Former prison guard used app to take and give thousands to inmates, SC officials say

A Midlands resident who used to work as a prison guard found herself behind bars after being arrested Monday, according to the South Carolina Department of Corrections .

Arieyelle Shiquise Coulette, a 25-year-old Sumter resident, was charged with misconduct in office, the S.C. Department of Corrections said Tuesday in a news release.

Coulette was a correctional officer at Turbeville Correctional Institution , where she’s accused of sending and accepting money from inmates , according to the release. The prison in Clarendon County is a men’s-only, medium-security institution, according to the S.C. Department of Corrections. The prison is in Turbeville, about 60 miles east of Columbia .

For about a month in 2021, from Aug. 23-Sept. 27, Coulette “did willfully, knowingly, dishonestly and unlawfully with malfeasance commit the offense of misconduct in office ,” an arrest warrant said.

Coulette accepted $22,879 from inmates via Cash App , while sending $6,790 to prisoners, according to the arrest warrant.

Information about how the money was used by either Coulette or the inmates, and the number of inmates involved, was not included in the release.

Coulette resigned from the S.C. Department of Corrections on Nov. 17, 2023, the arrest warrant shows.

Bond was set at $10,000 and posted the same day Coulette was arrested, according to Clarendon County court records.

She is scheduled to appear in court again Nov. 8, judicial records show.