Inside the jail, CI was the target of a plot to kill, court docs say

FORT WAYNE, Ind. ---For more than a month, the probable cause affidavits for two women in the thrall of an alleged big time drug dealer were sealed.

On Sept. 16, Redena Hire, 54 and Alexis Drake, 20, were charged with conspiracy to commit murder, a Level 2 felony and assisting a criminal, a Level 5, but the explanation wasn’t available.

Wednesday, The Probable Cause was able to obtain the documents detailing a plot to kill a confidential informant that the alleged drug dealer Jason Bridges, 45, wanted gone.

The first way was to plant a “hot shot,” an extremely potent fentanyl drug mix of a “G” or gram(s), hoping that the fentanyl would kill the confidential informant (CI), but the death would look like a drug overdose, according to a probable cause affidavit written by Officer S. Schmieman.

If the drug overdose plot didn’t go as planned, Bridges had another idea. He asked Hire to put “the black thing” or his “protector” in the glove box of a 2006 gray GMC Envoy.

Once she did that, someone would come by for the “whip,” street slang for the car.

To the witness who was picking up the car, Bridges told him in a phone call: “Once you find the perfect location then you, whatever bro, my other individual tell you the rest, (sic).”

Bridges would constantly talk about his "Plan A and Plan B," court documents said.

From left: Redena Hire, Alexis Drake, Jason Bridges

Bridges was arrested Sept. 2 when his home at 1038 Railroad St. in New Haven was raided. The Fort Wayne Police Department found every drug but heroin there, court documents said. 

At the Allen County Jail, Bridges picked up where he left off communicating with Hire and Drake, his girlfriend, and others via his jail tablet and other inmates’ jail tablets to arrange the murder of the CI.

But law enforcement was listening and monitoring these tablets, phones and video visits, court documents said, and were also hip to the slang and codes being used.

In a phone call on Sept. 4, Bridges complained that he didn’t want the CI to show up in court, but he was pretty sure she would, he said.

“I was just thinking man the only way I can win this is if she doesn’t show up to court,” Bridges said in a phone call. “A lawyer can’t help me.”

The person on the other end of the line tells Bridges he “already knows what it takes to win,” court documents said.

“I just have to get my feet wet,” the caller tells Bridges. “I’ll keep my ears to the street. I will be on top of it, play the dumb role and listen to what is going on in the street……I’m finna be on the hunt.”

Then the witness says “I’m going to make it happen. I’ll be out here huntin. I got you.” It’s not clear if this witness was arrested and charged for plotting to kill the CI.

To another witness, Bridges makes the job sound easy. “I’m trying to come home bro…I need you to give my people the info you have as the backup. The only thing you got to do bro is make the call.”

Making the call would get the CI to show up and then “BAM you know what I’m saying,” Bridges says. “I need you to dedicate a full day to me.” The Probable Cause is not naming the CI whose first name was identified in court documents.

By Sept. 16, law enforcement had had enough and arrested the two women on the conspiracy charges. Hire’s home in the 1200 block of Kenwood Avenue had been raided on Sept. 8. Fort Wayne police found numerous drugs, firearms and equipment to weigh and sell drugs, the probable cause affidavit said.

Around the same time, Bridges was put on “deadlock” meaning he was deprived of all means of communication with the outside, perhaps saving the CI’s life. Bridges is being held without bond, according to a jail spokesman.

“The girls,” as Hire and Drake are called in the probable cause, have a court hearing Nov. 19.