2/12/10 – TG: Tony Alamo transferred to Tucson prison ***COMMENTS***
Texarkana Gazette
February 12, 2010
By: Lynn LaRowe
Tony Alamo transferred to Tucson prison
Rules at the federal penitentiary where Tony Alamo is being held in Tucson, Ariz., allow an “embrace and kiss” at the beginning and end of each face-to-face visit.
Alamo was moved from the Federal Transfer Facility in Oklahoma sometime last week to the high-security U.S. Penitentiary in Tuscon, according to the federal Bureau of Prisons Website.
Alamo, whose given name is Bernie LaZar Hoffman, was convicted by an Arkansas jury last July of all 10 counts listed in a federal indictment accusing him of bringing young girls across state lines for sex.
In November, U.S. District Judge Harry Barnes sentenced Alamo to 175 years in federal prison.
Alamo was held in a downtown jail in Texarkana until a restitution hearing could be conducted concerning Alamo’s liability to the five Jane Does named in Alamo’s indictment.
During Alamo’s trial, one of the Jane Does testified Alamo exchanged wedding vows with her in the visitation area of the Federal Correctional Institution in Texarkana while he was serving time for tax evasion in the 1990s. The Jane Doe said other “wives” would bow their heads as if in prayer to shield Alamo from the view of guards and cameras while Alamo fondled her.
In the last few days of January, federal marshals moved the convicted Alamo from the county jail where he had been held for more than a year to a federal transfer facility in Oklahoma.
Officials with the Bureau of Prisons media relations office didn’t return calls Thursday and the public information officer at the Tucson penitentiary was unavailable for comment.
Whether Alamo will permanently remain in Tucson or if his stay there is just a stop on his way to another unit isn’t known at this time.
Concerns that Alamo, 75, will continue to control the followers who’ve remained loyal to him from within the confines of prison led a state judge to terminate the parental rights of seven members of Tony Alamo Christian Ministries members last month.
Another factor was the reluctance of devotees to find housing and employment independent of the controversial ministry.
Recordings of jailhouse conversations Alamo had while in the county jail were played at custody hearings as evidence of Alamo’s lingering grip.
The Tucson penitentiary permits an inmate to have up to 30 names on an approved visitors’ list. The maximum number of “friends and associates” allowed is 10.
Family members presumably comprise the remainder.
Prison rules define family as parents, spouses, grandparents, children, grandchildren, stepparents, cousins, siblings, aunts and uncles. In a previous ruling, a Bureau of Prisons official declined to say whether an inmate would be allowed to list multiple people as spouses.
Visitors must fill out a form, pass a background check and be approved by a prison counselor before they’re given a visit.
No more than three adults will be allowed to visit Alamo at one time, according to the Arizona facility’s visitation policies. At no facility within the Bureau of Prisons are conjugal visits allowed.
February 13th, 2010 at 6:30 am
I would say that s.o.b has more than a ‘lingering grip’ on the followers. More like a ‘death grip.’ Those poor, poor children; they are probably thinking their mom and dad don’t love them anymore..