Menard Correctional Center

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Menard Correctional Center is a state prison (Maximum-Security Adult Male and High Medium-Security Male), located in Menard, Illinois, with a total average daily population of 3,315 (2006). It was opened in March, 1878. Menard is the second oldest prison in Illinois and the state's largest maximum-security prison. The prison's Condemned Unit was closed in 2003 after then-Governor George Ryan granted clemency for all death row inmates.

[edit] Notable inmates

Kenneth Allen, sentenced to death (commuted to life) for the murders of Chicago police officers William Bosak and Roger van Schaik
Michael Blucker, an ex-convict who made national headlines when he sued the Illinois Department of Corrections, claiming he had contracted HIV from employee-sanctioned prison rape while under sentence for burglary at Menard
Homer Van Meter, bank robber and criminal associate of John Dillinger.

[edit] Trivia

In the 1993 movie The Fugitive, Dr. Richard Kimble (played by Harrison Ford) is sent to the prison at Menard to await execution, but escapes following a bus-train collision enroute.