Local Woman Breaks Into Prisons Online.

Business/Technology Editors

QUINCY, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 7, 2000

Most people's natural instinct is to avoid jail. But Laura Noonan has turned "going to prison" into an unusual and profitable enterprise. In what is considered to be a largely male-dominated and isolated industry, the business of prisons and jails is worth $45 billion a year, and one local lady has cornered the online market.

While others pursued venture capital in mainstream markets, Noonan's company financed over one million dollars to take control of corrections online. Today, Corrections.com holds exclusive partnerships with 30 of the industry's lead organizations, including the American Correctional Association and American Jail Association. After webcasting The White House Conference on School Safety, Corrections.com also established alliances with the U.S. Departments of Justice and Education.

What's more, it's profitable, and a textbook example of a vertical monopoly in one of the fastest growing industries. As for traffic, this b-to-b portal receives nearly 4 million hits per month (1 million page views per month) and boasts over 200 advertisers, including Aramark, Bell Atlantic, Bell South, Corrections Corporation of America (CCX), Gateway and Western Union. But most noteworthy is how Noonan in 1996, at the age of 24, gained the industry's trust to such an extent that organizations with a 30 year-old competitive history joined together under one domain.

"We have done more than just build a website, we've built a home for the industry," says Noonan, "and we've done it using a grassroots approach where we actually meet many of our browsers in person."

Noonan, recently asked to be part of the 6-person U.S. delegation for the United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders in Vienna, Austria, says she loves visiting prisons and working with practitioners. "I have been inside hundreds of facilities, and the issues are so powerful," remarks Noonan, who last year met with South African prison officials as part of the U.S. Ambassador Program. "From geriatrics and infectious diseases to juveniles, education and capital punishment, corrections is a fascinating microcosm of the free world." Corrections.com, also known as The Corrections Connection(R), provides a forum to discuss these issues.

Noonan, former Public Information Assistant for the Norfolk County Sheriff's Office (Massachusetts), has worked in corrections for 10 years. She received a J.D., Northeastern University, an MS in broadcast journalism, Boston University, and a B.A. in sociology, Brandeis University.