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FIRST ON FOX — Eight federal inmates — once on death row for murders, including the killings of fellow prisoners, gang-related stabbings, and the slayings of two campers — have been transferred to a notorious “supermax” prison in Colorado, the Justice Department told Fox News Digital. The news comes as U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi looks to crack down on the previous administration’s sweeping clemency actions.
The eight former death row inmates were transferred Tuesday to the U.S. Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Facility in Florence, Colorado, also known as “ADX,” Justice Department officials confirmed.
They were among the 37 death row inmates whose sentences Biden commuted in late December — prompting criticism and complaints that the record clemency and commutation actions were done as a political “Hail Mary,” and without proper vetting.
More of the death row inmates are expected to be moved to ADX, some within weeks, according to one individual familiar with the matter.
The 37 death row inmates commuted by Biden are all expected to be moved to the facility by “early next year,” the Justice Department source told Fox News Digital.
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The effort comes as Bondi and the Trump administration have sought to reverse some of the Biden administration’s efforts on criminal justice reform for certain criminals, and instead moved to prioritize violent crime and cracking down on the nation’s worst offenders.
Though a commutation cannot be fully reversed, Justice Department officials told Fox News Digital, Bondi has prioritized ways to penalize these individuals, in coordination with directives from Trump, and to ensure that the “conditions of confinement” are “consistent with the security risks those inmates present because of their egregious crimes, criminal histories, and all other relevant considerations,” according to an earlier DOJ memo.
The eight inmates sent to ADX this week were each convicted of first-degree murder within federal jurisdiction.
Many had been convicted of crimes that were especially heinous or violent. One individual was convicted of murdering a married couple who was camping at a campsite in the Ouachita National Forest in July 2003.
Another was convicted of kidnapping, robbing, and murdering a 51-year-old local bank president by tying him to a concrete block and chain hoist, and tossing him off of a bridge and into a lake.
Many had also killed prisoners while serving time — a factor that can be used in weighing whether to transfer a convicted felon to a higher-security prison.
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ADX is the only true federal “supermax” prison in the U.S., and its inmates are as notorious as the prison’s reputation. Among them are Ramzi Yousef, convicted in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing; Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, one of the Boston Marathon bombers; former Sinola Cartel leader Joaquín Guzmán, or “El Chapo”; and Mamdouh Mahmud Salim, the co-founder of al-Qaeda.
“President Biden’s decision to commute the death sentences of these monsters showed abhorrent disregard for our justice system and total disrespect for victims’ families already suffering through immense loss,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement to Fox News Digital.
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“After meeting with many of the victims’ families at the Department of Justice and promising to take action on their behalf, eight of these prisoners have been transferred to the Colorado super-max prison ADX. This will ensure that they spend the remainder of their lives in conditions consistent with the egregious crimes they committed,” she added.
Shortly after her confirmation as attorney general, Bondi issued a memo aimed at “restoring a measure of justice” to the victims’ families.
The measures granted by Biden earned more criticism than former President Barack Obama: As Fox News reported at the time, the vast majority of Obama’s clemency actions focused on commuting the sentences of federal inmates who met certain criteria outlined under his administration’s Clemency Initiative.
Bondi hosted victims’ families earlier this year to hear their concerns about the commutations, DOJ said. Some said they had been stunned by the eleventh-hour commutations, and that they not been given a heads-up by the Biden administration.
In February, Bondi issued a memo to the Bureau of Prisons ordering an evaluation of where these prisoners should be detained.
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