Can venture capital solve prisoner recidivism? Catherine Rohr believes it can — so much so that she ditched her job at a top private-equity firm to foster the capitalist portion of the criminal mind

As is often the case when there’s money to be allocated, the 48 entrepreneurs in plastic chairs under fluorescent lights on a cool September evening in College Station, Texas, sit with nervous attention. The following night, some 50 venture capitalists and other prominent corporate rainmakers from across the state will travel here — a reverse road show, if you will — to listen to these business pitches and perhaps fund the best.

All four dozen of these nascent capitalists — ranging in age from 22 to 47 — are male, but the person commanding all the attention is a 30-year-old woman named Catherine Rohr. A former VC and private-equity professional herself, Rohr can anticipate tomorrow’s questions and is here to critique a few of the pitches, a dress rehearsal for the kind of business-plan competition that can change lives.

Four of the entrepreneurs pitch their ideas. One, Jeremy Drake, a bald man in his mid-forties, has an idea for a moving company. “Eighty percent of my business is gonna be targeted at residential, of course,” he says, “but I’m not going to rule out the commercial business.” Another, Pablo Juarez, describes a mobile car-washing service. “Our marketing strategy is to go out and directly introduce Performance Mobile Power Wash to potential customers at their homes or places of business.” Still another, Gregory Phillips, describes a niche play stemming from his woodworking expertise. “I would like to introduce to you my business, which is called Chess King Custom Chessboards.”

As rough as these pitches start, they were all eagerly written, with marketing strategies and financial summaries to accompany the entrepreneurs’ innate street smarts. In time, with a little more polish, a few might be good enough to draw startup cash and a backer comfortable with the risk/reward.

But if backing startups, by definition, is inherently risky, then backing this particular group is a true leap of faith. These budding entrepreneurs, by and large, have more experience with capital crimes than venture capital. They’re all felons, murderers included, who have called the Texas prison system home for as little as 18 months or as long as 30 years — and they’re all about to be set free. Drake committed burglary. Juarez is in for cocaine possession. Phillips, aggravated robbery.

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