Suspended NFL quarterback Michael Vick may be released from federal prison in Kansas this spring to serve the final two months of his 23-month dogfighting sentence at his home in Hampton.
The Associated Press quoted an unidentified federal official yesterday as saying that the U.S. Bureau of Prisons had cleared Vick for home confinement as early as May 21 with electronic monitoring and close supervision by a parole officer. He is scheduled to be released from federal custody July 20.
Vick's lawyers, William R. "Billy" Martin of Washington and Lawrence H. Woodward Jr. of Virginia Beach, would not confirm the report. In a statement yesterday, they said, "We understand and respect that there is a process that the [Federal] Bureau of Prisons follows, therefore it is not appropriate for us to comment at this time."
A spokeswoman for the Bureau of Prisons said her agency would not discuss any move by Vick until it took place.
Vick, 28, who grew up in Newport News, has been incarcerated at a work camp adjoining the federal prison in Leavenworth, Kan., since pleading guilty in 2007 to financing a dogfighting operation at a house he owned in rural Surry County.
Other lawyers representing him in a Chapter 11 bankruptcy case in Newport News said recently that he was on the verge of being released early into a halfway house in Newport News to finish serving his time. But the AP reported that no beds were available at the halfway house, which made home confinement an option.
Officials at Reynolds and Associates, which owns the only federally licensed halfway house in Newport News, did not return a call. The facility, Rehabilitative Services No. 2, stands in the shadow of an overpass at the intersection of Warwick and Mercury boulevards in Newport News.
Vick's attorneys and agent have said the former Pro Bowl quarterback wants to return to action in the NFL quickly, and that an early release from prison could help him prepare. Vick is under suspension without pay by the league and would need approval from NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell to play again. Goodell has said he would not consider such a request until Vick finished serving his sentence.
Vick's former team, the Atlanta Falcons, has him under contract through 2013 but has said it does not want him back. The Falcons made the playoffs last season with rookie Matt Ryan as quarterback. The Falcons said they would entertain trade offers.
Other NFL teams may consider giving a second chance to Vick, whose fluid athleticism dazzled fans. At the time of his arrest, he was the highest-paid player in the NFL, with an annual salary of more than $8 million and endorsement deals worth millions more. The sponsors abandoned him after grim details of the dogfighting operation emerged and animal-rights groups and animal lovers pilloried him.
In his Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing in July, Vick listed assets of $16 million and liabilities of more than $20 million.
The dogfighting investigation began April 25, 2007, when police searched the house Vick owned on Moonlight Road in Surry after a relative of Vick's was arrested the previous day on a drug charge in Hampton and gave the address as his place of residence.
The search for drugs and paraphernalia discovered 66 dogs, mostly pit-bull terriers, and a dogfighting complex of dark-painted buildings in the woods behind the house.
When Surry authorities did not quickly file charges, federal officials suddenly took over the investigation, launching searches of the house and property.
Vick pleaded guilty to a single interstate dogfighting conspiracy charge, and he admitted in a sworn statement that he bankrolled the dogfighting operation, witnessed some fights, and took part in the killing of dogs that failed to perform.
In December 2007, a federal judge in Richmond sentenced him to the 23-month term. Vick tried to hurry along the process by reporting early to prison and by pleading guilty to two state felony dogfighting charges in Surry, for which he received probation but no additional time behind bars.
Contact Bill Geroux at (757) 498-2820 or wgeroux@timesdispatch.com.
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