The federal Bureau of Prisons informed The Associated Press that a weeklong lockdown was conducted to find other contraband along with the loaded gun. This lockdown also led to a criminal investigation into guard misbehavior.

The Bureau of Prisons officers found the handgun inside a housing unit at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan, according to a statement prison officials sent to the AP. This discovery represents a significant breach of protocol and has called into question the security practices the Bureau of Prisons has in place, which is tasked with confining 175,000 federal inmates. The jail where Epstein was kept at, which has been considered one of the most secure in America, is now facing scrutiny for its security policies. Officials have not disclosed where the gun was exactly found, or how it was smuggled inside the jail.