Legal News

Nothing Could Be Finer Than Madoff In Carolina?

By Chris Herring

Bernie Madoff was transferred today from his New York City jail cell to a federal prison in North Carolina where he’ll begin to serve his 150-year prison term, according to a Dow Jones Newswires story.

The 71-year-old Madoff, who pleaded guilty to bilking investors out of billions, will start his lengthy sentence at the Butner Federal Correctional Complex in Butner, N.C., which is within a half-hour of Raleigh. The complex includes a pair of medium-security prisons and a low-security prison.

During Madoff’s sentencing two weeks ago, U.S. District Judge Denny Chin recommended that the Ponzi-scheme operator be imprisoned in the Northeast. The U.S. Bureau of Prisons, however, has final say over where prisoners serve their time.

Alan Ellis, a lawyer who specializes in federal sentencing and matters involving the Bureau of Prisons, told the Law Blog in June Chin’s recommendation on location may have little relevance in the BoP’s decision. Click here to read the transcript from that interview.

“Not at all,” Ellis said when asked whether the BoP had to follow Chin’s suggestion. “And, frankly, I'd be very surprised if he was sent to the northeast. I'd guess that they're going to put him far away from the media, in a very well-run but isolated facility in the middle of nowhere.”

A handful of other infamous people inhabit the Butner prison. Current inmates include Adelphia Communications Corp. founder John Rigas and his son Timothy, each of whom was found guilty of concealing more than $2 billion worth of company debt. John Rigas, 84, will serve time until 2018 and Timothy, 53, is scheduled for release in 2022. Former Rite Aid Corp. Vice Chairman Franklin C. Brown, convicted of an accounting scandal, is at Butner until 2013. Jonathan Pollard, a former U.S. Navy official who admitted to spying for Israel, is at the prison until 2015.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on July 13, 2009 (boomark / email).