Community Education Centers, Inc. (abbreviated CEC) was a private corrections company based in West Caldwell, New Jersey that operated residential reentry facilities, jails, and in-prison drug treatment programs in seventeen American states and Bermuda.
[6] In August 2012, officials from Mercer County, New Jersey found that 73% of randomly sampled inmates from the CEC-operated Albert M. “Bo” Robinson Assessment and Treatment Center tested positive for drugs.
Critics argued that CEC continued to receive government contracts because its senior vice president was Bill Palatucci, a close friend of then-Governor of New Jersey Chris Christie.
[12] In October 2011, CEC Correctional Officer James Allen Roach pleaded guilty to charges of smuggling tobacco and marijuana to inmates at the Liberty County, Texas facility.
[13] In January 2012, the Deputy Commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Corrections, Lydell B Sherrer, pleaded guilty to federal extortion charges for arranging jobs at the facilities in exchange for bribes.