Attorney General Alan Wilson announces guilty verdict and major target plea in the Prison Empire investigation

(COLUMBIA, S.C.) – South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson announced updates in the Prison Empire investigation after a special term of court for the State Grand Jury during the week of June 24, 2024, in Pickens County. 

Jennifer Nicole Burns, a major target of the Prison Empire and Las Señoritas investigation, pleaded guilty to her charges in the Prison Empire investigation on the morning of trial.  Burns was set for trial for an incident on March 19, 2019, where law enforcement executed a search warrant at her residence. Law enforcement located approximately three kilograms of methamphetamine, a handgun, marijuana, and $10,740 inside a safe in Burns’ bedroom. 

Burns was distributing methamphetamine at the direction of her boyfriend, Warren Chastain, who is an inmate at the South Carolina Department of Corrections and had a direct connection to the Cartel. Initially, Burns indicated that she would cooperate with law enforcement. That same night, she chose to flee South Carolina for Mexico. Burns lived in Mexico among Cartel members for four years where she continued to facilitate trafficking of hundreds of kilograms of methamphetamine into the Upstate. 

Burns pleaded guilty to Trafficking Methamphetamine, 400 Grams or More (Conspiracy); Trafficking Methamphetamine, 400 Grams or More; Possession of a Weapon During the Commission of a Violent Crime; and Possession with Intent to Distribute Marijuana. Burns rejected the state’s global plea offer in both cases. The Honorable R. Lawton McIntosh sentenced Burns to 55 years in prison.    

The state also secured a guilty verdict of William Russell Oliver on June 26, 2024, for Trafficking Methamphetamine, 28 Grams or More, but Less than 100 Grams, First Offense; Possession of a Weapon During a Violent Crime; and Possession of Narcotics in Schedule II (Hydrocodone). Oliver stood trial for a February 16, 2018, incident where law enforcement searched his residence and located approximately 93 grams of methamphetamine, a handgun, 10 tablets of hydrocodone, drug paraphernalia, and items commonly used for drug distribution. Oliver is also charged as a co-conspirator in trafficking large amounts of methamphetamine and heroin in the investigation. On July 18, 2024, Oliver was sentenced to 25 years in prison by Judge McIntosh.   

The Prison Empire investigation is an investigation into a drug trafficking organization that operated from September of 2013 to May of 2021. This drug trafficking organization largely operated out of the South Carolina Department of Corrections, where incarcerated inmates utilized contraband cellular phones from within SCDC to coordinate drug trafficking with co-conspirators in the Upstate (primarily Greenville, Pickens, and Anderson Counties) and Mexico. This is the largest case in State Grand Jury history with over 90 defendants and hundreds of charges. 

The case was investigated by the South Carolina State Grand Jury, which was assisted in this case by a partnership of the Attorney General’s State Grand Jury Division, the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division, the South Carolina Department of Corrections’ Division of Police Services, the Pickens County Sheriff’s Office, the Greenville County Multi-Jurisdictional Drug Enforcement Unit, the Anderson County Sheriff’s Office, the Spartanburg County Sheriff’s Office, the Edgefield County Sheriff’s Office, the Lexington County Sheriff’s Office, the Laurens County Sheriff’s Office, the Easley Police Department, the Liberty Police Department, the Pickens Police Department, the United States Marshals Service, and the South Carolina Governor’s Counterdrug Task Force (a unit of the South Carolina National Guard). The lead prosecutor on the case is Assistant Attorney General Savanna Goude with Assistant Attorney General Christian Fazel and Litigation Services Coordinator Shane Acito assisting in the trial of William Oliver. 

Attorney General Wilson stressed that all other defendants are presumed innocent unless and until they are proven guilty in a court of law.