## JAMES PATTERSON

Some wait a year before making their way to the courthouse, their date with the public defender, and an appearance before the judge. Some get out much sooner, if only they can make bail. But there's no bail without money—or at least collateral—and, of course, being without money is often what lands people in jail in the first place.

Jeffrey Epstein could have posted bail for every single inmate in the Gun Club.

But that's just one of the ways in which Epstein is unlike his fellow inmates. He's an admitted pedophile now. Even a famous one.

And, famously, pedophiles tend to fare poorly in jail.

Luckily for Epstein, Ric Bradshaw, the sheriff in charge of local jails, transfers Epstein to the infirmary, where he spends exactly one night before being transferred seven miles up the road to a much smaller, safer location: the Palm Beach County Central Detention Center-or, as it's known, the Stockade.

"It's not somewhere we'd put a serial killer," Ric Bradshaw y says.

Most of the residents here are addicts who take part in drug education programs, prostitutes, petty criminals, and drunks. It's a far safer place for Epstein to be, and, unlike other inmates (except, of course, those being held in solitary), he'll end up with his own cell, even his own wing, which he has to himself. Epstein's allowed to pay for a security guard, who sits outside the cell and keeps watch. And he's allowed any number of visitors.

For a convicted felon, it's an extraordinary benefits package. But according to Sheriff Bradshaw, who also oversees the Stock- ade, Epstein is incredulous over the treatment he is receiving.

"He was astonished that he had to go to prison at all," Brad- shaw remembers.

"Let's just say he didn't think he belonged there."

## Sheriff Ric Bradshaw: June

ur job," says Ric Brads
killed him."
Sheriff Bradshaw co
Western. Imposingly tall, with
mustache, and slow, southern
old-school law officer-the ki
patrolling the streets of Tombst
He's been a lawman for forty-fc
been spent as the head of the co
talk to the media, and today, as
he's clearly uncomfortable, fidget
But here in his wood-panele
Gun Club, Bradshaw remembers
"We have a thousand sexua
says. "When he arrived here, he

200

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{"people":["james patterson","jeffrey epstein","ric bradshaw"]}