Federal Detention Center, SeaTac

The Federal Detention Center, SeaTac is a prison operated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons. It is located in SeaTac, Washington, near the Seattle–Tacoma International Airport, 12mi south of downtown Seattle and 16mi north of Tacoma, 1mi west of the 200th Street exit at the Interstate 5. The administrative facility employed 200 staff as of 2002 and housed 608 male and female inmates as of March 23, 2015.BackgroundOpened in September 1997, the detention center was designed for a capacity of 1000 inmates. The facility houses sentenced inmates, both male and female, as well as pre-trial, holdover, and immigration detainees. Many are involved in federal court proceedings in the Western District of Washington.ProceduresInmates are issued a "standard bed roll" consisting of bedding and towels upon arrival. Once assigned to a unit, inmates are estimated for size, provided clothes, and issued an identification card that must be carried at all times except to and from showers.Death of Roxanna BrownRoxanna Brown, the director of the Southeast Asian Ceramics Museum, died in a cell at the detention center on May 14, 2008. She had been arrested on May 9 for alleged wire fraud upon her arrival in the United States to give a lecture at an Asian art symposium at the University of Washington. The charge was dropped immediately after her death at the facility.