Lompoc Federal Correctional Complex
FCC Lompoc is located within the city of Lompoc, 175 miles (282 km) northwest of Los Angeles, adjacent to Vandenberg Space Force Base. The complex also includes a U.S. Penitentiary and a minimum-security prison camp.
Facility
The average offender at FCI Lompoc is serving between one and fifteen years for federal drug and or other non-violent offenses. It has four general housing units, two of which offer dormitory and room-type housing. The institution offers a full range of inmate employment, vocational training, education, counseling (both mental health and drug abuse), medical, dental, pre-release preparation, and other self-improvement opportunities.
Notable incidents
1980 escape
In the late evening hours of January 21, 1980, Christopher Boyce, who was serving a forty-year sentence for spying for the Soviet Union, escaped from FCI Lompoc. With the assistance of fellow inmates, he hid in a drainage hole, used a makeshift ladder and small tin scissors to cut through a barbed wire perimeter. Boyce was on the run for nineteen months, until U.S. Marshals and FBI Agents captured him on the Olympic Peninsula of western Washington at Port Angeles on August 21, 1981, ending one of the most extensive and complex manhunts in the history of the U.S. Marshals Service.
COVID-19 pandemic
A deadly COVID-19 outbreak swept through the federal correctional complex in 2020. It included several dozen staff members, including guards.
Notable inmates (current)
| Inmate Name | Register Number | Status | Details |
|---|---|---|---|
| Christopher Faulkner | 76501-112 | Sentenced to FCI for fraud and tax evasion; scheduled for release in 2030 and is not eligible for parole. Currently at FCI El Reno. | Texas oil-and-gas mogul who was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison for bilking investors out of millions of dollars and concealing money from the IRS. |
| Abu Khalid Abdul-Latif | 40739-086 | Serving a 18 year sentence; scheduled for release in 2026. Currently at FCI Sheridan. | Pleaded guilty in 2012 to conspiracy to murder US officers for plotting to attack recruits at a Military Processing Center in Seattle, Washington with grenades and machine guns; co-conspirator Walli Mujahidh received 17 years. |
| Henry Uliomereyon Jones | 46810-112 | Scheduled for release in October 2023; now at FCI La Tuna. | Former record company executive; convicted in 2008 of mail fraud, wire fraud, and securities fraud for running a Ponzi scheme that caused 500 investors to lose over $32 million; the story was featured on the CNBC series American Greed. |
| Changpeng Zhao | 88087-510 | Reported to Lompoc II in May 2024 to serve a four month sentence. Release Date: 09/29/2024 | Co-founder and former CEO of Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume as of November 2023. He resigned as the CEO in November 2023 after pleading guilty to a money laundering charge in the United States and was sentenced to four months in prison in April 2024. |
Notable inmates (former)
†Inmates who were released from custody prior to 1982 are not listed on the Bureau of Prisons website.
| Inmate Name | Register Number | Status | Details |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jimmy Snowden | Unlisted† | Transferred from Federal Correctional Institution, Texarkana in December 1971 and released in August 1972. | Member of the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan who became a conspirator and participant in the murders of Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner in 1964. |
| Christopher John Boyce Andrew Daulton Lee |
19347-148 19485-148 |
Boyce: released from custody in 2003 after serving 24 years Lee: released in 1998 after serving 19 years. |
Boyce & Lee were convicted of espionage in 1977 for selling classified information regarding US ciphers and spy satellites to the Soviet Union; they were respectively portrayed by Timothy Hutton and Sean Penn in the 1985 film The Falcon and the Snowman. |
| Bernie Ward | 90569-111 | Released from custody in 2014; served 6 years. | Former radio host and political commentator; pleaded guilty to distribution of child pornography in 2008 for using the Internet to transmit photographs of children being molested. |
| Reed Slatkin | 24057-112 | Released from custody in 2013; served 10 years. | Co-founder of EarthLink and ordained Scientology minister; pleaded guilty in 2002 to fraud, conspiracy and money laundering for perpetrating one of the largest Ponzi schemes in US history. |
| Chi Mak | 29252-112 | Was serving a 24-year sentence; released on October 31, 2022. | Former engineer for the Boeing aerospace company; convicted in 2007 of conspiracy to commit economic espionage and other charges for stealing restricted information related to the US Space Shuttle program and Delta IV rocket for the Chinese government. |
| Mossimo Giannulli | 77808-112 | Was serving a five-month sentence; released from custody on April 2, 2021 | American Fashion Designer who pled guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud and one count of honest services wire and mail fraud after being investigated as part of Operation Varsity Blues where it was discovered that Mossimo and his wife, Lori Loughlin, paid $500,000 to help secure their two daughters attendance at University of Southern California. |
