Ghislaine Maxwell’s move to ‘country club’ prison smacks of special treatment, experts say

With its red-roofed dormitories, grassy courtyards and wrought-iron fences, the Bryan Federal Prison Camp in Texas looks almost like a college campus, befitting its reputation as one of the nation’s most lenient lockups for nonviolent women offenders.

That it’s now Ghislaine Maxwell’s new home for serving her 20-year sentence for sex trafficking flouts federal guidelines on who should be held in such minimum-security facilities, according to corrections experts, who said Maxwell appeared to have received preferential treatment for answering the Justice Department’s questions about her deceased partner in crime, Jeffrey Epstein.

“Someone gave special preference to Maxwell that, to my knowledge, no other inmate currently in the Federal Bureau of Prisons has received,” said Robert Hood, a former warden of the Florence supermax prison in Colorado, home to some of the world’s most notorious criminals and on the opposite end of the security spectrum from Bryan.

“It’s a country club,” Hood said 0f the camp about 100 miles northwest of Houston. “Inmates, if they have a sex offense, are not going to a place like that, period. It’s truly unheard of.”

Long-standing policy from the Federal Bureau of Prisons restricts inmates with certain elevated security classifications, known as “public safety factors,” from serving in federal prison camps. Sex offenses are among the most severe. Maxwell was convicted in 2021 for helping Epstein groom, traffic and abuse dozens of underage girls.

Inmates serving sentences of 10 years or more generally aren’t eligible for transfer to minimum-security facilities. This, too, would have applied to Maxwell, who is not due for release until 2037. Exceptions can be made through what’s known as a “management variable.” In Maxwell’s case, prison staff would have had to request this waiver to move her, and senior prison officials would have had to sign off on it, according to BOP policy.

Meanwhile, The Associated Press reports Maxwell wants to keep grand jury records secret in the sex trafficking case that sent her to prison, her lawyers said Tuesday as prosecutors continued urging a court to release some of those records.

While it’s not uncommon for prison officials to allow inmates who cooperate with investigations to move to lower-security facilities, it’s rare for sex offenders to receive such benefits, and they almost never get moved into prison camps like Bryan, experts said.

“It’s enormously preferential treatment,” said Judi Garrett, a former BOP assistant director. “Getting a public safety factor for a sex offender waived is monumental.”

But Maxwell could have been in a position to leverage special treatment. She has become a focal point of efforts by President Donald Trump’s administration to calm a growing furor over its about-face decision last month to release no further information from the FBI’s Epstein files.

Epstein was indicted on sex trafficking and other charges in 2019 but died while awaiting trial in what has been ruled a suicide. Members of Trump’s Republican base have led a continuing clamor for the full release of the files and whatever information Maxwell may have that could implicate some of the disgraced financier’s rich and powerful friends.

Maxwell’s transfer from a low-security prison in Tallahassee came to light just a week after she sat for two days of interviews with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche.

David Oscar Markus, an attorney for Maxwell said she was asked about potentially “100 different people” and she “answered those questions honestly, truthfully, to the best of her ability.” Blanche has said that he would release information about their interview at an appropriate time.

Neither Markus nor the Justice Department have commented on the reason for her transfer. A spokesperson for the prisons bureau didn’t respond to a request for comment Tuesday.

Some victims of Epstein and Maxwell decried the transfer in a joint statement, calling Maxwell a sexual predator and saying she should “never be shown any leniency.”

And while some have speculated that Maxwell’s move could be the precursor to clemency, Trump has been noncommittal on the subject, though telling reporters he is “allowed to give her a pardon”

But one aspect of Maxwell’s housing is clear: Conditions at the Bryan prison camp are among the best in the corrections system and a significant improvement over even the low-security prison where the 63-year-old old had been held.

“A low-security prison has a substantially higher ratio of staff to inmates than a camp. You’re on a different planet,” said Larry Levine, founder of Pink Lady Prison Consultants, which helps women prisoners navigate the system. “You’re looking at double razor wire around the fence, trucks driving around it, cops with rifles. They’re locking the doors of the housing units at night.”

At the Bryan camp, located in a residential neighborhood, doors to dorms with bunk beds and suite housing remain unlocked, and the 635 khaki-clad inmates are generally free to roam the compound. A single layer of razor wire fencing stretches around the back part of the perimeter, while the front entrance is lined with low, wrought-iron fencing.

“The token fence there is to keep the public and press out, really,” Hood said. “It’s not really keeping the inmates in.”

Most inmates are serving time after being convicted of financial crimes or low-level drug offenses, and have less than 10 years left in their sentence.

Among the highest-profile inmates is Elizabeth Holmes, founder of the blood-testing company Theranos, who was convicted of defrauding investors. Another is Jennifer Shah, a “Real Housewives of Salt Lake City” cast member serving time for wire fraud. Bryan also briefly housed Michelle Janavs, heiress to the Hot Pockets food empire who was sentenced for paying a fixer to help get her children into the University of Southern California.

The camp offers recreational options, including an athletic field, library, and arts and crafts programs. Inmates can participate in vocational training or take on work assignments including landscaping, food service and cleaning. The camp also partners with Canine Companions for Independence, a program that allows inmates to raise and train service dogs.

During the day, staff consists of a chaplain, department heads, facility workers, teachers and correctional officers — a few dozen people in total, experts said. When the camp shuts down at night, they said, fewer than a half-dozen correctional officers may remain on-site.

Many inmates go to camps to prepare to leave the prison system, so conditions are less volatile and violence extremely rare.

“People are on their best behavior. They don’t want to get transferred out,” said Sharon Dolovich, a prison system expert at the UCLA School of Law. “The people inside are more relaxed. The staff are more relaxed. They’re mostly just grateful.”