There was an article on page B4 of the April 14, 2025 issue of the Wall Street Journal titled “Bankman-Fried’s New Prison Housed Capone.” SBF (as he is often known) was the founder of FTX cryptocurrency. It collapsed in November of 2022 and a year later he was convicted of fraud. When this article was read by several of us in prison, there was some discontent on how the article was phrased/written. I will outline the consensus of our concerns/thoughts below:
1) The article states that he will be held in the low-security Terminal Island facility in Los Angeles and that it houses sex offenders, gang members and people convicted on gun charges. We do not refute the factual basis of this, but how it is portrayed. First of all, any of the more violent offenders will be in a high or medium security facility. Only those who have been in the prison system a long time with no history of violence have moved into the lower security prison. The threat of violence is small. I have been in the Lexington FMC since January 3 of 2025 and I still have not seen a fight and have only heard of 2-3 of them.
2) Secondly, according to prison lingo, there are two types of sex offenders – clickers & touchers. Clickers are guys who have watched, seen, downloaded (or even downloaded and never watched as they were never the target of the download) child porn. I know several guys who just happened to click a bunch of videos for downloading with the intent to watch later, but never watched them. The second group are “touchers” and I think the title is self-explanatory. These types of guys disgust just about everyone in prison.
3) Even those with gun charges who are incarcerated may have never pulled a gun. If you are carrying a gun (or it was in your car) when you buy drugs, you automatically get a gun charge. It helps to add more time to your sentence – one of the unstated goals of the Justice Department. I know several guys who have gun charges and they are as meek as anyone I know outside of prison. Just because you have a gun charge does not automatically make you a violent offender – no matter what the BOP says.
4) I cannot comment much on gang members. I do not see any real evidence of that in the Lexington prison system. It may be different at Terminal Island. In any case, all three of these categories of criminals that will be in the low security prison will have been vetted or served so much time that the violence left them a long time ago.
5) Even though it does not have AC & needs lots of repairs, the Terminal Island facility has the reputation of being one of the best low security prisons in the system. Still, I find it laughable when the BOP spokesperson said there are “alternative means of remaining cool in hotter weather, such as fans and operable windows.” Really? Even my great-grandparents knew those two tricks. For the record, our unit here in Lexington does not have AC either and no one is looking forward to June through August when it can get up to 90 degrees inside the rooms. You will never know how hot it really is because there is no way of getting a thermometer to check the temperature.
6) SBF will not only get 15% Good Time Credit removed from his sentence, but should also be eligible for First Step Act credits that can remove up to 35% more time off his sentence. With these credits, he will assuredly get out before December 2044 and as he spends more time in the low security prison, he will probably eligible to be moved to a minimum security camp at some point in the future. He will have even more freedoms there than what he will face in the low security prison at Terminal Island.
These are just some of our thoughts after reading the article.
Dennis Zeedyk
