Surveillance footage filed in federal court shows a group of inmates at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Sunset Park turning a fourth-floor recreation-room window into a makeshift fishing spot for illegal goods. In the video, men stack chairs and a food cart to get up to the window, then haul on a rope loaded with contraband. Prosecutors say the clip captures a coordinated “fishing” run that took place on June 30, 2024 inside the federal lockup, and that it is now part of the evidence in the federal case against Daryl “Taxstone” Campbell and several co-defendants.
According to New York Daily News, correction officers later seized a rope wrapped in duct tape and stuffed with synthetic cannabis, more than 100 buprenorphine strips, roughly two dozen small bags of marijuana, wrapping paper, more than 400 cigarettes, two lighters, a scalpel and a phone charging cord and plug. The court video shows an accomplice outside the building hooking that rope to a line dangling from the rec room window while inmates inside try to tug the packages up. Prosecutors say the recording was filed as evidence in Campbell’s federal case.
How prosecutors say the scheme worked
Federal prosecutors say Campbell used a smuggled cellphone to choreograph repeated drops, recording instructions that covered everything from how long the rope needed to be to exactly where outside helpers should hook the bundles and how to clip sandwich bags to the line. A press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York describes an operation running from April through June 2024 and notes that other smuggling efforts were uncovered during a broader enforcement sweep. In one instance, staff recovered an approximately 50-foot line with contraband taped along its length, according to the release.
Who’s charged and what’s next
A wider crackdown announced in March 2025 charged 25 people in a dozen different cases tied to violence and contraband at MDC-Brooklyn, according to CBS New York. Court filings and reporting identify five men linked to the rope “fishing” attempt — Daryl Campbell, Ian Diez, Jonathan Guerrero, Abel Mora and Mayovanex Rodriguez — who are facing conspiracy and contraband charges, as detailed by New York Daily News. Campbell, already serving a lengthy state sentence for an unrelated killing, is set to be sentenced in the federal case on April 29, 2026, according to that reporting…