Former Virginia prison guard pleads guilty to smuggling drugs and taking bribes

BUCKINGHAM COUNTY, Va. (WRIC) — A former prison guard has pleaded guilty to conspiring to smuggle drugs into a prison in Virginia.

Twenty-four-year-old Kenneth J. Owen, of Charlotte Court, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to distribute and possess MDMA and buprenorphine, as well as two counts of money laundering conspiracy in Massachusetts and Virginia.

The U.S. District Court has scheduled Owen’s sentencing for Dec. 10, according to the Department of Justice.

In December 2019 and January 2020, Owen reportedly conspired with Sathtra Em, of Lowell, and Micheal Mao, who is an inmate at Buckingham Correctional Center in Dillwyn, to smuggle MDMA and buprenorphine in Suboxone form into the facility. The Department of Justice said that, during this time, Owen was a correctional officer at Buckingham.

As part of the conspiracy, Em sent the drugs by mail to Owen’s home and paid him $1,600 in bribes to deliver the drugs and other contraband to Mao inside the prison. Mao then sold the drugs to other inmates at the Buckingham facility, according to the Department of Justice.

Em collected the money made from the drugs on behalf of Mao in the CashApp accounts she used to pay the bribes to Owen. Owen used a CashApp account under the name of “Carlos” to receive bribes from Em and deposited the funds to his bank account after minutes of receiving them, according to authorities.

Em and Mayo had previously pleaded guilty for their involvement in the conspiracy. On Aug. 14, Em was sentenced to 21 months in prison, followed by a three-year supervised release, according to DOJ. Mao has been scheduled to be sentenced on Nov. 18.

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