After sentencing, a federal defendant can request to be housed at a specific prison facility. However, defendants should NOT simply ask to be placed in “a facility in Florida” or “a facility near their family.” That gives the BOP too much discretion. If a judge recommends that a defendant be placed in a camp and the defendant requests a facility near his or her home in Staten Island, New York, for example, the BOP can place the defendant at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, a maximum security facility for pretrial inmates.
Why would a defendant be placed in a maximum security pretrial detention center, when the judge recommended a camp? The BOP may simply state that the MDC-Brooklyn has been designated as a “camp,” so the judge’s recommendation was technically followed, and the facility is close to Staten Island because Brooklyn, New York is only 15 minutes away. So what’s the problem?
The bottom line is if a defendant wants to be designated to a camp in Pennsylvania, then the defendant must ask the judge for specific camp like Lewisburg Camp, or the Otisville (NY) Camp. The BOP website has a listing of all facilities and their classifications, (minimum security, low, medium, high), which can be reviewed before making any requests.