Wealthy convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, 66, just days after a federal judge ordered that he remain in jail ahead of his child sex-trafficking trial, had himself a little incident. Whether this was a suicide attempt or an attack by a fellow inmate remains unclear at the time of this writing, but an ex-con about to release a memoir has decided to opine in the New York Daily News that Epstein is “what’s known as a rapo to his future fellow convicts,” and he can expect to be a prime target behind bars.
The prison slang, which has elsewhere been written as rape-o, apparently refers to a person who is incarcerated due to sex crimes. Daniel Genis wrote that he did a decade’s worth of prison time for robberies and “must have met thousands of rapos.”
Genis said that he quickly found out that “rapos” are considered, among fellow inmates and prison guards, the lowest of the low, which often leads to extreme violence against them.
“[Rapos I spoke to] confirmed what I’d heard about the lives of rapos. Sex offenders were treated neutrally until their crimes were revealed, often by guards bending the rules. This led to extortion attempts, financial demands, humiliation, violence and the threat of rape,” he wrote. “Most sex between prisoners is consensual these days, but if anyone gets raped inside, it’s a rapo.”
Genis opined that, if Epstein ends up getting convicted, there’s one thing that may spare him from the violence often inflicted on inmates like him: “Epstein is the richest rapo ever seen.”
The ex-con suggested that while it “may be prison code to hate rapos and persecute them [….] a thousand dollars a month will buy off even the most determined ideological enemy inside.”
A few years ago, you may recall, former Subway spokesman Jared Fogle was roughed up in prison and called a “Chomo.” Fogle was convicted in 2015 for traveling to engage in illicit sexual conduct with a minor and for distribution and receipt of child pornography. The inmate who did it got a lot of fan mail for it.
Prison violence, however, is not limited to individuals who have committed sex offenses.
Jason Van Dyke, the ex-Chicago cop who murdered Laquan McDonald, was assaulted in prison shortly after he was sentenced to prison earlier this year.
Months later, infamous Boston mobster James “Whitey” Bulger was whacked in brutal fashion behind bars. The death certificate confirmed that Bulger was bludgeoned to death with a padlock in a sock.
[Image via mugshot]
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