Don’t Drop the Soap in the Prison Shower? How ’bout a Diamond?

By Mark Hoerrner

Bret Allen Langford did a lot to protect his diamond. Each time he was transferred, he would swallow the hardest appetizer known to man and then force himself to vomit up the 2-carat stone when he reached a place he considered safe. After several repeats, he ended up at the Theo Lacy Branch Prison and because of an in-house search, he tossed his prize down the drain.

The 39-year-old master criminal obtained his shiny stone during an alleged commercial burglary in April 2005. He entered a Jewelry Express in the Westminster Mall and asked a clerk to see the jewel and the certificate that accompanies such high-end stones. Once she turned it over for inspection, Langford took the diamond and hopped into a waiting car driven by his girlfriend. The amateur Bonnie and Clyde and made for parts unknown. The road to "unknown," however, must have had confusing directions, as police nabbed Langford minutes later while he was traveling south on the 405 Freeway.

Police subsequently searched the car but initially found nothing, said Orange County Sheriff’s Department spokesman Jim Amormino. Then, an astute police officer noticed the diamond certificate concealed in the vehicle’s gas cap. Police surmised that the diamond might be in the gas tank, but a search did not reveal the diamond.

When authorities had originally stopped Langford and his girlfriend, he had swallowed the diamond to conceal it, thus beginning a long pattern of working to keep his diamond a secret, perhaps holding out some hope that the diamond would bring him fortune after his release. But life has a way of intervening on hopes, and during an impromptu inspection by jail officials, Langford tossed the diamond into a shower where he scored a perfect shot into the drain. Unable to recover the stone, it sat in the drain for 14 months until a private investigator, hired by Langford, arrived at the jail with a court order to search the drain.

Peering into what must be one of the many entrances to Hell—a prison shower drain—jail officials found the diamond on a screen beneath the facility’s showers. The diamond will now be used as key evidence at Langford’s May 7th trial for the crime.

Amormino said that it’s likely Langford has made a deal with the Orange County prosecutor since his trial date is coming up shortly. He also said that Langford has a considerable record and that this offense, if a conviction is successful, could send Langford to jail for life under the state’s ‘Three Strikes’ law.

Eventually, the diamond will be cleaned and returned to the Jewelry Express store.