A 61-year-old Portland woman is being sent to a South Carolina state prison after police claim she traveled across the nation with meth hidden in pill capsules and handed balloons of the drug to an inmate during a weekend visit to a federal prison in Edgefield. Tracy Alic Rel was sentenced to ten years on Tuesday, July 28, and will be moved from the Edgefield County Detention Center to the South Carolina Department of Corrections.
The case arose from a March 2025 visit to FCI Edgefield, according to WYFF 4. According to reports, prison security officials noticed Rel acting strangely and reported her to deputies, who notified the Edgefield County Sheriff’s Office. Investigators eventually found her at a nearby hotel and discovered blue rubber balloons, methamphetamine, and empty pill capsules, all of which were comparable with contraband discovered within the prison.
FCI Edgefield is a federal facility, not a state prison in South Carolina, with a physical address of 501 Gary Hill Road listed by the Federal Bureau of Prisons. According to the agency’s visiting documents, the institution is a penitentiary for male detainees; therefore, Rel’s claimed handoff occurred during a scheduled visit to an inmate.
Rel apparently went from Oregon to Atlanta before heading to Edgefield, where she wrapped methamphetamine capsules in miniature rubber balloons and hid them inside vitamin bottles. She was convicted of methamphetamine trafficking in February and received a 10-year sentence last week, as reported by WYFF 4.
Rel’s case isn’t the first recent South Carolina prison drug case. The South Carolina Attorney General’s Office announced in August 2025 that former correctional employee Jameelah Fortune was sentenced to ten years in prison after pleading guilty to methamphetamine trafficking, attempting to furnish contraband, and conspiracy.
In March, The State reported that inmate Alicia Nicole Hicks was sentenced to 13 years in prison after pleading guilty to trafficking methamphetamine, giving contraband, and conspiracy in connection with an attempt to transfer drugs within Camille Graham Correctional Institution. The individual cases demonstrate how prison drug investigations can involve visitors, employees, and convicts alike.
The South Carolina Department of Corrections defines furnishing or attempting to furnish a prisoner with contraband as a felony punishable by one to ten years in prison and a $1,000 to $10,000 fine. The policy expressly defines drugs and prohibited substances as contraband, and the Department of Corrections conducts searches of visitors and others who enter its facilities.
That state protocol differs from the federal visitation restrictions at FCI Edgefield, where the alleged handoff happened. Rel is presently detained at the Edgefield County Detention Center and is scheduled to begin completing her term in the state prison system.
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