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| Officer accused of aiding inmates |
| By Durango Herald |
| Published: 04/25/2005 |
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A detention officer at the Archuleta County (Colo.) Jail has been arrested on suspicion of providing drugs to inmates and providing internal police information to a jail escapee. According to authorities, for as long as one year, detention officer Helen Plantiko sold tobacco and narcotics to prisoners at the jail. She also is suspected of sharing police information with one of the three men who escaped from the jail on March 17. The illegal activity is outlined in a two-page affidavit that law enforcement used to support her arrest. In the affidavit, Kirby Lewis, an agent with the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, describes how he identified Plantiko as a suspect and how she acknowledged committing illegal activities. Filed last Thursday in Archuleta County Court, the affidavit details how Plantiko, 23, of Pagosa Springs, supplied inmates with tobacco, marijuana and methamphetamine. During a voluntary interview with Lewis, Plantiko admitted to bringing marijuana into the jail on about five different occasions. She received $20 in addition to the cost of the marijuana, and she made anywhere from $5 to $500 for bringing in tobacco. Plantiko also admitted to receiving a phone call from Cody Dutton, one of the three escapees, while he was a fugitive. But she never alerted authorities. The escapee asked Plantiko to gather police intelligence about his escape, and Plantiko obliged. She queried another detention officer about the status of the search and relayed that information to the escapee, according to the affidavit. She also accessed a computer system to read reports about the police investigation, said Archuleta County Sheriff's Lt. T.J. Fitzwater. "She did not help them escape, but once they escaped, she provided them information (about) the investigation," Fitzwater said. An internal investigation found that no one else within the Sheriff's Office was aware of Plantiko's illegal activities, Fitzwater said. However, authorities have suspected for a while that Plantiko was providing drugs to the inmates, Fitzwater said, but they were not able to pin anything on her. Fitzwater said Plantiko should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law because she was in a position of trust. |
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