After 2 Mistrials in East Bay Prison Abuse Case, Federal Prosecutors Won’t Try Again

After two mistrials, federal prosecutors have moved to dismiss sexual abuse charges against former FCI Dublin prison guard Darrell Wayne Smith, the last of 10 former employees to face charges in connection with abuse at the shuttered East Bay women’s prison.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Paulson on Wednesday filed a notice to dismiss charges against Smith, who was accused by four women incarcerated at FCI Dublin of abusing them between 2019 and 2021. The U.S. attorney’s office confirmed it does not plan to pursue another trial but declined to comment further.

During two separate weekslong trials this year, the women testified that Smith pushed them up against the walls of their cells and other secluded rooms in the housing units, forced his fingers inside of them and, in one case, compelled a woman to have sex with him.

But Smith’s attorneys maintained throughout both trials that he’d been framed in the fallout of a federal investigation into systemic abuse at the prison, dubbed the “rape club” by incarcerated women and staff members. Nine other former employees, including the warden, have been convicted or pleaded guilty.

Victims of abuse at FCI Dublin have won major monetary settlements in two class-action suits against the Federal Bureau of Prisons, and some have been granted early release or asylum in the U.S.

Smith’s defense team alleged that he was an easy target for women seeking to gain such rewards because he’d been demoted years earlier after facing allegations of a sexual relationship with an incarcerated woman. He was ultimately cleared in that case.

Jurors in his first trial said they split down the middle on whether he was guilty, in part due to a lack of concrete evidence. While his second jury told the judge in September that they also could not reach a consensus, a court observer said several male jurors wept.

“The progress that’s been made to uncover and interrupt staff sexual abuse in the BOP is because of brave survivors and their collective advocacy,” Emily Shapiro of the California Coalition for Women Prisoners said following the second deadlocked jury. “We know that the criminal legal system will never bring true justice, especially in a political climate increasingly hostile to women, immigrants, and trans people. We will channel our outrage by growing the movement to address the root causes of this systemic violence.”

FCI Dublin was shuttered in April 2024, and about 300 women still incarcerated there were transferred to other BOP sites.

According to a court-appointed special master, who has been tasked with ensuring that the BOP fulfills certain protections for those women as part of one of the class-action lawsuits, some abuse allegations have continued to go unchecked and former Dublin inmates have reported retaliation by staff at other sites.