New York to Close Federal Prison that Once Held Jeffrey Epstein

The Justice Department will shutter the problem-plagued Metropolitan Correctional Center where pedophile Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide two years ago, as officials struggle to correct long-running safety and health conditions which a fed-up judge recently called “inhuman,” reports the Washington Post. The federal jail currently houses about 260 inmates and is one of two federal jails in New York City that have been the subject of scandals and complaints for years.

A Justice Department spokesperson said the Bureau of Prisons, which oversees and operates federal prisons and jails, “has assessed steps necessary to improve conditions at the [MCC]” and would need to close for an indeterminate amount of time. “In an effort to address the issues at MCC NY as quickly and efficiently as possible, the Department has decided to close the MCC, at least temporarily, until those issues have been resolved,” the statement said. Defense attorneys and prisoners rights advocates regularly decry the treatment of inmates at the city’s federal jails. At a woman’s sentencing in April, U.S. District Court Judge Colleen McMahon ripped into officials at the MCC and at the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in Brooklyn, saying the facilities are “run by morons.”