McRae Correctional Facility at a glance
“The contract with the last private prison, McRae Correctional Facility, located in McRae, Georgia, ended on November 30, 2022,” the Bureau of Prisons announced the next day. CoreCivic, which owned and ran the prison, had sold it to a Georgia state authority that August, and the Georgia Department of Corrections has run it since December 2022 as McRae Women’s Facility. McRae was not on the Bureau’s institution roster when checked on September 18, 2026. This page gives no mailing address, deposit instructions, visiting schedule or telephone number for it.
Each row below rests on a dated record, named in the caption.
| Official name | McRae Correctional Facility. The Inspector General’s 2020 report calls it Correctional Institution McRae; its 2016 report, McRae Correctional Institution. |
|---|---|
| Status | Bureau contract ended November 30, 2022. Absent from the Bureau’s institution roster, checked September 18, 2026. |
| Operated by | CoreCivic, formerly Corrections Corporation of America, which owned it until August 2022 |
| Location | McRae-Helena, Telfair County, Georgia |
| Security level | Two records differ. CoreCivic’s annual reports rate the building medium security; the Inspector General (August 2020) describes the men held there as low security, which is the Bureau’s classification of the people it sent. |
| Held | Adult men serving federal sentences, most of them non-citizens under immigration detainers (Inspector General, 2020) |
| Bureau relationship | Contract prison from December 1, 2002, when the first federal prisoners arrived, to November 30, 2022. The last contract began in December 2012 and was not renewed. |
| Now | McRae Women’s Facility, a Georgia state prison for women, re-commissioned in December 2022 (Georgia Department of Corrections) |
| Finding someone | Use the Bureau’s Inmate Locator; for someone released into immigration custody, ICE’s Online Detainee Locator System |
On this page
What happened to McRae Correctional Facility?
- 2000. Built for Corrections Corporation of America, now CoreCivic. Its report for that year called the 1,524-bed prison substantially complete but without a contract.
- May 30, 2002. The Bureau awarded the company a contract to hold 1,524 federal prisoners at McRae under its second Criminal Alien Requirement solicitation: three years, with seven one-year renewals.
- December 1, 2002. The prison began receiving federal prisoners.
- October 2011. After a competitive re-bid, the company won a new Bureau contract to expand McRae and keep running it; a 454-bed expansion was finished late in 2012.
- December 2012. The new contract began, for up to 2,275 men and up to ten years with extensions.
- January 26, 2021. Executive Order 14006: “The Attorney General shall not renew Department of Justice contracts with privately operated criminal detention facilities, as consistent with applicable law.”
- August 9, 2022. CoreCivic closed the sale of McRae to the Georgia Building Authority and leased it back through November 30 to finish its federal contract.
- November 30, 2022. The contract expired “and was not renewed,” CoreCivic reported; the Bureau had already moved its prisoners out.
- December 2022. Georgia re-commissioned the site for women as McRae Women’s Facility.
- January 20, 2025. Executive Order 14148 revoked Executive Order 14006, long after McRae had passed to the state.
Where are the people who were held at McRae?
Elsewhere in the federal system, or out of it. CoreCivic’s report says only that “The BOP transferred the BOP inmates to alternative federal capacity prior to expiration of the contract,” so this page names no receiving prison. The Bureau’s Inmate Locator takes a first and last name together, or a register number; our inmate locator guide explains its screens, and our page on federal prison transfers covers how the Bureau moves people.
Most men at McRae were under immigration detainers, the Inspector General reported in 2020, so many would pass to ICE at the end of their sentences; the Bureau’s record then shows a release, not a place. ICE’s Online Detainee Locator System covers people now in ICE custody, searched by A-Number or exact name with a country of birth.
What was McRae Correctional Facility?
A privately owned prison in Telfair County that the Bureau used for low-security men, most of them non-citizens. From the mid-1980s, its December 2022 release explains, the Bureau sent “Low security inmates with specialized needs, such as sentenced criminal aliens” to private prisons, and over time held contracts for 15 of them; McRae was the last. By 2022 CoreCivic described it as a 1,978-bed facility. Earlier versions of this page dated its opening to 2002, the year the first federal prisoners arrived.
When the Inspector General studied the international prisoner transfer program, it visited McRae because it was “a contract institution with increasing involvement in treaty transfer over the last 3 years and has a highly diverse foreign national inmate population” (Report I-2012-002 at p. 130); our page on the international prisoner transfer program explains it. The Bureau’s own Program Statement 5111.04, as amended May 23, 2017, lists McRae at p. 15 as a release site for the Institution Hearing Program, though not as a hearing site.
What did the Inspector General find at McRae?
Comparing fourteen contract prisons over fiscal 2011 to 2014, the Inspector General reported in August 2016 that “McRae had the highest rate of inmate suicide attempts and self-mutilation, the second highest rate of positive drug tests, and the third highest rates of cell phones found and inmate grievances” (Report 16-06 at p. 15 n.31).
Its August 2020 pandemic inspection found that McRae waited seven days after its first symptomatic case before confining all inmates to their housing units; by August 4, 2020, eighteen inmates had tested positive and one had died (Report 20-098 at pp. ii–iii).
The same report explains why pandemic release reached so few men there. Bureau memoranda excluded prisoners with detainers from home confinement, which the Inspector General called “particularly relevant to McRae since, as described above, most of the inmates at the facility were subject to ICE detainers.” Of 26 men screened between March 28 and June 1, 2020, 23 were found ineligible, and one went to home confinement on July 28. McRae had received 45 requests for compassionate release by May 19, and the Warden said none had been granted since the outbreak; the report notes that a man who was granted it would still face possible ICE detention and removal (at pp. 11–12 and n.34).
Federal prisons still operating in Georgia
The Bureau runs two institutions in the state: FCI Atlanta, at low security, and FCI Jesup, at medium, both in its Southeast Region. Our Georgia federal prisons hub describes each, and our explainer on federal prison closures and deactivations tracks announced closings. Placement is the Bureau’s call, so we recommend neither.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is McRae Correctional Facility still a federal prison?
No. The Bureau’s contract there ended on November 30, 2022, after its prisoners had been moved out, and McRae was absent from the Bureau’s roster when checked on September 18, 2026. The same buildings now hold women in Georgia’s custody, as McRae Women’s Facility.
Why did the Bureau of Prisons stop using McRae?
Its December 2022 release tied the end of every private-prison contract to the January 26, 2021 executive order against renewing them. CoreCivic’s annual report adds that the McRae contract expired unrenewed and that the company had sold the prison to a Georgia state authority in August 2022.
What is McRae Women’s Facility?
The name Georgia’s Department of Corrections gave the site when it re-commissioned it for women in December 2022. The department lists it as serving adult female felons at close security, and a July 2026 fact sheet places the state’s intake center for women there.
How can I find someone who was held at McRae under the federal contract?
Start with the Bureau’s Inmate Locator, using a first and last name together or a register number. If it shows a release and the person had an immigration detainer, search ICE’s Online Detainee Locator System by A-Number or exact name, with a country of birth.
Did revoking the private-prison executive order reopen McRae?
No. The order was revoked on January 20, 2025, but McRae had been sold to a Georgia state authority in August 2022 and has been run by the Georgia Department of Corrections since that December. No record we reviewed shows the Bureau returning to the site.
Can I send mail or funds to someone through McRae?
No. The Bureau holds nobody there, so a letter or deposit addressed to the old contract prison will not reach a federal prisoner. Find the person on the Inmate Locator first, then follow the published rules of the institution that actually holds them.
Where we can help
For a relative still serving a federal sentence elsewhere, we advise on problems inside a federal prison, from grievances to transfer requests.
Call 843-620-1100 or contact us to arrange a paid one-hour consultation about a specific situation. Calls are answered 24 hours a day.
Elizabeth Franklin-Best, P.C. is a federal criminal defense and post-conviction firm based in Columbia, South Carolina, practicing nationwide. Mentions of Georgia places on this page do not imply an office or a lawyer there.
Sources and currency
Federal records
- BOP Ends Use of Privately Owned Prisons, Bureau of Prisons, December 1, 2022.
- Pandemic Response Report 20-098, DOJ Office of the Inspector General, August 2020, at pp. i–iii, 11–12, n.3 and n.34.
- Evaluation and Inspections Report 16-06, DOJ Office of the Inspector General, August 2016, at p. 15 n.31.
- Evaluation and Inspections Report I-2012-002, DOJ Office of the Inspector General, December 2011, at p. 130.
- Program Statement 5111.04, Institution Hearing Program, Change Notice 1 (May 23, 2017), at p. 15.
- Executive Order 14006, 86 Fed. Reg. 7483 (Jan. 29, 2021), § 2; Executive Order 14148, 90 Fed. Reg. 8237, 8238 (Jan. 28, 2025), § 2(q).
- Bureau institution roster and ICE’s Online Detainee Locator System, both checked September 18, 2026.
Company and state records
- Corrections Corporation of America (now CoreCivic, Inc.), Forms 10-K for 2000 (filed April 17, 2001) at p. 56; 2002 (March 28, 2003) at pp. 27 and 61; and 2012 (February 27, 2013) at pp. 13, 64 and 75–76.
- CoreCivic, Inc., Form 10-K for 2022, filed February 21, 2023, at pp. 15, 17 and F-18.
- Georgia Department of Corrections: McRae Women’s Facility (read September 18, 2026) and Female Diagnostics and Classification Fact Sheet, July 2, 2026.
Sources reviewed September 2026; this page will record any later change in the site’s use.
Reviewed for legal accuracy by Elizabeth Franklin-Best, Esq., Principal Attorney·September 2026