How would you go about trying to get an inmate transferred closer to home, does it matter if it was in the sentencing orders?
Is an attorney required to still be acting in his client’s best interest after he is incarcerated?
3.Are there any advocates in Federal Prison to help an inmate if his attorney doesn’t seem to be doing anything to help him.
My understanding is that once the trial has been completed, the relationship between attorney and client is ended. The attorney has no ongoing obligation to a client.
According to the BOP website, the initial assignment in the federal prison system is based on a number of factors, primarily the level of security and supervision that the inmate is determined to need, medical or other needs, and other administrative factors.
When requesting a “nearer release transfer,” two things are worth noting. First, they generally will not consider a request until the inmate has served at least 18 months with good conduct. Secondly, they generalyy won’t consider one if the inmate is within 500 miles of home.
More details available From Chapter 10 of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Security Custody Classification Manual (5100.07) (pdf online - very large file).
Yes. §543.12 a. states that “the Warden must ensure that a list of legal resources (including attorneys acting pro bono or through an established legal aid program at the institution) is made available.”
I’m with Little Nemo on the second question. Generally the attorney’s obligation ends with the trial.
I am not your lawyer, this is not legal advice, and the other usual disclaimers apply.
I have heard (and this is third-hand hearsay so make of it what you will) that once you are sentenced, the Bureau of Prisons is responsible for prison assignment. Apparently you can hire counsel to represent you in the BOP on the assignment decision, and there are lawyers that specialize in this (this not normally considered part of the responsibilities of trial counsel). I assume that such lawyers would also represent a prisoner in a reassignment issue.
As a side note, the lawyer who told me this mentioned that most people did not avail themselves of these services, except those of Soviet or Russian background, who almost universally did.
It’s not necessarily the same in the federal prison system, but I know in the New York State prison system, the decision as to what particular facility an inmate is living at is made completely within the department of corrections. Judges sentence convicted people to a duration of imprisonment but do not have the authority to sentence them to a specific prison or otherwise influence where they will be incarcerated. Inmates may request a specific prison but they have no legal right to a choice of which prison they are assigned to. In fact, security policy is that inmates being transferred are not told what facility they are being sent to and in some cases inmates have to ask the officers what prison they’re in after they arrive there.
What if the inmate is pending reclassification and transfer due to conflict of interest, no fault of his?
What if the inmate is pending reclassification and transfer due to conflict of interest, no fault of his?
True.
I have friends that work in corrections. They say that high risk inmates are sent to the other end of the state from home. If the inmate escapes he has no idea where he is and is far away from any help in friends or family.
Do you think that is just simply the protocol or procedure in general for any reclassification and transfer or do you think it might be handled any differently since it is a Minimum Security Camp, totally nonviolent offender who has complied with everything? Would it be the Warden, the US Marshall, someone in the higher ranks of BOP, do you have any idea who actually decides this? Does it even help for anyone to make a plea on the behalf of the individual or just make it worse? If it would help, who would you actually make that plea to? I pose the question because on the BOP site it says they encourage visiting with family. We all know when an individual is totally isolated from anyone who cares for them, they won’t come out a better person or even as good a person than when they went in. Why do they put that on the site, just for PR or does some group or board actually consider these things.
In New York, we have a Guidance Department, which is supposed to be the place for inmates to go to if they issues like this. Each inmate is assigned to a specific counselor. If an inmate wants to request a transfer to another prison, housing unit, program, etc he’s supposed to talk to or write to his counselor. If an inmate feels he’s getting jerked around by his counselor, he can contact the senior counselor who’s next in rank. Or he can contact a security supervisor or a chaplain. Of he can write to the superintendant or the commissioner. Or he can call his Mom.
Then his Mom calls the prison and wants to talk to the person in charge. Which is, all too often, me. So Mom tells me what problem her son is having and I explain to Mom what her son should be doing and then I have somebody tell her son what he should be doing.
So while I don’t know the specifics of how things work in a federal prison, I’m pretty sure there’s somebody doing the equivalent job of receiving inmate requests and deciding whether or not to act on them. But there’s nobody whose job it is to be the inmate’s guardian angel and do things for him. Ultimately, the inmate is going to have to start asking questions about who he needs to contact to request a transfer and then take the initiative to contact that person. Or he’s going to have to call his Mom.
I wanted to thank you for talking to me, this is totally out of my league. May I email you directly so this won’t be posted on a message board? My email address is baconindallas@gmail.com.
I don’t want to risk saying too much on message board and I know you are not advising me and you are not my attorney, don’t look at it that way. You are being very helpful to me, the scariest thing is not knowing, and you are giving me some peace of mind which I desperately need right now.
You can email me if you wish (my address is in my profile). But I can tell you now that I’ve already given you virtually all of the information and advice I can about the federal prison system. Presumedly you want to tell me the specifics of the case you are involved with, but that’s not going to change anything I’ve already said.