Couple allegedly used 8-year old to smuggle drugs into a Middle TN Jail

Jun 29, 2015 at 08:00 pm by bryan


A DeKalb County prisoner and his wife were sentenced in Criminal Court Tuesday, June 23 on charges of introducing contraband in a penal institution after trying to use their eight year old child to smuggle a pill into the DeKalb County Jail.

Judge David Patterson in DeKalb County presided over the case...

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24 year old Justin Dale Estes and 30 year old Ashley Nicole Estes each received a three year sentence. Justin Estes must serve his time but a second charge of child endangerment was dismissed. The term is to run concurrently with another case against him in General Sessions Court. He was given jail credit from November 6, 2014 to June 23, 2015.

Ashley Estes' three year sentence has been suspended to supervised probation. She was given jail credit for 76 days and fined $2,000. A second charge of child abuse/neglect against her was dropped.

DeKalb County Sheriff Patrick Ray said that on Thursday, November 6, 2014 Justin Estes, serving a sentence in the DeKalb County Jail, was visited by his wife Ashley Estes and their children. Before the visitation, a Sheriff's Department Detective found a pill in the coat pocket of the Estes' eight year old daughter and learned that it was placed in the coat by Mrs. Estes. According to Sheriff Ray, Justin Estes admitted that he had told his wife to put a pill in the child's coat pocket. The pill was believed to be an eight milligram suboxone. If ingested, Sheriff Ray said the pill could have caused the child to suffer serious sickness or death. Mrs. Estes told the detective that she had previously brought drugs into the jail for her husband on different occasions by putting them in the clothing of her children, according to Sheriff Ray.

Source:

Partner Station WJLE

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