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Crystal Irwin was in and out of jail while struggling with substance abuse.

Now a certified recovery specialist at the Ellen O’Brien Gaiser Center in Butler, she recalls being court ordered to enter the jail’s reintegration program in 2013. She completed the program, but ended up returning to the jail on multiple occasions following relapses.

“I hadn’t built enough faith in myself. The resources were there — I just chose not to use them,” she said of the first time through the program.

“The second time, I was invested.”

Despite that, Irwin said she was clean for one year before finding herself back in her addiction and sitting in a police car.

Though her struggle is common for inmates at the Butler County Prison, not every story ends as happily as Irwin’s, according to warden Beau Sneddon. Of the nearly 400 people incarcerated at Butler County Prison in March, Sneddon estimates half of them have been charged with drug-related offenses.

Sneddon, who began working at the prison in 1998 as a corrections officer, has seen countless inmates released and later returned to the jail. He’s also seen success through people like Irwin, who eventually found a life outside the confines of the South Washington Street building.

Through the decades, the substances of concern have varied, but addiction has remained a topic of discussion at the jail and a factor in reentry.

“It’s very common to reenter,” he said. “To get out and stay out is pretty rare. Even to get out and stay out longer, I’m pumped.”

While incarcerated, people have access to food, a roof over their heads and medication-assisted treatment.

“A lot of times people come here because they get comfort. They’re drawn here. We give you structure,” Sneddon said.

That structure comes with the opportunity to recover from addiction.

Medication-assisted treatment is now a required program of all correctional facilities in the state, Sneddon said. It involves a combination of medication, therapy, classes and other resources to help those with substance abuse break the cycle of addiction.

The program was introduced in 2018, after Gov. Tom Wolf declared that the state’s opioid crisis was a disaster emergency.

Before the treatment process was first implemented at the jail, Sneddon said, corrections officers would fill and distribute medications to inmates. The treatment method for those experiencing withdrawal was to simply alleviate their symptoms.

“People withdrawing — it was brutal — they were really, really sick for a really, really long time,” he said.

Medication-assisted treatment went through a refinement stage after the state’s Department of Corrections required correctional institutions to have a program in 2020.

“It evolved out of necessity,” he said.

Twenty people at the prison are currently receiving the treatment: nine are on monthly doses of Sublocade, eight are on daily medications of Subutex and three receive methadone.

He notes that those who are receiving the treatment are progressing, but there is a stigma around medication-assisted treatment. People assume administering a substance to someone with substance abuse disorder is not effective, he said.

“Is it better than them dying? I think,” he said. “If you do it right, heck yeah, it works.

“I don’t think there’s a silver bullet for this.”

After Irwin went through the jail’s reintegration program in 2013, she relapsed in 2016.

“I was in my early 20s, I didn’t know if I believed in the addiction recovery thing. I was just doing it because I had to,” she said of her first time in the program.

Soon, she was back behind bars and was court ordered to the reintegration program yet again.

“What always took me down was crack and heroin,” she said.

This time, she was determined. She took the program seriously, and then reintegrated, finding a life outside the jail.

But a year later, she returned to her addiction.

“I had all this shame, and I just couldn’t get it together,” she said. “I felt, ‘How could I have done this?’

“I didn’t get myself together until 2018.”

Sometimes, Sneddon said, he finds himself wishing he could keep inmates at the jail longer — it would allow for better treatment planning and keep inmates, who the corrections officers often grow to care about, safe.

Depending on how long people are incarcerated, Sneddon said, he and the other officers often get to see people as they truly are without the influence of drugs.

“It’s neat to see people in here cleaned up and putting weight on. You kind of think, ‘I wish you could stay here forever,’” he said.

Those day-to-day interactions build a rapport between the officers and those entrusted to their care, Sneddon said.

“If you could see the relationship our officers develop with these people, it weighs on them,” he said. “You’ve dealt with this person sometimes for years, and all of the sudden they die of an overdose.”

Sneddon said keeping inmates safe can be a challenge sometimes and looks forward to new technology that will help keep contraband outside the jail’s walls.

In a recent incident, inmate Alec Miller, 23, who was convicted of murder, died at the jail last November of a fentanyl overdose.

Inmates Qualin A. Davis, 41; Richard A. Bowser II, 23; and William J. Derrick, 42, all of Butler, were charged with possessing contraband, in relation to Miller’s death in his county jail cell. Davis also was charged with felonies drug delivery resulting in death, five counts of contraband and four counts of drug sales.

Court documents indicate Davis had smuggled 16.32 grams of fentanyl into the jail Nov. 19.

Detectives said following Miller’s death, they found two rolled pieces of paper, a bag containing smaller bags of a brown substance and a plastic bag of 109 suspected fentanyl pills in Davis’ cell and found a rolled piece of paper and a brown substance in a black sock in the cell Miller and Derrick shared.

Sneddon said when someone is processed in the jail, they could be subject to a pat-down search or strip search, depending on the circumstances.

“(With) the extent people are willing to go to get contraband inside of here, we don’t always find the full amount,” he said in a January interview.

In February, two thermal body scanners were purchased using federal grant funds to help detect contraband on people brought into the jail, Sneddon said.

“The machines could be here any day,” he said. “I’m really hoping by the beginning of May to have them running.”

Sneddon said he had been researching the body scanners for a few years, and in October applied for the grant to purchase them. Once the scanners are installed, staff will be trained on the technology.

“Most people have contraband when they come in,” he said. “The type of contraband has changed. Usually when someone brings contraband in, it’s to sell it. To set themselves up.”

Those who struggle with addiction can then find their safe haven compromised, Sneddon said.

Irwin hasn’t returned to the jail since 2018. This time, her recovery stuck.

She said was motivated to get back on track, finding a job and eventually finding her way back to Gaiser in 2021, with three years of sobriety behind her.

She started working as a counselors aid and became a certified recovery specialist. She is on her way to becoming a case manager in the near future.

Throughout her experience in recovery, Irwin said her time in jail and the resources she received through the reintegration program were helpful to her.

“I think it does well prepping people with what they’re going to face when they get out,” she said. “Things were told to me as I was bouncing in and out of jail, it just took me actually listening.”

According to Irwin, her experiences at the jail allowed her to reevaluate how she dealt with the stress of release, and how going back to addictive substances to deal with stressors was an endless cycle.

“It’s like, all you know,” she said.

She added that finding support is the biggest struggle her recovering clients seem to have.

“It matters when there’s someone walking you through the process,” she said. “It’s helping the clients find support in their lives, and if they don’t have it, say, ‘OK, let’s make it.’”

Inmates often find themselves lacking shelter and other important resources when they are released. Irwin said the lack of three-quarter housing for women is one barrier she finds herself encountering with her own clients.

Sneddon said he, too, understands how many inmates return to the Butler County Prison post-release. While the jail aims to help inmates recover and reenter their lives outside of jail, there’s always a time constraint.

Because a prisoner’s release could happen any day, Sneddon said, you can’t always get them exactly the help they need.

“Right now it’s all-hands-on-deck, hurry up, because you know this person could get out,” he said. “We have to redefine the program … I think it’s so new we don’t know what we need to change.”

Ultimately, Sneddon said he hopes people realize that the work they do in the prison to fight addiction has ripple effects.

“We’re right in the middle of the community. The better job we do in there, the better we do for our community,” he said. “We’re taking in people’s kids, their wives, parents … and try to patch them up in every possible way.”

According to Irwin, the resources provided by the prison’s reintegration program made a difference in her transition.

“It’s really hard (going) from any kind of confined setting, it’s hard to jump back in full force,” Irwin said. “You’re going from no freedom to a bunch of freedom, and you don’t know how to handle it.”

Irwin is nearly finished with her bachelor’s degree in social work and is looking toward getting a master’s. She said the skills she’s acquired through recovery have helped her develop a sense of worth.

“When we’re using, we feel terrible about who we are, and then we have to keep getting high,” she said. “Life just continues to get better when we do the right thing.”

Irwin said she knows the life she’s built for herself after incarceration could all go away if she used again.

“The life I have today isn’t worth it,” she said.

This story was updated at 11:50 a.m., March 26, to reflect the warden did not bring up the death of an inmate. The information was added for context.