USP McCreary: Visiting Hours, Rules and Inspections

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

USP McCreary at a glance

USP McCreary is a high-security federal penitentiary for men at Pine Knot, Kentucky, with a minimum-security satellite camp beside it. It sits in McCreary County in the southeastern corner of the state, in the Bureau’s Mid-Atlantic Region, in the judicial district of Eastern Kentucky. It held 1,446 people as of September 2026 — 1,329 at the penitentiary and 117 at the camp.

Official name	United States Penitentiary, McCreary
BOP code	MCR
Security level	High; men, with an adjacent minimum-security satellite camp
Population	1,446 (as of September 2026)
Visiting	Saturdays, Sundays and federal holidays, 8:30 a.m.–3:00 p.m.; no entry after 2:00 p.m.
Inmate mail	Inmate Name & Register Number · USP McCreary · U.S. Penitentiary · P.O. Box 3000 · Pine Knot, KY 42635
Send money	Lockbox · Western Union (code city FBOP, DC) · MoneyGram (receive code 7932)
Phone	606-354-7000 · Fax 606-354-7190
Street address	330 Federal Way, Pine Knot, KY 42635
Judicial district	Eastern District of Kentucky
BOP region	Mid-Atlantic
Designated capacity	See capacity
Housing	Thirteen housing units; no single-cell housing
Special Housing Unit	120 segregation cells
Medical care level	Level 2
RDAP	No
UNICOR	See programs
Camp	Minimum-security satellite camp

One thing sets it apart from almost every other federal prison: in June 2024 the Justice Department’s Inspector General walked in unannounced, and of the six institutions inspected that week the OIG concluded that McCreary’s deficiencies were the most significant it found.

Kentucky has two federal penitentiaries, and this is the southern one

Kentucky holds two of the Bureau’s fifteen high-security institutions, four hours apart by road: USP McCreary at Pine Knot in the south, and USP Big Sandy at Inez to the north. So being told only that someone is “at a federal penitentiary in Kentucky” is not enough to get in a car, and getting the wrong one wastes a day of driving and a visit.

Institution	Where	Security level
USP McCreary (this page)	Pine Knot, McCreary County	High, with a camp
USP Big Sandy	Inez, Martin County	High, with a camp
FCI Manchester	Manchester, Clay County	Medium, with a camp
FCI Ashland	Ashland, Boyd County	Low, with a camp
FMC Lexington	Lexington, Fayette County	Administrative — a medical center

Two further traps. McCreary is a county, not a town, and the prison’s postal address is Pine Knot. And McCreary County runs its own jail, the McCreary County Detention Center at Whitley City; somebody held there was not sentenced in federal court and will not appear in the Bureau’s inmate locator.

What is the security level at USP McCreary?

High security at the penitentiary; minimum at the camp. The 2025 PREA audit records the custody levels held as High, Maximum and In at the penitentiary, and Minimum, Out and Community at the camp — six classifications at one address, and the distance between the two ends of that range is the distance between a locked cell and a dormitory job outside the fence.

Why this is a penitentiary and not an FCI

A United States Penitentiary is the top of the Bureau’s ordinary custody ladder, one step above a medium-security FCI and two above a low. The Bureau runs 118 institutions and only fifteen are high security; every one carries the USP prefix. What that means here: the 2025 PREA audit counted thirteen housing units, recorded that not one is single-cell, and counted 120 segregation cells. Cell visiting is confined to the same side of a unit, no more than three men in a cell, door open. The camp is a different sentence on the same ground: the institution’s only open-bay dormitory, 117 men in September 2026, green uniforms, and the only men here who may visit outdoors.

The points that decide which building

Designation is arithmetic done at the Designation and Sentence Computation Center in Grand Prairie, Texas, under the Bureau’s security designation rules, Program Statement 5100.08, before anyone arrives in Kentucky. The score adds up offense severity, criminal history, any history of violence or escape, detainers, voluntary surrender, education and drug history; our guide to federal prison designation sets out the method and the point bands. Two of those bands land at this address: 0–11 points at the satellite camp, 24 and above behind the penitentiary fence.

Public Safety Factors, and why the score is only half of it

A Public Safety Factor is a fact about a case that beats the arithmetic. Nine exist, no more than three may be applied at once, and three of the nine set a floor at high security however low a man scores: validated membership of a disruptive group listed in the Central Inmate Monitoring System; more than thirty years left to serve, including a non-parolable life sentence; and a guilty finding on a serious institutional violence code during a period of simultaneous disturbances. The group listing is an intelligence judgment recorded after arrival rather than a finding made in court, which is what makes it the factor most often worth contesting. Factors are entered on form BP-337 at designation and added or removed afterward on form BP-338, and both sit in the central file.

Moving to a lower-security institution

Two doors, and they open differently. A Management Variable is the Bureau’s written override of its own score, used when placement does not match the scored level. Release Residence, the variable families use most, carries the First Step Act’s 500-driving-mile rule and reaches men within 36 months of release; our guide to federal prison transfers explains who approves a variable and how it is requested. The second door is specific to this institution: the D.C. Corrections Information Council recorded in 2014 that men who take part in McCreary’s Challenge Program “can receive a lower security designation within 9 to 12 months of participating in the program.”

How crowded is USP McCreary?

More crowded than any single published figure suggests, because the Bureau has published three different capacity numbers for this prison over twenty-four years and has never reconciled them.

Figure	What the document calls it	Source and date
1,088 beds	Rated capacity of the prison as designed	DOJ OIG, Federal Bureau of Prisons Management of Construction Contracts, Report 02-32 (August 2002)
955	“Total inmates prison was designed to house”; later called rated capacity, taken from the PREA and ACA reports	D.C. Corrections Information Council reports of February 28, 2014 and March 23, 2023
1,408 + 116	“Designated Facility Capacity” for the penitentiary and the camp	PREA audit report, final May 12, 2025
1,446	Current population	BOP population report, modified September 10, 2026

Whichever number controls, the prison has been running above it. The CIC calculated in 2014 that McCreary was at 149 percent of capacity, holding 1,422 men in a building it recorded as designed for 955. The 2025 PREA audit answers “Yes” to the question whether the facility had been over capacity at any point in the previous twelve months, and gives an average daily population for that year of 1,450 at the penitentiary — forty-two above the same document’s stated designated capacity. Its staffing plan, according to the same audit, is built on an average daily population “since the last PREA audit, which is 1663.”

The Bureau’s own policy explains why that matters at a penitentiary. Program Statement 1060.13, dated March 19, 2026, defines Optimal Capacity as “generally 80-95% of a DFCL’s Physical Capacity,” a concept that “is based on the premise that institutions operate better when not at 100% capacity, particularly in the case of institutions with high security levels.” McCreary has spent years above 100 percent of the lowest capacity figure the Bureau prints for it, and there is no single-cell housing here at all.

Who are the notable inmates at USP McCreary?

Three men whose cases are widely reported are held here now. Most of the lists circulating online are years out of date; the names below come from the Bureau’s inmate locator.

• Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, register 02476-748, serving life. In June 2009 he became the first detainee transferred from Guantanamo Bay to the United States to face prosecution in a civilian criminal court. He was convicted in the Southern District of New York for his part in the 1998 bombings of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed 224 people, and was sentenced to life on January 25, 2011; the Attorney General’s statement that day recorded that he was the fifth person convicted in federal court over the bombings.
• Richard Lee McNair, register 13829-045, aged 67, whose locator record shows a release status of “STATE PRIS” — a term the Bureau’s own guide to its locator does not define. He is one of the most-reported escape artists in the federal system: contemporaneous Louisiana reporting recorded that he got out of USP Pollock on April 5, 2006 concealed in a pallet of mailbags, spent more than eighteen months at large, was stopped in Canada in October 2007, and was given thirty months for the escape by U.S. District Judge Dee Drell, consecutive to a life sentence he was already serving on a North Dakota state murder conviction.
• Christopher Lawrence Jeburk, register 09029-021, serving life. The Eleventh Circuit recorded the sentence in 2018: “In 1996 a jury found Jeburk guilty of bank robbery, conspiracy to commit bank robbery, possession of a firearm, carjacking, and interstate transportation of a stolen vehicle. He received a prison sentence of life plus five years.”

One more name belongs here for a different reason. Mufid Elfgeeh, register 23582-055, was serving 270 months for attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization when McCreary staff saw him stabbing his cellmate. A federal jury in London, Kentucky, convicted him of attempted murder on April 29, 2026 and on September 1, 2026 U.S. District Judge Robert Wier added 230 months. The U.S. Attorney’s office recorded that Elfgeeh was angry the Bureau had not given him a private cell and that staff in protective gear had to breach the cell to take the weapon. His locator record reads IN TRANSIT, with no facility — the screen shows “NOT IN BOP CUSTODY” and his projected release date — not McCreary.

Men the internet still places here who are not here

A family reading an out-of-date page sends mail to the wrong prison.

Named in circulating lists	Register number	Where the Bureau records him now
Ronell Wilson	71460-053	MCFP Springfield, Missouri
Thomas Pitera	29465-053	USP Big Sandy — the other Kentucky penitentiary
Timothy S. Durham	60452-112	FCI Greenville, Illinois
Ricky Rivera Mungia	26372-077	USP Terre Haute, Indiana
Matthew Madonna	03789-158	FMC Rochester, Minnesota
Haji Bagcho	29820-016	Released from Bureau custody on December 16, 2022

Two more: Kenneth Lee Shaver and Justin Boe, convicted of the murder of Lance Cameron Smith in a cell at McCreary on February 4, 2015, Shaver sentenced to life in November 2023, are both now held at ADX Florence in Colorado, not in Kentucky.

How do I find someone at USP McCreary?

Use the Bureau’s inmate locator, which covers everyone in federal custody since 1982 and shows a register number, age, release date and, while someone is held, the prison’s name. Search by the eight-digit register number if you have it, or by committed name — the name on the judgment, not a nickname.

Two cautions specific to this institution. The locator shows “McCreary USP” for both the penitentiary and the camp; it will not say which, and that difference governs clothing at a visit, commissary day and whether a man may sit outside. And “Big Sandy USP” is a different prison, the penitentiary at Inez, four hours north. Our guides to using the BOP inmate locator and how inmate number searches work cover the rest.

How do I write to someone at USP McCreary?

Mail does not go to 330 Federal Way. It goes to a post office box, and the same box serves the penitentiary and the camp — which is why the second line of the address block matters.

For someone at the penitentiary	For someone at the camp
INMATE NAME & REGISTER NUMBER USP MCCREARY U.S. PENITENTIARY P.O. BOX 3000 PINE KNOT, KY 42635	INMATE NAME & REGISTER NUMBER USP MCCREARY U.S. PENITENTIARY SATELLITE CAMP P.O. BOX 3000 PINE KNOT, KY 42635

Mail without a register number is returned. Put your own name and full return address in the upper left corner. Incoming first-class mail is distributed Monday to Friday by the evening watch officer in each housing unit, and there is no mail service on weekends or on federal holidays, so a letter posted on a Thursday from another state is unlikely to be read before the following week. Our guide to writing to a federal inmate covers what may and may not go inside.

Legal mail is handled differently at each end of this institution: at the penitentiary a man is put on call-out to collect legal and special mail, while at the camp the case manager or counselor delivers it within twenty-four hours. Under the Bureau’s correspondence rules, special mail must be addressed to the individual by name and register number, carry the attorney’s name, and carry the “Special Mail — Open only in the presence of the inmate” legend; mail that is not marked is opened and read as general correspondence. Our guide to attorney-client communication in the Bureau sets out the rules.

Going the other way, the handbook imposes a local rule that catches people out. Outgoing mail from the penitentiary goes unsealed into the unit mailbox and is inspected; outgoing legal mail must instead be hand-delivered to the mail room, Monday to Friday, during the breakfast meal, with identification. Everything else has to be in the unit boxes by 9:30 p.m. Every outgoing letter from general population, “This includes legal mail,” must carry a TRULINCS mailing label.

How do I send money to someone at USP McCreary?

Not to Pine Knot — funds sent to the prison’s own address are returned. All three routes run through the Bureau nationally and all need the committed name and eight-digit register number.

• By post — a money order to Federal Bureau of Prisons, Post Office Box 474701, Des Moines, Iowa 50947-0001. The Bureau requires that “the inmate’s full committed name (no nicknames) AND eight-digit register number must be printed legibly on all negotiable instruments AND on the outside of the envelope.”
• Western Union Quick Collect — code city FBOP, DC.
• MoneyGram Express Payment — receive code 7932, company Federal Bureau of Prisons.

Timing, from Program Statement 4500.13 (2026): Western Union and MoneyGram funds are ordinarily posted “within two hours of the transfer, if it was initiated between 7:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. EST,” and later transfers post by 7:00 a.m. the next morning. The Bureau’s Send Money page puts the daytime figure at two to four hours. Program Statement 4500.13 also carries a restriction that matters before you pay a wire fee: “Inmates with no power of attorney authorized are not allowed to receive Western Union or MoneyGram funds.” Our guides to sending money to a federal inmate and using MoneyGram go through each route.

What are the visiting hours at USP McCreary?

Saturdays, Sundays and federal holidays, 8:30 a.m. until 3:00 p.m., at both the penitentiary and the camp. No visitor is admitted after 2:00 p.m.; visitors are warned at 2:45 p.m. and all visits end at 3:00. There is no weekday and no evening visiting. Those hours come from the institution’s own supplement to the Bureau’s visiting regulations, MCR-5267.09e, dated January 24, 2022.

Before you travel, call. The Bureau publishes no visiting schedule in the machine-readable record behind its facility pages — the visiting-days field is empty for all 118 institutions, not just this one — so the printed supplement is the only schedule there is, and it is now more than four years old. McCreary keeps a recorded line for exactly this: 606-354-7000, extension 7002, “a recording regarding the status of visitation.” Use it on the morning you leave. In September 2026 the Bureau’s live record for McCreary carries no lockdown notice, but a penitentiary can go on modified operations in an afternoon: the D.C. inspectors counted twenty-three institution-wide lockdowns here in the twelve months to October 2022.

Who can visit, and how many

No more than four visitors at a time, dependent children under sixteen included in the four. Immediate family are normally approved; friends and associates are capped at ten on the list, and friends with prior criminal history “are not ordinarily approved.” A man may change his list only once a quarter unless a unit manager allows more, so get everyone who might realistically travel onto it in one submission. Everyone sixteen or over needs government photo identification, and a sixteen- or seventeen-year-old traveling without an approved adult relative needs written parental approval mailed in advance.

What visitors can wear and bring

The dress rules are detailed and enforced at the front lobby: “Any individual not appropriately dressed will be asked to leave the institution.” Female visitors “must wear a brassiere and other undergarments without exception,” in a material that will pass screening. Skirts more than two inches above the knee, halter tops, sleeveless shirts, tank tops, backless shirts and dresses, body suits, hip huggers, wrap-around skirts and see-through clothing are barred, and no adult visitor may wear shorts, sweat pants, athletic jump suits, camouflage or khaki-colored clothing, or open-toe shoes.

One inconsistency in the document will decide a real visit at the front door. The dress list in the body of the supplement bars camouflage; the summary handed to visitors as Attachment A leaves camouflage out and adds “yoga/exercise pants,” which the body does not mention. Both lists are in the same file. Dress for the stricter of the two: no camouflage, no khaki and no leggings.

What you may carry in: one clear quart-sized zip-top bag with no more than $40.00 in change for the vending machines; diapers, clear baby bottles and sanitary supplies; and only unopened, store-bought baby food. No diaper bags, no other food, no juice, no water bottles. Purses, hats, photographs and games belong in your car or in the front lobby lockers.

Inside the room: seating is assigned and you sit across from one another; an embrace and a kiss are allowed at the start and the end and not in between; no hand-holding while seated; nothing on the tables. The vending machines are for visitors only, and an incarcerated man may not use them or handle anything a visitor brings in. Breastfeeding is not permitted in the visiting room, and bottle feeding must be done in the food and vending area. A driver who is not an approved visitor must leave the property. Our guide to federal prison visitation rules covers the national framework.

Identification, screening and what happens on the inside

Everything entering the penitentiary is searched by the front lobby officer “without exception.” What happens to the man you are visiting is a real difference between a penitentiary and a lower-security prison. A man at the USP visits in an institution-issued jumpsuit: he undresses in the visual search area, his own clothing including socks and underwear is searched and held until the visit ends, and he is visually searched going in and coming out. The only things he may keep are a religious medallion worn inside the shirt, approved religious headwear, a plain wedding band, prescription glasses and his underwear and socks. A man at the camp wears his ordinary green uniform and is pat searched.

People in the Special Housing Unit visit in the non-contact area on the same days, first come first served, cut to two hours each if that area fills. They are escorted in restraints and wear SHU orange. Our guide to special housing units explains how people end up there.

Attorney visits follow a separate path. An attorney of record may be placed on the approved visiting list, and a visit during normal hours is then conducted as an ordinary visit. A legal visit outside visiting hours must be arranged in advance through the unit team, and the supplement is specific that such visits “will only be authorized by the Associate Warden (Operations),” with a memorandum of approval sent to the front lobby, the control center and the operations lieutenant beforehand. Bring a bar card as well as photo identification. One local rule catches counsel out: a man may not bring legal documents into the visiting room without prior approval from his unit manager, and approved documents are searched by escorting staff in his presence.

Getting to Pine Knot

The institution’s own directions: from Interstate 75, take Exit 11 at Williamsburg, Kentucky, and travel west on KY-92 for approximately 19.6 miles. Turn right onto US Highway 27 North for about 0.1 miles, then right onto KY-92 East, then left onto KY-1044 — the second turn for KY-1044, marked by a green road sign reading “United States Penitentiary.” Travel roughly one mile and the penitentiary is on the left; its parking area is the second right, and camp parking is straight past it on the left.

Plan on driving. The supplement keeps a list of taxi services in the front lobby and says of it, in terms, that “these services are not local and may require additional charges to travel to the facility.” The D.C. Corrections Information Council recorded the journey from Washington in 2014 as 570 miles and nine hours by car and called the prison “inaccessible by bus.”

How do phone calls and email work at USP McCreary?

Telephones sit in each housing unit and are available, according to the institution’s handbook, “from 6:00 a.m. until lockdown.” The national allowance is 510 minutes a month under the Bureau’s telephone regulations, Program Statement 5264.09 (2026) — 300 free to anyone eligible for First Step Act telephone incentives, the remaining 210 purchasable once those 300 are exhausted — a single call should generally not exceed 15 minutes, with at least 30 minutes between completed calls, and the minutes reset on a man’s own revalidation date rather than on the first of the month. Calls are monitored and recorded unless they are properly arranged unmonitored attorney calls. When a count or census is called, calls end immediately — which is why a conversation can stop mid-sentence at four o’clock.

Email runs on TRULINCS and reaches the outside world through CorrLinks, which cap how many contacts a man may hold. The handbook prices the email feature at five cents a minute of terminal time rather than per message, so a long reply costs more than a short one. The D.C. inspectors counted six telephones and four communications computers in each housing unit in December 2022, and tablets selling through the commissary at $110 to $115. Our guides to CorrLinks and TRULINCS and federal inmate phone calls cover the rest.

What can people buy at the USP McCreary commissary?

The monthly spending limit is $460, set nationally by the Bureau’s trust fund and commissary policy, Program Statement 4500.13, issued May 7, 2026, which raised it from $360 and adds a further $50 for the November and December holiday period, in effect for no more than one validation period. Postage stamps, nicotine replacement patches and lozenges, over-the-counter medications, vitamin and mineral supplements, and copy cards and paper are excluded from the limit.

McCreary’s own Admission & Orientation handbook says the limit is $320. It was revised in January 2013 and has not been reissued since, so the figure is two national increases out of date, and the institution’s published commissary order form of August 15, 2019 prints no limit at all. If you have read $320 or $360 for this prison anywhere, including in the Bureau’s own handbook for it, that figure is obsolete.

How shopping actually works here

One shopping day a week, assigned by housing unit, and a written list submitted the day before. The handbook’s schedule runs Monday for the Special Housing Unit and units 3A and 3B; Tuesday for 1B, 2A and 2B; Wednesday for 6A, 6B and 1A; Thursday for 5A and 5B; Friday for 4A and 4B. Camp shopping is Tuesdays and Thursdays, 10:45 a.m. to noon, by register number.

The order form adds the rule that decides whether a man eats that week: “Shopping lists must be placed into the drop-boxes in front of Food Service by close of the noon meal mainline the day prior to your authorized shopping day.” Miss the drop box and there is no shopping until the following week. The same form warns that the commissary closes for a full week in March and one in September every year for inventory.

The list carries Swintec typewriter ribbons at $9.95, lift-off correction tape at $18.15, white legal pads at $1.20 and #10 envelopes at $1.55: men prepare filings on typewriters at this institution, and the leisure library held eight of them when the D.C. inspectors came through. Reading glasses come in eight strengths at $2.60 a pair, and stamps carry their own weekly cap of $11.00, separate from the monthly limit. Our guide to the federal prison commissary covers the national rules.

Commissary here has also been the subject of a documented dispute. In its March 2023 report the D.C. Corrections Information Council recorded that every man it interviewed said the whole unit is denied commissary when one person does something wrong, that the men said this causes more violence, and it recommended that the warden “develop alternatives to unit wide commissary restrictions in response to individual infractions.”

What programs are available at USP McCreary?

The program that defines this institution is the Challenge Program, and the one families most often ask about — RDAP — does not run here at all.

The Challenge Program

The Challenge Program is a residential, cognitive-behavioral treatment program written for penitentiary settings, for high-security men with substance use problems, mental illness, or both, who live in a housing unit separate from general population. The Bureau’s First Step Act Approved Programs Guide of August 2026 records it as worth 500 hours, classifies it as an Evidence-Based Recidivism Reduction program delivered by Psychology Services, requires at least eighteen months remaining, and names the eleven high-security institutions that run it. McCreary is one, and so is USP Big Sandy: Kentucky has two of the Bureau’s eleven Challenge units.

What the program looks like on the ground comes from the Corrections Information Council’s two published inspections of this prison. In April 2013 the D.C. Corrections Information Council found 73 men in it against a capacity of 90, and was told the unit “will not be at capacity until another treatment specialist is hired.” By December 2022 there were 97 participants, in a two-year program that can run to 36 months, with three phases, three journals in each, eight resident mentors who have completed it, and automatic expulsion for fighting or drugs. The CIC also recorded that one D.C. man had been expelled without explanation and two others who met the criteria denied without explanation — a reminder that admission is a decision that can be questioned in writing.

Drug treatment without RDAP

There is no Residential Drug Abuse Program at USP McCreary or at its camp, and four separate documents say so. The institution’s own handbook states it in terms: “USP/SCP McCreary does not have a Residential Drug Abuse Program (RDAP), but we can refer interested inmates who meet all the eligibility requirements.” The D.C. inspectors recorded the same in 2014. The RDAP locations list printed inside the August 2026 First Step Act guide, headed “Updated 6/4/2026” and totaling 57 programs at 50 locations, names for Kentucky only USP Big Sandy and the two programs at FMC Lexington. And the guide’s programs-by-institution table marks this institution with a dot rather than an X in both residential drug treatment rows.

The consequence is concrete: the twelve-month sentence reduction available under 18 U.S.C. § 3621(e) on completion of RDAP cannot be earned at this address, because the program is not here to complete. Psychology Services will take a request and refer a man who qualifies, and the referral turns into a transfer or it does not. Where that year matters, the argument has to be made at designation or through a transfer request. Our guide to the Residential Drug Abuse Program sets out the eligibility rules.

What does run here: basic drug education, available in Spanish through the drug abuse program coordinator; a non-residential drug treatment program, recorded by the D.C. inspectors in 2014 as six months long with a $30 incentive on completion; aftercare for men finishing the twelve months that follow a residential program served elsewhere; and Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous.

Education, the law library and vocational training

A man without a verifiable high school diploma or GED must attend class — 240 hours under the 2013 handbook, 480 hours according to what the D.C. inspectors were told in December 2022. The education record here is strong: the CIC recorded that McCreary had the third-highest number of GED graduates in the entire Bureau in fiscal year 2012, 57 men, and that it won the Bureau’s Golden Apple Award that year. There were seven law library computers in 2022, access by request, and men with pending litigation could be excused from work to use them; there is a terminal in the Special Housing Unit too, although eighteen of the twenty-six respondents who had been in the SHU told the CIC they had no access to books or to the law library while they were there. See our guide to education in federal prison.

Faith, reentry and the UNICOR question

Religious services here are large. By December 2022 there were fifteen active groups staffed by one chaplain, an assistant and four other staff, with the largest congregations recorded as Sunni Muslim at about 150 men, Christian at about 90 and Native American at about 30. Nine of the twenty Muslim men among the CIC’s forty-two respondents said they were not receiving the appropriate religious diet and fifteen said there were no leaders specific to their faith; the Bureau replied by setting out the Alternative Diet Program under Program Statement 5360.09 without addressing the individuals, because the CIC had not named them. Our guide to religious programs in federal prison covers the request process. On reentry, the institution told the CIC in 2022 that it offers roughly 85 evidence-based recidivism reduction programs and productive activities across the thirteen First Step Act need areas.

Whether McCreary has a Federal Prison Industries factory is answered differently in different Bureau records, and the record that controls says no. The D.C. Corrections Information Council, reporting in March 2023 on its December 2022 visit, wrote that “UNICOR closed in 2011 and the facility is now used for recycling,” and the institution’s own handbook, revised in January 2013, does not mention Federal Prison Industries at all. The August 2026 First Step Act guide answers it both ways: its programs-by-institution grid marks Federal Prison Industries here, but its Federal Prison Industries description page — the half written out in prose, and the half that controls — lists 55 institution codes and McCreary is not one of them. Ask the unit team in writing before counting on a UNICOR job; our guide to UNICOR and prison work explains what the pay grades are worth.

What is daily life like at USP McCreary?

The day is shaped by counts and by movement, both stricter at a penitentiary than anywhere else in the ordinary federal system. The shape below comes from the institution’s Admission & Orientation handbook, the only one the Bureau publishes here, last revised in January 2013; treat it as the framework rather than today’s timetable.

Time	What happens
6:00 a.m.	General wake-up call. Telephones become available in the units
By 7:45 a.m.	Beds made, trash out, cells clean
7:45 a.m.	Work call. Arriving late to a work assignment is a disciplinary matter
10:00 a.m.	Standing count on weekends and federal holidays
Midday	Noon meal mainline — also the deadline for next-day commissary lists
4:00 p.m.	Standing count, lights on, doors locked
Evening	Dinner. In December 2022 the D.C. inspectors recorded that men collect the evening meal from the kitchen and carry it back to the housing unit rather than eating in the dining hall
9:30 p.m.	Last call for outgoing mail in the unit boxes
10:00 p.m.	Standing count

Housing is two-man cells across six numbered units, each split into a right and a left side, with 128 cells and twenty showers per unit as the D.C. inspectors counted them in 2013 — twelve sides plus the camp dormitory, which is how the PREA audit reaches thirteen. Institution-issued hygiene comes round every other Friday, alternating between the two sides of the prison: one toothbrush a month, one tube of toothpaste a week, five shampoo packets a week, three razors every two weeks, two bars of soap a week and six shaving cream packets every two weeks. Recreation runs to three yards, a band room, and painting, leatherwork and music classes taught by other residents; in 2013 the CIC recorded a food budget of $3.25 per man per day, a hot breakfast and lunch, a cold dinner, and only water to drink. Our guide to recreation in federal prison covers what is generally available.

Health care at a prison a long way from a hospital

McCreary is a care level 2 institution: routine and stable chronic care on site, anything more complex sent out. In December 2022 that care was delivered by one doctor present Monday to Friday, one dentist, and 27 staff and contractors in all. The population divided into 704 men at care level 1, 372 at care level 2 and two at care level 3 being moved elsewhere, and the most frequent conditions were diabetes, cardiac disease, HIV and hepatitis.

Two figures from that inspection deserve to be read together. Pill line runs twice a day, with fifty to a hundred men in the morning and a hundred to a hundred and fifty in the evening, and staff estimated that about 75 percent of what is handed out is psychiatric medication. Two psychologists serve the institution; psychiatric care is delivered by telehealth, and they round in the Special Housing Unit on Wednesdays.

Then there is the geography. Several hospitals lie within a 35-mile radius and the institution was making two or three outside trips a day in 2022. For an emergency the distance is measured differently. In April 2021 the Inspector General published a management advisory memorandum on the Bureau’s procurement of air ambulance services, and its table of the five institutions that paid the most for air ambulance claims between October 2011 and August 2019 is headed by USP McCreary: 27 claims for rotary-wing transport totaling $481,314.92 and 26 for the associated air mileage totaling $398,801.26. FCI Manchester, also in eastern Kentucky, was second. The OIG did not audit or validate the underlying claims data, so the amounts may not reflect exactly what the Bureau paid. Our guide to medical care in federal prison covers the sick call and appeal routes.

What do inspectors say about conditions at USP McCreary?

A great deal more than they say about almost any other federal prison. Two independent bodies have been inside and published what they found: the Justice Department’s Inspector General, unannounced, in June 2024, and the District of Columbia’s Corrections Information Council, in April 2013, October 2015 and December 2022.

The Inspector General’s unannounced inspection

On Tuesday June 4, 2024 the OIG walked into six federal prisons at once, one in each Bureau region, without notice; USP McCreary was the Mid-Atlantic Region’s. The institutions were chosen “based on their relative scores from the OIG’s prison inspection risk assessment tool, as well as the volume and nature of complaints submitted to the OIG regarding institution operations,” and the results were published on June 17, 2025 as Concurrent Inspections of BOP Food Service Operations, E&I Report 25-062.

Of the six, McCreary came out worst. The report’s own words: it and FCI Marianna “had the greatest number of deficiencies. When considering the overall volume and nature of the deficiencies, we also determined that USP McCreary’s deficiencies were the most significant of all the institutions we inspected.” What they found here:

• On arrival in the camp kitchen, “an unsecured and unattended knife” in a food preparation area, neither tethered nor supervised as policy requires; a Bureau employee said that when not in use it is kept in an unlocked desk drawer rather than the locked cabinet policy requires.
• In the penitentiary kitchen, a dirty room with “a pervasive smell of raw meat,” and inside a broken walk-in refrigerator running at 80 degrees Fahrenheit, “a large amount of day-old prepared food that had been left in uncovered serving trays.” The food service administrator believed men working the previous day had hidden it there to avoid throwing it out, and said there was no intention of serving it.
• No soap in the bathroom used by the men who prepare food: the soap the institution had bought would not work in the dispenser, so a man had to ask a staff member for it.
• During an observed dinner service at the penitentiary, “no BOP employee was supervising inmate workers in the kitchen. This is a violation of BOP policy.”
• Two of the three freezers in the food warehouse inoperable, with the institution renting three mobile trailer freezers at $3,400 a month each for at least two months. The one working freezer was leaking refrigerant; the inspectors saw food that appeared to have thawed and refrozen, built-up ice at the threshold, and pallets stacked so precariously they could fall on the people retrieving food.
• In the camp kitchen, a ventilation system that was not working, with steam build-up, water stains and a hole in the ceiling; and in the penitentiary cafeteria, “water seeping through broken floor tiles and emitting a strong and unpleasant odor.”
• No security cameras inside the food storage warehouse, one of five such findings among the six institutions, and evidence that inmate workers had diverted containers of food.

The staffing finding cuts against the usual explanation. McCreary’s food service department was fully staffed on the day — all fifteen authorized positions filled — and the administrator nevertheless told the OIG he believes it is understaffed, while employees said low staffing often leaves a single officer supervising men handling food service knives, “and this makes some of the employees feel unsafe.” A department at its authorized strength that its own manager calls understaffed is a statement about that strength.

The Bureau’s answer is on the record too, and it is substantial. McCreary put cook supervisors on twelve-hour shifts “guaranteeing the presence of two staff members whenever inmates are working in the kitchen.” The knife was removed and staff trained on tool management, and daily area and pat searches were introduced to stop food being diverted. Two freezers were repaired and the rental trailers returned between April and May 2025; racks were installed so pallets could be stacked properly; daily temperature logs were started on the broken walk-in, which is no longer used to store food. The ventilation system, the broken floor tiles and the cafeteria drain were all repaired during 2024, and hand soap was placed in every food service restroom with daily checks.

A man here sued over that cafeteria floor in 2022, alleging that on May 23, 2020 he was pushing a cart carrying 24 pans of potatoes and water when the wheels caught in an area of floor “missing three tile pieces” and the load came down on him. The case was screened out on how it was pleaded rather than on what happened. Four years after that accident the Inspector General was still photographing water coming up through the tiles.

The Inspector General states its own count, most recently in its inspection of USP Canaan, E&I Report 26-055, published May 21, 2026: “Since 2023, the OIG has conducted inspections at 14 BOP institutions: 7 individual facility inspections, 6 inspections conducted as part of the OIG’s Concurrent Inspections of BOP Food Service Operations, and the most recent ongoing inspection effort at Federal Correctional Institution (FCI) Berlin in New Hampshire.” USP McCreary is one of the six. The Bureau runs 118 institutions.

Other Inspector General work that names this prison

Two further OIG products publish figures about McCreary specifically, neither from an inspection of conditions here. In its Audit of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Oversight of the Use of Restraints, Report 25-070 of July 29, 2025, the OIG published Bureau TRUINTEL data for January 2018 through September 2024 by institution: USP McCreary recorded 632 reported applications of restraints, the third highest in the federal system, behind USP Thomson at 1,448 and USP Big Sandy at 712 — the two ranked immediately after Thomson are both in Kentucky. And in Report 24-089 of August 7, 2024 the OIG sampled 73 men’s Inmate Financial Responsibility Program files at three institutions, McCreary among them.

The D.C. Corrections Information Council, 2013 and 2022

The Corrections Information Council is an independent body created by Congress and the D.C. Council to inspect the prisons where District residents are held. Because the District has no prison system of its own, its residents are scattered across the Bureau and the CIC follows them. It has inspected USP McCreary three times and published two reports. The CIC surveys only D.C. Code offenders, its respondents volunteer, and the samples are small. In December 2022 it heard from 42 of the 54 D.C. men then at McCreary, including four of the seven in the Special Housing Unit — 42 out of a total population of 1,576. In April 2013 it interviewed 24 D.C. men on site and received 33 letters. These are not surveys of the prison; they are the only independent interviews with anyone inside it that have ever been published.

From the December 2022 visit, of 42 respondents: fourteen reported being physically abused by staff at McCreary; seven said they were assaulted in areas of the prison with no cameras; twenty-five said staff make racist remarks and twenty-five said staff behavior here is worse than at other penitentiaries; twenty said grievance forms were not available; nineteen said they had no access to reading materials; sixteen said medical services do not answer sick-call slips within 48 hours; two reported sexual abuse or assault; and fourteen did not know how to report sexual abuse at all. Two more told interviewers they had been abused but left the survey question blank for fear of retaliation.

The Bureau’s response is published in the same report: that it takes allegations of staff misconduct seriously, that all are reviewed and referred where necessary, and that “the CIC did not provide USP McCreary with detailed and specific information to investigate or substantiate any allegation of abuse. Therefore, the BOP cannot thoroughly address any of these claims.” The Bureau records that at closeout its staff asked for names and dates and the CIC staff declined; the CIC’s position was that naming men would expose them to retaliation. Both accounts are in the document.

What is not a survey is the Bureau’s own incident data, which the CIC obtained for both inspections. Set side by side, it is the closest thing that exists to a longitudinal measurement of this prison.

Bureau incident data	August 2012 – August 2013	November 2021 – October 2022
Uses of force	106	156
Uses of restraints	80	83
Events involving chemical agents	34	97
Assaults on inmates with a weapon	13	23
Assaults on inmates without a weapon	50	84
Assaults on staff with a weapon	3	4
Assaults on staff without a weapon	29	6
Institution-wide lockdowns	0	23

Force was used at this prison roughly three times a week in the year to October 2022, on the Bureau’s own count. Chemical agents were used nearly three times as often as nine years earlier. And an institution that did not lock down once in 2012 and 2013 locked down twenty-three times in twelve months, nine of them in May 2022 alone.

The grievance figures from the same period explain why a family may find letters to the warden go nowhere. Over twelve months men at McCreary filed 177 BP-9s at the institution, 88 BP-10s at the region and 30 BP-11s at Central Office. On-time answers ranged from 61.1 to 100 percent for BP-9s and 66.7 to 100 percent for BP-10s — but for BP-11s, the final level, the on-time rate was zero percent in May, June and September 2022. Several men told the CIC they do not report staff conduct at all, from fear of retaliation or of a prolonged SHU stay while the remedy runs.

The PREA audit

USP McCreary passed its most recent Prison Rape Elimination Act audit, conducted by Cynthia Swier of Corrections Consulting Services, an independent auditor who was on site from April 29 to May 1, 2025 and issued a final report on May 12, 2025, with 45 standards met, none exceeded and none unmet.

The audit is also the most detailed published description of this prison: two buildings, thirteen housing units, no single-cell unit, 120 segregation cells, and a population of 1,551 on its first day, with an average stay of 666 days. Of those 1,551 men, 45 had a physical disability, 144 a cognitive or functional disability, nineteen had limited English, and 233 had disclosed prior sexual victimization during risk screening. Forensic examinations after a sexual assault are performed off site at a local hospital.

On allegations the audit gives two different totals, so both belong here. Its tables record fifteen in the twelve months before the audit — four of sexual abuse and eleven of sexual harassment, six of those staff-on-inmate. Its narrative under standard 115.22 says something else: “The PAQ indicated that there were 27 allegations reported within the previous twelve months.” Nothing was substantiated, and six criminal investigations were still open. The institution had installed or updated video monitoring technology in the preceding year — worth setting against the D.C. inspectors’ finding two years earlier that men reported being assaulted where there were no cameras.

What the courts have said

Conditions claims out of McCreary are heard in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky at London, and the docket shows a pattern: cases here tend to fail on rules rather than on facts, and the rule that kills most of them is the clock. Because Congress wrote no limitation period for a Bivens claim, courts borrow the most analogous state period, and for events at McCreary that means Kentucky’s one-year period for personal injury. The court dismissed a claim about wound care at screening on that ground in Wright v. Cunnagin in 2019, and claims from a fall from a top bunk on the same ground in Crafton v. United States in 2021. One year from the date of the injury is far shorter than most families assume. Three further traps recur: a Bivens claim may not be brought against an officer in an official capacity, as the Sixth Circuit held for McCreary staff in Parks v. Reans, 510 F. App’x 414 (6th Cir. 2013); a transfer moots a request for an injunction; and exhaustion is unforgiving, as in Smith v. Sumner in 2023, where an appeal failed because a BP-10 “is filed when received, not when signed.”

Two decisions cut the other way. In Reed v. Parsons, decided in July 2024, the court refused to dismiss a claim about the withdrawal of psychiatric medication because there were unresolved factual questions about whether the grievance process was in fact available to the man bringing it — a holding that sits directly alongside the D.C. inspectors’ finding, eighteen months earlier, that twenty of forty-two respondents said grievance forms were not available. And in Matthews v. USP McCreary, in January 2025, the court allowed Eighth Amendment deliberate-indifference claims to proceed past screening against three physician assistants and the warden in their individual capacities.

USP McCreary in the news

Recent news about USP McCreary centers on violence inside the penitentiary and on the conditions men describe there; older items concern deaths in custody. Items about this institution, newest first:

• September 2026 — Mufid Elfgeeh was sentenced to 230 months for the attempted murder of his cellmate at USP McCreary, on top of the 270-month terrorism sentence he was already serving; a jury had convicted him that April.
• February 2026 — Kenneth Lee, 33, died after a fight involving several men at about 11:30 a.m. on February 16. The Bureau said two other men and one employee were taken to a local hospital. Lee had been at McCreary since December 2024.
• November 2025 — Eric Watson, 34, was sentenced to 108 months for assaulting a federal officer. On his plea agreement, two men began fighting on Christmas Day 2023 and when staff ordered them to stop Watson advanced on them and took an officer to the ground.
• January 2024 — Washington City Paper published “Hunger and Violence Dominate Daily Life at USP McCreary,” a first-person account by Askia Afrika-Ber, a man then serving a 53-year sentence there. He described unit-wide commissary restrictions running since the start of 2023, an evening meal issued to the housing units rather than the dining hall, plexiglass partitions left in the visiting room after the pandemic, and a restriction on books sent in. A Bureau spokesperson replied that wardens may “establish controls or implement temporary security measures,” that “sanctions are not imposed in a capricious or retaliatory manner,” and that “agency guidance is clear that we do not implement blanket restrictions on book” ordering. The Bureau separately confirmed to the paper that a man had been found unresponsive inside the prison in early November 2023 and pronounced dead at a local hospital, and that the FBI had been notified. Ask about the plexiglass when you call; it is not mentioned in the 2022 visiting supplement.
• August 2021 — the Bureau posted one news release reporting the death of a person held at USP McCreary; the Bureau’s releases are listed on its press release page.
• December 2020 — the Bureau posted one news release reporting the death of a person held at USP McCreary; the Bureau’s releases are listed on its press release page.

Frequently asked questions about USP McCreary

Problems at USP McCreary: where we can help

This institution’s own record names the problems that recur here. A prison the Inspector General found in the worst condition of six it inspected without notice. The third-highest count of restraint applications in the federal system. Twenty-three institution-wide lockdowns in a single year. A final-level grievance answered on time zero percent of the time in three separate months. No RDAP, which puts a year of sentence reduction out of reach at this address. And a court record in which almost every conditions claim from McCreary has died on a deadline or a pleading rule rather than on what happened.

• The one-year clock. Kentucky’s one-year personal injury period is borrowed for Bivens claims arising here, and it has ended cases at screening before anyone read the facts. If someone has been hurt at McCreary, the date of the injury is the date that matters.
• The administrative remedy process, which has a clock on every rung and, here, a documented history of forms being unavailable and final-level appeals going unanswered. A court has already refused to dismiss a case from this prison because whether the process was genuinely available was a live question of fact. Getting that evidence recorded at the time is the work.
• Designation and transfer. Whether a man is behind the penitentiary fence or at the camp turns on security points, Public Safety Factors and a Management Variable, all arguable, and the Challenge Program is on the record here as a route to a lower designation. See our guide to federal prison transfers.
• RDAP referrals. The program does not run here, so the § 3621(e) year has to be pursued through a referral and a transfer, timed against the release date rather than left to the unit team’s calendar.
• Medical care that is not happening — among the top three concerns in both published inspections of this prison, nine years apart. The route runs through a written request, then the remedy process, then, where negligence has caused injury, a Federal Tort Claims Act claim with its own two-year administrative deadline.
• Use of force, restraints and SHU placements. The Bureau’s own figures make these the most likely thing to go wrong here, and the D.C. inspectors recommended in 2023 that Central Office and the Inspector General review camera footage, restraint incidents and disciplinary reports involving staff-inmate contact. A protective custody request that becomes an open-ended SHU stay is a version of the same problem.
• Disciplinary proceedings that threaten good conduct time; First Step Act time credits that are not being earned, calculated or applied correctly; halfway house and home confinement placement, handled by the reentry office for the district of release (RRM Nashville for Kentucky); and compassionate release and sentence computation errors.

Elizabeth Franklin-Best, P.C. handles federal criminal defense, appeals and post-conviction matters nationwide, and advises families on Bureau of Prisons issues at institutions 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

• USP McCreary, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. Address, contacts, population, region and judicial district.
• Visiting Regulations, Institution Supplement MCR-5267.09e, Federal Bureau of Prisons, USP McCreary, 2022. Hours, lists, visitor numbers, dress, searches, and special-housing and attorney visits; replaced Institution Supplement MCR-5267.09d (2021).
• U.S.P. McCreary Commissary Order Form, Federal Bureau of Prisons, USP McCreary, 2019. Prices, the shopping-list deadline and the inventory weeks.
• USP/SCP McCreary Admission and Orientation Handbook, Federal Bureau of Prisons, USP McCreary, 2013. The daily schedule, mail, telephone, commissary and program descriptions.
• Physical Capacity for Bureau Facilities, Program Statement 1060.13, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. Defines Physical, Total and Optimal Capacity.
• Trust Fund/Deposit Fund Manual, Program Statement 4500.13, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. The monthly commissary spending limitation and the deposit posting times.
• Inmate Security Designation and Custody Classification, Program Statement 5100.08, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. Security points, Public Safety Factors and Management Variables.
• Inmate Telephone Regulations, Program Statement 5264.09, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. The 510-minute monthly allowance and call duration; replaced Program Statement 5264.08 (2008).
• First Step Act Approved Programs Guide, Federal Bureau of Prisons, Reentry Services Division, 2026. Challenge Program institutions, the RDAP locations list and the programs-by-institution table.
• Find an Inmate, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026.
• Population Statistics, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026.
• Send Money, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026. The deposit routes, posting times and holds.
• Press Releases, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026.
• Death at USP McCreary, Federal Bureau of Prisons, 2026.

Audits and inspections

• 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. The Inspector General’s count of the institutions it has inspected since 2023.
• PREA Audit Report: USP McCreary, Corrections Consulting Services, 2025. Physical plant, capacity, population and allegation data.
• Concurrent Inspections of BOP Food Service Operations (Report 25-062), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2025. The unannounced June 2024 inspection of six institutions, McCreary among them.
• Audit of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Oversight of the Use of Restraints (Report 25-070), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2025. Reported applications of restraints by institution.
• Audit of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Inmate Financial Responsibility Program (Report 24-089), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2024.
• USP McCreary: Report on Findings and Recommendations, District of Columbia Corrections Information Council, 2023. The December 2022 inspection, with the Bureau’s responses.
• Management Advisory Memorandum: Procurement of Air Ambulance Services (Report 20-059), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2021. Air ambulance claims by institution, with the OIG’s caveat that it did not audit the claims data.
• USP McCreary Inspection Report, District of Columbia Corrections Information Council, 2014. The April 2013 inspection, with the Bureau’s responses.
• Federal Bureau of Prisons Management of Construction Contracts (Report 02-32), U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2002. The prison’s rated capacity as designed.

Court records

• Matthews v. USP McCreary, No. 6:24-cv-00062 (E.D. Ky.), U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, 2025. The January 28, 2025 screening decision.
• Reed v. Parsons, No. 6:23-cv-00127 (E.D. Ky.), U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, 2024. The July 11, 2024 decision on whether the grievance process was available.
• Smith v. Sumner, No. 6:22-cv-00216 (E.D. Ky.), U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, 2023. The May 24, 2023 decision on exhaustion.
• Rivera-Ruperto v. USP McCreary, No. 6:22-cv-00074 (E.D. Ky.), U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, 2022. The May 13, 2022 decision.
• Crafton v. United States, No. 6:19-cv-00229 (E.D. Ky.), U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, 2021. The February 2, 2021 decision on the limitation period.
• Wright v. Cunnagin, No. 6:19-cv-00094 (E.D. Ky.), U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, 2019. The August 20, 2019 decision on the limitation period.
• United States v. Jeburk, No. 18-10202 (11th Cir. 2018), U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, 2018. The sentence as the court recorded it.
• Parks v. Reans, 510 F. App’x 414 (6th Cir. 2013), U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, 2013. Official-capacity Bivens claims against McCreary staff.
• USP McCreary Inmate Sentenced for Attempted Murder, U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of Kentucky, 2026. Mufid Elfgeeh’s sentence.
• USP McCreary Inmate Convicted of Attempted Murder, U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of Kentucky, 2026.
• Former USP McCreary Inmate Sentenced to Life in Prison for First Degree Murder, U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of Kentucky, 2023. Kenneth Lee Shaver’s sentence.
• Statement of the Attorney General on the Sentencing of Ahmed Ghailani, U.S. Department of Justice, 2011.
• Ahmed Ghailani Transferred from Guantanamo Bay to New York for Prosecution on Terror Charges, U.S. Department of Justice, 2009.
• Former BOP Computer Specialist Pleaded Guilty to False Statement Charges, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2025.
• BOP Unit Secretary Pleaded Guilty and Sentenced for Harassment, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2025.
• Jury Acquits BOP Lieutenant of Deprivation of Rights Under Color of Law, Falsifying a Record, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2025.
• Federal Bureau of Prison Lieutenant Indicted for Civil Rights Violations, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2024.
• BOP Unit Secretary Arrested and Charged with Unlawful Sexual Contact, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2024.
• BOP Correctional Officer Sentenced for Theft of Government Property, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2023.
• Former BOP Employee Arrested for Introduction of Contraband, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2020.

News and other sources

• Inmate Dies Following Fight at Federal Prison in Kentucky, WKYT, 2026.
• Hunger and Violence Dominate Daily Life at USP McCreary, Where D.C. Men Are Incarcerated, Washington City Paper, 2024. With the Bureau’s responses in the editor’s notes.
• 18 U.S.C. § 3621(e), Imprisonment of a convicted person, U.S. Code (Legal Information Institute).

Sources reviewed September 2026.

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