Phones, chargers seized from Puzhal jail

Chennai: Prison Officials seized five mobile phones from as many inmates lodged in the High Security Block (HSB) of Puzhal Prison II, during the small hours on Tuesday.  The raiding party also recovered chargers and SIM cards.

An internal probe is underway in the Prisons department to ascertain as to how the contraband goods were sneaked into the high security campus and also to establish any nexus between the prison staff and the undertrial prisoners.

Sources said the raid in the HSB was necessitated following specific inputs from the intelligence units about the prevalence of mobile phones among prisoners. “They were having access to their comrades-in-arms operating elsewhere outside the prison complex and were also able to plot crimes like before they were remanded to judicial custody,” an Intelligence official told DC.

A search in the cell holding inmate Mohammed Rafiq (26) of Perungalathur led to the seizure of a mobile phone. He was earlier arrested by the CB-CID sleuths who had last March busted a counterfeiting racket and recovered counterfeit currency of nearly Rs 10 lakhs face value.

Simultaneous search on cell no. 43 led to a seizure of mobile phones from Sundar aka Ashok (28) of Sunguvarchatram and Jhon aka 'Little' Jhon,36, of Ambattur. The team searched cell no. 6, and 7 and seized a mobile phone each from Saravanan (34) of Virugambakkam and Raj alias Assean (25) of Urappakkam.  The team was led by deputy jailor Dharmalingam, and five others. A formal complaint had been lodged with the Puzhal Police to pursue a criminal case against the inmates.

On November 1, Prison officials has seized a mobile phone and SIM cards from remand prisoner Abu Tahir (39) of Padi, who was cha-rged in the murder of K.P. Suresh Kumar, president of Tiruvallur’s East unit of HM, on June 18, 2014.