Report: Hennepin County Juvenile Detention Center used unwarranted seclusion amid staffing shortage

The Hennepin County Juvenile Detention Center (JDC) has resorted to the unwarranted seclusion of minors and the use of restrictive disciplinary techniques to compensate for staff shortages, according to a state inspection report released last week.

The annual audit found a series of rights violations affecting troubled teens housed in the downtown Minneapolis facility as they await trial or placement in a secure residential treatment center, including frequent isolation and improper wellness checks.

A widespread review of video footage, personnel reports and inspector observations discovered that the JDC locked children in their rooms for long stretches, canceling recreation time and outreach programming, because of staffing shortages rather than behavioral issues. The inspection revealed multiple occasions when teens were confined without cause, even when several correctional officers were sitting in a nearby office.

If minors filed a formal grievance about that treatment, their complaints often went unanswered. One in four were not responded to within the required five-day window — a repeated rule violation by the JDC that has only worsened since their previous inspection last fall.

The report confirms longstanding allegations by attorneys and their young clients, who have testified in court hearings about how bleak conditions inside the detention facility damaged their mental and physical health. Some reported languishing in their cells for up to 16 hours a day, barring them from parental visitation or phone calls.

“The JDC is not a rehabilitative or therapeutic environment, so you already have kids under an enormous amount of stress,” said public defender Tracy Reid. “They’re not getting appropriate psychological care that a person would need to endure those conditions. So we’re seeing increased violence by the children.”

For months, Reid has sought records outlining how often youths were being locked in their cells and for what length of time. Eventually, she obtained a court order, which acknowledges that the JDC does not specifically track that information. But over a seven-week period, the document noted, there were only five days where programming wasn’t modified for the entire building.

“If the staffing shortage is this bad, they need to treat it as an emergency to fix it,” Reid said, accusing the facility of confining children for “egregiously long periods of time” simply for the convenience of the adults tasked with their care.

The Minnesota Department of Corrections ordered the JDC to implement a plan for achieving compliance, including ensuring proper supervision for teens and adequate recreation time outside of their rooms, by Thursday.

Hennepin County, which owns and operates the facility, released a statement Tuesday saying that they have already begun taking corrective actions.

“Our staffing challenges are not dissimilar to other correctional facilities and law enforcement agencies, and we have made a concerted effort to address them,” said Mary Ellen Heng, acting director of the county’s Department of Community Corrections and Rehabilitation. “We have made good progress in our hiring, onboarding, and training of staff. We are interviewing 20 more [juvenile correctional officer] applicants next week.”

The county employs 69 full-time officers to staff the JDC, yet only 53 remain active.

Although state licensing requires the facility to maintain a 1-to-12 ratio of staff to minors, the JDC upholds a 1-8 ratio for compliance with the Prison Rape Elimination Act, a county spokeswoman confirmed.

The three-story juvenile detention center is part of a larger $13 million complex on Park Avenue between S. 5th and 6th streets in downtown Minneapolis that includes juvenile courts and offices. It has capacity for 87 beds; only 27 teens are currently housed there.

Many are children with complex mental health needs, accused of crimes and awaiting proceedings within the juvenile justice system. Others have already been ruled incompetent to stand trial, but remain stuck in limbo — despite a state law that forbids warehousing a nondelinquent youth there for more than 24 hours.

“The inspection report documents concerning conditions affecting youth held there,” said Sarah Davis, director of the Children and Families Division within the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office. “We are working collaboratively with our partners at the JDC to gain a deeper understanding of the issues and to quickly address them.”

The public rebuke comes just two weeks after the state ordered that the Hennepin County jail reduce its inmate population by 239 people — or roughly 20% — because of inadequate staffing and lax wellness checks. Seven inmates have died while in custody of the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office, which runs the jail, since September 2022.

Sheriff Dawanna Witt was granted an extension to decrease those numbers after missing the deadline last month, even as she sought an administrative appeal against the state mandate.

The Hennepin County Board on Tuesday reluctantly agreed to spend $5.4 million over the next six months to house inmates in seven other counties. Hundreds have already been shipped out, lowering the jail’s overall population to roughly 555.