CORCORAN, Calif. — If Michael Jackson is acquitted of child molestation and related charges, he'll probably return home to his whimsical Neverland ranch in Santa Barbara County.
But if he is convicted of any of the 10 felony counts against him, he will probably land in the most secure prison unit in California, designed to protect famous convicts from attack by other inmates, prison officials say.
Corcoran State Prison is set in the middle of America's richest cotton fields, about 50 miles south of Fresno.
Its Protective Housing Unit is considered the safest place for an inmate in the California prison system, and therefore the home for mass murderers such as Charles Manson and Juan Corona -- and any inmate whose notoriety would make him a trophy for other inmates, Corrections Department spokeswoman Terry Thornton said.
The special housing unit at Corcoran is a strange prison within a prison, where some of the nation's most infamous criminals and gang turncoats rub elbows, play board games and devise elaborate legal strategies they hope can one day set them free.
Those who were once fearsome criminals, however, are largely defanged inside this weird setting known as the PHU, opened in 1992. Although former guards and inmates assigned to the unit agree it is safe, they say it requires a high degree of wariness and guile to survive.
Counting Manson and Corona, 20 inmates are living in the unit at the far rear of the sprawling facility, surrounded by miles of San Joaquin Valley farmland.
Sirhan B. Sirhan, who assassinated Sen. Robert F. Kennedy in 1968 and was one of the first inmates placed in the unit, spent years playing chess and working as an administrative clerk for 13 cents an hour.
Last year, after an infraction, he was moved to a segregated housing unit within the Kings County prison.
"Inmates in the PHU basically can't live on any other yard in the state," Thornton said. "It is the only true protective housing unit.... It is the highest protection we offer."
California prison regulations set several basic requirements for eligibility for the special unit, Thornton noted: "The inmate has notoriety likely to result in great bodily harm to the inmate if placed in the general [prison] population," and "There is no alternative placement, which can ensure the inmate's safety and provide the degree of control required for the inmate."
