• Freed from prison, former Illinois governor goes into, out of halfway house in a morning

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    By Phil Rogers, NBCChicago.com

    George Ryan will sleep in his own bed tonight.

    The Bureau of Prisons agreed to release Ryan from the Chicago halfway house he entered this morning and allow him to go home to his longtime residence in Kankakee, a source close to the former governor said.

    Gov. Jim Thompson confirmed Ryan was released from the halfway house Wednesday morning and is back in Kankakee. Thompson said Ryan was released shortly after entering and as of 11:30 a.m. was in his living room, beaming and surrounded by grandchildren.

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    Such moves are not unprecedented, but the speed with which Ryan was transitioned home was not expected. Many observers believed that Ryan would be required to stay at the Chicago halfway House for three weeks to a month before transitioning home.

    "Home confinement is a regular program with the Bureau of Prisons just like the halfway house," Thompson said, speaking in front of Ryan's house as family members gathered on the porch, "because they can't fit everyone in a halfway house."

    In essence, the rules will be the same. Ryan will be subject to the same reporting requirements he would have had to obey in Chicago. He will be subject to periodic checks from his counselor to make certain he is at home at the appropriate times.

    Spokespeople for the halfway house said Ryan will be "vigorously monitored."

    If he is required to get a job, he will still be expected to report when he is leaving his home, when he arrives for work, and when he departs his workplace to return home.

  • Ex-Illinois governor George Ryan set for halfway house after 6 years in prison

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    By Phil Rogers, NBCChicago.com

    Under normal circumstances, jailed former Illinois Gov. George Ryan would be packing his bags and preparing to go home to his house in Kankakee. But Ryan’s circumstances are hardly normal.

    For the last six years, the former governor has been a federal prisoner. When he leaves the federal penitentiary in Terre Haute next week, he will be traveling not to Kankakee but to a halfway house in Chicago.

    And he has nothing to pack. Someone will have to bring him the clothes he wears out of the prison gate.

    "It will be the first time he’s worn his own clothes in six years," Ryan’s former chief of staff, Scott Fawell, said Monday.

    Fawell provides a unique perspective. Not only was he Ryan’s closest advisor, but he also did more than four years himself for Ryan-related crimes. And he occupied that same Salvation Army halfway house on Chicago’s west side.

    "It’s dingy. It’s dark. It’s dirty,” Fawell said. "It’s an old facility."

    And ironically, said Fawell, it will be the place where Ryan will most likely mingle with the hardest criminals he will see during his entire stay with the Bureau of Prisons.

    "You can be in the same room with guys who have done 20 or 30 years in prison, where he’s used to a little different clientele," Fawell explained.

    Ryan will be required to take mandatory classes on such mundane skills as opening a bank account, writing a check, and making out a resume. It sounds ridiculous for a former governor but is par for the course in the Bureau of Prisons' one-size-fits-all approach to corrections.

    "It’s for everybody," Fawell said. "Whether you’ve done 30 years or three months."

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    After orientation, it will be time for the former Springfield dealmaker to go to work. Every halfway house resident is required to have a job and to work 40 hours each week.

    Ryan will have to sign out when he departs in the morning and call when he arrives at his job site. He is to be back at the Salvation Army facility at Ashland and Monroe by 7 p.m. every evening.

    "It’s more that they want you to go somewhere," Fawell said. "And you have to bring back a paycheck every week or two to give 25 percent of your gross to the halfway house."

    Halfway house residents are constantly reminded they are not totally free. But the differences between their Chicago existence and their lives behind bars are enormous. Not only are they allowed to wear their own clothes, they can carry a wallet and money for the first time. Personal items are allowed.

    Ryan will even be allowed to get a driver’s license and keep a car on site. Ryan used to issue the state’s driver’s licenses when he served as Illinois Secretary of State.

    Eventually, perhaps as early as three weeks or so, Ryan will be allowed to begin transitioning to his Kankakee home. But even then, he will very much remain under Bureau of Prisons control.

    "They’ll call him between 8:30 and 10:00, between 11:00 and 1:00, and between 2:00 and 4:00 in the morning," Fawell said. "Every single night."