The Florida federal prisonsToddandJulie Chrisleyare preparing to report to later this month are “no country club,” according to one legal expert.
In November, theChrisley Knows Beststars weresentencedto a combined prison term of 19 years, after ajury convicted the coupleof a multimillion dollar bank fraud and tax evasion scheme.
“It’s still confinement,” veteran defense attorney Paul Cambria tells PEOPLE, “but a camp is the best place to be.”
“They’re almost like a college dormitory situation. There’s usually no fences or barbed wire, or things like that. There’s obviously monitors and cameras and so on, but it is a fairly relaxed atmosphere.”
Julie and Todd Chrisley.Danielle Del Valle/Getty for E3 Chophouse Nashville
According to the Bureau of Prisons, FPC Pensacola is a male-only, minimum security prison camp that sits on 23 acres.
According to a 2022 Prison Rape Elimination Act Audit Report, the camp averages a daily population of about 324 inmates between the ages of 22 to 80. The facility offers counseling programs, vocational training, and an “inmate workforce to support Navy operations,” including at Naval Air Station, Pensacola, predominantly in the areas of “grounds maintenance and common labor-type work,” the report reads.
On the other hand, FCI/FPC Marianna is considered a medium security institution, with an adjacent minimum security satellite camp. About 1,000 inmates, including both men and women, are confined to the institution, while about 200 others are imprisoned in the camp area, per the Bureau of Prisons. The facility offers educational opportunities, wellness instruction and team and individual sports activities, among other recreational programs, according to its 2021 Prison Rape Elimination Act Audit Report.
Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Sign up forPEOPLE’s free True Crime newsletterfor breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases.
“The camps are basically for white collar, non-violent — a lot of dollars-and-cents kind of crimes,” says Cambria, “things where violence is not involved.” The population typically consists of “business people, professionals, lawyers, doctors, dentists and accountants,” he adds.
Both Todd and Julie will be given more freedom, as opposed to other prisons, and will be allowed to “move around the campus, so to speak,” Cambria says. “It isn’t like they’re locked in a cell.”
source: people.com
