I was just reading this Wikipedia article about the sentencing of Mile Mrkšić and Veselin Šljivančanin for the Vukovar massacre and it made me wonder if other countries have a “Camp Cupcake” of sorts. Here in the United States, if you’re rich/powerful/well-connected and are convicted of a serious jailable offense, chances are you won’t be doing hard time with the rest of the dregs of society.
So what is prison like for VIP’s in other countries?
I seem to recall something on the History Channel about a Columbian drug lord, the name Escobar comes to mind who built his own palace for lack of a better word to be incarcerated in. It worked until his men shot a few goverment agents checking on him. It was a very messy business as I recall. He escaped, and was eventually hunted down and killed, but it was unclear whether it was by US DEA or Columbian Police.
I’ve read that most of the cushy prisons, especially in the federal system, have vanished in recent years and that federal prisons are even harder than most state prisons these days.
The link mentions a prison in the Netherlands, so I’m not sure where prisons in the United States fits in. In any case in the US the prison you’re sent to depends strongly on your offense, not on your wealth and status. The majority of wealthy people who are convicted of crimes are convicted of various “white collar” offenses. In those cases the convictee might end up in a “minimum security” facility. I doubt however that even Bill Gates could arrange to serve his time in such a facility if he were found guilty of multiple premeditated murders. BTW, “Camp Cupcake” is a facility for women only, and in the US system anyway women are treated better than men at every level (cause they’re such delicate things :rolleyes: ).
As for the Third World, it’s notorious in many countries that for enough money you can usualy bribe the guards for almost anything except an escape.
You got a cite for this?
Call me stupid but I can’t find any reference to Mrkšić or Šljivančanin in the link supplied by the OP.
The Wikipedia article briefly tracks the progress made by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia from its inception in 1994 to March this year. It says as follows:
The piece goes on to describe the detention facilities provided for those involved in ongoing cases:
Nice.
Although Scheveningen is a prison facility, and one which is superior to my own residence in some respects, it doesn’t sound like the kind of place in which convicted prisoners such as Mrkšić and Šljivančanin would be incarcerated. I don’t know where they are right now but I’d like to hear from someone who does. They were only sentenced on 27 September and it does remain possible they will return to Scheveningen if there is an appeal (if that’s where they have been spending time of late).
The BBC fails to mention their currrent location or their final destination, as do other reports of the sentencing I have read.
Never mind the rich and powerful- if con man Frank “Catch Me If You Can” AZbagnale is to be believed, an ordinary Swedish prison is nicer than an average Holiday Inn.
A lot of my patients have done time in federal prisons, and they’re uniform in their opinion that they don’t find them pleasant places. This includes a few “rich” and formerly “powerful” types. In fact, a number have expressed preference for our own State institutions.
Certainly our State pens are quite far removed from “cushy”.
Brief BBC story on ex-politician Jeffrey Archer’s stay in a “Category D”, the lowest security, prison here in the UK.
Evidently Thai prisons aren’t too bad if you have the means.
BTW, there’s a factor that is often lost in media discussions of “cushy” conditions in minimum security prisons, and why taxpayer money should be spent to provide criminals with an environment not unlike a college dormitory. That factor is that in spite of the amenities which may exist in them, keeping a prisoner in a minimum security lockup is far cheaper than keeping them in a maximum security institution. It makes economic sense to take prisoners who will actually obey rules about staying inside fences and so on, and put them somewhere with minimal guarding and much lower per-prisoner cost. A nicer environment provides an inducement for the prisoner to want to be there, rather than in the higher security prison - “Look, obey the rules, and this place isn’t so bad. Break them, and you’ll be in a cell with bars and guards.”. In practice, that means that the Jeff Skillings, who generally obeyed day-to-day social strictures while committing their crimes wind up in minimum security prisons because they can reasonably be expected to not cause trouble.
You got it. His name was Pablo Escobar, and he was the subject of Vinny Chase’s movie, Medellin 
The palace he built for himself was called La Catedral which Wikipedia claims was complete with a soccer field, jacuzzi, and bar. Escobar even chose the guards himself. A pretty fascinating character, if you ask me. He’s almost got a Robin Hood-like reputation in his hometown.
A famous person in Australia might be able to use his or her fame as a legitimate reason to request being placed in “protective custody” when in prison if that fame might lead to increased danger from the other inmates. But just being rich? Nope.
Then again pedophiles and others also tend to be granted protective custody, and from what I hear, being granted protection is not so hot. You might have a lesser chance of being bashed, raped, blackmailed, etc but you are in the same type of shitty cell, and you will be more restricted than the general prison population.
If you happen to be a white collar criminal who has a lengthy stretch of time to do, Canada is the destination of choice.
Presenting William Head Institution located 25 kilometres outside of Victoria, British Columbia in a city called Metchosin.
My wife & I toured this facility in 1984, and it literally takes your breath away.
It’s located on a peninsula that jets out onto the Pacific Ocean and is surrounded on 3 sides water.
It’s not a traditional institution like the movies.
They built these small crescents each containing 5 or 6 townhomes, and the inmates live inside them, cook their own meals, buy their own food.
If you didn’t know, you would think you’re in
someone’s house, complete with pool table in the living room.
It looks like a little suburb complete with streetlamps and sidewalks, and every hour or 2, the guards take a walk through each house and check on everyone.
We saw deer grazing, inmates were standing at the dock by the water fishing for salmon, and off in the distance we saw seals playing with each other.
If I didn’t see the place with my own eyes, I would never have believed it.
I guess the local people from Victoria regular write letters to the editor of the local paper bitching about it.
William Head is a federal medium security institution, so the sentences can range from 2 years all the way to life.
Type
William Head Institution
into Google and you’ll get a few links
Well?
I’ve visited a friend at Club Fed, in the '80s. He was at Lompoc, which, supposedly, was the cushiest in the system. It’s where the Watergate gang was housed.
It was not a destination. They had no library, the food was, according to my gourmet friend, inedible. If they wanted fresh fruit, there was an apple machine in the rec room, they could buy apples. They cost a week’s pay each. When I visited, all he wanted me to bring him was $5.00 in quarters.
There was one TV, that was ruled by one group. The cells were tiny, with only screening walls between them.
They were allowed to wear their own clothes. They could have two pairs of jeans and two shirts, four pairs of underwear and socks. They did their own laundry.
They had a tennis court, but no rackets. There was a track, and a basketball court.
Most of them worked in the flower fields. The “flavor of the week” got to ride a horse to and from the gardens, everyone else walked.
Not so plush, in my opinion.
Sorry, DrDeth. Some of us don’t check the SDMB every day. :rolleyes:
No, I do not have a cite other than what I’ve heard on the news and in conversation. Is one particularly necessary in this case? Do you believe all U.S. prisons are the same? If you start a thread in GD, I’ll be happy to discuss it there.
It need not be the case that all prisons are the same - it could simply be that the differences are based on the nature of the crimes commited by the prisoners, rather than on their wealth.
Right. I hardly believe all prisons are the same. I know a dude that got sent to one of those “farm camps”, a minimum security prison. He said it wasn’t a hell-hole, but hardly a vacation spot. 
picunurse & **Qadgop the Mercotan **very knowledeable post’s bely your claim in your OP. Qadgop the Mercotan definately should know. (Thanks Doc!)
But I am sorry about the “well?”.
Agent Foxtrot writes:
> No, I do not have a cite other than what I’ve heard on the news and in
> conversation. Is one particularly necessary in this case? Do you believe all U.S.
> prisons are the same? If you start a thread in GD, I’ll be happy to discuss it
> there.
You were the one who made the claim in your OP, not DrDeth. When someone asks you for a cite for your claim on the SDMB, the standard rule is that you either 1) provide a cite, 2) withdraw your claim, or 3) admit that you don’t have a particular cite for the claim, although you’re under the vague impression that it’s true. I guess you’re doing option 3 here.