Not long after it was first reported that Ghislaine Maxwell was moved to one of the cushiest federal detention facilities in the country, a private Facebook group dedicated to current and former federal prison staffers erupted in shock and outrage.
The federal prison camp in Bryan, Texas, is one of seven minimum security, dormitory-style federal security facilities that do not typically hold inmates like Maxwell, 63, who are convicted of sex crimes and serving lengthy sentences.
“As a retired BOP employee, this makes me sick,” wrote one person on the “Bureau of Prisons staff and retirees” Facebook page.
“Since when are sex offenders allowed at the camp?” another wrote. “I don’t care who she snitched on, she’s a damn human trafficker.”
NBC News reviewed screenshots of the page, which were provided by one of the group’s members. The Facebook group is open only to those who pass an extensive vetting process to ensure they are, in fact, current or former BOP staffers, according to the member who has knowledge of how it is administered.
Vito Maraviglia, a retired federal prison special investigative agent, said in an interview that in his 27 years on the job he doesn’t recall an instance in which a sex offender was moved to a prison camp. Placing Maxwell there meant it would be easier for her to escape or for someone on the outside to target her on the camp’s grounds, Maraviglia said.
“The logic to me is not there,” he added. “It doesn’t pass the smell test.”
Robert Hood, a former Bureau of Prisons chief of internal affairs, said in an email to NBC News that Maxwell’s transfer to the camp in Bryan is a “travesty of justice.”
“To relocate a sex offender serving 20 years to a country club setting is offensive to victims and others serving similar crimes,” wrote Hood, who also served as warden at the ADX Florence “supermax” prison in Colorado.
Maxwell is serving a 20-year prison sentence for recruiting and grooming teenage girls to be sexually abused by her confidant, Jeffrey Epstein. Her case has gained renewed attention in recent weeks as a growing chorus of critics, mainly right-wing influencers and Trump supporters, have criticized the administration’s decision not to release all federal files related to Epstein.
Maxwell had been locked up in a low-security facility in Tallahassee, Florida, that housed men and women. But she was moved to the all-women, minimum-security federal prison camp in Texas last week after she and her lawyer answered questions from Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche for nine hours over two days.
Josh Lepird, regional vice president for the federal prison officers’ union that includes Maxwell’s new home, said in an interview that any inmate would want to serve their time at the prison camp in Bryan.
“You ever hear of the old ‘Club Fed’ they used to talk about? This is one of those places,” said Lepird. “It’s really a great place to do your time if you’re an inmate.”
Inmates held at the facility have more programs available to them, Lepird said, including one that involves training service dogs for people with disabilities. They also have the freedom to roam its grounds, which are surrounded by a small fence and not razor wire or walls.
The risk of escape is among the reasons why sex offenders and others who committed violent crimes are not placed at camps like the one in Bryan, according to current and former federal prison staffers.
As NBC News has previously reported, Bureau of Prisons rules require sex offenders to be held in at least a low-level security prison like FCI Tallahassee, unless they receive a waiver. Only the administrator of BOP’s Designation and Sentence Computation Center can make that decision, according to the waiver policy.
Lepird, the union official, said he found it “very odd” that an inmate like Maxwell was moved there.
“The best I can say is there is some kind of cooperating involved,” he surmised.
The Bureau of Prisons has confirmed Maxwell’s transfer but has not provided an explanation for it. A spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Maxwell’s attorney, David Oscar Markus, has also not responded to questions about the transfer.
Epstein, the wealthy financier, died in a New York City jail in 2019 while he was awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. His death was deemed a suicide. But that finding did little to mollify conspiracy theorists and others who believe that Epstein was killed to protect other powerful men involved in his trafficking ring and that the federal government is in on it.
Comments by Attorney General Pam Bondi have further fueled suspicion. In February, Bondi told Fox News that an Epstein client list was “sitting on my desk right now” waiting to be reviewed and released (she later said she was referring to the entire file). But on July 6, the DOJ and FBI announced an exhaustive Epstein case review had not uncovered evidence that justified criminally investigating other individuals, sparking a fierce backlash from some of Trump’s most ardent supporters.
With the controversy consuming headlines and Trump’s presidency, Blanche was dispatched to speak with Maxwell — a highly unusual move by a senior Justice Department official. But it remains unclear what was discussed or what the next steps are.
Questions have also surfaced about Maxwell’s reliability given that prosecutors and the judge who oversaw her 2021 trial have said she had made multiple false statements under oath.
But Maxwell’s transfer was met with relief by at least one person other than the convicted sex offender herself.
In the private Facebook group, a member who identified themselves as a staffer at the Florida facility where Maxwell had been held said they weren’t going to miss her.
“Glad to be rid of her,” the person wrote. “She is an absolute pain in the ass.”