Source: United States Attorneys General
The U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of International Affairs, with the assistance of the Department’s Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP), transferred 14 Mexican nationals serving prison sentences for drug distribution-related convictions in the United States to their home country on Friday. The transfer was made pursuant to the United States’ prisoner transfer treaty with the Government of Mexico.
“Friday’s transfer of 14 federal inmates to correctional authorities in Mexico has saved the United States over $4 million by eliminating the need to pay incarceration costs for the 96 years remaining on their combined sentences,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew R. Galeotti of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. “The Justice Department will continue such transfers – pursuant to our treaty with Mexico – to reduce incarceration costs and relieve overcrowding in our federal prisons.”
All 14 inmates transferred Friday were serving sentences relating to the distribution of controlled substances. The inmates will complete the remainder of their sentences in Mexico pursuant to the treaty. The inmates requested to be transferred to their home country, and the governments of both the United States and Mexico approved these transfers.
The transfer was part of the United States’ congressionally enacted International Prisoner Transfer Program. The Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs’s International Prisoner Transfer Unit (IPTU) administers the program and coordinates all treaty-based international prisoner transfers.
Under the program, approved foreign national inmates in federal and state prisons are transferred, under certain circumstances, to complete their prison sentences in their native countries’ prisons. The United States has entered into 10 additional bilateral transfer agreements and two multilateral transfer conventions. These international agreements give the United States transfer treaty relationships with more than 85 countries.
To learn more about the International Prisoner Transfer Program, visit: www.justice.gov/criminal/criminal-oia/iptu