According to a press release put out by the United States Attorney’s Office (Eastern District of Michigan), a former federal prison guard is facing charges for bribery. John Jake Froehly, a 36-year-old from Newport, has been indicted by a federal grand jury on two counts of bribery.
Froehly, who was employed at the Federal Correctional Institution in Milan, Michigan, was arraigned last Monday, and was then released on an unsecured $10,000 bond. He is accused of soliciting and accepting bribes from inmates, and smuggling contraband items into the prison.
FCI Milan, the corrections facility where Froehly worked is located in Washtenaw County. It is a minimum security federal prison housing about 1,500 inmates within it’s walls.
Court records show that Froehly is accused of having accepted money from an inmate in return for smuggling items into the prison in July of 2013. He is also accused of allegedly accepting money just a few months later that same year, in return for promising to help an inmate get transferred to a lower security prison.
This alleged bribery case was investigated by the FBI
There is no information, however, regarding exactly what items Froehly is said to have smuggled into the prison, or how much money he received in return. This alleged bribery case was investigated by the FBI working in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Justice of the Inspector General .
According to court documents and the federal penal code, bribery is a felony punishable by up to 15 years in a federal prison, with fines of up to $250,000. If convicted, Froehly is facing a substantial sentence, which could be even longer if he is sentenced to consecutive sentences.
The case will be prosecuted on behalf of the United States by Assistant U.S. Attorney Frances Lee Carlson. As of yet, there is no information on which attorney Froehly has chosen to defend him.