The prison camp where former Westar chief executive officer David Wittig has requested to serve his sentence is a far cry from the lavish accommodations he once enjoyed.

“It’s a steel bunk that’s bolted to the floor with a steel desk bolted to the wall,” said John Colautti, public information officer for the Federal Medical Center in Ayers, Mass., describing the cubicle-like rooms that inmates share with a roommate. “There’s nothing extravagant.”

The prison consists of a 100-person medical unit reserved for inmates with special medical needs and a 124-person minimum-security work camp. Inmates at the work camp typically do groundskeeping jobs such as cutting grass and shoveling snow.

“The camp provides us with the labor force to maintain the outer areas of the grounds,” Colautti said. “There’s also labor to augment the essential running of the camp itself – whether it be food service work or cleaning up the common areas or the bathroom areas.”

He said inmates – many of whom are nonviolent drug offenders – typically work seven hours per day, five days per week. They have a morning inspection at 7:30 a.m. and are expected to be in bed at 11 p.m.

Having a background as a CEO won’t make a difference in an inmate’s classification, Colautti said.

“There’s no preferential treatment for individuals with, say, a higher education, nor is there preferential treatment for the kind of crime,” he said. “The work assignments are based on institutional needs. If there’s a need for five cooks and we have four, we’re going to look to fill that slot.”

Wittig asked that U.S. District Court Judge Julie Robinson recommend that he be sent to the prison, saying he was well-suited for minimum security and that it would allow him to be close to his family. But the actual determination about where an inmate goes is made by the Federal Bureau of Prisons after sentencing, based on factors including the available bed space.

“There’s no guarantee where an offender is going to be placed,” Colautti said.