It's a warehouse for youth. Butler's concerns have been confirmed by new internal reports recently published by the Detroit News . Michigan State Police have charged one Maxey counselor and are pursuing charges against another. The incident report filed by the FIA referred to students and staffers fighting in the halls with teachers hiding in classrooms. One news report stated several youth inmates suffered broken bones as a result of the melee.
Several investigations are under way involving sexual assaults by residents and staff members.
The State Police investigation confirmed sexual activity occurring between male students at the facility and inappropriate monitoring of male inmates in showers by female employees. Since the earlier reports were written the crisis at the center has not gone away. On March 21 the former deputy chief of security and brother of the chief of security, Dwayne Blackburn, was sentenced to 30 days in jail for assaulting a cleaning woman in a bathroom. The Maxey center is not an aberration. The penitentiary was run by a private company, the Wackenhut Corrections Corporation, the largest for-profit prison operator in the world.