ADX (Administrative Maximum): Florence

History

ADX is the third in a line of federal high-security penitentiaries that began with Alcatraz (1934–1963). From 1963 to 1978, BOP officials dispersed problem prisoners among several standard penitentiaries rather than concentrating “the worst of the worst” in one small special purpose prison.

The return to the concentration model began with the transfer of the system's most serious disciplinary problems to the federal penitentiary at Marion, Illinois, which opened in 1963. Ten years later, in 1973, a Control Unit within Marion was established in which inmates moved only in restraints and escorted by several officers. No congregate activities were allowed for these prisoners who were regarded as the most dangerous and disruptive in the federal system. The movement to a regime in which the entire prison was run in a Control Unit mode followed the killing of two officers in separate incidents in the Control Unit on the same day, October 22, 1983. In each case, three officers were escorting a prisoner who was able to remove his handcuffs, secure a knife, and attack the escort group; in addition to killing two officers, four others were seriously injured. Several days later, the body of the 25th Marion inmate to die at the hands of his fellow prisoners was found.

On October 28, BOP Director Norman A. Carlson ordered that “indefinite administrative segregation” regime, popularly called a “lockdown,” be initiated in all units of the prison. Henceforth, prisoners were moved one at a time from their individual cells under the escort of three officers and only after they had been handcuffed and leg chains had been attached. All congregate activities including going to the dining hall for meals, to work, to the yard and recreation areas, and to education classes and religious services in the chapel were terminated. All basic services including food were provided to prisoners, who were confined to their cells for 23 hours, leaving one hour for solitary exercise.

What came to be officially labeled as the “high-security” program quickly produced complaints [Page 16]from prisoners and several prisoners' rights groups on the grounds argued that these conditions of confinement violated the inmates' protection against “cruel and unusual (psychological) punishment.” A legal challenge was mounted in the Federal District Court of Southern Illinois, which subsequently ruled against the prisoners. This ruling was affirmed by the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals and by the U.S. Supreme Court when it denied a writ of certiorari. These decisions provided the constitutional basis for what came to be known as the “Marion model.”

Officials from many states visited the prison to make certain that the new “supermax” prisons they were planning took into account the policies and procedures that had been tested in the courts. Marion carried out its function as what the press called the “new Alcatraz,” until its successor at Florence, Colorado, came on line in November 1994.

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