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NY inmate smuggles contraband weapon into jail in rectum

Slashed another inmate with the blade he kept hidden from metal detectors

By Jordan Carleo-Evangelist
Times Union

COLONIE — A Brooklyn man being held on murder and arson charges out of New York City allegedly slashed a fellow Albany County jail inmate Friday with a small knife he kept hidden in his rectum and which escaped detection by jail metal detectors, authorities said.

The attack happened around 9:50 p.m. Friday when Steven Sidbury, 23, slashed another inmate in the back of his head and repeatedly punched him, Sheriff Craig Apple Said.

Apple said authorities suspect Sidbury attacked the inmate, a man being held on a drug charge and parole violation, because he was resisting Sidbury’s efforts to form a jail gang.

“We firmly believe he was recruiting soldiers to try to get himself established up here,” Apple said.

Sidbury is being held at the Albany County jail as a boarder — or visiting inmate — from Rikers Island in New York City, where he is facing murder, arson and weapons charges, the sheriff’s office said.

The county gets paid by other jurisdictions to house their inmates.

Apple said the attack happened in a common area of the cell tier and that Sidbury struck just before the inmates were due to be locked in their cells for the night.

After the attack, Sidbury consented to an X-ray that revealed one of the small knives, which the sheriff likened to surgical scalpel.

Sidbury allegedly voluntarily handed the blade over to jail officers rather than face a cavity search, but then a follow-up X-ray revealed a second knife, the sheriff said.

Apple said Sidbury, who has been at the jail about a month, admitted that he smuggled the weapons into the Albany Shaker Road facility himself.

“The problem is this guy came up from New York city with it in his rectum,” he said. “It’s so thin, our machines weren’t picking it up.”

The jail was locked down for the weekend while correction officers searched cells and common areas for more contraband, revealing another shank that appeared to be a screwdriver bit forced into a pen, Apple said.

Sidbury will be charged with multiple counts of assault, criminal possession of a weapon and promoting prison contraband in connection with the slashing, authorities said.

Jail staff, meanwhile, is researching technology to detect smaller weapons, Apple said.

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