Madoff enroute to federal prison: U.S. official say

Mon Jul 13, 2009 4:26pm EDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Admitted thief Bernard Madoff was moved from his New York jail cell on Monday and was en route to federal prison, a U.S. prison official said.

Disgraced financier Madoff, who has spent the last four months in jail after pleading guilty to a worldwide fraud of as much as $65 billion, was sentenced to 150 years imprisonment by a judge on June 29.

“He is in transit to another facility,” said Scott Sussman, a spokesman for the Manhattan Correctional Center next door to the courthouse where Madoff confessed to his crimes in front of defrauded investors.

Sussman declined to provide further details, citing Federal Bureau of Prisons policy not to disclose the location of a prison until the convict had arrived.

Madoff’s lawyer had asked that his client be incarcerated at the Federal Correctional Institution in Otisville, New York, a medium-security prison about 70 miles northwest of New York City, but the final decision is made by the prisons bureau.

CNBC TV reported on Monday that Madoff was being transferred to a prison in Butner, North Carolina. A spokeswoman at Butner was not available for comment. (Reporting by Grant McCool; Editing Bernard Orr)