Youth Counselor Declared Brain-Dead After Juvenile Inmate Assault

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A counselor at Wisconsin’s troubled youth prison has been declared brain-dead following a fight with an inmate, the county coroner said Wednesday, less than three weeks after prosecutors filed criminal charges against a warden and multiple staffers in connection with two maximum security inmates’ deaths.

Corey Proulx, 49, was declared brain-dead Tuesday so the family could proceed with organ donation, Lincoln County Coroner Valerie Caylor said.

State Rep. Michael Schraa, chair of the Assembly’s corrections committee, issued a statement Wednesday questioning whether the Department of Corrections is operating in “crisis mode.” He promised to to hold a hearing on the agency’s overall operations “as quickly as possible.”

“We have a deceased staff member, nine DOC employees facing criminal charges, and four deceased inmates,” Schraa said, adding later in the statement: “Lives need to be protected.”

Proulx was injured during a fight Monday night at Lincoln Hills-Copper Lake Schools, the state’s youth prison in Irma in northern Wisconsin. Department of Corrections spokesperson Beth Hardtke said a 16-year-old inmate assaulted a staff member in a residence hall and then attacked Proulx.

The first staff member was taken to a hospital, treated and released but Proulx’s head struck concrete during the altercation, Department of Corrections officials said in a statement. The inmate did not suffer any injuries that required medical treatment.

Multiple agencies, including the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Department, the Wisconsin Department of Criminal Investigation and the Wisconsin State Patrol are investigating the fight.

Gov. Tony Evers ordered U.S. and Wisconsin flags to fly at half-staff through sunset Thursday to honor Proulx.

“By all accounts, Corey was a dedicated public servant who led with kindness and compassion in his commitment toward helping and supporting the youth he worked with,” the governor said in statement.

Corrections officials said in their statement that Proulx returned to his job as a counselor at Lincoln Hills last spring after briefly leaving the facility two years before.

“A career in corrections, with its dual mission to protect the public and guide individuals toward rehabilitation, can be demanding and requires so many sacrifices for our staff and our families, and Corey made the ultimate sacrifice,” DOC Secretary Jared Hoy said in a statement. “Our DOC family is mourning Corey’s loss, and we are keeping all of his family members and friends in our thoughts.”

Lincoln Hills-Copper Lake is Wisconsin’s only youth prison. The facility has been plagued by allegations of staff-on-inmate abuse, including excessive use of pepper spray, restraints and strip searches. A court-appointed monitor is currently overseeing the facility.

The death comes a little more than two weeks after prosecutors charged Waupun Correctional Institution Warden Randall Hepp and eight members of his staff with various felonies, including misconduct and inmate abuse, in connection with two inmates’ deaths at the maximum security facility since last year. One of the inmates died of a stroke and the other died of dehydration, according to court documents. Prosecutors allege Hepp and the workers failed to care for them.

Two other inmates have died at Waupun over the last year. One killed himself and the other died of a drug overdose. No one has been charged in those deaths but federal investigators are probing a suspected smuggling ring at the prison.

The state prison system also has been grappling with a chronic shortage of guards. The vacancy rate at Lincoln Hills-Copper Lake stood around 12% during the first two weeks of June, according to the most recent data on the DOC’s website.

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