Cynthia and her husband spent an ordinary day in December 2022 driving to their retirement home, planning to clean it out after the holidays.

Then, her phone buzzed.

“Where is my fucking money your son caught out owing me,” the text read. “I’ll send word wherever he goes if you try and call (a prison official) and tell on me. I want the 250 I’m owed or I’ma have him hurt.”

Cynthia faced a dilemma: pay or risk her son getting assaulted, maybe killed. Her son was imprisoned at the Lawton Correctional and Rehabilitation Facility at the time.

The extortion threats started in 2017 when her son was booked into the Oklahoma County Detention Center. Cynthia suspects gangs are orchestrating the extortion.

The first time it happened, within the first week he arrived at the jail, Cynthia said she drove to Walgreens and spent more than $500 on Green Dot reloadable debit cards. She texted the card details, thinking it would stop the threats. It didn’t.

Her son, who is serving an 11-year sentence, suffers from mental health issues and drug addiction and is indebted to the gangs who sell to him. When Cynthia refuses to send money, interest is added and her son is assaulted. He told her that he was raped.

That same month, another inmate sent her a photo of her address listed online, threatening to kill her.

Cynthia, a 65-yearold mother of two who lives in Oklahoma City, estimated she has spent more than $50,000 on Green Dot cards and Cash App payments since 2017, at least $40,000 with the cards and $10,000 with Cash App. The extortionists instructed her to describe the payments as something innocuous, such as coffee or art supplies, so it doesn’t raise red flags.

Oklahoma Watch interviewed six people with almost identical extortion stories. The names of those included in this article were changed or withheld to protect them and their incarcerated family members from likely retaliatory violence.

Many cases go unreported for fear of gang retaliation, more than a dozen Oklahoma correctional experts, prisoner advocates and district attorneys said, making it difficult to pinpoint how many people are affected. The Department of Corrections does not track the number of extortion cases.

Former Oklahoma Department of Corrections Director Joe Allbaugh said extortion of family members by gangs from inside the prisons was widespread while he held the position from 2016 to 2019. He conceded that he could not tackle the problem.

“It’s another one of these things that keeps me, personally, up at night,” Allbaugh said. “I failed.”

A Walking Zombie

When the extortion began, Sylvia’s son was also incarcerated at the Lawton prison.

Though she lives thousands of miles away from Oklahoma, she started receiving text messages from suspected gang members less than a month after her son was booked into the prison in April 2023.

At only 21 when he arrived at Lawton, Sylvia said his age makes him vulnerable.

Sylvia, a 39-year-old mother of three from Mississippi, tried to ignore the calls from her son — approximately 20 per day — begging for money to pay the blackmailers.

In May 2023, however, a violent storm hit her home city. As the wind and rain barrelled in, her son would not stop calling.

When the storm let up and cell service resumed, she gave in and sent $180.

Once, when she could not get the money to the inmates on time, he was stabbed.

She now sends at least $100 weekly. Though she has sent more than $13,000 since last summer, if she is ever late on her payments her son said that his food gets held back by inmates working as food runners in the cafeteria. He is terrified to leave his cell because he is frequently attacked, even when escorted to the showers.

“My cell phone rings and when I see the name of the prison, I want to throw up,” she said. “I am a walking zombie, I am a shell of myself.”

The issue isn’t limited to the Lawton prison, a sprawling 2,697-bed medium-to-maximum security facility that incarcerates some of the state’s most violent offenders. Those interviewed have been extorted by gangs at Mack Alford Correctional Center, Allen Gamble Correctional Center, Dick Conner Correctional Center and others.

Dorothy’s son was incarcerated at John Lilley Correctional Center, a minimum security prison in Boley, when the extortion began. In July 2022, a suspected gang member threatened to assault her son if he didn’t receive $1,000.

Like Cynthia, she rushed out to buy Green Dot cards and sent the money to the extortionists.

Dorothy, a mother of four from New Mexico who works two jobs, has sent more than $8,000 via Cash App since 2022. She said his unwillingness to join a gang or partake in drugs makes him a target.

Dorothy ran out of money one day last year and could not send the money in time. That night, her son was stabbed.

Reporting the Crime Cynthia, Sylvia and Dorothy reported the extortion to law enforcement, from local sheriff’s offices to the Department of Corrections and the FBI. Finding those responsible, however, is not so easy.

After Cynthia filed a complaint, the Oklahoma Department of Corrections’ Office of the Inspector General opened an investigation.

Investigators confiscated four contraband phones, forensically examined them and interviewed several inmates across the prison system who denied being involved. After two months, investigators were unable to determine who sent the messages.

Instead, they concluded that her son was partially behind the extortion and one investigator emailed Cynthia and asked if she wanted to press charges against him. The investigator said if she continued sending money, she could be in violation of several state statutes for knowing the money was going toward drugs.

Cynthia admitted that her son has drug problems but said the response made it sound like no gang member or other inmate was involved. She said she felt