San Quentin
What was the place of detention for Thomas Silverstein from 1971 to 1975?
Thomas Silverstein Thomas Silverstein ( February 4 , 1952 – May 11 , 2019 ) was an American criminal who spent the last 42 years of his life in prison after being convicted of four separate murders while imprisoned for armed robbery , one of which was overturned . Silverstein spent the last 36 years of his life in solitary confinement for killing Corrections Officer Merle Clutts at the Marion Penitentiary in Illinois . Prison authorities described him as a brutal killer and a former leader of the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang . Silverstein maintained that the dehumanizing conditions inside the prison system contributed to the three murders he committed . He was held in a specially designed cell in what is called Range 13 at ADX Florence federal penitentiary in Colorado . He was the longest-held prisoner in solitary confinement within the Bureau of Prisons at the time of his death . Early life . Thomas Silverstein was born in Long Beach , California , to Virginia Conway . Conway had divorced her first husband in 1952 while pregnant with Silverstein and married Thomas Conway , who Silverstein claimed was his biological father . Four years later , Virginia divorced Conway and married Sid Silverstein , who legally adopted her son . Silverstein was timid , awkward , shy , and frequently bullied as a child in the middle-class neighborhood where the family lived , in part because his peers mistakenly believed he was Jewish . Virginia Silverstein demanded that her son fight back , telling the boy that if he ever came home again crying because he had been beaten up by a bully , she would be waiting to give him another beating . Silverstein states , Thats how my mom was . She stood her mud . If someone came at you with a bat , you got your bat and you both went at it . At age fourteen , Silverstein was sentenced to a California Youth Authority reformatory where , he said , his attitudes about violence were reinforced . Anyone not willing to fight was abused . In 1971 , at age nineteen , Silverstein was sent to San Quentin Prison in California for armed robbery . Four years later , he was paroled , but he was arrested soon after along with his father , Thomas Conway , and his cousin , Gerald Hoff , for three armed robberies . Their take was less than $11,000 . In 1977 , Silverstein was sentenced to fifteen years for armed robbery , to be served at United States Penitentiary in Leavenworth , Kansas . Murders at USP Marion . While at Leavenworth , Silverstein developed ties with the Aryan Brotherhood . In 1980 , Silverstein was convicted of the murder of inmate Danny Atwell , who reportedly refused to serve as a mule for heroin being moved through the prison . He was sentenced to life without parole and transferred to the United States Penitentiary in Marion , Illinois ( USP Marion ) , which was then a high security facility . The conviction was overturned in 1985 after it emerged that the jailhouse informants who testified at his trial had perjured themselves on the stand . At Marion , Silverstein was housed in the Control Unit , a virtual solitary confinement regime reserved for extreme management problems ( prisoners prone to assaultive and disruptive behavior ) in the prison . In 1981 , Silverstein was accused of the murder of Robert Chappelle , a member of the D.C . Blacks prison gang . Silverstein and another inmate , Clayton Fountain , were convicted and Silverstein received an additional life sentence . Silverstein maintained his innocence . While Silverstein was on trial for Chappelles murder , the Bureau of Prisons transferred Raymond Cadillac Smith , the national leader of the D.C . Blacks prison gang , from another prison into the control unit in Marion . From the moment Smith arrived in the control unit , prison logs show that he began trying to kill Silverstein . I tried to tell Cadillac that I didnt kill Chappelle , but he didnt believe me and he bragged that he was going to kill me , Silverstein recalled . Everyone knew what was going on and no one did anything to keep us apart . The guards wanted one of us to kill the other . Silverstein and Clayton Fountain killed Smith with improvised weapons , stabbing him 67 times . After Smith was dead , they dragged his body up and down the catwalk in front of the cells , displaying it to other prisoners . Silverstein received another life sentence . Murder of Correction Officer Clutts . On October 22 , 1983 , Silverstein killed Correction Officer Merle Clutts at USP Marion . After being let out of his cell for a shower , Silverstein used a ruse to get Clutts to walk ahead of him and positioned himself between Clutts and other officers . He stopped outside the cell of another inmate , Randy Gometz . Gometz passed a homemade prison knife to Silverstein and unlocked Silversteins handcuffs with a homemade key . Silverstein then attacked Clutts , stabbing him multiple times . Silverstein later claimed that he murdered Clutts in retaliation for Clutts deliberately harassing him . Among other things , Clutts was accused of destroying paintings by Silverstein . A few hours later , Clayton Fountain ( also an Aryan Brotherhood member ) used the same strategy to kill Correctional Officer Robert Hoffmann . USP Marion was subsequently placed on an indefinite lockdown , which ultimately lasted for 23 years . Following the murder of Clutts , Silverstein was transferred to the United States Penitentiary , Atlanta , where he was placed in solitary confinement . His security status was recorded as no human contact . The events surrounding the murders of Correctional Officer Clutts and Hoffmann inspired the design of the federal supermax prison , the United States Penitentiary , Florence ADX ( USP Florence ADX ) in Colorado , which opened in 1994 and was built to house the most dangerous inmates in the federal prison system . Silverstein and Gometz were both held at ADX Florence . Fountain died at the United States Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield , Missouri in 2004 . Riot in Atlanta and transfer to Leavenworth . During the 1987 Atlanta Prison Riots , Cuban detainees at the Atlanta federal penitentiary released Silverstein from his isolation cell . They handed Silverstein over to the Federal Bureau of Investigations Hostage Rescue Team one week later . Bureau of Prisons officials were reportedly afraid that Silverstein would begin killing correctional officers held hostage by the Cubans . Before the Cubans released Silverstein to Bureau of Prisons , the Cubans let Silverstein out of his isolation cell and Silverstein was able to roam freely about the prison . One of the prison guards being held hostage had a history of being kind to Silverstein . ( When the guard would handcuff Silverstein he would make it a point to ask Silverstein if his handcuffs were too tight. ) He was confronted by Silverstein and was ultimately spared by him . Bureau of Prisons negotiators were able to convince the Cuban riot leaders to hand over Silverstein as a gesture of good faith , a relatively easy decision for them , given that Silversteins status was peripheral to the aims of the Cuban leaders during the riot . Silverstein was subsequently moved back to Leavenworth , where he stayed for the next 18 years . In 2005 , when USP Leavenworth was downgraded to a medium-security facility , Silverstein was moved to ADX Florence , a supermax facility in Colorado . His earliest theoretical date of release was November 2 , 2095 . Allegations of torture and injustice . Silverstein claimed that no human contact status is essentially a form of torture reserved for those who kill correctional officers . When an inmate kills a guard , he must be punished , a Bureau of Prisons official told author Pete Earley . We cant execute Silverstein , so we have no choice but to make his life a living hell . Otherwise other inmates will kill guards too . There has to be some supreme punishment . Every convict knows what Silverstein is going through . We want them to realize that if they cross the same line that he did , they will pay a heavy price . Ted Sellers , a former convict who met Silverstein during 25 years spent in prison , said he became a legend at Leavenworth . Sellers told BBC News Online , He is not as bad as they portray . Sure he is dangerous if they push him to the wall . But there were some dirty rotten guards at Marion… They would purposely screw you around . You are dealing with a person locked up 23 hours a day . Of course hes got a short fuse . Death . Silverstein died on May 11 , 2019 , after spending 36 years in solitary confinement ; he died from complications from heart surgery .