Deputies slapped handcuffs on a person at the criminal courthouse on Monday, but the Harris County sheriff said the one in custody makes his living defending alleged criminals.
Sheriff Ed Gonzalez announced Jason Johnson’s arrest after the law enforcement leader’s Detentions Criminal Investigations and Security Division alleged the defense attorney slipped his jail inmate client sheets of paper laced with synthetic marijuana.
Johnson is charged with possession of a prohibited substance in a correctional facility and engaging in organized crime.
According to court records, an investigator was listening to jail calls for a different investigation and heard a plan set to unfold in the courthouse the following Monday, Aug. 5. Authorities used the information in the jail call to narrow involvement down to inmate Jamie Joel Rook-Perez, who is charged with murder .
Law enforcement conducted surveillance on Johnson, his attorney, during the hearing.
A woman who knows Rook-Perez showed up with an envelope that investigators said contained six drug soaked papers labeled as power of attorney. She gave the envelope to Johnson, who passed it on to Rook-Perez in the inmate holding area.