By Dean Seal

Law360 (April 27, 2020, 8:39 PM EDT) -- A Manhattan federal judge, seemingly frustrated with the U.S. Department of Justice's "ever-changing guidelines" to the Bureau of Prisons, has ordered the immediate release of a convicted fraudster with a high risk of contracting COVID-19 in the Connecticut prison that has yet to transfer her to home confinement as promised.

U.S. District Judge Ronnie Abrams said Friday the DOJ's shifting guidance to the BOP regarding home confinement and compassionate release has eroded her confidence that admitted commodities fraudster Haena Park will be released on April 30 as scheduled.

At the judge's urging, the immunocompromised Park was originally scheduled for a transfer to home confinement by April 10 at the latest, but the BOP blamed a "change to the relevant guidelines" when it had to explain to Judge Abrams on April 23 why Park's release had been delayed to April 30.

Saying she "cannot be assured that Ms. Park will indeed be released on April 30," the judge granted her compassionate release, effective immediately.

"The court will not allow Ms. Park to be endangered for one more day," Judge Abrams said. "We are living in novel and dangerous times. Every day — indeed, every minute — may count, particularly for someone like Ms. Park who is at a high risk from COVID-19 and currently lives in a facility with a documented outbreak and limited means of protection."

Park was serving a three-year prison sentence after pleading guilty in January 2017 to commodities fraud. The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission filed a civil suit against her and her companies around the time of her arrest a year earlier, alleging she'd sustained heavy losses while trading in foreign currencies and futures but covered them up by fabricating performance data and earnings statements.

The Harvard-educated investment fund manager worked at Goldman Sachs before founding her own firms in 2010, and by the time her fraudulent activity was discovered six years later, she had lost 99% of the nearly $23.2 million invested through her firms and withdrawn $1.74 million of the pooled funds to pay her own salary.

Judge Abrams was lenient with Park when she sentenced her to just three years in prison in July 2017 instead of the nine- to 10-year sentence called for by relevant guidelines, citing Park's remorse, health issues and pregnancy. She also ordered Park to pay nearly $23 million in restitution.

On April 2, Park filed an emergency motion for compassionate release in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, as she suffers from diseases that compromise her immune system and was housed in a Connecticut correctional facility with especially high levels of COVID-19 infection.

As of Friday, the facility in Danbury has seen 32 staff members and 15 inmates test positive for the novel coronavirus, with one death.

Judge Abrams initially urged the BOP to resolve an internal release request from Park by no later than April 10, but while the prisons department approved her for a transfer to home confinement, Park's counsel informed the judge on April 22 that the BOP had yet to set a release date.

The judge then asked prosecutors to submit an affidavit from the facility's warden "explaining why [the BOP] is refusing to transfer Ms. Park to home confinement," to which the BOP responded the next day that her transfer had been delayed because of changes to relevant guidelines, with a new release date set for April 30.

That led Judge Abrams to take the matter into her own hands. She said Friday her preferred course of action would be to grant Park temporary release from the Danbury facility during the pandemic and have her return to finish her sentence "once the danger from COVID-19 had subsided."

But the authority to grant that kind of temporary release lies "solely in the BOP's hands," the judge said, leaving her with only two options: Either have Park stay in the prison for another week, hoping the BOP makes good on its promise of an April 30 release, or grant her compassionate release immediately.

"The court fears that leaving Ms. Park any longer at FCI Danbury may convert a three-year prison sentence into a death sentence," Judge Abrams said. "And that the court cannot allow."

Park's prison sentence was reduced to time served and, with her consent, she has been placed on a supervised release status with home confinement until June 19 of next year, when her original incarceration would have been completed.

The DOJ declined to comment Monday.

Counsel for Park did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday.

The government is represented by Christine I. Magdo of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York.

Park is represented by Julia L. Gatto of the Federal Defenders of New York.

The case is U.S. v. Park, case number 1:16-cr-00473, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

--Editing by Janice Carter Brown.

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