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FROM SAM BANKMAN-FRIED’S fraud-ridden crypto empire to Elizabeth Holmes’ sham biotech company to deepfakers on the internet bilking grandmas of their retirement savings, white-collar crime seems to touch every last corner of tech. For the business titan who may one day end up in custody and can’t count on a presidential pardon, it never hurts to know a guy.
WIRED spoke with a self-described former “troubleshooter for the mafia” who was incarcerated in US penitentiaries for a decade and found a new role for himself on the outside: He became a prison consultant. Now he works with an array of white-collar offenders. He berates and curses the ears off his clients—but it’s all part of the no-bullshit approach he says he uses to help them reduce and optimize their time inside.
ONCE WHEN I was in prison and we were walking out of the dining hall, I stopped and I looked out the window. I said, “Do you see it?” And the other inmates are like, “What?” I go, “It’s right there.” And they’re stopping and gazing into the sky. Then more people come out of the dining hall and start looking too, and before you know it, so do the correctional officers. Finally, I said: “Gee, see how easy it is to take control of stupid people?”
