Notorious Colorado Supermax Loses Two of Its Most Infamous Residents

The U.S. Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Facility, better known as ADX, has recently lost two of its most high-profile prisoners.

After living in the supermax outside Florence, Colorado, for more than two decades, Theodore "Ted" Kaczynski, aka the Unabomber, was transferred to a federal prison medical center in North Carolina back in 2021; he was found unresponsive in his cell early Saturday, June 10, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

Kaczynski was serving four life sentences after sending a series of homemade bombs through the mail over seventeen years, starting in 1978; after being tracked down to a cabin outside of Livingston, Montana, in 1996, he'd pleaded guilty to setting sixteen explosions that killed three people and injured 23 others.

His death is reportedly being investigated as a suicide.
Double agent Robert Hanssen, an FBI agent who spied for the Soviet Union and then the Russians, was found dead in his cell at the federal supermax prison in Florence on Monday, June 5.

Hanssen was serving fifteen consecutive life sentences for treason, according to the Bureau of Prisons; he'd pleaded guilty to the crimes over two decades ago in exchange for the death penalty being taken off the table.

The U.S. Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Facility, better known as ADX, has a deserved reputation as the highest-security supermax prison in the world. It still houses some of the most notorious and murderous prisoners in North America — from shoe bomber Richard Reid to Aryan Brotherhood leader Barry Mills and Colombian guerrilla leader Simon Trinidad — in 23-hour-a-day, escape-proof lockdown.

As detailed in Alan Prendergast's comprehensive coverage of ADX, ADX is controversial not just for what it keeps in but what it manages to keep out. Proper treatment of the mentally ill, for one thing: A massive lawsuit against the U.S. Bureau of Prisons alleges a history of abuse of delusional, self-mutilating prisoners. Journalists, for another: As Prendergast first reported in Westword a decade ago, contrary to stated BOP policy, the prison has routinely denied every reporter's request for a face-to-face interview with an ADX prisoner since 2001. Aside from one tightly supervised media tour in 2007 — when 60 Minutes ran a piece on the prison titled "A Clean Version of Hell," and a movie thriller based on Hanssen's life titled Breach was released — that practice continues. 

So do complaints about what the isolation does to prisoners, as Prendergast detailed in "At the Federal Supermax, When Does Isolation Become Torture?"

Hanssen began spying for the Soviets in 1979, three years after he joined the FBI. "On February 18, 2001, Hanssen was arrested and charged with committing espionage on behalf of Russia and the former Soviet Union. Hanssen — using the alias 'Ramon Garcia' with his Russian handlers — had provided highly classified national security information to the Russians in exchange for more than $1.4 million in cash, bank funds, and diamonds," according to the FBI history page.

On July 17, 2002, Hanssen moved into ADX, joining such notorious prisoners as Kaczynski and Terry Nichols, a co-conspirator in the Oklahoma City bombing.

“On Monday, June 5, 2023, at approximately 6:55 am, inmate Robert Hanssen was found unresponsive at the United States Penitentiary (USP) Florence ADMAX in Florence, Colorado,” according to a Bureau of Prisons release. “Responding staff immediately initiated life-saving measures. Staff requested emergency medical services (EMS) and life-saving efforts continued. Mr. Hanssen was subsequently pronounced deceased by EMS personnel."

Our original June 6 story on Robert Hanssen's death was updated on June 11, with information on the passing of Ted Kaczynski.