CORPORATE CRIME REPORTER
Expert
Names Top Five Prisons for White-Collar Criminals
19 Corporate Crime Reporter 30, July 20, 2005
Hand caught in the corporate cookie jar?
Guilty on all counts?
Judge sentences you to the slammer?
Fear not, dear corporate CEO.
There is a guide for your post-conviction life.
It’s called the Federal Prison Handbook 2005.
And it’s co-author – Alan Ellis – wants you know – there
is prison, and there is prison.
While the guidebook profiles each of the nation’s 178 federal prisons,
only about a third of them are minimum security prisons – or federal prison
camps – suitable for your average CEO.
And Ellis says – this is what you want – a federal prison camp.
While the fabled Club Fed is a thing of the past – you know, get up the
in morning, play golf, steak and lobster for dinner – federal prison camps
are a cut above your other currently available alternatives.
Ellis is a lawyer who specializes in federal sentencing and post-conviction
remedies.
The federal system houses 180,000 prisoners.
Ellis estimates that about ten percent, or 18,000, are white collar criminals.
In an interview with Corporate Crime Reporter, we asked Ellis to name his top
five prisons for white collar criminals.
Here’s his list:
Yankton, South Dakota. “A stand alone federal prison camp,”
Ellis says. “A vanishing breed. These are camps that are not satellites
to larger more secure institutions. It happens to be a converted college that
went defunct. It’s in the middle of the town, not on the outskirts. There
is a lot of community programming. People leave during the day and come back
at night.”
Englewood, Colorado. “That’s outside of Denver,”
Ellis says. “It’s a satellite camp to the federal correction institution
there. I’m told by my clients that it is a pretty laid back place.”
Texarkana, Texas. “The federal prison camp there has an drug
and alcohol treatment program,” he says. “It has a pond stocked
with fish. And one of my clients said he liked to spend his day fishing.”
Sheridan, Oregon. A federal prison camp outside of a medium level security
facility about 60 miles from Portland.
Pensacola Naval Base. “You get out during the day, you work on
the Naval base, you intermingle with Navy personnel,” Ellis says. “The
food is better. You are outside. I’ve had people who were taking care
of the grounds at the admiral’s house. The admiral’s wife would
bring out lemonade, invite the inmate in for lunch. Things of that sort.”
“If you are Jewish, I would say the federal prison camp at Otisville,
New York, about 70 miles from New York City,” Ellis adds. “It has
programs for orthodox and religious Jews. It has religious furloughs where people
leave the prison for religious holidays.”
Ellis says that while most white-collar convicts are assigned to federal prison
camps, getting into a federal prison camp is not slam dunk automatic. (See Interview
with Alan Ellis, San Rafael, California, 19 Corporate Crime Reporter
30, pages 10 - 16, July 25, 2005, print edition only).
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