By Adam Ghassemi
COLUMBIA, Tenn. – At the Maury County Jail in Columbia chances are you'll hear Kenneth Sneed before you even see him.
The 65-year-old inmate says he lost his right leg in a motorcycle accident four years ago. He was just booked last week for stealing newspapers, and driving on a revoked license , both misdemeanors. Now he's facing an even bigger charge "introducing a weapon into a penal facility," a felony.
"I'll just fight it in court because I didn't do it intentionally," Sneed said from inside jail Wednesday.
Officers say a couple of days after being booked Sneed starting raising suspicions.
"One of my correctional officers smelled cigarette smoke in his cell," Maury County Sheriff's Office Chief Deputy Nathan Johns.
Searching his cell turned up nothing. Then, they looked closer. Inside his prosthetic leg they found cigarettes, a box of razor blades and even scissors hidden in his shoe's tongue.
"Then certainly that could mean devastation for other inmates and also for our staff here," Johns said.
But Sneed insists he never meant to smuggle anything into jail. "They act like I tried to bring in a damn machine gun or something," he said.
They're supplies, he says, he forgot about that are meant to maintain his leg.
"Cut the foam, cut some of the inside of it so it would lay up against this and it won't get twisted up," Sneed explained.
Now he'll have to plead his case before a judge that he really is harmless and would never use his disability, or even the cane he relies on, to hurt anyone. "I don't do that. I don't hit nobody [sic.] with the cane. I use it to walk with," said Sneed.
Sneed was already in a Maximum Security part of the jail because of his disability. Deputies say that's so other inmates don't turn against him.
This isn't the first time something like this has happened, deputies say they've even seen friends or family of inmates try to sneak contraband into jail inside of baby diapers.
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