More Durham jail staff arrested, accused of crimes involving inmates. What to know.
Less than two months after the Durham County Sheriff’s Office charged two former employees, accusing them of having sex with an inmate, it has charged another two workers for separate crimes involving prisoners inside the jail.
One of the defendants is a detention officer; the other is a contract worker, the Durham County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release.
Former Sgt. Nicole Locke, 45, of Raleigh, was arrested Friday on multiple charges. Among them: two counts of felony conspiracy; one count of providing phone/electronics to inmates, also a felony; and one count of misdemeanor conspiracy.
In Locke’s arrest warrant, she’s accused of providing components of a mobile phone to an inmate at the Durham County jail on 219 S Mangum St. in August.
The identified inmate is the same as the one two former detention center workers are accused of having sex with in 2023. The man is incarcerated on several charges, including murder, according to court and jail records.
The N&O isn’t publicly identifying the inmate.
Locke was released on a $15,000 unsecured bond, the release stated.
Earlier this month, on Oct. 7, Briana Ashley Bowie, 31, of Durham, a nurse contracted to work in the prison, was charged with one count of felony conspiracy to sell a Schedule VI controlled substance.
In Bowie’s arrest warrant, she’s accused of bringing marijuana to an inmate in September. She’s also charged with conspiring with the inmate to sell the contraband inside the jail. The inmate is not the same as the one identified in Locke’s case.
Bowie’s bond was set at $5,000 unsecured.
Locke and Bowie are no longer associated with the office, Durham County Sheriff Clarence Birkhead said.
“I will not stand for any activity which contradicts our mission in the care and custody of the people who are confined to the Durham County Detention Facility,” he said in a statement. “Be it a Sheriff’s Office employee or a contractor; we must hold everyone who interacts with our residents to a high standard.”
Past charges
In September, the sheriff’s office charged two former workers with having sex last year with the same inmate at the jail.
The encounter was not violent, according to the sheriff’s office, but consent is not a legal defense, The News & Observer reported.
The charges are part of a “continuing investigation into alleged sexual activity at the Durham County Detention Facility,” the sheriff’s office said at the time.
