A year after former President Joe Biden spared 37 prisoners on federal death row from execution by reducing their sentences to life in prison, the Trump administration is making good on its promise to treat them as harshly as possible anyway.
Ten of the prisoners were transferred to one of the most restrictive maximum-security prisons in the U.S., an infamous facility in Colorado nicknamed "the Alcatraz of the Rockies" where every prisoner is kept in solitary confinement. Two were taken to states where prosecutors have pledged to seek the death penalty against them again, in state court. Two others face death penalty charges in Florida. And the rest are stuck in limbo, having been told to expect a move to the Colorado prison, named ADX Florence, at any moment. That limbo has driven one of the prisoners to try to kill himself, he told NPR.
President Donald Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi have defended their treatment of the prisoners, saying the men deserve it because of their murder convictions. Some family members of people murdered by the prisoners support the transfer of the men to ADX.
But interviews conducted and documents obtained by NPR show the moves the Department of Justice has taken to additionally punish the men violate current federal policy, and litigation claims those actions could be unconstitutional.
"It's gravely damaging the way that people are being treated," said Brian Stull, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, who is representing 21 of the 37 prisoners in lawsuits filed against Trump and the federal government. "They're almost like pawns caught in the crossfire."
To send prisoners to ADX, federal rules were disregarded
Immediately after Biden commuted the prisoners' sentences on Dec. 23, 2024, Trump was vocal about his disagreement with the decision.
"Also, to the 37 most violent criminals, who killed, raped, and plundered like virtually no one before them, but were just given, incredibly, a pardon by Sleepy Joe Biden," posted Trump on TruthSocial on Christmas Day, in 2024. "I refuse to wish a Merry Christmas to those lucky "souls" but, instead, will say, GO TO HELL!"
But Trump wasn't the president yet. Shortly after Biden's announcement, Bureau of Prisons officials followed the standard "redesignation" process to decide where the 37 prisoners should be sent, since they no longer belonged on death row, which is inside the federal penitentiary in Terre Haute, Ind.
By law and according to current federal rules, the government is required to make objective decisions about where prisoners should be transferred. Officials do that by considering specific criteria, including the prisoners' location, security, programmatic needs, mental and physical health requirements and faith-based necessities.
To determine whether a prison is a match for a prisoner based on their health needs, officials use a ranking system. Federal prisons and prisoners are classified in mental and physical "care level" categories, ranging from 1 to 4. The lower the number, the less complex the care needs of the prisoner and the fewer services a prison can provide. Prisoners typically can't be sent to facilities ranked lower than their needs. Terre Haute can care for prisoners ranked 3 or below; ADX can only accommodate prisoners rated 2 or below.
That health consideration is only supposed to be disregarded if the prisoner poses an extraordinary security risk, like in the case of Mexican cartel leader Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán, for example, who has a history of escaping Mexican prisons and is currently housed at ADX.
"ADX Florence general population units are designed for male inmates who have demonstrated an inability to function in a less restrictive environment without being a threat to others, or to the secure and orderly operation of the institution," states a 2006 DOJ and BOP program statement obtained by NPR.
That's because the conditions at ADX are some of the most restrictive in the federal system. Unlike in other prisons, where solitary confinement is often reserved as a punishment for bad behavior and there are opportunities for prisoners to spend time in groups, in ADX, the prisoners are always confined alone and are required to stay inside cells no larger than a parking spot for between 22 and 24 hours a day. Communicating with other people inside the prison is almost impossible and external communication is limited to no more than one hour each month.
Dr. Andrea Brockman, a psychologist who worked with ADX prisoners for three years, said that the extreme isolation created mental distress for inmates, some of whom harmed themselves by setting themselves on fire, cutting themselves open, pulling out their intestines and attempting suicide.
"It's all concrete, so you see nothing," Brockman said. "You lose your ability to really cope and manage what's going on."
Before Trump took office, officials evaluated the 37 prisoners' files and began the process of recommending new institutions for them. They were considered for prisons where they could be placed in the general population, alongside inmates with similar life sentences, according to Christopher Synsvoll, a BOP attorney. But on the first day of Trump's presidency, he released an executive order that indicated his administration intended to punish the prisoners — and change their prison placement recommendations.
"The Attorney General shall take all lawful and appropriate action to ensure that these offenders are imprisoned in conditions consistent with the monstrosity of their crimes and the threats they pose," the order stated.
Two days after Trump's order, prisoners were informed they would be evaluated for placement in ADX, some of them told NPR. Eight months later, in September, the first eight prisoners were transferred by bus to Colorado. Two more prisoners were sent to ADX in November. The rest will soon follow, the DOJ has said.
"Most of the 37 inmates who had sentences commuted by Biden will be transferred to ADX," a DOJ spokesperson said.
But documents obtained and reviewed by NPR show that sending the men to ADX violates current DOJ and Bureau of Prison policy.
Before 2025, at least 11 men on death row were designated at a care level of 3 or above for either their medical or mental conditions, according to prisoner records. One man who had been rated at a care level of 3, Charles Hall, has been admitted to the hospital more than 200 times since 2004 for complications related to his Crohn's disease, his attorney said. Another, Chadrick Fulks, was rated a 3 for both medical and mental health. Fulks has chronic kidney disease, degenerative disc disease and requires a catheter to urinate. Fulks was placed on suicide watch three times and cut his throat twice. A third prisoner rated at level 3, Ronald Mikos, takes more than 12 medications a day for his heart disease, hypertension, edema, ulcers and glaucoma. In Terre Haute, Mikos uses a cell designed for inmates with disabilities.
But after Trump took office, some of the prisoners' care records were changed to bring them down to a rating of 2 — a match with ADX — although federal guidelines indicate that care levels should be adjusted only if a prisoner's health changes. Officials downgraded Mikos' and at least one other prisoners' care level from 3 to 2, despite no significant changes to their health, NPR found after interviewing prisoners' attorneys and reviewing records filed in the lawsuit that described care levels.
"The inmates transferred to ADX are among the most dangerous in the federal penitentiary system," said a DOJ spokesperson, when asked for comment about the downgrading. "Their incarceration at ADX is entirely consistent with the egregiousness of their crimes and the security risks associated with their detention."
Prisoners' discipline records also do not support their transfer to ADX. Some former death row prisoners had no discipline records whatsoever at the time they were recommended to be transferred to ADX, prison documents obtained by NPR show. Other prisoners have not had a discipline record or a violent or escape-related infraction in over a decade.
One prisoner's disciplinary file, for example, shows "0 points" in the criminal history section. In the violence category, his file says "NONE;" in drug abuse, "NEVER."
A former correctional officer who used to work as a guard on federal death row in Terre Haute said the prisoners were "mellow," well-behaved and not aggressive. NPR has allowed the former officer to remain anonymous because he fears retaliation for speaking to the press.
"You're up there with them for years, you get to know them," said the former officer. "Most of those inmates are safer to be around than those in [the] general population."
After the first eight prisoners were moved to Colorado in September, Pam Bondi indicated on X that they were being sent there because the prison conditions were a better "match" for their crimes.
"We have begun transferring the monsters Biden commuted to Supermax prisons, where they will spend the rest of their lives in conditions that match their egregious crimes," Bondi posted.
"She's saying the quiet part out loud," said Stull, the ACLU lawyer. "Everything about their behavior says it's not about security."
Robin Maher, the director of the Death Penalty Information Center, a nonprofit that publishes information about executions, believes the government inflicting punishment on the prisoners by sending them to ADX with no security justification is unlawful.
"These are new punishments," said Maher. "This is an additional punishment for these men who have already been sentenced."
Federal policy also requires prison officials to try to send prisoners to facilities located no more than 500 miles away from their primary residence. But ADX is more than 500 miles away from the districts where each of the 10 men who are already there were sentenced, NPR found, including cities in North Carolina, Louisiana and Virginia.
Bill Breeden, Fulks' spiritual advisor, said being separated from Breeden and the rest of his community in Terre Haute is the part of the move that Fulks is most dreading.
"I think that's the thing that's hurting him the most, is moving away from here," said Breeden. "He has been in the same cell basically for about 21 years. And in that cell and on that cell block, he has a community of people and they communicate a lot."
"Psychologically, we are messing with them"
As early as April, some prisoners in Terre Haute grew so worried about being moved to ADX that they started thinking about hurting themselves. In an interview with NPR from his cell, Billie Allen, one of the 37 prisoners, said that some of the others in the block were growing suicidal.
"If you put enough pressure on them, they will break," said Allen, in April. "There are going to be possibly a few suicides coming."
By July, Fulks said he couldn't take the thought of being moved away from his community any longer.
Fulks carved four letters into his chest, then tried to hang himself with a noose. When that didn't work, he used a razor blade to slit his wrists and neck.
"To be told that they're going to take that away from you, it's been very hard for me to deal with. I've been really struggling, even mentally struggling," Fulks said. "In July, I cut my throat."
NPR asked the BOP to confirm details about Fulks' suicide attempt, but a spokesperson declined.
"For privacy, safety, and security reasons, we do not discuss the conditions of confinement for any inmate, including health information or status," said Public Information Specialist Donald Murphy.
The pending move is still weighing on other former death row prisoners.
In an essay published online in September, one of the prisoners, Rejon Taylor, said another prisoner who was on death row in Terre Haute was "making elaborate plans to string himself up" and hang from a noose. Taylor has also started entertaining the idea of suicide himself, he indicated in the essay.
"A sense of doom hovers ahead as I anticipate being buried alive at ADX, cut off from the social world, existing in conditions of monstrosity," wrote Taylor. "I'd rather orchestrate my own demise than exist in conditions not designed for humanity."
According to BOP policy, prisoners struggling with mental health issues like that should be disqualified from placement at ADX.
"Inmates currently diagnosed as suffering from serious psychiatric illnesses should not be referred for placement at…ADX Florence," a policy document states.
Brockman, the former ADX psychologist, said she believes the government's threat of transferring the prisoners to ADX is "directly linked" to their recent suicidal thoughts and attempts at suicide.
"Psychologically, we are messing with them," Brockman said. "Psychologically, we have a government who is causing so much damage and harm, it's going to be hard to undo that."
Copyright 2025 NPR
