Martinez agreed with Smith’s bond recommendation and set it at $150,000.

He still has five other charges on which he has not posted bond in Harris County. Smith said during court that Jones has past cases in Mississippi and Tennessee as well.

So far, there have been 20 deaths in the Harris County Jail in 2023, and according to the DA’s office, many are believed to be drug-related.

Thus far in the investigation, exact connections of who brought the specific drugs into the jail that led to each death have not been made.

“We have not been able to make those connections at this time,” Smith said. “Again, we are getting new leads every single day.”

Jones and Sharpe’s charges make a total of five arrests in a month relating to drugs in the jail.

Attorney Ronald Lewis was arrested during a visit to the jail and found to be in possession of 11 sheets of paper believed to be soaked in drugs, according to Lt. J. Wheeler with the Harris County Sheriff’s Office Criminal Investigations and Security Division.

Brianna Scott, who is accused of supplying laced papers to another attorney, has been charged with conspiracy to deliver a simulated controlled substance.

The attorney that Scott is accused of supplying to has not been charged.