Michael Cohenâ€™s Jewish Prison in New York Doesnâ€™t Sound Half Bad

Flip_flop_politics
Published on Oct 30, 2021
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/22/nyregion/michael-cohen-otisville-prison.html
Larry Noodles figures Michael Cohen will be OK at Otisville. Thatâ€™s the federal prison where Donald Trumpâ€™s former lawyer and fixer just started his three-year sentence for tax evasion and campaign finance violations. And Larry â€” real last name: Dressler â€” probably knows more about Otisville than anyone.

The Otisville Federal Correctional Institute, located about 80 miles north of midtown Manhattan in the Catskill Mountains, has a particular distinction: Itâ€™s got the largest population of white-collar Jewish criminals of any federal prison. Dressler did 18 months there for mortgage fraud, kept a diary every day of his stay, and still runs a gossip blog about the prison under his prison nickname, Larry Noodles (he smuggled in pasta from the warehouse where he worked).

To hear him tell it, the place isnâ€™t half bad for Jewish inmates like him and Cohen: Thereâ€™s Shabbat services, monthly trips to a Mikvah bath, and Kosher commissary options like gefilte fish and rugelach.

"I think with Michael Cohen... well, according to the inmate code, youâ€™re not allowed to give advice to someone who is quote-unquote a rat. But I donâ€™t think they would give him too hard of a time. Because they know he is high-profile," Dressler said.

VICE News interviewed the former Otisville inmate about what Cohen can expect at this special upstate slammer.

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