Viktor Bout: Conditions in US Prisons Horrid Despite Extensive Funding

Conditions in US prisons fail to meet the extensive financing of almost a million dollars per inmate per year, Russian national Viktor Bout convicted in the United States for selling weapons to US agents, said.

BANGKOK (Sputnik) — Bout was arrested in Bangkok in 2008 in an operation by Thai and US authorities, accusing him of conspiring to kill US soldiers by supplying Colombian militants with weapons. He was convicted by a US court in 2011 and sentenced to 25 years in prison.

"According to the US Congress data, our custody in the special conditions of the communication control unit costs the US budget $981,000 per inmate per year, while in the general regime prisons this figure equals $34,000 a year," Bout told RIA Novosti in an interview.

He added that with such financing, the US authorities could be providing inmates with better conditions, including food. According to Bout, US still fails to investigate the imbalance in prisons funding.