FCI Dublin Was Plagued by Abuse. That Led to False Accusations, Ex-Guard’s Attorneys Say

Attorneys for a former FCI Dublin prison guard accused of sexual abuse wrapped up their defense on Wednesday, arguing that as the now-defunct prison spiraled into scandal, women who were incarcerated there saw an opportunity to frame him for their own gain.

Darrell Wayne Smith is the tenth former Dublin employee criminally charged with sexual abuse following a sprawling FBI investigation into the prison, which U.S. attorneys say was permeated by a culture of sexual misconduct, retaliation and cover-ups. More than 100 women have alleged abuse, and the nine other former employees who were charged with related crimes have been convicted.

Smith’s defense team painted a different story. At FCI Dublin, they said, incarcerated women controlled the facility and took advantage of the system.

One juror in Smith’s first trial this year, which ended in a mistrial after the jury was unable to reach a consensus, told the Mercury News that his defense attorneys had cast enough doubt on the women’s stories. The attorneys had highlighted monetary settlements the women were awarded after coming forward in a related class-action civil suit, as well as other remedies they received, including early release and, in some cases, asylum in the U.S.

Smith faces 14 charges related to allegations of abuse against four women during his time as a correctional officer at FCI Dublin, from 2019 to 2021. Before his second trial began in August, a fifth woman whose allegations were included in the first trial was dropped from the case, and her accusation removed.

During their defense in this second trial, Smith’s attorneys doubled down on attempts to cast doubt on the accounts of Smith’s accusers.

A formerly incarcerated woman subpoenaed to testify on behalf of Smith this week told the court that when she was at Dublin, she overheard another incarcerated woman encouraging a crowd to file Prison Rape Elimination Act complaints against guards. That crowd included one of Smith’s accusers, she said.

She said the woman was suggesting that others “jump on the bandwagon” after Dublin’s former warden and other officers began facing accusations.

Portia Louder, another formerly incarcerated woman who now runs a blog about her time in prison, suggested that her bunkmates framed her for having an alleged sexual relationship with Smith years before the current accusations against him. Smith was ultimately cleared of those accusations after an internal investigation.

“The inmates ran the unit” and “were much more intimidating than the officers were,” Louder said on the stand.

She testified that she believed the allegations about her and Smith were made in retaliation after he granted her request to move into a more coveted cell.

Defense witnesses who worked or served time at the prison alongside Smith’s accusers were asked to judge their character, and multiple said they did not believe the women to be truthful.

Multiple former guards and psychologists at the prison said FCI Dublin took PREA complaints seriously, provided psychological services to women who made accusations, and had a specific guard in the prison’s control room whose job it was to watch the cameras in housing units, where Smith’s alleged abuse took place.

But Assistant U.S. Attorney Sailaja Paidipaty pointed out that the rules and protocols they described — which they said protected incarcerated women and should have prevented guards from acting improperly — historically, had not.

“Is it fair to say that not everyone at Dublin was following policy?” she asked witness Ty Alewine, a former guard and a drug treatment specialist. “There’ve been nine officers convicted of violating the policy not to abuse inmates, correct?”

“Jesus, help us all, yes,” Alewine said.

Smith’s wife, Carla Sisi-Smith, who did not testify during his first trial, took the stand last for the defense. Her testimony on Wednesday stayed away from her and Smith’s romantic relationship, though it’s unclear if that was the defense’s initial plan.

The morning of her testimony, Judge Yvonne Rogers ruled that an 8-and-a-half-minute video the government presented could not be shown in court unless Sisi-Smith herself led to it.

The video taken from Smith’s cellphone shows Sisi-Smith cooking a meal naked. Throughout, she asks Smith to stop recording her at least five times and appears uncomfortable, a brief filed by Paidipaty said.

“During trial, several victims testified that they told the Defendant to leave them alone and to stop verbally and physically abusing them. Yet his sexual abuse continued,” Paidipaty wrote. “Similarly, here, Mrs. Smith repeatedly asks the Defendant to stop filming her, yet he refuses. Her discomfort is evident both by her words and her actions: she eventually retrieves a towel to cover herself after he continues to film her despite her pleas to stop.”

The video was not presented to jurors.

The government also used its cross-examination to point to a series of financial moves the couple made around the time of Smith’s indictment, seeming to propose that, as reports of officer misconduct at Dublin came to light, Smith tried to flee to Florida, where his wife and daughters had relocated years prior.

Sisi-Smith said that she had moved to Florida in 2018 to care for her mother, who had cancer. When Smith followed in 2021 after an alleged injury, Sisi-Smith said she wanted her husband nearby as her mother’s cancer was progressing.

Smith reported falling while on duty at Dublin in December 2021. After the fall, he filed for workers compensation and remained on disability for about two years, but Paidipaty presented a CT scan taken of Smith’s back during an emergency room visit after that fall, which showed no significant injuries.

The government also pointed to financial documents showing that around the time Smith was charged in 2023, multiple properties the couple owned were transferred from a joint LLC under which they operated a rental company to Sisi-Smith’s name, exclusively.

A month after a second indictment levied additional charges against him in 2024, over a dozen more of the couple’s rental properties were transferred to Sisi-Smith’s name, and the government alleged that three cars were also transferred from Smith’s to Sisi-Smith’s name around the same time. She denied that claim.

The LLC the couple ran their rental home business under has now been dissolved, Sisi-Smith said.

The testimony also opened the door to questions about a financial affidavit Smith signed in order to get assistance from the court covering his legal fees, in accordance with the Criminal Justice Act. It appears that Judge Rogers is questioning the affidavit after seeing Sisi-Smith’s financial statements presented by the government — which showed properties and assets moved from his name to hers in recent years.

Rogers said closing statements would go forward as planned on Thursday, but she would hold an evidentiary hearing on the financial affidavit next week.