- Eduardo Verdugo/AP
- Some convicted drug dealers doubted that the apprehension of cartel leader Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán was real.
Word travels fast in prison. A couple of weekends ago Derek Thomas was watching a basketball game on one of the TVs in a common area inside McDowell Federal Correctional Institution in West Virginia, glad to be out of his cell. Authorities had been putting the prison on lockdown even more often than usual to try to quell conflicts among inmate factions.
“At first people were like, ‘It’s not even real—it was too easy,’” Thomas says. “They’ve got so many of us in here and most were not major players in the drug game. When you’ve got somebody that high up, he’s like a myth.”
Over the next couple of weeks, Thomas and other inmates began to worry that Chapo’s arrest would slow the movement to reform federal drug policies. Most of the drug offenders at McDowell were convicted of dealing crack, Thomas says, and they’re well aware that Congress and the Obama administration have taken steps to ease sentencing guidelines. Thomas is also hopeful that mandatory minimum sentences for heroin will be reduced.
“It’s a well-oiled machine that’s just not going to stop.”
