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In a strange twist of fate, two highly successful South Asian Americans and former friends whose lives are now inextricable linked to each other by crime, find themselves living under the same roof at Devan Federal Medical Center Devens in Ayer, Mass., northwest of Boston, with 1,000 other inmates, writes Anita Raghavan in The New York Times.
Raj Rajaratnam, the Sri Lankan-origin former founder of the Galleon Group hedge fund and Rajat Gupta, former managing director of McKinsey and Co, are both being held at the minimum security prison, where they occasionally run into each other.
The two made the headlines after US District Attorney for New York district Preet Bharara, himself of Indian origin, charged them with insider trading – Rajaratnam for soliciting and using such info to make huge trades, and Gupta with providing such information in at least once instance about a potential Warren Buffett investment when he was on the board of Goldman Sachs.
Gupta, arguably one of the most-respected members of the Indian-American business community, achieved even greater public admiration as a leading global philanthropist in his post-McKinsey career, particularly through the American India Foundation that was set up in the aftermath of the Gujarat earthquake in 2001 and as chairman of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Naturally, his fall from grace when he was convicted of insider trading was a shocker for many.
In 2012, Gupta was sentenced to two years in prison on one count of conspiracy and three counts of securities fraud for sharing confidential information he learned as a board member of both Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble with Rajaratnam.
Rajaratnam was sentenced to 11 years in federal prison in 2011 after his conviction on 14 counts of conspiracy and securities fraud.
Years after their trials, both men find themselves under the same rooft with 1,000 other inmates, mostly incarcerated for white-collar crimes.
In a New York Times report, Raghavan writes that friends, a former inmate and those who have interacted extensively with the two men describe the relationship between the two as ‘awkward’. Despite living in the same prison, the two only meet occasionally in the common areas at Devens and exchange pleasantries.
David Morgan, a former inmate who served about a year and half on charges related to insurance fraud, who met both men at Devens says now when people ask Gupta about trading stocks, Gupta simply replies that he doesn’t know anything about stocks.
Tough prison conditions
When Gupta arrived in June 2014, he was assigned to Devens’s minimum security camp, which houses 135 inmates. But in April 2015, he was sent for six weeks to the Special Housing Unit, or SHU (pronounced “shoe,”), as punishment for having an unauthorized item: an extra pillow. It was the second time that Mr. Gupta was sent to ‘the hole’; the first time was for sitting during the inmate count, when he was actually tying a shoelace, Morgan claims.
Inmates in the unit are kept in near-solitary conditions. They are allowed out only for one hour of exercise a day, said Michael Santos, a former federal prisoner who is now a consultant. A light is on 24 hours a day for observation.
When inmates are moved for a visit, they must wear orange jumpsuits and are restrained in an elaborate procedure. There is a cutout door within the cell door through which inmates are also fed. The inmate is told to back step to the door, squat down, and told to put his arms behind his back; through that slot, a guard handcuffs him before opening the door.
At a disciplinary hearing in May, some of Gupta’s privileges such as visiting rights were revoked, people briefed on the situation told the NYT. When Gupta’s elder sister travelled from India to see him, he offered to serve more time if she could visit, these people said. His requests were denied, so she returned without meeting him.
‘Gupta is my friend’
Raghavan writes that when Morgan, the former inmate, arrived at the compound in October 2013, Rajaratnam, a longtime diabetic who needs dialysis, was housed in the prison’s hospital. After a stint in the camp, when Morgan returned to the main prison compound late last year, he noticed that Rajaratnam was in the same unit as he was.
Morgan said that Rajaratnam told him that he considers Gupta as his friend. But when Morgan responded: “He doesn’t consider you his friend,” Rajaratnam said, “Listen, you need to know I had an opportunity to give up Gupta and I didn’t,” the NYT report said.
However, Samidh Guha, Rajaratnam’s lawyer, said his client recalled meeting with Morgan for a few minutes. “Rajaratnam simply told Morgan that Gupta is a good man and is innocent,” Guha said.
A spokeswoman for the Devens prison declined to comment on specific inmates. Rajaratnam was recently moved back to the hospital, according to those who know him.
It’s my ‘destiny’
The report says that in prison, it is Gupta’s family that has kept him going. At the camp, he pasted family photos on the bottom panel of the bunk above him. “Hey, David, look at what we have to be grateful for,” Morgan remembered Gupta saying. “‘When I go to bed, I see them, and when I wake up, I see them.’”
Before his recent transfer to the main compound, Gupta reported daily at 5.30 am to the cafeteria, where he washed tables. He liked to take a brisk five-mile walk before the 8.40 am inmate count. After dinner at 4 pm., the two walked and talked. “Those conversations were priceless,” Morgan quoted as saying. “Where would I ever meet a guy like Rajat?”
“He is the most competitive man. Don’t let anyone tell you differently,” Morgan said of playing bridge with Gupta. “When we played cards together, we won. Whatever he does, he played to win.”
In the winter, Gupta started writing a book, Morgan said.
