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TRUMP APPOINTS NEW BOP DIRECTOR
The Federal Bureau of Prisons has been rudderless since January 20th, when then-director Colette Peters was unceremoniously shown the door by the incoming Trump Administration. Last week, Trump announced that he was appointing William “Billy” Marshall III, commissioner of the West Virginia Division of Corrections and Rehabilitation, as the latest BOP Director.
Trump said on social media that “Billy is a Strong Advocate for LAW AND ORDER. He understands the struggles of our prisons better than anyone, and will help fix our broken Criminal Justice System. Congratulations Billy, you will inspire us all!”
Marshall, a Marshall University and the West Virginia State Police Academy graduate, served 25 years with WVSP before retiring in 2017. He then served as the Criminal Investigation Director for the state Dept of Military Affairs and Public Safety. He became head of the state prison system in 2023.
Walter Pavlo wrote in Forbes that Marshall is “someone who is going to be tough on crime. However, he is going to head an organization that is substantially larger than the approximately 6,000 state prisoners in West Virginia… There are federal prison compounds that hold more inmates than all of the state of West Virginia.” Nearly 9,000 federal prisoners are held in BOP facilities located in West Virginia.
“WV regional jails have come under scrutiny for squalid conditions, excessive use of force and record numbers of deaths,” the Los Angeles Times reported. “They were the target of several civil rights suits, including one filed in 2022 that alleged the jail had broken toilets infested with maggots, 70 people sharing a single shower, and people being forced to sleep on ‘cold, wet floors in the winter without heat’.”
Marshall accused inmates of “ma[king] up claims of inhumane treatment and [telling] relatives to spread them,” television station WCHS reported in 2023.
Lydia Milnes, an attorney who has sued the WV DCR several times, told the Times, “I’m concerned that he comes from a past where the culture is to use force to gain control as opposed to considering less violent alternatives. He has continued to foster a culture of using excessive force.”
A separate suit, which the corrections department settled in 2022, alleged widespread failures of the jails’ medical and mental health care.
Forbes, Trump Announces New Director of the Bureau of Prisons (April 11, 2025)
Los Angeles Times, Trump’s new director of federal prison system led a troubled state agency (April 12, 2025)
– Thomas L. Root