Ah, well. Since I’ve created myself as sort of sub-expert in the workings of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, a\/k\/a BoP, and since I’ve written fairly extensively in this blog about my personal experience with the BoP during the now-forgotten time when Jan 6 rioters were being sentenced and sent to federal prisons, I think it’s incumbent upon me to address the Ghislaine Maxwell prison situation.<\/p>\n
How many people do you know who have the Bureau of Prisons website bookmarked? Huh? (Pre-script: don’t ignore the links below. I just re-read them. They’re really pretty funny. I<\/em> laughed. Why wouldn’t you?)<\/p>\n With immense glee, a\/k\/a schadenfreude, I have reported on the, uh, quality of life the Trump gang would experience in a variety of federal prisons,*<\/a> from Allenwood to Florence. Here’s Yazoo City<\/a>. And Herlong.\u00a0<\/a>And Otisville.<\/a><\/p>\n Ah, I sigh nostalgically for those glory days when that violent gang, the one Trump pardoned, went to prison bam bam bam. But now we have Ghislaine Maxwell to deal with, so I must get on with prison life as it is today.<\/p>\n Re Allenwood,<\/a> once considered to be the country club of the federal prison system, I described how I learned the term Club Fed and how I was coldly reprimanded for using it when to a Federal Bureau of Prisons employee.<\/a><\/p>\n Here’s what I learned about the Federal Bureau of Prisons: it is an autocratic iron hand, <\/a>ruling over the federal prison population. It commands every second of the prisoners’ lives. And when it comes to the transfer of prisoners, nobody can really petition for a prisoner’s transfer, unless it has to do with court appearances and the court is nowhere near the prison.<\/p>\n So who has the superclout to effect Maxwell’s transfer? I’ll get to my musings in Part II.<\/p>\n But first…more for the fond memories than for answering the question, I went into the BoP websites for the two prisons now linked to Maxwell. Tallahassee was where she’d been staying and Bryan, Texas was where she’d been moved.<\/p>\n TV commentators first tended to focus on the recreational differences between the two prisons. Soft life or hard life? Understandable, because there were no answers to the substantial questions why? and how?<\/p>\n So, while I believe it’s the least important aspect of this situation, I’ll dip in. Just because I know how.<\/p>\n As I discussed in the above links to prisons, lengthy and specific advisories that, uh, welcome prisoners into B0P facilities are contained in Admissions and Orientation Handbooks. I’ve spent quite a lot of time reading and recording much of this information, so I was easily able to take a look at the two handbooks Ghislaine Maxwell would have been given for the Tallahassee prison from which she was just moved and for the Bryan, Texas facility where she now resides.<\/p>\n Tallahassee FCI <\/strong>(Federal Correctional Institution), is a low security facility. Maybe I should repeat that. Low security<\/em>. Almost as low as they can go. Its handbook contains only one paragraph re recreation:<\/p>\n The Recreation staff encourages each inmate to participate in the leisure<\/em> Federal Prison Camp Bryan<\/strong> is a minimum security<\/em> facility. (This is not a radical difference from the low-security of Tallahassee.) Here’s what Bryan’s Admissions and Orientation Handbook from Bryan lists as recreational activities for prisoners:<\/p>\n Leisure Programs:<\/strong> Institutions offer a wide range of activities in which inmates may participate when not performing assigned duties. Leisure activities include: organized and informal games, sports, physical fitness, table games, hobby crafts, music programs, intramural activities, social and cultural organizations, and movies.<\/em><\/p>\n I found most of these even in higher security prison handbooks, so don’t get too agitated about the amelioration in Ghislaine’s prison life. Then there’s this:<\/p>\n Art and Hobby Craft Programs:<\/strong> The hobby craft programs available are art work, beading, knitting, ceramics, paper art, fimo, crocheting, quilling, plastic canvas, and beading. No items other than unit-based hobby craft activities are allowed out of the hobby craft area. Inmates will be allowed to ship all completed Hobby Craft at mail out and must ship all completed projects within 30 days of completion. Art and hobby craft programs are not meant for the mass production of art and hobby craft items or to provide a means of supplementing an inmate\u2019s income. Use of hobby craft facilities is a privilege that the Warden or staff delegated that authority may grant or deny.<\/em><\/p>\n There is a Wellness Program, too, with a limited description.<\/p>\n From my days of reading these things — and I checked back through my posts — I see not much difference in prison programs. Even higher security (male) federal prisons offer such activities as crocheting. (Yes, they do! Do not argue with someone who spent hours reading through these things.)<\/p>\n So although it may seem like a welcoming gift to Maxwell to be moved from Tallahassee to Texas, I don’t think her prison life will be particularly softer in Bryan, not enough to count as a meaningful, if initial, bribe for testimony exonerating Trump. Which has to be what this is all about.<\/p>\n *Do you remember when Peter Navarro went to prison<\/a> (at the link above)? Yes, he did. Know what he’s doing now? He’s Trump’s Czar of Tariffs. That is, this insane policy has been pushed by Navarro for years. The same Navarro who went to prison. So many of the Trump Minion Collection are felons. This might explain why the Federal BoP information on its sites are now fixated on programs of early release and parole. Kind of personal, isn’t it?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Ah, well. Since I’ve created myself as sort of sub-expert in the workings of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, a\/k\/a BoP, and since I’ve written fairly extensively in this blog about my personal experience with the BoP during the now-forgotten … Continue reading
\nactivities offered through this department. The recreation schedule for the<\/em>
\ngeneral population runs five days per week between the hours of 12:30<\/em>
\np.m. – 3:30 p.m. weather permitting. Recreation lasts one hour for each<\/em>
\nunit once it has begun.<\/em><\/p>\n