The Federal Correctional Institution, Dublin (FCI Dublin) is a low-security United States federal prison for female inmates in

Dublin, California Dublin (formerly, Dougherty, Alameda County, California, Amador and Dougherty's Station) is a suburban city of the East Bay in California. It is located within the Amador Valley of Alameda County, California, Alameda County's Tri-Valley region. ...

. The facility also has an adjacent satellite prison camp housing minimum-security female offenders. FCI Dublin is located 20 miles southeast of

Oakland Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third largest city overall in the Bay A ...

on the Parks Reserve Forces Training Area. It is located near Santa Rita Jail, which is operated by Alameda County. In 2021 and 2022, the facility was embroiled in a scandal over a permissive and toxic culture of rampant sexual abuse by staff at the facility.

History

FCI Dublin opened in 1974. It became an exclusively female prison in 2012 and is one of five federal prisons for women in the United States.

Facility and programs

The prison's education department offers GED and ESL programs, as well as courses in parenting skills. The prison also provides legal and leisure library services in addition to training in the use of various computer software. There are two Federal Prison Industries

UNICOR Federal Prison Industries, Inc. (FPI), doing business as UNICOR (stylized as unicor) since 1977, is a wholly owned United States government corporation created in 1934 as a prison labor program for inmates within the Federal Bureau of Prisons, a ...

programs at FCI Dublin: the Textiles and the

Call Center A call centre ( Commonwealth spelling) or call center (American spelling; see spelling differences) is a managed capability that can be centralised or remote that is used for receiving or transmitting a large volume of enquiries by telephone. ...

. Textiles employ approximately 150 inmates on the manufacture of custom draperies,

parachute A parachute is a device used to slow the motion of an object through an atmosphere by creating drag or, in a ram-air parachute, aerodynamic lift. A major application is to support people, for recreation or as a safety device for aviators, who ...

s, and disaster blankets. They also sort and repair USPS mailbags. The Call Center employs around 250 inmates on directory assistance inquiries. It houses inmates who are serving an average sentence of 5 years. It has a design capacity of 250 inmates, but houses 1,077 as of April 11, 2013. Conditions are cramped, with three inmates sharing a cell on the top tier and four inmates sharing a cell on the bottom tier, designed to house a single prisoner. Meals are served in shifts due to the small size of the dining facilities. Like most American prisons, FCI Dublin also contains a SHU (Security Housing Unit), where any prisoners who are deemed to have broken prison rules are kept in segregation under a highly restrictive regime. Prisoners in the SHU spend more time locked in their cell than the general prison population, are only allowed out for limited amounts of time and must be transported to and from their cell wearing

handcuffs Handcuffs are Physical restraint, restraint devices designed to secure an individual's wrists in proximity to each other. They comprise two parts, linked together by a Link chain, chain, a hinge, or rigid bar. Each cuff has a rotating arm whi ...

. Depending on the circumstances, an inmate may spend weeks or even months in the SHU. FCI Dublin is surrounded by two separate fences with a gap of approximately between them. Measuring high, each chain-link fence is reinforced with multiple coils of razor wire (at the top and bottom) plus electronic sensors to detect escape attempts. The institution also has an adjacent administrative detention facility housing adult males on holdover or pre-trial status, and a minimum-security satellite camp housing adult female offenders, which opened in 1990. This minimum-security camp was several old army barracks and these have been torn down. The BOP has removed a section of the FCI and placed approximately 200 female minimum security prisoners in this space. This facility is just short of a FCI. All the guards are rotated out of the FCI.

Notable incidents

On November 5, 1986, Ronald McIntosh, who had escaped during a prison transfer one month earlier, landed a stolen helicopter in the exercise yard and escaped with Samantha Lopez, who was serving a 50-year sentence for bank robbery. Mr. McIntosh was serving a sentence for wire fraud when he met Ms. Lopez working in the business office of the prison and the two devised the escape plan. They were arrested by FBI Agents 10 days later and subsequently convicted of air piracy and escape. McIntosh received a 25-year sentence and Lopez had five years added to her sentence.

Sexual abuse of prisoners

A 2022 investigation by the Associated Press reported a "permissive and toxic culture...of sexual misconduct by predatory employees". The AP reported that inmates alleged "rampant sexual abuse by correctional officers", and that prisoner were allegedly "threatened or punished when they tried to speak up". In 2022, the prison chaplain signed a plea agreement and was scheduled to plead guilty to sexually abusing one inmate, and former warden Ray J. Garcia was found guilty of sexual offenses against prisoners.

Notable inmates

†Inmates incarcerated prior to 1982 do not have an assigned register number.

References

External links

FCI Dublin - Official BOP Website
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