FMC Devens: Federal Medical Center in Ayer, Massachusetts

By Elizabeth Franklin-Best, Esq., and Christopher Zoukis, JD, MBA

FMC Devens at a glance

FMC Devens is an administrative-security federal medical center in Ayer, Massachusetts, holding 1,186 men as of September 2026: 1,072 at the medical center and 114 at the adjacent minimum-security satellite camp. It stands on the former Fort Devens Army post about 39 miles northwest of Boston and runs the Bureau’s only Memory Disorder Unit, the single federal prison unit built for people with dementia.

Official name	Federal Medical Center, Devens
BOP code	DEV
Security level	Administrative; men · camp: minimum
Population	1,186 (as of September 2026)
Visiting	Sunday, Monday and federal holidays, 8:30 a.m.–3:00 p.m. · last entry 2:00 p.m., camp 2:30 p.m.
Inmate mail	FMC: Inmate Name & Register Number · FMC Devens · Federal Medical Center · P.O. Box 879 · Ayer, MA 01432 Camp: Inmate Name & Register Number · FMC Devens · Federal Medical Center · Satellite Camp · P.O. Box 879 · Ayer, MA 01432
Send money	Lockbox · Western Union (code city FBOP, DC) · MoneyGram (receive code 7932)
Phone	978-796-1000 · Fax 978-796-1118
Street address	42 Patton Road, Ayer, MA 01432 · Middlesex County
Judicial district	District of Massachusetts
BOP region	Northeast
Housing	Six general population, four mental health and four medical (hospital) units · camp: one open-bay building
Special Housing Unit	See security level and housing units
Medical care level	Level 4; camp Level 2 · see the four care levels
Mental health care level	Level 4; camp Level 2
RDAP	No
Sex offender treatment	Residential program (SOTP-R) · SOMP institution
UNICOR	No
Camp	Yes · minimum security, half a mile down Patton Road

FMC Devens answers to the Bureau’s Northeast Region and is one of only seven medical referral centers in the federal system. See also our guide to federal prisons in Massachusetts.

Is it FMC Devens, FPC Devens, or Fort Devens Prison?

All three names refer to one 21-building site on the former Fort Devens Army post: FMC Devens is the Federal Medical Center, and FPC Devens is its satellite Federal Prison Camp. Mixing them up costs families wasted trips and returned mail. The Federal Medical Center is administrative security and held 1,072 men as of September 2026; the Federal Prison Camp, half a mile further down Patton Road, is minimum security and held 114. They share a post office box and a telephone number and little else: khaki uniforms at the medical center, green at the camp, and a point system that rations visits at the medical center only.

The Bureau’s own documents give the address differently.

What you are sending	Where it goes
Mail and parcels to an incarcerated person	P.O. Box 879, Ayer, MA 01432
Mail to a staff member	P.O. Box 880, Ayer, MA 01432
Freight and non-USPS parcels	36 Independence Drive, Building 1677, Devens, MA 01434
Where you physically drive	42 Patton Road — given as Ayer, MA 01432 on the Bureau’s roster and as Devens, MA 01434 in the institution’s own visiting supplement

Devens is not an ordinary town but an unincorporated enterprise zone carved out of Ayer, Harvard and Shirley when the Army post closed, which is why one street sits in two ZIP codes depending on which agency is writing. Send inmate mail to the Ayer post office box, committed name and register number on the first line — mail without a register number is returned.

What is the security level at FMC Devens?

The medical center is administrative security; the camp beside it is minimum security. Administrative is not a rung between low and medium but a separate category for institutions with a special mission, and it means the institution holds men of every security level at once. The 2024 PREA audit records the custody levels in use here as "Administrative/Com, Min, Out, In, Max" — every classification the Bureau has. A man doing eighteen months for tax fraud and a man serving life for murder can share a corridor, because what they have in common is a medical need, not a security score.

The Inspector General’s April 2024 inspection counted six general population housing units, four mental health units, four medical (hospital) units and one Special Housing Unit at the medical center, plus one open-bay building at the camp. The March 2026 handbook names the general population units P, G, H and J, the mental health units N-4 and N-5, and the inpatient units N-1, N-2, N-3 and PA; its Education section describes the Special Housing Units as K-unit and N-1. N-1 is therefore two things in the institution’s own handbook, an inpatient unit and a special housing unit, and the First Circuit described it in August 2026 as "a locked mental health unit" and "the highest level of security at FMC Devens." The sick-call route differs by unit, so ask the unit team which rules are being applied to N-1 before relying on either.

The handbook puts it directly: "FMC Devens is somewhat unique among FBOP institutions, in that the hospital is also a housing unit." Whether a man lands at the medical center or the camp turns on his security point score, on any Public Safety Factor, and — uniquely here — on his medical and mental health care level.

How does someone get designated or transferred to FMC Devens?

Someone is sent to FMC Devens through a medical designation, decided by the Central Office Medical Designator in the Office of Medical Designations and Transportation on a form a clinician fills out, not through the Designation and Sentence Computation Center that handles ordinary designations. See our guide to the designation process.

The four care levels, and why this is a Level 4 institution

The Bureau’s patient care rules, Program Statement 6031.06 (2026), assign a care level to every person and, separately, to every institution. For a facility it turns on "the clinical capabilities and resources of the institution and the surrounding community, as well as specific medical missions (e.g. dialysis, oncology, etc.)." The levels run from 1, for the generally healthy, to 4, which the policy defines this way: "Care Level 4 institutions are the Bureau’s MRC" — Medical Referral Centers. The Inspector General’s December 2024 report rates the medical center Medical Care Level 4 of 4 and Mental Health Care Level 4 of 4, and there is nothing above that. The Bureau’s own 2024 care-level charts are less tidy: the medical chart dated February 13, 2024, prints the medical center as "3,4" in its table by region yet files Devens under Level 4 in its list by level, and it rates the unit it labels "LOW" at 3 and the camp at 2; the undated mental-health chart gives the medical center 4 and both that unit and the camp 2.

The Bureau’s roster names all seven medical referral centers: FMC Butner, FMC Carswell, FMC Devens, FMC Fort Worth, FMC Lexington, FMC Rochester and the U.S. Medical Center for Federal Prisoners at Springfield, Missouri. Carswell is the only one for women, and Devens is the only medical center holding men only that has a minimum-security camp attached. FMC Lexington, which the Bureau’s roster records as holding men and women, also has one. Our guide to medical designations and care levels explains where the assignments go wrong.

The BP-A0770, and who actually signs it

The instrument is form BP-A0770, the Medical/Surgical and Psychiatric Referral Request. The Bureau’s designation manual, Program Statement 5100.08, sets the order: the Health Services Administrator completes it "with input from the Clinical Director and other providers involved with the inmate’s care," the sending Warden authorizes it, and the Central Office Medical Designator approves or denies. The sequence has no box for the family, the judge or defense counsel. Everything an outside lawyer does is aimed at getting complete, current specialist documentation in front of the Clinical Director so that a 770 gets written at all.

Three urgency levels exist. An emergency transfer requires direct transport. A routine/urgent transfer must reach the medical center "typically within two to three weeks of designation," and the policy states flatly that "holdover housing at a county jail or Bureau general population institution is not permissible." A routine transfer may take months. People "requiring dialysis, peritoneal or hemodialysis, will be referred to the Office of Medical Designations and Transportation"; for organ transplant, "a limited evaluation and copy of the subspecialist consultation is sufficient to support the 770 redesignation request."

Two further provisions apply. If a person objects in writing or through his attorney to a transfer for psychiatric treatment, PS 5100.08 provides that "the provisions of 18 U.S.C. § 4245 may apply," staff must suspend the transfer, and Regional Counsel decides when it may resume. And a medical transfer is usually temporary: "medical cases are normally returned to their parent facility unless the DSCC approves a change in the parent facility based on clinical justification provided prior to redesignation." If a family wants Devens to be permanent, that argument has to be made before the redesignation. See federal prison transfers.

When the medical center stops accepting patients

A medical center can close its doors, and in 2024 this one did, three times. Admissions to the Memory Disorder Unit were paused at the Warden’s January 2024 request, approved in April, until October 25, 2024. New orthopedic cases were refused from March 13 to December 3, 2024, the institution having run on one physical therapist since August 2023. And a moratorium on Medical Care Level 4 men needing help with activities of daily living ran from June 5 to December 3, 2024. The Inspector General’s assessment supports anyone whose family member was left waiting elsewhere: the pause "could require inmates to stay at institutions without necessary memory disorder or orthopedic care, which may exacerbate these conditions."

What medical and mental health care does FMC Devens provide?

FMC Devens provides more medical and mental health care than any other federal prison for men, including the Bureau’s only dementia unit, dialysis and forensic evaluation, though less than its mission statement implies. The Inspector General’s April 2024 inspection produced the only current independent inventory: a 12-bed inpatient unit with one airborne isolation room and round-the-clock nursing, outpatient urgent care and chronic care clinics, and a Physical Therapy Department. The care-level mix the institution reported in April 2024 shows who is here.

Care level	Medical	Mental health
Level 4	18% (171 men)	13% (122 men)
Level 3	13% (127)	2% (20)
Level 2	26% (241)	6% (56)
Level 1	43% (402)	79% (743)

Source: DOJ OIG, E&I Report 25-009 (December 2024), Figure 1. Forty-three percent of the men at a Level 4 medical center carry the lowest medical care level; 44 percent of the population was over fifty.

The Memory Disorder Unit

The Memory Disorder Unit provides 24-hour nursing care to men with dementia, and the Inspector General states that “FMC Devens maintains the only MDU within the BOP.”

It held 16 men at the inspection. Inspectors read all 16 files and found four — a quarter of the unit — who did not meet the institution’s own criteria, which require a dementia diagnosis and no propensity for violence. Staff said Devens "at times… uses the MDU as a housing unit for inmates who have behavioral issues and cannot be housed elsewhere." And of 21 men over fifty whose records were sampled, none had received a cognitive screening in the previous year. The prison that runs the Bureau’s only dementia unit was not systematically screening for dementia.

Dialysis, transplants and rehabilitation

Devens runs a Dialysis Treatment Center, and the Inspector General records that "the BOP has only four institutions with a dialysis unit: FMC Devens, FMC Butner, FMC Carswell, and U.S. Medical Center for Federal Prisoners Springfield." For a man on hemodialysis, the choice of federal prison is a choice among four buildings in the country. Devens also coordinates transplants through a community transplant center, and it "was the first BOP institution to provide its inmates donor transplant services."

Cancer care is not on-site: oncology consultations appear in the inspection among the outside records the institution was waiting to receive, so treatment runs through community providers and depends on an escort.

Forensic evaluation, competency restoration and civil commitment

A large part of what Devens does has nothing to do with serving a sentence. Under 18 U.S.C. §§ 4241–4248 it is a forensic evaluation site, conducting court-ordered evaluations of competency, criminal responsibility and dangerousness for defendants referred from across the country; it provides restorative care, including involuntary medication, to pretrial detainees found incompetent; and it houses civil commitments, including men committed as sexually dangerous. There were 52 men at Devens for forensic evaluation in 2024, and inspectors recorded that day-to-day care of all 52 "fell on one Forensics Unit psychologist."

Sex offender treatment and the SOMP designation

Devens is a Sex Offender Management Program institution and holds the Bureau’s residential sex offender treatment program. The March 2026 handbook states: "The SOTP-R is currently available only at FMC Devens." That sentence explains much of who is designated here. SOMP is a moderate-intensity management program for lower-risk participants; SOTP-R sits inside it, voluntary and high-intensity, for higher-risk participants. Both sex offender program psychologist posts were vacant at the inspection, and any man convicted of a sex offense involving a minor gets a "WA CONV" annotation in the visiting computer.

How sick call works, and what it costs

Sick call runs Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, and how a man reaches it depends where he lives. Units P, G, H and J report to the Health Services lobby by the close of the 7:30 a.m. move; mental health units N-4 and N-5 to the N-unit nursing station; the Special Housing Unit and inpatient units N-1, N-3 and PA raise concerns with a nurse on rounds; at the camp a written request goes in the medical mailbox. A clinician triages and usually schedules an appointment "up to two weeks after presenting to sick call."

There is a $2.00 copay for a visit a man requests himself, with one exception here. The copay statute exempts people in inpatient status at a medical referral center, and the handbook names them: "At FMC Devens, only inmates housed in N1, N3, N2 and PA units meet this criteria. All remaining inmates are outpatient." Live in the hospital and you do not pay; live in general population at the same medical center and you do. Staff referrals, chronic care, preventive care, emergencies, mental health care and insulin carry no fee. Pill line runs at approximately 6:00 a.m., 10:45 a.m. (insulin only), 11:00 a.m., 4:45 p.m. and 7:00 p.m. Our page on medical care in federal prison covers the system-wide rules.

How does FMC Devens figure in a compassionate release motion?

FMC Devens can support a compassionate release motion, because a federal inspection documents gaps in its care, and it can undercut one, because it is already the Bureau’s highest care level; which way it cuts depends on facts a lawyer develops rather than assumes. Under 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A) a person may move the court after exhausting administrative appeals or 30 days from the Warden’s receipt of a request, whichever is earlier. The governing policy statement, USSG § 1B1.13 in the Guidelines Manual effective November 1, 2025, lists four medical circumstances, and the third is written for facts like these: § 1B1.13(b)(1)(C) covers "a medical condition that requires long-term or specialized medical care that is not being provided and without which the defendant is at risk of serious deterioration in health or death."

Subsection (C) turns on care that is not being provided, which at most federal prisons is hard to prove from the outside. At Devens there is a federal inspection report, published December 11, 2024, recording that a Level 4 medical center had one physician and a Clinical Director covering roughly 941 men; that the Clinical Director’s post then sat vacant from June to at least October 2024; that 57 outside appointments were an average of 53 days overdue; and that a quarter of the beds in the Bureau’s only dementia unit held men who did not meet the criteria for it. Those findings come from the Department of Justice, not from the defendant.

The same record can cut the other way. A man at Devens is already at the Bureau’s highest care level, and the government will say — correctly, as a matter of policy design — that he is receiving specialized care by definition. A § 1B1.13(b)(1)(C) motion out of Devens has to be specific: the named treatment, the date ordered, the date due, the date it happened or did not, and the clinical consequence of the gap.

The Bureau’s own route runs in parallel. Its compassionate release rules, Program Statement 5050.51, issued in September 2026, replaced the 2019 statement and govern a reduction-in-sentence request to the Warden. Its medical criteria include a terminal, incurable disease, "a serious and advanced illness with an end-of-life trajectory," and a debilitated condition: a serious physical or medical condition, or a serious functional or cognitive impairment, "from which the inmate is not expected to recover, and which substantially diminishes the inmate’s ability to provide self-care within the correctional environment." The old statement’s eighteen-month life expectancy and bed-or-chair tests are gone. The new statement also covers a condition needing long-term or specialized care "that cannot be provided in the Bureau without undue hardship, prohibitive costs, or significant disruption to the safe and orderly running of the institution" — a different question from the guideline’s "is not being provided." Three deadlines come from the statute, 18 U.S.C. § 3582(d)(2)(A), which the program statement restates: after a terminal diagnosis the Bureau must notify the attorney, partner and family within 72 hours and give family an in-person visit within 7 days, and it must process a request within 14 days of receiving it. The first two clocks start at the diagnosis, not the request. See our pages on federal compassionate release and the request to the Warden and the 30-day clock.

Who are the notable inmates at FMC Devens?

Notable men held at FMC Devens include former Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano, Colombo family acting boss Victor Orena, Genovese consigliere James Ida and Born to Kill leader David Thai.

Name	Status	Case
Edward Mangano	Held here; projected release December 4, 2031	Former Nassau County Executive, sentenced April 14, 2022, in the Eastern District of New York to 12 years for bribery and obstruction
Victor “Little Vic” Orena	Held here, aged 92; serving life	Acting boss of the Colombo crime family; mandatory life for racketeering and murder in aid of racketeering
James Ida	Held here, aged 86; serving life	Genovese family consigliere, convicted 1997 in the Southern District of New York of racketeering including murder
David Thai	Held here, aged 70; serving life	Leader of the New York gang Born to Kill; two concurrent life terms and $413,285 restitution
Danny James Heinrich	Held here; projected release December 6, 2032	Sentenced in Minnesota to 20 years on child pornography charges after admitting in his plea to the 1989 murder of Jacob Wetterling
Kent Igleheart	Held here; projected release October 29, 2034	Former Roswell, Georgia city councilman, sentenced to 20 years for producing child pornography
Sheldon Silver	Died here January 24, 2022	Former Speaker of the New York State Assembly, convicted of honest services fraud and extortion
John Franzese	Released from Devens June 23, 2017	Colombo family underboss; at release, the oldest person in federal custody
Anthony Weiner	Reported to Devens November 6, 2017; released May 14, 2019	Former member of Congress, 21 months for transferring obscene material to a minor

Three men often listed at this prison are not held here. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, held at Devens around his Boston Marathon bombing trial, is now at the federal supermax in Florence, Colorado. Rajat Gupta was released on March 11, 2016, his last recorded facility the New York residential reentry office. And Frank Salemme died in custody on December 13, 2022, at Springfield, Missouri, not at Devens. The locator’s record holds a current facility, or the last one before release, not a custody history.

How do I find someone at FMC Devens?

Use the Bureau’s free public Inmate Locator, searching by the eight-digit register number if you have it — the number is the reliable key, because the locator matches the committed name on the judgment, not the name a person uses.

Devens produces two kinds of failed search. A man sent here for a court-ordered competency evaluation may still be a pretrial defendant; once he is booked into a Bureau institution the locator lists him with a release date of "UNKNOWN," while a defendant still held in a county or contract jail may not appear at all. And a medical transfer moves fast, so a locator result is a snapshot, not a plan. See how register numbers work.

How do I write to someone at FMC Devens?

Write to P.O. Box 879, Ayer, MA 01432, which the medical center and the camp share, with the committed name and register number on the first line. Use the exact blocks below; add the housing unit if you know it.

For someone at the medical center	For someone at the camp
Inmate Name & Register Number FMC Devens Federal Medical Center P.O. Box 879 Ayer, MA 01432	Inmate Name & Register Number FMC Devens Federal Medical Center Satellite Camp P.O. Box 879 Ayer, MA 01432

Nothing you mail arrives in the original. The March 2026 handbook records that "all incoming general correspondence will be photocopied (black and white) entirely to include the envelopes and all contents. Inmates will only be provided the photocopies." Photographs — up to 25 per mailing — are photocopied in color, and again only the copies are delivered. Send a birthday card or a child’s drawing and your family member receives a black-and-white photocopy of it. Send nothing you want him to keep.

Legal mail is treated differently, but not entirely. It is opened and inspected in the addressee’s presence and is not read — but only if the sender is clearly identified as an attorney and the front is marked "Special Mail – Open only in the presence of the inmate" or words to that effect. Without the marking it is handled as ordinary mail, and the Bureau puts the burden on the incarcerated person to tell his lawyer to mark it. Even then, the handbook records that "all envelopes from incoming Special/Legal mail will be photocopied (black and white) prior to delivery." Our guide to attorney-client communication in the Bureau of Prisons and the Bureau’s legal activities rules cover the privilege question.

Outgoing mail runs the other way: because Devens is an administrative facility, "all outgoing mail, except for Special/Legal Mail, may not be sealed and will be subject to inspection/screening." At the medical center, as at any administrative institution, softcover publications must come from a publisher, book club or bookstore, so a book mailed from home is refused; at the camp, a minimum-security facility, 28 C.F.R. § 540.71 lets softcover publications other than newspapers come from any source. The Bureau’s correspondence rules and our guide to writing to someone in federal prison cover the national rules.

How do I send money to someone at FMC Devens?

Send money through the Bureau’s national lockbox in Iowa or one of two wire services, never to the prison’s address. All three routes need the committed name and the eight-digit register number.

Route	Where it goes	How fast it posts
Postal money order	Federal Bureau of Prisons Committed Name Eight-Digit Register Number Post Office Box 474701 Des Moines, Iowa 50947-0001	Non-postal money orders carry an automatic 15-day hold; personal checks and cash are not accepted
Western Union Quick Collect	Code city FBOP, DC, register number entered with no spaces or dashes followed immediately by the last name	Two to four hours if sent 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. Eastern; otherwise by 7:00 a.m. next day
MoneyGram Express Payment	Receive code 7932, company name Federal Bureau of Prisons, Washington, DC. Up to $300 online	Same as Western Union

The sender’s name and return address go in the upper left corner of the lockbox envelope, which must contain nothing but the money order. Two ceilings matter before sending a large sum: commissary spending is capped at $460 a month under the Bureau’s trust fund rules, Program Statement 4500.13 (2026), so money above that sits in the account; and a man in "refuse" status under the Inmate Financial Responsibility Program has a $25.00 monthly limit and will not be considered for furloughs or early release. See sending money to a federal prisoner.

What are the visiting hours at FMC Devens?

Visiting at FMC Devens runs on Sundays, Mondays and federal holidays, 8:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., at both the medical center and the camp. That schedule comes from the institution’s own visiting supplement, DEV 5267.09N, dated July 22, 2025, and signed by Warden F. J. Bowers; it rescinded the July 2023 version. Our page on the Bureau’s visiting regulations and our guide to visiting a federal prisoner cover the national rules.

There is no Saturday visiting at FMC Devens. Listings that give Saturday visiting hours are out of date.

The cut-offs come earlier than closing and differ between the two prisons: no visitor is admitted after 2:00 p.m. at the medical center or 2:30 p.m. at the camp, and on Sundays and holidays no incarcerated person enters the visiting room after 9:30 a.m., because of the 10:00 a.m. count. Four visitors are allowed at a time, adults and children counted together, from a list of up to 25 people. Men in the Special Housing Unit visit Tuesdays only; the supplement gives 8:30 to 10:30 a.m., the handbook 8:30 to 10:00 a.m. Call 978-796-1000 and press option 1 before you travel.

The visiting point system

Visiting at the medical center is rationed by points. Each man receives seven points a month; a Sunday visit costs three, a Monday visit one, and points do not carry over. Seven points buys two Sundays and a Monday, and the month is over. The camp does not use points: "visiting is on a point system at the FMC only."

The Bureau’s two current documents disagree on the numbers. The March 2026 handbook says twelve points a month, five visitors at a time and a ten-person list; the July 2025 supplement says seven points, four visitors and a 25-person list. The difference decides whether a family gets one visit a month or three. The supplement controls: it is the institution’s operative visiting regulation and the one the Bureau links from its facility page as policy, while the handbook is newer but calls itself informational.

The supplement bars sleeveless, see-through, skin-tight, camouflage, khaki and tan clothing, shorts, sweat suits and open-toed shoes, and requires skirts and dresses to fall no more than two inches above the knee. The prohibited-items list includes keys. Visitors "will not be allowed to bring keys, i.e., car and/or house keys into the visiting room," and handbags, cameras, phones, smart watches, ordinary watches and food are barred too. You may bring a clear plastic bag no larger than six by six by three inches, up to $20.00 in coins, a light jacket and infant supplies. Vending food has its own rule: every item must come out of its wrapper onto a paper plate before the visitor sits down.

Identification, the ion scanner and screening

Every visitor needs valid state or government-issued photo identification, signs form BP-A0224 before a staff member, passes a metal detector and has all property X-rayed. The Bureau’s search and contraband rules set the national baseline.

Devens also uses an ion scanner, and its penalties escalate with each failure. Fail twice in a day and you are refused entry and cannot be retested for 48 hours; fail on a second visit and you lose visiting for 30 days; a third failure costs 90 days, a fourth 180, and any further a year. Ion scanners detect trace residue, not possession, and residue transfers from cash, a shared car, a handrail. Wash your hands and wear freshly laundered clothes.

The strictness has a reason. Announcing the January 2026 sentencing of a former state employee who passed synthetic-cannabinoid-soaked paper to a man in the visiting room, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Massachusetts stated that K2 "presents a health problem at FMC Devens, where inmates have become sick from smoking paper believed to contain K2, as well as prison staff who have been exposed to the secondary smoke." That is also why your letters arrive as photocopies.

Getting there

The institution sits off Route 2 at the Jackson Road exit, roughly 39 miles northwest of Boston; turn onto Patton Road and the medical center is half a mile along on the right, the camp half a mile beyond. Follow the signs for Jackson Road rather than an exit number: the July 2025 supplement says exit 37, the March 2026 handbook Exit 106B, because Massachusetts renumbered its exits and only one document was updated. A man surrendering voluntarily cannot drive himself — the Bureau’s voluntary surrender sheet requires that he be dropped off, and any car left in the lot is towed.

How do phone calls and email work at FMC Devens?

Calls are placed by the incarcerated person — you cannot call in. The number has to be on his approved list, which holds up to 30 numbers, and a single call should generally not exceed 15 minutes. The monthly allowance is where the March 2026 handbook contradicts itself: its correspondence section says 300 minutes a month, its Trust Fund section "inmates are limited to 510 minutes per month." Both sentences sit in the same document, and national policy has now resolved the conflict in favor of the larger figure. The Bureau’s telephone regulations, Program Statement 5264.09, issued September 3, 2026, rescinded the 2008 edition and set 510 minutes per calendar month: 300 are free to anyone eligible for First Step Act telephone incentives, and the remaining 210 may be purchased only after the 300 are used up. The handbook’s 300-minute sentence is the superseded number.

Phones run from 6:00 a.m. to no later than 9:00 p.m., with access ordinarily restricted Monday to Friday from 7:30 to 10:30 a.m. and from 12:30 p.m. until after the 4:00 p.m. count — which is why calls from Devens tend to come at the same time each day. Every call is recorded except a properly arranged unmonitored attorney call, which the handbook says requires a demonstrated need "such as an imminent court deadline." See our guide to federal inmate phone calls.

Email runs on TRULINCS, reached by families through CorrLinks. Email with a lawyer is not privileged; privileged writing has to go by marked special mail. Our page on CorrLinks and TRULINCS explains how the system works and what it costs.

What can people buy at the FMC Devens commissary?

The spending limit at the FMC Devens commissary is $460 a month. It is set nationally by the Bureau’s trust fund rules, Program Statement 4500.13, the Trust Fund and Deposit Fund Manual, issued May 7, 2026, whose summary of changes records that it "increases spending limit from $360 to $460 per month." The limit rises by $50 during the November–December holiday period, for no more than one validation period.

The institution’s March 2026 handbook gives a different figure. It says "inmates are allowed to spend up to $420 in a revalidation cycle," and, under the heading Spending Limitations, "The National Spending Limit is 420.00 but may be further restricted at the local level." That $420 is not a Devens limit: the handbook calls it the national one. And no Bureau policy has set a national limit of $420 — before May 7, 2026, it was $360, and since then it has been $460 — so the handbook is wrong on its own terms, not merely out of date. Plan on $460, and confirm with the unit team before making a large deposit.

The order form the Bureau publishes for this institution is dated July 11, 2022, so every price on it is more than four years old. Stamps carry a separate cap: "the total dollar amount for all stamps requested may not exceed $11.00." Shopping is once a week on a day set by register number.

The stock reflects the population. Alongside the soups and the mackerel, the Devens form carries a Casio scientific calculator, a Timex Ironman watch, a clear Sangean radio, Dr. Scholl’s insoles, a satin kippah — and typewriter ribbons, because the law library’s typewriters are for legal use only and a man buys his own ribbon to use them. Our page on the federal prison commissary covers the national rules.

What programs are available at FMC Devens?

FMC Devens offers GED and ESL classes, one vocational program (Culinary Arts), drug education, the non-residential drug program, Medication-Assisted Treatment and First Step Act programming, but no Residential Drug Abuse Program and no UNICOR factory.

Drug treatment: no RDAP

FMC Devens does not run the Residential Drug Abuse Program. The March 2026 handbook and the Inspector General’s independent inventory both record only the non-residential program, the 40-hour Drug Education class and Medication-Assisted Treatment. The consequence is a sentencing one: the up-to-twelve-month reduction under 18 U.S.C. § 3621(e) runs only to people who complete the residential program. A man who needs both a medical center and RDAP cannot get them in the same building, and someone has to choose which comes first — deliberately, with counsel, before a designation is fixed. See the Bureau’s drug treatment rules and our page on getting into RDAP.

Education and vocational training

GED classes run Monday to Friday in three sittings, all testing computer-based, and completing the GED or ESL program earns a $50.00 commissary credit. Vocational training is one program: Culinary Arts, roughly 870 classroom hours over eight months. The Inspector General found it had ten seats and seventy men waiting, and that it was "the only vocational program offered for the entire institution." Staffing shortages had also stopped the Commercial Driver’s License program at the camp and the Certified Nursing Assistant program at the medical center. There is no UNICOR factory here. See our guides to prison education and vocational training.

First Step Act programming and release preparation

The Bureau’s approved-programs guide lists what each institution is approved to offer. Approval is not delivery. At Devens in April 2024 the Anger Management waitlist alone held 237 men — a quarter of the population — and the LifeSkills Laboratory, built with $150,000 of First Step Act money as one of three national pilot sites, was finished in fiscal year 2023 and had still enrolled no one by fiscal year 2025, because the post to run it was unfilled. See our guide to First Step Act time credits. Halfway-house placement runs through the Residential Reentry Management office for the district a man is releasing to, not the prison’s; for Massachusetts and the other New England districts that office is RRM New York.

What is daily life like at FMC Devens?

Daily life at FMC Devens runs on counts and controlled movement like every federal prison, but with a hospital inside it. The shape of the day, from the March 2026 handbook:

	Weekdays	Weekends and holidays
Official counts	12:05 a.m., 3:00 a.m., 5:00 a.m., 4:00 p.m. and 9:30 p.m.; the last two are stand-up counts
Extra stand-up count	—	10:00 a.m.
Meals	Breakfast 6:15–7:15 a.m.; lunch from 11:15 a.m.; dinner after the 4:00 p.m. count	Coffee hour 7:00–8:00 a.m.; brunch after the 10:00 a.m. count; dinner after the 4:00 p.m. count
Controlled movement	7:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m., ten minutes on the half hour
Uniform required	6:15 a.m. – 4:00 p.m., and for all visits	Personal clothing permitted
Telephones	6:00 a.m. – 9:00 p.m., access limited 7:30–10:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. until the 4:00 p.m. count clears	6:00 a.m. – 9:00 p.m.

Source: FMC Devens Admission & Orientation Handbook, March 2026. Schedules change; treat this as the shape of the day rather than a guarantee.

What do inspectors say about conditions at FMC Devens?

Inspectors have found serious problems at FMC Devens: the Justice Department’s Inspector General identified staffing, healthcare, infrastructure, programming, rounds and radio deficiencies in its unannounced 2024 inspection, while a 2024 PREA audit found no standard unmet. FMC Devens was the fifth institution inspected on site, unannounced, by the Inspector General, in a program that had reached fourteen institutions on the Inspector General’s own count in May 2026 (Report 26-055). Most federal prisons have never had one. Since the inspection, four later Inspector General reports, through May 2026, have cited the findings made here, and one of them follows up on whether a specific failure was fixed.

The 2024 Inspector General inspection

Inspectors were on site, unannounced, from April 22 to 26, 2024, observing, interviewing staff and incarcerated men, and reviewing camera footage. Evaluation and Inspections Report 25-009 was published on December 11, 2024, and makes eleven recommendations, ten of them about healthcare. Its summary finding: the inspection "identified several serious issues at FMC Devens related to staffing, inmate healthcare quality, infrastructure, inmate programming, failure to complete rounds, and radio system deficiencies."

• Physicians. During and shortly after the inspection the medical center had one physician plus the Clinical Director, also a physician, covering roughly 941 men. Two of six physicians were on extended leave without pay and three posts were vacant; the Clinical Director retired in June 2024 and the post was still vacant on October 5, 2024.
• Rounds. Inspectors reviewed 280 hours of overnight camera footage from the Memory Disorder Unit, a hospital unit and a transitional mental health unit. Officers completed 53 percent of required rounds, "leaving vulnerable inmates unobserved for multiple hours each night."
• Preventive care. Of 21 men over fifty whose records were sampled, ten had received a preventive health screening in the previous year. A physician told inspectors: "If a person is not in a chronic care clinic, they could be here for years and never be seen."
• Radios. Staff radios received no signal in parts of the institution, "namely the hospital and areas below ground," and many were past their serviceable dates with no "man down" function.
• Infrastructure. Unfunded repairs were estimated at $15 million in February 2024 — $8 million for heating and cooling, $4 million for roofs. Inspectors photographed water intrusion in housing units, the chapel, the optometry room and the dialysis unit.

The Bureau concurred with all eleven recommendations and described corrective steps, among them nurse supervisors observing the medication line and a sick-call logbook required from July 1, 2024.

What the Inspector General has said since

Later Inspector General reports return to the Devens findings.

• The empty classroom got used. The Inspector General’s evaluation of First Step Act funding (Report 26-057, May 28, 2026) returns to the $150,000 of fiscal 2021 money Devens spent on a LifeSkills laboratory — a mock store with a banking area, a kitchen and a laundry room. The rooms were finished in fiscal 2023 and, as of the December 2024 inspection report, still had no one enrolled in them because no Bureau employee was available to teach the class. Nine other institutions had built the same rooms and only one had managed to run the program in them. As of March 2026 five of the ten sites were active, and the Devens rooms were among the five. Seventy men were in the program nationwide.
• The rounds finding turned out not to be local. The inspections of FDC SeaTac (September 2025) and USP Canaan (May 2026) each record that shortcomings in inmate-monitoring rounds “similar to those we identified” had already been found at Devens, along with FCI Tallahassee and FCI Sheridan — institutions that “had not conducted all inmate-monitoring rounds as required by BOP policy and their respective institution-level post orders.”
• The escort problem reappeared in a health report. The Inspector General’s evaluation of colorectal cancer screening (Report 25-057, May 20, 2025) cites Devens twice: once for the finding that it and FCI Sheridan “reported a lack of sufficient custody staff to escort inmates to external medical appointments,” and once for a figure: as of April 2024, 93 percent of men here at average risk had been offered screening. Offered is not completed, and the report is about the gap between the two. Devens was not one of the fourteen institutions interviewed for it.

Who actually provides the medical care

Specialist care here has long been bought in, and the Inspector General audited the buying. Report 22-052, published March 17, 2022, examined three comprehensive medical services contracts with the University of Massachusetts Medical School, worth an estimated $304.4 million in total, covering FCC Butner, FMC Devens and FCI Ray Brook. All three ran out in March 2020, after which the institutions bought care through short-term contracting instead. The audit found that Butner and Devens then “purchased medical services for nearly 2 years without full and open competition”; that the contracting officer’s representative delegated at FMC Devens did not hold a current certification; and that the Bureau “did not have a reliable, consistent process in place to evaluate timeliness or quality of inmate healthcare.”

Criminal cases out of this institution

Two Inspector General investigations here have become public cases beyond the Bourget prosecution described below. A Devens correctional counselor was charged in July 2023 and sentenced on May 8, 2024, for accepting more than $90,000 in benefits and a $50,000 property loan from a man in his care. And in 2025 a former Massachusetts state employee, Tasha Hammock, pleaded guilty on October 7 to providing a controlled substance — synthetic cannabinoid on treated paper — to Raymond Gaines, a man held here; Gaines was indicted on July 10, 2025, for possessing it. Both were worked by the Inspector General’s Boston Office with the FBI.

Staffing

Devens had 533 authorized positions and 432 filled in April 2024 — 101 vacancies, unevenly spread.

Department	Filled / authorized	Filled
Correctional Services	161 / 201	80%
Health Services	113 / 149	76%
Psychology Services	20 / 33	61%
Nurses	10 / 42	24%
Pharmacists	5 / 11	45%
Overall	432 / 533	81%

Source: DOJ OIG, E&I Report 25-009 (December 2024), reporting April 2024 data. The Chief Pharmacist, Chief Psychiatrist, Director of Nursing, Chief Dental Officer and Deputy Chief Psychologist posts were vacant on October 5, 2024.

Between January 2023 and April 2024 staff worked about 98,000 hours covering correctional officer posts through overtime and augmentation — roughly 47 full-time positions, seven more than the department’s vacancy count, which led inspectors to conclude that the 201 authorized posts "may be too low." The reason is money: a physician at Devens earned about $282,480 a year against roughly $415,300 at a nearby hospital emergency department, and entry-level officers started at $55,138 against a Massachusetts median of $78,810.

The 2024 PREA audit

FMC Devens was audited under the Prison Rape Elimination Act on October 29–31, 2024, by an independent auditor, Cassandra McGilbra of Corrections Consulting Services, whose report is dated December 13, 2024. The facility passed: 41 standards met, four exceeded, none unmet.

The report discloses one limitation. In the twelve months before the audit the institution recorded 14 allegations of sexual abuse — six inmate-on-inmate, eight staff-on-inmate — none substantiated. The auditor could not examine the staff cases and said why: "I was unable to review Staff investigations due to the OIA department is no longer under the facility administration supervision." Eight of the fourteen were therefore outside the audit. Our page on the Bureau’s sexual abuse prevention rules covers the national framework.

Litigation

• United States v. Bourget, No. 23-1582 (1st Cir. August 21, 2026). The court affirmed a Devens correctional officer’s conviction under 18 U.S.C. § 242 for violating the Eighth Amendment rights of a man identified as KT during a forced cell move on June 18, 2019. KT was handcuffed behind his back on the N-1 mental health unit — the highest security level at Devens — when the officer entered at full speed and struck him in the face with a shield.
• Miles v. Bowers, 173 F.4th 372 (1st Cir. April 27, 2026). The court vacated the dismissal of a habeas petition against the Warden of FMC Devens over First Step Act time credits, holding that the risk and needs assessment is not a prerequisite to earning credits and that "the location of the pre-assessment participation cannot be determinative." The court held that the Bureau must consider the fifteen months the petitioner spent working as an orderly in a county jail while awaiting transfer, and remanded for an individualized determination; it did not decide that the work qualified.
• Cockerham v. Boncher, 125 F.4th 11 (1st Cir. December 27, 2024). A man civilly committed under 18 U.S.C. § 4243 argued that Devens is not a "suitable facility" under § 4247(a)(2). The court affirmed dismissal of his discharge claim but vacated and remanded so he could press suitability. The opinion records that between 2010 and 2022 the Warden filed eleven periodic reports with the committing court, recommended conditional release in nine, and the court took no action on any.

FMC Devens in the news

Recent news about FMC Devens centers on the K2 contraband case and the Inspector General's inspection; older items concern a counselor's sentence for taking payments from a man in his care and the Bureau's death releases from 2020 to 2022.

• January 2026 — Tasha Hammock, 44, a former Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection employee, was sentenced to three years’ probation for passing K2-laced papers to a man in the Devens visiting room on August 18, 2024. Prosecutors had asked for twelve months’ imprisonment.
• December 2024 — the Justice Department’s Inspector General published its unannounced inspection of FMC Devens.
• May 2024 — William S. Tidwell, 50, a correctional counselor at Devens since 2008, was sentenced to two years in federal prison for accepting more than $90,000 in payments and benefits from a man in his care, plus false statements to a bank and identity theft.
• May 2020 to October 2022 — the Bureau posted 14 news releases reporting the deaths of people held at FMC Devens; the Bureau’s releases are listed on its press release page.

Frequently asked questions about FMC Devens

Problems at FMC Devens: where we can help

The problems at FMC Devens are clinical before they are administrative: in 2024 the Inspector General found one physician and a Clinical Director covering roughly 941 men here, ten of twenty-one sampled men over fifty screened in a year, and night rounds completed 53 percent of the time. Raise the problems below early rather than at the next program review.

• Care ordered and not delivered — an outside consultation never scheduled, a specialist follow-up whose records never arrive, a sick-call visit turned away. The route is a written request to staff, then the administrative remedy process, which has a twenty-day clock on the first rung (see how to file a BP-9). See Federal Tort Claims Act claims where negligence has caused injury.
• Getting a family member out — compassionate release under 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A) and the Bureau's reduction-in-sentence rules, where the Inspector General’s findings on care at this institution bear directly on USSG § 1B1.13(b)(1)(C).
• First Step Act time credits and sentence computation errors — whether credits and good conduct time are calculated and applied correctly under the Bureau's sentence computation manual, including for time in a county jail before transfer. See our federal prison early release practice.
• Disciplinary proceedings that threaten good conduct time, and Special Housing Unit placements that outlast their justification, including protective custody.
• Challenges to the conviction or sentence itself, through a direct appeal or a § 2255 motion.

Elizabeth Franklin-Best, P.C. handles federal criminal defense, appeals and post-conviction matters nationwide, and advises families on Bureau of Prisons issues across the system. Call (843) 620-1100 or contact us to talk through a specific situation.

Christopher Zoukis, JD, MBA, the firm’s Managing Director, writes and maintains the federal prison policy material on this site. He is not counsel of record; legal representation is provided by Elizabeth Franklin-Best.

Sources and currency

Bureau of Prisons documents

• FMC Devens, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. The Bureau’s facility page for the medical center and its camp.
• FMC Devens Inmate Admission and Orientation Handbook, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026.
• Visiting Regulations, Institution Supplement DEV 5267.09N, Federal Bureau of Prisons, FMC Devens, 2025. Replaced the July 2023 supplement.
• FMC Devens Commissary Shopping List, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2022.
• FMC Devens Voluntary Surrender Information, Federal Bureau of Prisons. What a person surrendering may bring, and the drop-off rule.
• RRM New York, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. The Residential Reentry Management office for Massachusetts and the other New England districts.
• Trust Fund/Deposit Fund Manual, Program Statement 4500.13, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. Raised the commissary spending limit from $360 to $460.
• Compassionate Release/Reduction in Sentence Procedures, Program Statement 5050.51, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. Replaced Program Statement 5050.50 (2019).
• Inmate Security Designation and Custody Classification, Program Statement 5100.08, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2006, as amended in 2026. Sets the referral sequence for medical and psychiatric redesignations.
• Inmate Telephone Regulations, Program Statement 5264.09, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. Sets 510 minutes a month and at least 30 minutes between completed calls; the monthly cap does not apply to unmonitored legal calls. Replaced Program Statement 5264.08 (2008).
• Patient Care, Program Statement 6031.06, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026.
• First Step Act Approved Programs Guide, Federal Bureau of Prisons, Reentry Services Division, 2026. Program approvals by institution.
• About Federal Inmate Records, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. Explains a release date shown as "UNKNOWN" for people whose confinement term is not yet determined.
• Institution Care Levels for Medical Assignment and Institutional Mental Health Care Levels, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2024. Released under Freedom of Information Act request 2024-03455 and published by the Washington Lawyers' Committee.
• Press Releases, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2022. Includes the 14 releases, May 2020 to October 2022, reporting deaths at FMC Devens.

Audits and inspections

• Evaluation of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Use of First Step Act Funding and Implementation of First Step Act Programs at Its Institutions (Report 26-057), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2026. Returns to the LifeSkills laboratory at Devens.
• Inspection of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ U.S. Penitentiary Canaan (Report 26-055), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2026. Cites the inmate-monitoring findings made at Devens and counts the institutions inspected on site.
• Inspection of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Federal Detention Center SeaTac (Report 25-081), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2025. Cites the inmate-monitoring findings made at Devens.
• Evaluation of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Colorectal Cancer Screening Practices for Inmates and Its Clinical Follow-up on Screenings (Report 25-057), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2025. Escort staffing and screening offers at Devens.
• PREA Audit Report: FMC Devens, Corrections Consulting Services, 2024. Audit by Cassandra McGilbra, an independent auditor.
• Inspection of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Federal Medical Center Devens (Report 25-009), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2024. Unannounced on-site inspection, April 22–26, 2024.
• Audit of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Comprehensive Medical Services Contracts Awarded to the University of Massachusetts Medical School (Report 22-052), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2022.

Court records

• United States v. Bourget, No. 23-1582 (1st Cir. 2026), U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, 2026.
• Miles v. Bowers, 173 F.4th 372 (1st Cir. 2026), U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, 2026.
• Former State Employee Sentenced for Providing K2-Laced Papers to a Federal Prison Inmate, U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Massachusetts, 2026. Tasha Hammock’s sentence of three years’ probation.
• Non-DOJ Individual Pleaded Guilty to Providing Contraband to a Prison Inmate, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2025. Tasha Hammock’s guilty plea.
• BOP Inmate Indicted on Contraband-Related Charges, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2025. Raymond Gaines’s indictment.
• Cockerham v. Boncher, 125 F.4th 11 (1st Cir. 2024), U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, 2024.
• Federal Prison Employee Sentenced for Accepting Payments from Inmate Under His Care, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2024. The correctional counselor’s sentence.
• Federal Prison Employee Sentenced for Accepting Payments from Inmate Under His Care, U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Massachusetts, 2024. William S. Tidwell’s two-year sentence.
• United States v. Orena, 48 F.4th 61 (2d Cir. 2022), U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, 2022.
• Former Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano and His Wife Linda Mangano Sentenced for Corruption and Related Charges, U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of New York, 2022.
• Former Roswell City Councilman Sentenced for Producing Child Pornography, U.S. Attorney’s Office, Northern District of Georgia, 2018. Kent Igleheart’s sentence.
• Danny Heinrich Sentenced to 20 Years in Prison, U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Minnesota, 2016.

News and other sources

• U.S. Sentencing Guidelines Manual § 1B1.13, Reduction in Term of Imprisonment Under 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A), U.S. Sentencing Commission, 2025.
• 18 U.S.C. § 242, Deprivation of rights under color of law, U.S. Code (Legal Information Institute).
• 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A), (d)(2)(A), Imposition of a sentence of imprisonment, U.S. Code (Legal Information Institute).
• 18 U.S.C. § 3621(e), Imprisonment of a convicted person, U.S. Code (Legal Information Institute).
• 18 U.S.C. § 4241, Determination of mental competency to stand trial or to undergo postrelease proceedings, U.S. Code (Legal Information Institute).
• 18 U.S.C. § 4243, Hospitalization of a person found not guilty only by reason of insanity, U.S. Code (Legal Information Institute).
• 18 U.S.C. § 4245, Hospitalization of an imprisoned person suffering from mental disease or defect, U.S. Code (Legal Information Institute).
• 18 U.S.C. § 4247(a)(2), General provisions for chapter, U.S. Code (Legal Information Institute).
• 18 U.S.C. § 4248, Civil commitment of a sexually dangerous person, U.S. Code (Legal Information Institute).
• 28 C.F.R. § 540.71, Procedures, Code of Federal Regulations (Legal Information Institute).

Sources reviewed September 2026.

Reviewed for legal accuracy by Elizabeth Franklin-Best, Esq., Principal Attorney·September 2026