Former Luzerne County judge Michael Conahan has been moved to a minimum security satellite camp in Miami, Florida, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
The camp opened in 1976 and houses 397 male offenders, the bureau said.
The relocation is an improvement for the 64-year-old Hazleton native because prison camps have dormitory-style housing, limited or no perimeter fencing and more access to work and program opportunities, according to online information.
In comparison, the Federal Correctional Complex at Coleman in Florida, where Conahan had been lodged for five years and three months, or since November 2011, was a low-security facility surrounded by barbed-wire fencing located 46 miles northwest of Orlando.
Inmates in low-security prisons are locked in cells at night, officials have said.
Conahan was transferred from Coleman to a detention center at the Federal Correctional Institution in Tallahassee, Florida, earlier this month to await transfer to the Miami facility.
He is incarcerated for a racketeering charge related to his acceptance of money in exchange for decisions that benefited two privately owned juvenile detention centers.
The federal prison bureau initiates transfers but does not publicly discuss the rationale. Conahan may have been eligible for placement in a camp because he now has less than a decade remaining on his sentence. His scheduled release date is Dec. 18, 2026.
The Miami camp is adjacent to a low-security correctional institution. A photograph of the complex on the bureau website shows a well-manicured lawn with several palm trees at the entrance.
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