Cpl. Aaron Smith, of Dresden, oversees a staff of eight in booking at Two Bridges Regional Jail in Wiscasset. As part of his job, Smith nurtures a statewide network of legal, law enforcement, and corrections contacts. (Sherwood Olin photo)
Visitors to Two Bridges Regional Jail in Wiscasset come from all corners of the state, from every kind of background, for all sorts of reasons, almost always involving some form of legal trouble. Since 2015, every single one of them has shared one thing in common: in one form or another they have all passed through the administrative hands of Cpl. Aaron Smith.
As the assistant support services supervisor at Two Bridges, Smith oversees an eight-person department at the heart of the jail’s operation, managing traffic in and out of the facility and juggling communication with multiple outside agencies, jurisdictions, and inmates on a daily basis.
Smith or one of his officers is often the first corrections officer a new arrival sees at Two Bridges. Inmates can arrive in all sort of emotional conditions, Smith said. When he greets someone in booking, he likes to set a calm, professional tone early in an effort to make the experience as smooth and safe as possible for all concerned.
Smith said his job is similar to a hotel concierge in the sense that he greets someone and takes care to see their needs are attended too. Smith credits his years of retail experience for helping him develop the skills he applies every day.
“I think that was a big help, just coming from that customer service background,” he said. “It’s called IPC – interpersonal communication – and it’s actually a class that we have to teach when you start here. It just teaches you to talk to people. Instead of just yelling at somebody, you talk to them and just be like, ‘Hey, you know, this is this and this is what’s going on with you.’”
Once someone has been through booking, Smith will have little cause to interact with that individual, but he fields a steady stream of inmate questions. The specific topics can range widely, Smith said.
“What’s my time?’ ‘What’s my court stuff?’ ‘I had money at this jail. Can I get it transferred?’” Smith said. “You’re the conduit for all of that.”
Treating someone with the respect due an adult from the start can go a long way to determining the tenor of an individual’s stay, Smith said. One of the easiest ways to keep an anxious person calm is to keep them informed. Information is highly prized for an individual who has zero control in their current situation.
In this context, something like a timely response really matters, Smith said.
“I remember my days of being down in a housing unit with 70 some-odd people that have had zero answers from when they were first brought in,” he said. “I teach my guys: ‘It’s a 24-hour operation. You do not have to book that guy in in 10 minutes. Take your time. Make sure everything’s good. Make sure they have all their questions answered.
“Then that way, they’re not getting in trouble in the housing unit because they don’t know what’s going on and winding up back down at booking, because that’s not what you want,” Smith said. “Then they’re going to wind up down there even longer than if you had just taken the time to do your job correctly and answer everything that needed to be answered.”
Absolute honesty and complete transparency are vital when dealing with inmates, Smith said. Word travels fast and a bad reputation is hard to shed. If an inmate asks an officer for something, help acquiring a toothbrush, for example, and the officer agrees to help and then does not; it reflects badly on the officer and it could lead to complications moving forward.
“That’s one of my biggest things,” Smith said. “If I tell someone I’m going to do something for them, it happens. It may sometimes take a day, depending on how busy I am, but it will happen … I think that’s the biggest thing with this in this line of work. Honesty is huge here. If you’re dishonest with the inmates, they’re going to be dishonest with you back.”
Even if it is not possible to provide an answer, Smith encourages his officers to be upfront and transparent. It’s a good practice and saves time and effort down the line for everyone, Smith said.
“Just be honest with them,” Smith said. “Tell them what’s going on. Tell them when their court date is. Tell them who their attorney is. Give them that extra five-minute phone call to their family. If that’s what keeps it so you’re not down there having to pepper spray or tase somebody five days from now because they’re so stressed out because they don’t know what’s going on with their life. You’re putting in the work at the get go, but for the long game, you’ll be better off.”
Smith’s long game did not involve working in a jail. He grew up a farm in Dresden, the son of Mark and Nancy Smith. Graduating from Wiscasset High School in 2000, Smith had a short, unsuccessful career as a vacuum cleaner salesman before he started in retail with Hannaford Supermarket in Topsham.
He moved on to Walmart in Brunswick in 2001, where he eventually met and married his first wife. Together the couple welcomed two children, Gavyn, now 19, and Brandon, 14. In 2006, Lowe’s opened next door in Brunswick, and Smith happily signed on for a similar position and a small raise.
“You figure I was only making $8 an hour at Walmart at the time, so I was like, ‘You guys are going to pay me almost $9 an hour to walk across the parking lot? I’m there,” he said.
It was a chance encounter at Lowe’s that inadvertently jump-started Smith’s corrections career in 2009. Smith was at work one day when someone he currently works with, Darryl Groh, came in on his day off for personal business.
“I was department manager of plumbing and heating at the time,” Smith said. “Oddly enough, you don’t have to know anything about any of that stuff in there to be a manager or anything. You just have to know where stuff is, and you just kind of direct them to it.”
During their interaction, Groh started peppering Smith with questions, which led to Groh encouraging him to apply for a job at Two Bridges. Smith turned up the next day and was well into the screening process before he realized he was actually in the middle of the job application. According to Smith, it seemed like the next thing he knew he was being handed a written proficiency test and told he needed to be scheduled for a polygraph test and a psychiatric evaluation.
“The psych evaluation is very strange,” he said. “They bring you in and they’re just like, ‘You sure this is what you want to do? You really want to do corrections?’ I was like, ‘At this point, everybody’s trying to talk me out of it, so I don’t know.’”
Despite his reservations, Smith has found he really enjoyed the work. He likes responsibility, he likes to take care of people, and he likes to solve problems. Corrections offered an opportunity for him to do all those things, he said. Doing his job well helps keep everyone safe and the facility operating smoothly.
“Inmates will come up to me all the time and just thank me,” he said. “They’ll just be like, ‘You helped me out. You did this. You did this.’ That’s a big part of this, and that’s why the inmate part of the job is never hard for me. I’ve never had an issue with it. Like I said, it goes back to the customer service aspect of everything.”
Starting as a housing unit officer in 2009, Smith transferred into booking in 2011. He became a full-time booking officer in 2013 and then booking supervisor in 2015.
Due in part to Smith’s seniority, he has developed relationships with related agencies across the state. New hires are constantly reaching out for information or guidance, and Smith is happy to oblige.
“There’s a lot of that,” Smith said. “A lot of different county jails consistently reaching out to me, asking how I’ve done things, how we’ve invented policies to work around this, that, or whatever else the state likes to throw at us. I think I probably come in to 50-60 emails every day, just from different people out there that just have questions on lawyers, the courts, the (U.S.) Marshals Service, the federal government there, there’s a lot.”
Sixteen years into his corrections career, Smith still loves going to work every day. Unlike some hires who view corrections as a stepping stone to law enforcement, Smith doesn’t see his job that way and said he has no desire to change professions. At some point in the future, he may want to transition into another currently undefined role in corrections, but not now, he said.
When he is not at work, Smith likes to spend time outdoors around the Dresden home he shares with his girlfriend, Mandy Charlton. The couple looked for a property together for quite a while in other communities before finding a place in Smith’s hometown, not far from his childhood home.
The house is located on the Eastern River in Dresden and borders open lots currently controlled by the town. The location works great for the family, Smith said, as he loves to fish and kayak and Charlton is avid birder.
“Right now we’re in the process of getting all of our garden beds done,” Smith said. “My girlfriend loves to garden and stuff like that, so she wants to do a lot of vegetable gardens and stuff this year.”
The couple also got pair of electric bikes, which they use to scoot around Dresden. Smith said e-biking is something they can do together and it’s perfect for him, falling neatly between a bicycle and motorcycle. Much like he tries to do in his day job, e-bikes lend themselves to a smooth operation, Smith said.
“I don’t like to pedal,” he said.”I like to just hit a button and go.”
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