Judge rejects GOP call to give Wisconsin youth prison counselors more freedom to punish inmates

A federal judge has rejected Republican legislators' calls to give counselors at Wisconsin's troubled youth prison more leeway in controlling and punishing inmates after a counselor was killed during a fight at the facility this summer.

U.S. District Judge James Peterson sent a letter Tuesday to state Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Van Wanggaard and Democratic Gov. Tony Evers telling them if they want changes at Lincoln Hills-Copper Lake Schools they should file a formal legal motion and need to show current restrictions on counselors are endgangering staff and inmates.

The youth prison in northern Wisconsin has been plagued by allegations of staff-on-inmate abuse, including excessive use of pepper spray, restraints and strip searches.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit in 2017 demanding improvements at the prison. Then-Gov. Scott Walker's administration settled the case in 2018 by agreeing to a consent decree that prohibits punitive confinement, restricts confinement to 12 hours, limits the use of mechanical restraints to handcuffs and prohibits the use of pepper spray.

A group of GOP lawmakers led by Wanggaard have been pushing to relax the consent decree since counselor Corey Proulx was killed in June. According to a criminal complaint, Proulx fell and hit his head on concrete pavement after a 16-year-old male inmate punched him in the face. He was pronounced brain-dead two days later.

Wanggaard and other Republicans sent a letter on Aug. 16 to Evers, Corrections Secretary Jared Hoy and U.S. District Judge James Peterson complaining that the consent decree's restrictions have made the youth prison more dangerous for staff and inmates. The Republicans asked Hoy to ask Peterson to