Bureau of Prisons overrides own scoring system to incarcerate J6 defendants in more dangerous locations?

Eliyahu Tulshinski

July 16, 2023

Concern that government agencies are applying a double standard to their critics has spread to include suspicions of bias at the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) following the placement of non-violent trespassers in dangerous prisons rather than minimum security camps.

Weaponized prosecution

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has been accused of the illegal practice of selective prosecution since shortly after it diverted tremendous resources to hunting down non-violent protestors who entered a government building that is normally open to the public but had “area closed” signs temporarily placed a large distance from the entrance.

That the “Area Closed” signage was not viewable on the path that many protestors took, particularly in a large crowd where one could not see beyond the people tightly massed around them, did not dissuade tax-payer funded FBI agents and federal prosecutors from building cases of not just misdemeanor trespass but felony obstruction against those exercising their First Amendment right to protest government actions.

Federal agents should have given pause, though, because the statute used to prosecute hundreds of peaceful Jan 6 protestors defines a trespasser as one who, “knowingly enters or remains in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority to do so. . . . [T]he term ‘restricted buildings or grounds’ means any posted, cordoned off, or otherwise restricted area.” [Emphases added]. To get around this requirement, prosecutors overcharged defendants to pressure them into “confessing” to knowing the Capitol was closed.

Federal agents show no such zeal to lock up protestors who not only support government policies but call for even more government intervention in the daily lives of its citizens, as they not only fail to hunt down such protestors when they act peacefully but even drop assault charges when they do not. The FBI was even mocked for returning an axe an Antifa member used in an attack on a senator's office.

Drop everything, there's been a trespass

When FBI Director Christopher Wray testified before the House Judiciary Committee last week, he claimed not to know how many millions of tax payer dollars were used or how many agents were assigned to track down non-violent Jan 6 protestors, but he did claim to know that resources were not taken from child exploitation investigations.

Rep. Troy Nehls: “Knowing that you are dealing with some of the sickest people in our society with investigations related to child sex trafficking, have you reassigned any of these agents or personnel to investigate January 6, yes or no?”

Director Wray: “I don’t believe we have reassigned people away from child exploitation.”

Unfortunately for Wray, and for America's children, USA Today reported otherwise.

[A]gents in all but one of the FBI’s 56 field offices have been drafted to track down those who participated in the deadly insurrection. Investigators who typically work cases involving the trafficking of drugs, child pornography and sex have taken calls from rioter’s angry ex-wives and former girlfriends and employers turned tipsters. They’ve mined tens of thousands of photos and videos. They followed trails rioters left on social media. [Emphases added].

The Federalist, in “An FBI So Corrupt It Lets Mass Shooters Rampage," summarized the political policing to which participants in the January 6th protest have been subjected.

While letting much worse leftwing violence from well-documented “extremist” networks continue largely unchecked on federal property in Portland and elsewhere, the FBI has placed “thousands” of billboards across the country seeking tips to ferret out all private citizens who were at the capitol. . . .

It also appears the FBI is using its police power to prosecute people in connection with the Capitol riot who participated in no violence, including one who never went inside the Capitol nor harmed any person or public property.

Weaponized prisons

America's Frontline Doctors' (AFLDS) Creative Director John Strand, who was sentenced to 32 months in prison for escorting AFLDS founder Dr. Simone Gold as a security guard during her five-minute medical freedom speech in the Capitol on January 6th, would be expected to serve his time in a minimum security prison. The lack of violence or even aggressiveness exhibited by Strand and Gold is clearly seen in the below video compilation (from dozens of CCTV videos) which captures the entire 48 minutes in which they were in the Capitol building (almost half of which were spent trying to leave the crowded space).

One might be inclined to believe that a man who has no arrests, no violence and no aggressiveness in his background might spend those 32 months in the government's minimum security prisons known as Federal Prison Camps, which allow inmates freedom of movement and even permission to leave the camp to work.

To be placed in a prison camp, a defendant must have 11 or less points on the BOP's risk assessment.

The BOP does not release a defendant's assessment score, but Strand appears to have no security risk factors listed in the BOP's scoring template other than two points for being under 55 years of age, which is offset by the three points he is credited for voluntary surrender, leaving Strand with what appears to be a security point score of less than zero risk (-1).

A security point score of -1 would normally have a defendant assigned to a minimum security prison camp, where violence is rare, according to Prison Finder.

Minimum Security Prison:

These types of prisons [are] home to inmates who are serving out time for non-violent offenses.

Minimum security prisons offer dormitory-style housing. They also have a low inmate to correctional officer ratio along with little to no perimeter fence. They usually offer inmates a work program.

Inmates in these prisons typically have less than 10 years left on their sentences with little to no history of violence. [Emphases added].

The BOP is not, however, allowing Strand to serve his sentence at a minimum security federal prison camp, instead “bumping up” his security level and assigning him to begin his nearly three-year sentence on July 25^th at a Federal Correctional Institution.

Categorized as one security level above "minimum," correctional institutes are described by Prison Finder as incarceration sites for inmates with histories of violence.

Unlike the minimum security prisons, inmates in low security tend to have some history of violence. The prisons are enclosed with fences. Prisoners usually have [up to] 20 years left to serve.

The BOP sends a letter to convicted defendants who are not already incarcerated with only the prison address and date on which to report, without any explanation of how the security level was determined. Thus, when the security level does not match the BOP's own scoring system, a defendant is not informed of the mechanism by which their security level was increased. BOP guidelines do, however, list Public Safety Factors (PSFs) and Management Variables (MGTV) which are used to change security levels.

In the case of Jan 6 defendants, even scores of less than zero risk, such as Strand's presumed -1 security point score, could lead to confinement in a correctional institution if BOP officials claim that the mere entrance into the Capitol building automatically renders the defendants a positive rating for the PSF of being a “threat to government officials,” regardless of whether they actually threatened officials or posed such a threat during their walk through the building's lobby (for most, while keeping within the velvet ropes meant to guide visitors).

Likewise, Jan 6 defendants who have a security point score higher than 11, and would normally be assigned to a low or medium security prison, could see the BOP use the “threat to government officials” PSF to bump them up to a medium or high security level, respectively. In fact, non-violent Jan 6 defendants may even be housed with high security level convicts, as Frontline News reported in comparing Dr. Gold's assignment with that of Ghislaine Maxwell, who was convicted of recruiting, grooming and procuring multiple teen girls for sexually abuse:

A tale of two jails

Contrast the incarceration conditions of child trafficker Maxwell with that of America’s Frontline Doctors founder, Simone Gold, MD. Dr. Gold was incarcerated yesterday (7/26/22) at the Federal Detention Center of Miami, a prison that includes high security risk, violent offenders. In place of [Maxwell's] in-person academic courses, paid correspondence courses are permitted. In place of cooking and woodwork, prisoners are trained to be janitors and food handlers. No talent shows, softball or apprenticeships. . . . And all visiting has been suspended “until further notice.”

Dr. Gold, a female, middle-aged doctor and lawyer has all the qualifications listed by the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) for minimum security designation: no previous record of aggressive behavior in her life, let alone criminal activity, a relatively short incarceration of 58 days, who voluntarily surrendered for her confinement, and is incarcerated for the lowest level of offense (misdemeanor trespass) with no victims. Maxwell, with a 20 year sentence on a high-level sex trafficking offense with multiple minor victims, and an automatically high security risk rating according to BOP rules, clearly appears to be a case of preferential treatment of a member of the “elite”.

How could the BOP rules be turned upside down to place Dr. Gold with high security inmates? The BOP simply did not assign her to a prison for a specific risk level. Had they done so, she would have been at a minimum security “camp”. Instead, BOP officials placed Dr. Gold in a so-called “administrative facility,” the type of federal prison which holds inmates in all security categories together. A high security prisoner may even be placed in the same cell as a minimum security detainee.

Congress

The House of Representatives, which is currently holding hearings on the DOJ's two-tiered justice system, through its Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, may wish to add BOP Director Colette Peters to its list of government officials to publicly question. The committee may well probe Peters with questions like:

Have there been internal memos or oral instructions at BOP calling for or implying that Jan 6 defendants should have their security level increased through PSFs like “threat to government officials” or by assigning them to administrative facilities hosting high security level inmates?
What precedents, if any, exist for putting people with a security point score like Strand's to be placed in a BOP security level higher than minimum?
Is BOP independently, or in conjunction with the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) or the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), having non-violent Jan 6 defendants' airplane boarding passes designated SSSS requiring one to undergo extensive additional screening normally reserved for suspected terrorists?

If you have a story about the prison placement of a Jan 6 defendant, please share it with us.

“I will not bear false witness”

Strand can be reached at his website, where he posted the following message about his incarceration.

Most do not realize that I was given a plea "bargain" by the government, their typical coercion tactic to pressure defendants into admitting legal guilt--regardless of their actual guilt or innocence. Instead of the 20 YEAR FELONY + 4 misdemeanors I am charged with, they offered the temptation of reducing my entire indictment down to a single misdemeanor, with a typical sentence of only 0-30 days in prison.

I refused.

I rejected this plea deal because I am innocent; therefore, the plea admission would be a false statement. But even worse, the government’s “statement of fact” in that plea was a dirty lie—it created a fraudulent narrative about J6 to fabricate the idea that thousands of people knew in advance the Capitol plaza was “restricted”, and that the protesters had premeditated an illegal attack against the U.S. government with the explicit intent to thwart a Constitutional process. This is both untrue, and preposterous.

I will not bear false witness, including against myself, as this is a direct violation of God's command.

Selective law enforcement