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[AlohaDawg]

(Discuss)


Forbes

The 12 best places to go to prison

 
Where a shamed CEO does his time makes all the difference. Does he want to learn to be a chef or to get back in shape? It's a quality-of-life issue, really.

By Forbes

Two disgraced Enron executives, former Chief Jeffrey Skilling and founder Kenneth Lay, were found guilty of securities fraud and a host of other charges today and now face the likelihood of lengthy prison terms.

Where they will serve their time -- assuming they serve time at all -- can be almost as important as how much time they'll do, says Alan Ellis, a former president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. Ellis now specializes in the defense of white-collar offenders.

Although criminals don't get to choose their prisons, they can make requests. And assuming their desired location matches their security classification, as defined by the Bureau of Prisons -- minimum, low, medium or high -- and has space available, requests are often honored.

Often, but not always. Take the case of Samuel Waksal, the former ImClone Systems (IMCL, news, msgs) CEO, who requested to serve his seven-year sentence at Eglin Federal Prison Camp in Florida. (Eglin was once considered so cushy that the term "Club Fed" was actually coined to describe it. It was recently closed.) Instead, Waksal was shipped off to the Schuylkill Federal Correctional Institute in Minersville, Pa., which did not make our list.

And the fates of crooked corporate titans like former Tyco (TYC, news, msgs) Chief Executive Dennis Kozlowski and Adelphia (ADELQ, news, msgs) founder John Rigas can hardly be encouraging, either. Kozlowski will serve up to 25 years of hard time in a New York state prison, while Rigas, who is free pending an appeal, was sentenced to 15 years in the can.

You could escape – but why?

The days of "Club Fed"-- think golf courses and lobster bakes -- are long gone. But minimum security facilities, known as federal prison camps, are the best suited for disgraced CEOs and other white-collar criminals. In theory, inmates in these camps show no risk of violence or escape. Both shoe-mogul Steven Madden and Martha Stewart are FPC alums.

Why are prison camps the way to go, if you must go at all? Among other perks, federal prison camps have a relatively low staff-to-inmate ratio, dormitory-style accommodations and little to no fencing. In fact, inmates could walk away from these camps. Few do, however, because recaptured inmates face severe consequences.

While some of the minimum security facilities still stand on their own, it is increasingly common to have camps lie adjacent to larger and more secure institutions, particularly low-security federal correctional institutions.

"It used to be that those freestanding facilities were considered to be more relaxed," says David Novak, a former Microsoft (MSFT, news, msgs) consultant who served time in a federal prison camp for mail fraud. "The differences now really come down to convenience for family, weather and things of that nature."

Ellis says the quality of life among staff members also can make one prison more pleasant than another. "Happier staff makes for happier inmates," he says.

To determine which prisons are the best places to serve time, we turned to the man who wrote the guidebook, literally. Ellis has written several editions of the Federal Prison Guidebook, which profiles each of the nation's 178 federal prisons.

If you've got to do time …

 
Prison                              Perk
FCI Ashland, Ky.                Wellness program
FCI Bastrop, Texas             Easy airport access
FCI Dublin, Calif.                 Bookmobile service
FPC Duluth, Minn.              Musical instruments available
FCI Englewood, Colo.         Pool, ping-pong, foosball
FCI Lompoc, Calif.              Gym, tennis courts
FPC Montgomery, Ala.        Career retraining
FCI Otisville, N.Y.               Active Jewish religious program
FPC Pensacola, Fla.             Day jobs at the Navy base
FCI Sheridan, Ore.              Learn to be a fitness trainer
FCI Texarkana, Texas         Track, bocce pit, basketball court
FPC Yankton, S.D.             Music lessons, intramural sports
 

-- Lacey Rose, Forbes
 

[Drygioni]

FPC Duluth, Minn.              Musical instruments available

So that's where those dang harmonicas come from.

I think being shut in a place with musical instruments, regular meals, hopefully other musical guys and a strict hierarchy would be tolerable.

[misterqueue]

So that's where those dang harmonicas come from.

I think being shut in a place with musical instruments, regular meals, hopefully other musical guys and a strict hierarchy would be tolerable.

Pfft.. you don't need all that to have a good time.

But apparently you need food.  I understand most prisons have something they call food.

[smick]

My girlfriend has a deep fear of incarceration.   She is convinced that since she's vegan, The Man, would torture her by going of of their way to not honor that diet.

[Hobot]

FCI Dublin, Calif.                 Bookmobile service

Count me in!  I could spend my time reading up on how not to break the law again.

[wombat]

It's all about the people, man.

It's just like a job! Now is that a surprise, or not? Hmm.

[smick]

ALSO: They have regulations to honor specific diets, smick's SO, go ahead and get felonious.

Oh heck yea!  We have a couple we've been eyeing for a while.

[linnea]

Dang, Ash, that sounds crazy. For a while, I was really into HBO's series about a high security pen called "Oz". It scared the holy hell out of me. Watching those DVDs is the closest I've come to the corrections system. I have seen little pamphlets/tracts about "Christ the Prisoner" that they use for prison ministry, and I cannot imagine being incarcerated. One of my best friends is a staunch Mumia Abu-Jamal supporter and he regularly collects books and things for prison libraries. Anyway, some of the folks at our local Department of Public Safety kept trying to convince me to apply for a CO job (corrections officer). Since I volunteer as a firefighter/EMT, I spend a lot of time at the station.  In a small town's pokey that only holds short-term prisoners, it wouldn't be that bad. However, I just don't think I have what it takes to be a CO, small town or not.

[smick]

Oh heck yea!  We have a couple we've been eyeing for a while.

In doing some more reading on the "Vegan in Prison" thing, it appears the way to eat a wholesome meal is to get put into prison, hunger strike, and get media attention to force the prison to feed you correctly. 

While some of them have provisions for a vegan diet, most of them will only do it for religious reasons, which I think only 7th Day Adventists are part of (Though I think most of them are vegetarian.)

Speaking of the 7th Dayers, they used to run this vegan restaurant here in town with super awesome food.  The problem: It was always empty, and was in the basement of a bridal boutique.  So you're sitting in a smallish room, with the owner of the place a few feet from you reading a book, surrounded by wedding dresses.

So creepy.

[Doc]

So creepy.

Or so awesome?
No actually just creepy.
It's so weird, my great uncle is a fairly hard line seventh day adventist (or so I thought), up till recently he used to minister in the prison near where he lived (he quit on account of being 90, also see the way I tied this story into the overall topic?). But he's never mentioned the vegan thing, though he has made it clear in the past that he doesn't dig on things with cloven hooves.
Then again he group out rurally so he might just be a bit more practical about it.

[smick]

Well, I'll admit to knowing next to nothing about them, beyond them observing Saturday instead of Sunday as the sabbath.

My knowledge of them being Vegan/Vegetarian comes from there being a creepy restaurant in town, and watching "The Road to Wellsville"

Though, doing a google search shows a lot of hits in re: 7th Day Vegetarians.

[Mite]

I had a buddy growing up who was a 7th day adventist. They're sorta just old fashioned Christians (like, pre-Paul old fashioned), so they stick to a lot of jewish dietary law and stuff. He weren't no vegan, that's for sure - if he could, he would have killed everything he ate himself, and he would have eaten well.

[wombat]

(like, pre-Paul old fashioned)

No cameras?

[Doc]

No cameras?

No moustache.

[linnea]

Don't do it, Linnea.

Just. Don't. Do. It.

Life's too short to baby sit assholes.

Dude, I totally agree. I would much rather do my job as a CADD tech and public servant than babysit felons. It is a well established fact that disgruntled prisoners regularly throw urine/feces/other hazmat at prison guards. Although EMS exposes me to stuff like that (puke, blood, amniotic fluid at times), at least I have PPE (personal protective equipment) for those situations, and I can have someone arrested for assault if they throw feces at me. In the jailhouse, probably the only thing I could do is have the judge add it to their already long rap sheet. Not my idea of a fun time. At least in EMS I can always logroll my puking patient towards my partner!