K2 smuggled into Douglas County Jail, inmates accused of using batteries to smoke it

K2 slipped into the Douglas County Jail through the mail, and inmates allegedly turned computer tablets into smoking devices by stripping out lithium batteries and using them to heat the drug. The episode, laid out in arrest affidavits, exposed a rare mix of contraband entry, broken supervision and improvised drug use inside the county’s correctional system.

The alleged chain of events began April 3, when an inmate told jailers that an envelope had arrived containing paper sprayed with K2, also known as Spice, along with broken tablets whose batteries had been removed. Two days later, jail staff said another inmate, Dakota Logan Grundy, was found screaming and then passed out on his cell floor. Investigators reported finding a broken tablet, a paper, a smoking pipe and a lithium battery in his cell.

K2 is a synthetic cannabinoid intended to mimic THC, and the Drug Enforcement Administration says it is often sold as an herbal incense-style product that can be smoked in pipes or similar devices. In Douglas County, the allegations suggest the jail had to confront more than one failure point at once: mail screening that did not stop the drug, and access to technology inside the facility that was apparently repurposed to consume it.

Two men already housed in the jail, Caiden Clem, 19, and Temujin Jernigan, 24, were charged with felony trafficking contraband in a correctional facility. Under Kansas law, trafficking contraband in a correctional institution is generally a severity level 6, nonperson felony, but it can rise to a severity level 5 felony when the item is a controlled substance. Clem’s contraband case was publicly set for an early May court date, and he was already being held in connection with an aggravated assault tied to the Jan. 17 shooting at The Hawk bar in Lawrence. Jernigan was facing an attempted first-degree murder charge tied to the Jan. 23 shooting at Hawks Pointe apartments, along with drug charges in another case.

Joshua Mayo was identified in one affidavit as the inmate who reported the contraband, and he later admitted that in open court. A judge later sentenced him to 15 months in prison after rejecting his bid for probation.

The Douglas County Correctional Facility, at 3601 E. 25th Street in Lawrence, is operated by the sheriff’s corrections division and is listed in public directories at a capacity of about 196 inmates. The case now stands as a warning about how one package and one piece of jail technology can ripple through multiple felony cases, raising the stakes for staff, inmates and taxpayers when controls fail in more than one place at once.