Former Illinois Gov. George Ryan was let out of a federal prison in Indiana in the dead of night early Wednesday and checked briefly into a Chicago halfway house before he was released — in a surprise decision — to his home to finish out his 61/2-year sentence on home confinement.
The quick turn of events allowed Ryan, who turns 79 next month, to elude a horde of media gathered at the prison in Terre Haute, Ind., and then slip from the halfway house on the Near West Side undetected several hours later.
By 10:30 a.m., Ryan had an emotional reunion with 17 of his children and grandchildren at his longtime Kankakee home, according to his attorney, former Gov. Jim Thompson. Later in the day, Ryan's daughter, Jeanette, smiled as she left through a rear entrance. "We are very happy he's home," she said.
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4700 Bureau Road North, Terre Haute, IN 47802, USA
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912 South Greenwood Avenue, Kankakee, IL 60901, USA
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105 South Ashland Avenue, Chicago, IL 60607, USA
Home confinement for Ryan means he won't have to face weeks or months at the Salvation Army halfway house where many of the state's other disgraced politicians have had to take up residence.
The move struck some as one more backroom deal cut by a longtime political insider, but Thompson and U.S. Bureau of Prisons officials denied that Ryan received special treatment.
Thompson said he was surprised by the accommodation and that he didn't know it was being planned for Ryan until Wednesday morning.
"It's not something I asked for, it's not something he (Ryan) asked for, so it is in no way preferential treatment," Thompson said.
A Bureau of Prisons spokesman in Washington declined to say how many inmates like Ryan go directly to home confinement in the final months of their sentences, but the agency's website made it clear that the ordinary route would be to go first to a halfway house.
The Bureau of Prisons won't discuss specific inmates, but spokesman Chris Burke said officials decide each inmate's placement on an individual basis after assessing everything from financial stability and family ties to any emotional or medical issues such as drug or alcohol addiction.
As for the overnight departure, Burke said prisons officials consider the disruption to the prison as well as inmate safety.
"These issues are considered with any inmate — that he get safely from point A to point B," Burke said.
At least one other well-known defendant, convicted insurance broker Michael Segal, 69, was allowed last year to skip the halfway house.
Court records in Segal's case revealed that officials at the prison in Oxford, Wis., where he was held, recommended he be released directly to home confinement because he "has few re-entry needs."
Several veteran attorneys who spoke to the Tribune on Wednesday said that at his age, Ryan doesn't need help transitioning back to life on the outside either. Among the classes offered at the halfway house are how to write a check and what to wear on a job interview.
"For someone like George Ryan, who's (almost) 79 years old, he's not a person who needs to find a job or needs help transitioning," attorney Marc Martin said. "He's essentially retired."
The attorneys also said the Salvation Army's halfway house has limited resources and that inmates of Ryan's age and stable background make good candidates for home release to alleviate crowding there.
"I do not know the Bureau of Prisons to ever make deals with anyone, I don't care who they are or who their lawyer is," said attorney Jeffrey Steinback.
Yet that doesn't always explain why other older high-profile inmates — including William Hanhardt, a former Chicago police chief of detectives in his 80s — recently had to serve time at the halfway house. However, former Chicago Ald. Edward Vrdolyak, 75, who also spent time in the halfway house, was mandated to serve time there in a judge's sentencing order.
While Ryan will awaken Thursday at his Kankakee home, he clearly will be under more restrictions than when he left for prison more than five years ago.
He can't leave without permission. He can't enjoy a drink. He will be subject to overnight calls from prison officials. He will have to submit to random tests for drugs and alcohol. Though he is out of prison, Ryan is still a federal inmate.
George Ryan returns home to finish sentence under house arrest
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