Most prisoners stay around two years and had been sent to Rivers because they violated parole conditions and/or committed drug offenses.

"[3] In 2009 Philip Fornaci, the director of the DC Prisoners' Project, described the medical care at Rivers as "abysmal".

[6] In August 2016, Justice Department officials announced that the FBOP would be phasing out its use of contracted facilities, because private prisons provided less safe and less effective services with no substantial cost savings.

The agency had expected to allow current contracts on its thirteen remaining private facilities to expire.

[7] However, Attorney General Jeff Sessions criticized the August 2016 decision and reversed it on February 22, 2017.