Mr. Benjamin Rice began his career as a correctional attorney almost 20 years ago. He started as deputy attorney general with the State of California, where he served as lead attorney on three class action cases and assisted with several others. He was asked to join the Governor's Office of California as deputy legal affairs secretary over public safety. Mr. Rice was recruited 2 years later to become chief counsel of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation - the second largest prison system in the country at the time with 175,000 inmates, 65,000 employees, and 115 lawyers to manage. He was recruited 9 years later by a private health care company to become its chief counsel. That company eventually merged with another private health care company and is now the largest in correctional health care. Mr. Rice recently opened his own business as a correctional consultant to help counties avoid class cases and intends to work on these cases as an expert in the future.