The Alaska opioid epidemic knows no boundaries. In just 24 hours, five inmates at the Hiland Mountain Correctional Center overdosed on drugs that were smuggled into the facility.
Prison officials say it started on Monday when correctional officers at Hiland Center found a female inmate in cardiac arrest in one of their housing units. Then it got worse according to Jacob Wyckoff is the director of Institutions at the Department of Corrections.
"On Tuesday, we had 3 almost simultaneous events within the course of about seven minutes, where three different inmates presented very similar circumstances. unresponsive in a state of cardiac arrest," said Wyckoff.