Please download, print and mail a story of hope to someone who is incarcerated. These powerful stories are told only by those who have been incarcerated themselves. Each transcript will need two stamps to send by the USPS.
Link to Transcripts of Glenn E. Martin, Jeffrey Abramowitz, David Garlock, Dirk Van Velzen & Brandon J. Flood Interviews. Please download and send to a loved one in prison: https://reentryusa.com/?page_id=214.
Please download, print and mail a story of hope to someone who is incarcerated. These powerful stories are told only by those who have been incarcerated themselves. Each transcript will need two stamps to send by the USPS.
On Fri., Aug. 16th, 10:30 am, Jeff talked white collar crime and opioid addiction with Lisa Wexler on her show at its new home at WICC AM 600 and HD2 107.9FM. Call In (203) 333-9422.
Rev. Jeff Grant, J.D., M.Div. is an ordained minister with over three decades of experience in crisis management, business, law, reentry, recovery (clean & sober 16+ years), and executive & religious leadership. Sometimes referred to in the press as “The Minister to Hedge Funders,” he uses his experience and background to guide people faithfully forward in their lives, relationships, careers and business opportunities, and to help them to stop making the kinds of decisions that previously resulted in loss, suffering and shame.
After an addiction to prescription opioids and serving almost fourteen months in a Federal prison for a white-collar crime he committed when he was a lawyer, Jeff started his own reentry – earning a Master of Divinity from Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York with a focus in Christian Social Ethics. He is Co-Founder of Progressive Prison Ministries, Inc., the world’s first ministry created to support individuals, families and groups with white collar and other nonviolent incarceration issues, and is the first person in the United States formerly incarcerated for a white collar crime to be appointed as CEO of a major criminal justice organization. More information: prisonist.org.
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The Lisa Wexler Show is a talk radio show focused on the day’s events, as well as cultural trends, scientific breakthroughs, lifestyle choices and social and political happenings. The show features host monologues, guests and call-ins from listeners.
The Lisa Wexler Show has aired for over 11 consecutive years in Fairfield and Westchester Counties of the metro NY region. Notable guests have included Jane Fonda, Gloria Steinem, Larry King, Alan Alda, Governors Rell, Malloy, Huckabee, Kasich, many Presidential candidates, scientists, physicians, writers, chefs, celebrities and trendsetters. Lisa’s sister, former RHONY Jill Zarin, is a frequent guest on the show. The Lisa Wexler Show broadcasts on the radio in the Westchester and Fairfield County regions as well as via internet streaming.
We were prominently mentioned in this article about our friend Chip Skowron. Please feel free to email your thoughts and comments to me at [email protected].
“Jeff Grant, the lawyer turned minister who counseled Skowron before he entered prison, [is co-founder of Progressive Prison Ministries (prisonist.org), the world’s first ministry supporting the white collar criminal justice/economy exiled community]. Greenwich’s taste for schadenfreude, he says, has much to do with brute competition. ‘When anybody shows signs of weakness, everyone is feeding on the carcass—of the person or institution that’s been torn down,’ he says. ‘In Bridgeport, when someone goes down for a crime, the community rallies around to help the family. Here, we cast them out on an iceberg.’”
Chip Skowron pleaded guilty to securities fraud, lost his freedom, and found religion. But, as it turns out, federal prison is more forgiving than Connecticut high society.
LOOK HOMEWARD, HEDGIE
Chip Skowron at his home in Greenwich. “I really feel most comfortable in prison,” he says. Photograph by Jonathan Becker.
In early 2006, before the indictment and the headlines, before he was abandoned by most of the people he knew, Joseph Skowron III and his wife, Cheryl, were living in a tidy three-bedroom ranch home in Greenwich, Connecticut. In the early 20th century, Greenwich attracted flocks of industrialists and their descendants—Rockefellers and Morgans, beneficiaries of Carnegie Steel—who built manor homes on generous acreages. Always prosperous, the town was in the midst of another boom, and Skowron, who goes by Chip, was a member of the town’s new elite, a partner in a hedge fund called FrontPoint Partners. Since 2000, drawn by Connecticut’s relatively low taxes, the hedge funders had all but taken over Greenwich, occupying much of its office space and replacing its stately Victorians with garish mansions, priced to move at $15 million. As VANITY FAIR observed at the time, “The people who can afford to live in Greenwich these days run hedge funds.”
Among the aggressive, often eccentric billionaires who dominated the town, a peacock spirit prevailed. Paul Tudor Jones II, the founder of Tudor Investment Corporation, built a Monticello-like mansion so imposing as to overshadow the yacht club next door. Down the shoreline, Edward Lampert, the founder of ESL Investments, bought a $21 million home, only to tear it down and erect a sprawling new estate in its place. And in the rural backcountry, Steven Cohen assembled a 32,000-square-foot spread that included an ice rink to rival Rockefeller Center’s.
At 36, Skowron didn’t quite have ice-rink money. He had begun his career in finance just five years earlier, as an analyst at Cohen’s SAC Capital Advisors. But before long, he was overseeing some $1 billion in assets at FrontPoint, where one of his partners was Steve Eisman, the shrewdly bearish housing-market investor profiled by Michael Lewis in The Big Short. Cheryl was expecting the couple’s fourth child, and Skowron wanted a home to reflect his success. In early 2006, he bought a three-acre tract on Doubling Road, a quiet, curving lane lined with old trees and low stone walls, for $4.1 million. Across the street lay Greenwich Country Club, whose membership roll included Gerald Ford, Tom Seaver, and various Fortune 500 executives. Skowron hired an architect to design a New England shingle-style home of more than 10,000 square feet. Completed, it had seven bedrooms, four fireplaces, a pool, a wine cellar, and a seven-car garage. Views stretched to Long Island Sound.
Cheryl had no interest in the Greenwich social circuit, with its acquisitive pulse. But Chip reveled in it. The Skowrons, already members at one of the town’s several country clubs, applied to join another. Greenwich has a dense calendar of charity galas, and Skowron made sure that he and Cheryl turned up at the right events. He joined the Monticello Motor Club, a speedway in upstate New York where Jerry Seinfeld is a member. One item in his auto collection, an Alfa Romeo 8C Spider, once appeared on a list of Greenwich’s most expensive cars. He traveled widely and lavishly. In Paris he favored the Plaza Athénée; in Barcelona, the Hotel Arts.
Among friends and family, Skowron was known to be generous, loyal, and fun-loving—a griller of burgers and sharer of beers. But he was emotionally exhausted, wrung out by the pressure of keeping up appearances and increasingly troubled by a sense of emptiness. “I wanted to be somebody that was important,” he recalls. “I wanted to accomplish, succeed, to be satisfied. It was all illusory.”
In November 2010, the façade began to slip. Press reports indicated that Skowron had become a target of a federal investigation into insider trading spearheaded by Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York. Marshaling tactics traditionally associated with Mafia and narcotics investigations, Bharara and his team uncovered webs of criminality that stretched across the hedge-fund world and beyond. Skowron stood accused of bribing a French doctor with wine, cash, and travel in exchange for confidential information from a clinical drug trial—a scheme that allowed FrontPoint to dodge some $30 million in losses. He was suspended from the firm, which quickly collapsed. More than 200 people lost their jobs. Charged with securities fraud and obstruction of justice, Skowron faced up to 30 years in federal prison.
Like many people contemplating a once unthinkable future, Skowron found himself drawn to religion. He read Scripture obsessively. As he considered whether to fight the charges against him—charges he knew to be legitimate, and which did not encompass the whole of his insider-trading résumé—a passage from Matthew seemed especially relevant: “For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.”
Skowron decided to plead guilty and was sentenced to five years. Prison remained a frightening prospect. He knew that Cheryl would be left alone with four children in the big house on the hill. But incarceration also presented an opportunity. Perhaps, through the crucible of imprisonment, Skowron might escape a life of grasping narcissism from which he could not otherwise tear himself away—a life he had come to believe would destroy him. What he didn’t yet know was that the challenges of prison would pale in comparison to those of coming home.
Skowron was far from Greenwich’s biggest hedge-fund manager to face prison time. Following a seven-year investigation, Bharara’s office accused SAC Capital—the firm run by Steven Cohen, Skowron’s first Wall Street boss—of trafficking in “inside information on a scale without any known precedent in the history of hedge funds.” Cohen avoided criminal charges, but SAC was forced to admit to an institutional culture of illegal trading, paying $1.8 billion in fines before shuttering in 2013.
Still, Skowron was prominent enough to become a cartoon of financial excess. New York highlighted his Ferrari 458 and Porsche Cayenne; a New York Post headline sneered, CHIP’S OUT OF LUCK. With his blond hair, blue eyes, and prominently dimpled chin, Skowron made a natural subject for Wall Street caricature. But he’d spent most of his life pursuing a less narrowly self-interested profession. When he was 11, his father was power washing their home, in Cocoa, Florida, when he fell off the roof. Skowron discovered him crumpled and unconscious, a picture of powerlessness. The scene terrified him. He decided to become a doctor, the kind who could fix such injuries.
After college, Skowron received a full scholarship to a combined M.D./Ph.D. program at Yale. During his residency in orthopedic surgery at Harvard, he used his vacation time to provide medical treatment in places like Kosovo and Guatemala. But he quickly grew disenchanted. No matter how many surgeries he performed, there was always pressure to do more. The older doctors he knew seemed discontent; many had failed marriages. His disillusion was bewildering, akin to losing faith. But Skowron had lost neither his sense of exceptionalism nor his outsize ambition. Soon after dropping out of Harvard, he decided to go into finance.
His timing was good. Eager to add an intellectual gloss to his already fantastically lucrative empire, Cohen was hiring professionals with Ivy League pedigrees and turning them into specialists in areas like energy and technology. Skowron’s background made him perfect for health care, one of Cohen’s favorite sectors. Instead of saving lives, Skowron could make a fortune tracking real-world events—the discovery of a new treatment, say, or the failure of a clinical trial—that might spark profitable volatility in health care stocks. In 2007, only six years after beginning his career in finance, he made $13.5 million.
Skowron’s fall was jarring. But he quickly had reason to think that, in pleading guilty, he had made the right decision. On his first day in prison, at a medium-security facility in Pennsylvania, another inmate extended his hand.
“Hi,” the man said. “My name is Chip.”
Unbelieving, Skowron replied, “My name is Chip, too.”
“Let’s be clear about this,” the man said. “I’m Chip 1, you’re Chip 2.” Noticing that Skowron was holding a Bible, Chip 1 quoted from Romans: “Just remember that all things work together for good.” They embraced, and Skowron felt confirmed in his newfound belief that he was being guided by God.
About 70 percent of Skowron’s fellow inmates were drug offenders, many of them poor young men of color. He saw gentler versions of Hollywood prison tropes: friction between inmates and guards, black-market intrigue, prisoners who liked to stir chaos just to thwart boredom. But the distance between his expectations of prison life and its reality was vast. Skowron had imagined that things would be horribly dull: rows of men staring into space, counting hours. In fact, prison was dynamic—rich with incident and culture. Some of what happened there seemed to shimmer with biblical resonance. One day, the prison was beset by a plague of snakes; they dropped from a light fixture onto men watching soap operas and rose out of a drain in the shower, where an inmate known as Joe the Greek was bathing. Then there was Chuck, a powerfully built gym buddy of Skowron’s, who began rapidly losing weight. By the time an appropriate doctor was consulted, his cancer was beyond curing.
It wasn’t all grim. One day, an inmate known as Gunz offered to give Skowron a tutorial on curried jack mack, a delicacy involving the bone-in mackerel sold at the commissary. Another prisoner, Kareem Burke, who went by Biggs, provided a pepper and an onion for the dish—a rare stash of fresh produce. Burke, who had cofounded Roc-A-Fella Records in the 1990s with Jay-Z and Damon Dash, was in prison for conspiring to distribute marijuana. Despite their differences, he and Skowron bonded quickly. Both men had lost their mothers at a young age; now, in quick succession, both came to consider themselves born again. Their high-profile friendship attracted others, and they were soon joined by a large group of inmates for regular meetings in Skowron’s bunk. The gatherings resembled AA meetings: discussions of sin, suffering, and the search for meaning and consistency in the wake of trauma. Burke spoke about his guilt for failing to support his older brother, who had been murdered years earlier. Others regretted infidelity. Many admitted their failures as fathers.
Prison ecology isn’t known for rewarding vulnerability, but the bunk became a foxhole, fostering a spirit of confession and mutual reliance. Among the men who met there, Skowron found he could expose himself in a way he had never been able to before. When news of his legal trouble broke, his Greenwich social circle had vanished. He was ejected from his country club, and his family felt humiliated by the publicity. Worried that he might be wearing a wire, former business associates wouldn’t speak to him. The abandonment surprised him. Skowron believed he’d had deep, nuanced relationships. On reflection, he saw that most of them had been based on the conference of status. Virtually none of his old friends visited him in prison.
As his relationships with the other inmates deepened, he became ashamed of his pride in his education and his wealth, which had insulated him in a cocoon of superiority. He saw that it had enabled a false, destructive worldview—the kind that, widely held, abetted mass incarceration. The people in prison were not who he had expected them to be, and prison, he now believed, was not where the vast majority of them belonged. Increasingly, he felt, they were his brothers.
Following his release, in November 2015, Skowron returned to live with his family in Greenwich, where they remained comfortably situated at the house on Doubling Road. There was the pool and there was the billiard room, with its Oriental rug and its Monaco Grand Prix posters. There was the view of the country club. Skowron’s office, paneled in dark wood, was like a stage set, accessorized with props from a prior life: framed credentials on the wall, a shelf dedicated to Ferrari paraphernalia, a photo with George and Barbara Bush.
Skowron was barred from working in the securities industry, but he quickly took ownership stakes in several businesses—apparel, medical marketing, health care, car sales—drawing on many of the same qualities that once made him an effective hedge-fund manager. Within two years, he found himself meeting with a top executive at HSBC, slipping almost seamlessly, he marveled, back into upper-corporate echelons. He enjoyed driving his silver Porsche Panamera, which smelled sweetly of his cologne. He kept his taste for fine wine.
But Greenwich was full of social trip wires. At Whole Foods or the park, Skowron was likely to encounter people he had caused to lose jobs or money. His neighbors were polite but distant. Not long after coming home, Skowron suggested to his wife that they have dinner at Mediterraneo, a favorite restaurant downtown. “I’m not going to that hedge-fund hangout!” she said. Ultimately, citing the Parmesan-encrusted halibut, he convinced her—only to run into Gil Caffray, a founding partner of FrontPoint.
Shortly before going to prison, Skowron had met with Jeff Grant, a former lawyer and onetime Greenwich resident who had spent 14 months in federal prison for wire fraud and money laundering. Grant, who had become a minister, counseled numerous hedge funders during Bharara’s insider-trading probe, and the chilly reception that greeted Skowron in Greenwich was familiar to him. It could seem in part like an aversion to self-knowledge; to interact with men like Skowron was to confront the sometimes suspect means by which the town maintained its status as one of the world’s most privileged enclaves. “It’s a mirror on themselves,” Grant says.
On Friday, Oct. 18, 2019, 9 am ET, Michael Kimelman, a former hedge fund founder and manager who was convicted and incarcerated for a white collar crime (who is a member of our online White Collar Support Group), was our guest on Criminal Justice Insider with Babz Rawls Ivy & Jeff Grant – The Voice of CT Criminal Justice. Live on WNHH 103.5 FM New Haven, rebroadcast at 5 pm. Live-streamed and podcast everywhere, see below. Sponsored by the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven – Now More Than Ever.
Michael Kimelman is an expert on disruptive innovation and personal disruption; he uses the lessons of his own life to offer inspiration and insight to others — from formerly incarcerated youth to global CEOs — on overcoming personal and professional challenges. His mission is to empower people with the skills and mindset to become resilient and prosper in the face of adversity. Michael was a lawyer at Sullivan & Cromwell and then founded Incremental Capital, a New York-based hedge fund. He is currently the head of Blockchain Strategic Development at Loop Media, Inc., and is the co-Founder of Crypto.IQ, a strategic advisory and media firm with a focus on digital assets. Michael’s website: https://mikekimelman.com
The Criminal Justice Insider Podcast with Babz Rawls Ivy and Jeff Grant is broadcast live at 9 am ET on the first and third Friday of each month Sept. through June, from the WNHH 103.5 FM studios in New Haven. It is rebroadcast on WNHH at 5 pm ET the same day. Podcast and Archive available all the time, everywhere.
Fri., Sept. 6, 2019: Khalil Cumberbatch, Chief Strategist at New Yorkers United for Justice Fri., Sept. 20, 2019: Aaron T. Kinzel, Lecturer in Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Michigan-Dearborn Fri., Oct. 4, 2019: Charlie Grady, Outreach Specialist for the FBI CT Community Outreach Program Fri., Oct. 18, 2019: Michael Kimelman, Former Hedge Founder and Manager who was Convicted and Incarcerated for a White Collar Crime Fri., Nov. 1, 2019: Corey Brinson, Former Attorney Convicted for a White Collar Crime who is running for Hartford City Council Fri., Nov. 15, 2019: Cathryn Lavery, Ph.D., Professor of Criminal Justice at Iona College, New Rochelle, NY
Season Two Guests:
Fri., Sept. 9, 2018: Kennard Ray, CT Unlock the Vote and Candidate for CT State Legislator Fri., Sept. 21, 2018: Louis L. Reed, National Organizer for #Cut50 Fri., Oct. 5, 2018: Sue Gunderman & Beth Hines, CT Reentry Roundtables Fri., Oct. 19, 2018: Venice Michalsen, Assoc. Professor of Justice Studies, Montclair State University Fri., Nov. 16, 2018: Andrew Clark, Director of the Institute for Municipal and Regional Policy, Central Connecticut State University Fri., Dec. 7, 2018: Glenn E. Martin, Founder/Consultant of GEM Trainers and Past-President and Founder of JustLeadershipUSA Fri., Dec. 21, 2018: Fernando Muniz, CEO of Community Solutions, Inc., and community leader Rosa Correa. Fri., Jan. 4, 2019: New Years Retrospective Show Looking Back at Past CJI Guests. Fri. Jan. 18, 2019: Peter Henning, Law Prof. at Wayne State University and “White Collar Watch” columnist for the NY Times. Fri., Feb. 1, 2019: Jeffrey Deskovic, CEO of The Jeffrey Deskovic Foundation who was Exonerated after Serving 16 Years in Prison Fri., Feb. 15, 2019: Jeffrey Abramowitz, Executive Director for Reentry Services, JEVS Human Services, Philadelphia. Fri., Mar. 1, 2019, Rollin Cook, CT Commissioner of Correction Fri., Mar. 15, 2019: Dieter Tejada, Justice Impacted Criminal Justice Advocate Fri., Apr. 5, 2019: John Rowland, Former CT Governor Fri., Apr. 19, 2019: Gregg D. Caruso, Ph.D. Professor of Philosophy at SUNY Corning & Co-Director of the Justice Without Retribution Network at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland Fri., May 3, 2019: Michael Taylor, CEO of Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center in the Greater New Haven area Fri., May 17, 2019: Tarra Simmons, Esq., Attorney & Criminal Justice Reform Advocate, Washington State Fri., June 7, 2019: Louis L. Reed, National Organizer for #Cut50, Part Deux! Fri., June 21, 2019: Marcus Bullock, CEO of Flikshop
Sponsored by the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven – Now More Than Ever.
On Friday, Oct. 4, 2019, 9 am ET, Charlie Grady, Outreach Specialist for the FBI CT Community Outreach Program, was be our guest on Criminal Justice Insider with Babz Rawls Ivy & Jeff Grant – The Voice of CT Criminal Justice. Live on WNHH 103.5 FM New Haven, rebroadcast at 5 pm. Live-streamed and podcast everywhere, see below. Sponsored by the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven – Now More Than Ever.
Listen on SoundCloud:
Watch on YouTube:
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The Criminal Justice Insider Podcast with Babz Rawls Ivy and Jeff Grant is broadcast live at 9 am ET on the first and third Friday of each month Sept. through June, from the WNHH 103.5 FM studios in New Haven. It is rebroadcast on WNHH at 5 pm ET the same day. Podcast and Archive available all the time, everywhere.
Fri., Sept. 6, 2019: Khalil Cumberbatch, Chief Strategist at New Yorkers United for Justice Fri., Sept. 20, 2019: Aaron T. Kinzel, Lecturer in Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Michigan-Dearborn Fri., Oct. 4, 2019: Charlie Grady, Outreach Specialist for the FBI CT Community Outreach Program Fri., Oct. 18, 2019: Michael Kimelman, Former Hedge Funder and Author of Confessions of a Wall Street Insider: A Cautionary Tale of Rats, Feds, and Banksters Fri., Nov. 1, 2019: Corey Brinson, Former Attorney Convicted for a White Collar Crime who is running for Hartford City Council
Fri., Nov. 15, 2019: Cathryn Lavery, Ph.D., Asst. Chair & Graduate Coordinator for the Iona College Criminal Justice Department
Fri., Dec. 6, 2019: “Free Prison Phone Calls” Show, Guests to be Announced.
Fri. Dec. 20, 2019: John Hamilton, CEO, Liberation Programs
Fri., Jan. 17, 2020: Serena Ligouri, Executive Director, New Hour for Women & Children – L.I.
Feb. 7, 2020: David Garlock, Program Director, New Person Ministries, Lancaster, PA
Fri., Mar. 20, 2020: Tiheba Bain
Season Two Guests:
Fri., Sept. 9, 2018: Kennard Ray, CT Unlock the Vote and Candidate for CT State Legislator Fri., Sept. 21, 2018: Louis L. Reed, National Organizer for #Cut50 Fri., Oct. 5, 2018: Sue Gunderman & Beth Hines, CT Reentry Roundtables Fri., Oct. 19, 2018: Venice Michalsen, Assoc. Professor of Justice Studies, Montclair State University Fri., Nov. 16, 2018: Andrew Clark, Director of the Institute for Municipal and Regional Policy, Central Connecticut State University Fri., Dec. 7, 2018: Glenn E. Martin, Founder/Consultant of GEM Trainers and Past-President and Founder of JustLeadershipUSA Fri., Dec. 21, 2018: Fernando Muniz, CEO of Community Solutions, Inc., and community leader Rosa Correa. Fri., Jan. 4, 2019: New Years Retrospective Show Looking Back at Past CJI Guests. Fri. Jan. 18, 2019: Peter Henning, Law Prof. at Wayne State University and “White Collar Watch” columnist for the NY Times. Fri., Feb. 1, 2019: Jeffrey Deskovic, CEO of The Jeffrey Deskovic Foundation who was Exonerated after Serving 16 Years in Prison Fri., Feb. 15, 2019: Jeffrey Abramowitz, Executive Director for Reentry Services, JEVS Human Services, Philadelphia. Fri., Mar. 1, 2019, Rollin Cook, CT Commissioner of Correction Fri., Mar. 15, 2019: Dieter Tejada, Justice Impacted Criminal Justice Advocate Fri., Apr. 5, 2019: John Rowland, Former CT Governor Fri., Apr. 19, 2019: Gregg D. Caruso, Ph.D. Professor of Philosophy at SUNY Corning & Co-Director of the Justice Without Retribution Network at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland Fri., May 3, 2019: Michael Taylor, CEO of Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center in the Greater New Haven area Fri., May 17, 2019: Tarra Simmons, Esq., Attorney & Criminal Justice Reform Advocate, Washington State Fri., June 7, 2019: Louis L. Reed, National Organizer for #Cut50, Part Deux! Fri., June 21, 2019: Marcus Bullock, CEO of Flikshop
Sponsored by the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven – Now More Than Ever.
In light of recent prosecutions against some unscrupulous prison consultants, I researched my files and found this letter I sent to the prison consultant that I had hired when I was at my most scared and vulnerable. I never heard from him again and never received the return of the money I had paid him for delivering nothing he promised. Since, we have found there are some prison consultants (very few) that can deliver some value, but it is definitely caveat emptor.
This is one reason as a ministry we started the first confidential online no-costWhite Collar/Nonviolent Support Group; meeting #159 is this Monday 7 pm ET, 4 pm PT. If you, a friend, family member, colleague or client are in need, or have been ripped off by an unscrupulous prison consultant, please go to our contact page or write us at: Rev. Jeff Grant, Progressive Prison Ministries, Inc., PO Box 1, Woodbury, CT 06798. – Jeff
August 4, 2007
David Novak, Prison Consultant
Salt Lake City, Utah 84102
Re: Refund of Consulting Fee
Dear David:
As you should know, I have recently arrived home after my incarceration of 13 ½ months at Allenwood Low Security Correctional Institution in White Deer, Pennsylvania, and then approximately five weeks in a halfway house in Hartford, Connecticut.
Approximately 18 months ago I learned that I had been designated to report to a “low security” institution and not a “camp” as my lawyer advised me would likely be the case. Upon their advice, I then retained you as my prison consultant /expediter to (1) attempt to change my designation to a camp, and, if you were unable to do so in the few weeks before I had to report, to (2) attempt to have me transferred to a camp soon after my arrival at the low security institution. You told me that you were capable of achieving both of these goals and that you had accomplished same many times in the past on behalf of other similarly situated clients. Most importantly, you represented that you had contacts inside the Bureau of Prisons that respected your judgment and would likely change my designation based upon it. You assured me that you could, would and promised to work quickly, efficiently and effectively on my behalf, and that you would be in constant and continual communication with me at all times, both before and after I reported to prison. Based upon these representations, and seemingly with little other choice, I paid you your requested retainer in full.
From that moment forward, you delivered to me no value whatsoever.
From the outset, you failed to tell me that Bureau of Prisons had recently closed down its regional designation offices, rendering your alleged contacts useless, and had centralized its designation offices to Grand Prarie, Texas. Had I known that your contacts were no longer in positions to change my designation, I would never have retained you.
As far as I can tell, you made no other attempts to have my designation changed before I reported (how could you, you had no contacts left). I never received any accounting from you of any attempts on your part to have my designation changed from a low to a camp (i.e. telephone calls made on my behalf, contacts made, information packets transmitted, etc.).
In fact, you were clandestine and circumspect when I asked you how things were going. You told me that that this was due to the nature of the representation as if you were a spy. I had no choice but to believe you.
Once your “attempt” to have my designation failed and I reported to the low security institution, I received no guidance from you as to how to handle matters of the next goal of an attempt to transfer me to a camp as soon as possible. You did manage to let me know however that you were going on a month-long vacation which coincided exactly with my report to prison, and would be unavailable to work on my behalf during that time. Of course, you withheld this information when I retained you less than four weeks before.
I had to learn on my own during that month that I had a low enough security level to have been designated to a camp (my level was 0) but there was no room in the camps on the day on was designated. So I was designated to a low security institution with a “management variable” which allowed me to be there despite my level. I learned that the management variable lasts one year. You knew this, or should have known this, at the time of your retention and should have advised me that it would be impossible for me to be transferred from the low to a camp before the expiration of the year period. Yet, you failed to tell me this before I retained you and instead accepted my retainer payment under false premises.
Accordingly, there was no reason whatsoever for me to have retained you. You had no contacts with which you could have achieved goal one, and due to my management variable, goal two was impossible. You withheld both facts from me at the time of your retention.
I never heard from you once during my entire incarceration other than one brief note, in response to one of my letters to you, telling me to “keep up the good fight”. You never answered your cell phone the many times I tried to reach you, although you promised when I retained you that I’d “always” be able to call you on your cell phone and even though you know how hard it is for inmates to use the telephone.
I was vulnerable and you took advantage of me. You held yourself out as an expert and skilled professional in the field with special knowledge and contacts. I was in no position to protect myself. I was forced by my circumstances to trust you. I was frightened and would have agreed to almost any anything just for the hope of re-designation to a camp. You knew this; this is your lifeblood. You lied in every instance. You left me out of time, out of money, defenseless with no other options. Like a true confidence man, you created false hope and then used it to your advantage.
I shudder to think how many other of your clients were treated this way (although it shouldn’t be too difficult to find them and find out). The small sample I polled at Allenwood all had similar experiences to mine. But none, or at least not many of them I assume, practiced law for over twenty years, as I have, and know how to protect their interests upon their release.
I want my money returned immediately so that I do not have to take this matter further and resort to litigation and regulatory intervention. I trust when you consider this you will finally do the right thing.
I expect your certified check within ten days to close this matter.
Very truly yours,
Jeff Grant
P.S. David Novak was later wanted for murder. The widow won a multi-million dollar civil judgment against him. Watch the NBC Dateline story here.
On Friday, Nov. 1, 2019, 9 am ET, Corey Brinson, a former attorney convicted for a white collar crime who is now a prison and pardons consultant running for Hartford City Council (and a member of our online White Collar/Nonviolent Support Group), was our guest on Criminal Justice Insider with Babz Rawls Ivy & Jeff Grant – The Voice of CT Criminal Justice. Live on WNHH 103.5 FM New Haven, rebroadcast at 5 pm. Live-streamed and podcast everywhere, see below. Sponsored by the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven – Now More Than Ever.
Corey Brinson is the founder and chief executive officer of the Second Chance Firm, LLC. Mr. Brinson works closely with professionals who are the subject of federal prosecution and are expected to surrender to the Federal Bureau of Prisons for a period of incarceration. Mr. Brinson also works with people with criminal records who are seeking a pardon in the State of Connecticut or with the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of the Pardon Attorney. Mr. Brinson is also a registered and active lobbyist in Connecticut and advocates for broad, sweeping criminal justice reform.
Mr. Brinson brings his unique experiences in the criminal justice system to his prison consulting, pardon, and lobbying work. He has experienced the entire criminal justice system. Specifically, he has tried a murder case to verdict, obtained not guilty verdicts in felony cases, represented white-collar defendants in state and federal criminal court, and has argued for criminal defendants at sentencing hearings in federal court. Additionally, he has obtained and advocated for pardons for clients before the Connecticut Board of Pardons and Paroles.
In 2017, Mr. Brinson was convicted in federal court of a white-collar crime related to unlawful banking transactions concerning a client’s multimillion-dollar securities scheme. He served 16 months in a federal prison camp and a halfway house. Mr. Brinson is also a 2018 graduate of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ Residential Drug Abuse Program, which provides inmates with significantly reduced sentences and improved life skills.
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The Criminal Justice Insider Podcast with Babz Rawls Ivy and Jeff Grant is broadcast live at 9 am ET on the first and third Friday of each month Sept. through June, from the WNHH 103.5 FM studios in New Haven. It is rebroadcast on WNHH at 5 pm ET the same day. Podcast and Archive available all the time, everywhere.
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Community Foundation of Greater New Haven website: https://www.cfgnh.org/LeadingOnIssues/IncarcerationandReentry/CriminalJusticeInsiderRadioArchives.aspx
An article about each show is published a few days later in the New Haven Independent (newhavenindependent.org).
Fri., Sept. 6, 2019: Khalil Cumberbatch, Chief Strategist at New Yorkers United for Justice
Fri., Sept. 20, 2019: Aaron T. Kinzel, Lecturer in Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Michigan-Dearborn
Fri., Oct. 4, 2019: Charlie Grady, Outreach Specialist for the FBI CT Community Outreach Program
Fri., Oct. 18, 2019: Michael Kimelman, Former Hedge Funder and Author of Confessions of a Wall Street Insider: A Cautionary Tale of Rats, Feds, and Banksters
Fri., Nov. 1, 2019: Corey Brinson, Former Attorney Convicted for a White Collar Crime who is running for Hartford City Council
Season Two Guests:
Fri., Sept. 9, 2018: Kennard Ray, CT Unlock the Vote and Candidate for CT State Legislator
Fri., Sept. 21, 2018: Louis L. Reed, National Organizer for #Cut50
Fri., Apr. 5, 2019: John Rowland, Former CT Governor
Fri., Apr. 19, 2019: Gregg D. Caruso, Ph.D. Professor of Philosophy at SUNY Corning & Co-Director of the Justice Without Retribution Network at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland
Fri., May 3, 2019: Michael Taylor, CEO of Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center in the Greater New Haven area
Fri., May 17, 2019: Tarra Simmons, Esq., Attorney & Criminal Justice Reform Advocate, Washington State
Fri., June 7, 2019: Louis L. Reed, National Organizer for #Cut50, Part Deux!
Fri., June 21, 2019: Marcus Bullock, CEO of Flikshop
Sponsored by the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven – Now More Than Ever.
Barbara (Basia) Skudrzyk reported to the Satellite Camp at Greenville Federal Correctional Institution on June 3, 2019 to serve a thirty-three month sentence. She has been a member of our White Collar Support Group for about nine months, and will be writing letters regularly for publication on prisonist.org.
Dear Jeff,
Thank you for staying in touch and being a tremendous guide during this life-altering experience. It’s day nine here at Greenville, and I would not be as strong and prepared if it weren’t for our team who have gone through the system or just started the process.
Having a space that is safe and not being judged is essential to accept what is part of this “captive” experience. I’m sure each Camp/FCI has its own culture and set of rules, but I believe there is one underlying current that can help anyone to get through this journey. This IS a journey, and NOT a destination. Through Progressive Prison Ministries we create an environment, a trust walk, that gives you the integral skillsets to manage a system that doesn’t have readily identifiable rules and guidelines.. In order to get through this journey you have to MOVE and think FORWARD.
My best advice in these nine days is to develop a schedule that develops you into who you want to be. In my case, I am awaiting orientation which will be in 3 – 4 weeks. Programming is very limited so the best you can do is request to be wait-listed on whatever you can join. I wake up at 5:30 am, eat breakfast at 6 am, walk the track for 3 miles and then read until lunch. After lunch I go to the education center and volunteer. Yesterday I was able to help a young woman write her first resume. She’s scheduled to leave in two weeks. It was a great exercise and confidence booster knowing she now has some preparation as she has to get a job within fourteen days of leaving.
I’ve sat in on the PAWS program to learn more about the process and some of the GED classes. If there’s an opportunity to volunteer while you’re waiting to be considered for a job – do it! Stay active. While sitting writing this letter in the library I observed a woman crocheting. She’s been in the system 8.5 years. I asked if she would be interested in teaching me how to crochet, so now I have another project to fill up my time.
As we’ve all been advised, lay low, be humble and do not gossip. There’s plenty of opportunity to engage, but don’t do it! If you open up your mouth like I’ve seen many women do, it’s equivalent to throwing food in a koi pond – the fish are on top of one another waiting for the bait. Don’t be the bait!
There’s a PA system with announcements on the hour. I’m trying to decipher what it all means. Depending on where you are and who the announcer is, you can get a lot of “WHA WHA WHA WHA WHA!”
Some advice that I would share with someone preparing is continue to keep an open mind, don’t pass judgment – when you’re frustrated run or walk it out. Don’t vent to anyone, just write it all out or lean on your group. Navigating a system of unknowns only gives you strength and resilience for the next day. Don’t fight the system and be okay with hearing “I don’t know” from many people around you.
Make sure you have your contact list of friends and family. You can have up to 100 contacts – 30 of these you can only email. Make sure you mail a contact list to yourself the day before you report, with full addresses, phone numbers and email addresses.
Stay positive and take this time to read what you never had time to read. I’ve read 3 books in one week! You have a $90 budget for commissary, so plan the night before on your essential needs. You can plan on two different outcomes depending which route you take: Route 1: you can put on the pounds by purchasing extra snacks and sweets, or Route 2: focus on essentials only and budget your money on communication and development. Develop a plan to workout and lose those pounds that have developed through all the years.
Just as in any environment, culture eats strategy for breakfast. Don’t try to be a super hero or someone who thinks they can change the system. This doesn’t mean giving up. Create a culture within yourself to make yourself stronger, wiser and practical.
“Walk cheerfully and with a sincere and open heart as you can, and when you cannot always maintain this holy joy, at least do not lose heart or your trust in God” – Padre Pio
Barbara (Basia) Skudrzyk reported to the Satellite Camp at Greenville Federal Correctional Institution on June 3, 2019 to serve a thirty-three month sentence. She has been a member of our White Collar Support Group for about nine months, and will be writing letters regularly for publication on prisonist.org. Dear Jeff, Thank you for staying in touch and being a tremendous guide during this life-altering experience. It’s day nine here at Greenville, and I would not be as strong and prepared if it weren’t for our team who have gone through the system or just started the process. Having a space that is safe and not being judged is essential to accept what is part of this “captive” experience. I’m sure each Camp/FCI has its own culture and set of rules, but I believe there is one underlying current that can help anyone to get through this journey. This IS a journey, and NOT a destination. Through Progressive Prison Ministries we create an environment, a trust walk, that gives you the integral skillsets to manage a system that doesn’t have readily identifiable rules and guidelines.. In order to get through this journey you have to MOVE and think FORWARD. My best advice in these nine days is to develop a schedule that develops you into who you want to be. In my case, I am awaiting orientation which will be in 3 – 4 weeks. Programming is very limited so the best you can do is request to be wait-listed on whatever you can join. I wake up at 5:30 am, eat breakfast at 6 am, walk the track for 3 miles and then read until lunch. After lunch I go to the education center and volunteer. Yesterday I was able to help a young woman write her first resume. She’s scheduled to leave in two weeks. It was a great exercise and confidence booster knowing she now has some preparation as she has to get a job within fourteen days of leaving. I’ve sat in on the PAWS program to learn more about the process and some of the GED classes. If there’s an opportunity to volunteer while you’re waiting to be considered for a job – do it! Stay active. While sitting writing this letter in the library I observed a woman crocheting. She’s been in the system 8.5 years. I asked if she would be interested in teaching me how to crochet, so now I have another project to fill up my time. As we’ve all been advised, lay low, be humble and do not gossip. There’s plenty of opportunity to engage, but don’t do it! If you open up your mouth like I’ve seen many women do, it’s equivalent to throwing food in a koi pond – the fish are on top of one another waiting for the bait. Don’t be the bait! There’s a PA system with announcements on the hour. I’m trying to decipher what it all means. Depending on where you are and who the announcer is, you can get a lot of “WHA WHA WHA WHA WHA!” Some advice that I would share with someone preparing is continue to keep an open mind, don’t pass judgment – when you’re frustrated run or walk it out. Don’t vent to anyone, just write it all out or lean on your group. Navigating a system of unknowns only gives you strength and resilience for the next day. Don’t fight the system and be okay with hearing “I don’t know” from many people around you. Make sure you have your contact list of friends and family. You can have up to 100 contacts – 30 of these you can only email. Make sure you mail a contact list to yourself the day before you report, with full addresses, phone numbers and email addresses. Stay positive and take this time to read what you never had time to read. I’ve read 3 books in one week! You have a $90 budget for commissary, so plan the night before on your essential needs. You can plan on two different outcomes depending which route you take: Route 1: you can put on the pounds by purchasing extra snacks and sweets, or Route 2: focus on essentials only and budget your money on communication and development. Develop a plan to workout and lose those pounds that have developed through all the years. Just as in any environment, culture eats strategy for breakfast. Don’t try to be a super hero or someone who thinks they can change the system. This doesn’t mean giving up. Create a culture within yourself to make yourself stronger, wiser and practical. “Walk cheerfully and with a sincere and open heart as you can, and when you cannot always maintain this holy joy, at least do not lose heart or your trust in God” – Padre Pio Love & Blessings, Basia (or “Webster,” my new camp nickname!)
