A woman from Albany, New York, has pleaded guilty to mailing drug-soaked documents disguised as legal paperwork to prisons across the state.
Maya McIntosh, 33, pleaded guilty to multiple charges, including conspiracy to manufacture, distribute, and possess with intent to distribute a controlled substance and its analog, as well as unlawful possession and use of a means of identification. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of New York announced
her plea on March 18.McIntosh sold the illegal drugs on social media, supplying drug-soaked documents to buyers who intended to send them to people in prison. Her process involved ordering chemicals used to produce MDMB-4en-PINACA, a synthetic cannabinoid, in liquid form, which she then sprayed or soaked onto copy paper and business envelopes.
According to prosecutors, McIntosh placed the drug-riddled documents in U.S. Priority Mail Express envelopes and addressed them to inmates at
various correctional facilities across New York. Prison staff were led astray by the disguised legal correspondence McIntosh had stamped with the names of real attorneys in the return address section without their knowledge or consent.This tactic made the documents appear as legitimate legal paperwork rather than containing controlled substances, the U.S. Attorney’s Office stated. Prosecutors believe McIntosh ran the operation between January 2023 through July 2024.
She was indicted and arrested in September and has been in federal custody since. McIntosh faces up to 20 years in
prison for each count, along with a maximum fine of $1 million for the drug-related charges, a $250,000 fine for the other counts, and a supervised release term ranging from at least three years to life.More arrests could come as the United States Postal Inspection Service and Homeland Security Investigations continue to investigate the case. This comes as prison staff raise growing concerns about the use of “legal mail” to smuggle drugs into state prisons. Correction officers, who recently participated in a 22-day strike, identified the issue as one of their top priorities.
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