BUTTE — Though the Department of Justice has announced it will no longer house federal inmates in private prisons, federal prisoners in Montana are staying in their privately-owned beds.
The Montana Standard reports that 95 of the 550 beds at Crossroads Correctional Center, a privately run mixed-security state prison in Shelby, are held for federal prisoners. Those prisoners come from the U.S. Marshals Service, not the Bureau of Prisons, and therefore are not affected by the Department of Justice’s decision.
Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Montana Melissa Hornbein says Montana’s federal inmates are either being held before sentencing or after sentencing but before they’ve been assigned to a federal facility.
Montana is home to no federal prisons. Crossroads is Montana’s only private prison.