By Maxine Bernstein
oregonlive.com
PORTLAND, Ore. — A Marion County grand jury report this week highlighted “cascading failures” at Oregon’s largest youth prison, including contraband getting into the facility, unaddressed gang-related violence and insufficient staff or training to address the problems.
While MacLaren Youth Correctional Facility is a youth prison, 60% of its current population is 18 or older, and the prison often is unable to meet the significant mental health needs of those held at the Woodburn campus, the report said.
“This grand jury believes that MacLaren is struggling, in part, because being asked to fill so many roles has resulted in an inability to fulfill any of them well,” the report said.
Marion County District Attorney Paige Clarkson convened the grand jury in June to investigate the conditions and management of MacLaren in the wake of sexual abuse claims by men incarcerated there as youth and a backlog of complaints that went unaddressed.
The report described contraband entering the Woodburn prison as “out of control,” the result of inadequate supervision of youth phone calls, lack of screening or monitoring of visitors, and staff shortages.
Contraband found inside the prison included tobacco products, vapes, marijuana and other drugs, improvised weapons, cell phones and cash.
Improvised weapons have included sharpened pieces of metal, wood or plastic, according to the report.
On multiple occasions, outsiders have lobbed contraband-loaded objects, such as tennis balls or footballs, over the single chain-link fence along the prison’s perimeter. Youth have retrieved the tossed objects, the report said.
MacLaren has no barbed or razor wire fencing. Additional fencing was considered to improve safety, the report said, but funding for the work was not provided.
The report recommended the use of body scanners for youth, visitors and staff, patrols with drug-sniffing dogs and the recording of youth calls. It also suggested either raising the height of the outer fence or adding additional barriers to restrict access to MacLaren’s property.
The report also highlighted frequent staff turnover that has left those who remain working to cover additional shifts under mandatory overtime that’s led to burn-out. About half of all MacLaren staff have less than five years of experience, the report said. This month, there were 154 teens and young men at MacLaren with 307 staff, the report said.
And the teens now sent to MacLaren have fewer incentives than past populations at MacLaren to comply with rules because their sentences are shorter, “adding to the volatility for both youth and staff,” the report said.
The grand jury blamed a series of significant legislative changes made to Oregon’s juvenile justice system in 2019 that ended a decades-old practice of automatically sending youths accused of serious crimes to adult court.
The changes also gave juveniles convicted of Measure 11 crimes, which mandate minimum prison terms for serious offenses, the opportunity for a so-called “second look” hearing half-way through their sentences, allowing judges to consider allowing young offenders to serve the rest of their sentences under community-based supervision instead of prison.
Youth sentenced to MacLaren may remain there until their 25th birthday before they can be transferred to an adult prison to finish out a prison term. The Oregon Department of Corrections also may transfer an adult to MacLaren if the adult was sentenced to prison before turning 20 and if their offense was committed when they were younger than 18.
While the overall youth population at MacLaren has dropped, the number of encounters resulting in injuries to staff and requiring a safety intervention have remained relatively steady or risen, the report said.
The grand jury called for stronger discipline and sanctions for the youth involved in assaults or other misconduct at the Woodburn prison. Jurors questioned the prison’s “developmental model,” in which consequences are typically limited to temporarily removing a teen from a housing unit as a sort of “time out” until they are stabilized and can regulate their emotions and return.
Officials from the Oregon Youth Authority , the state agency that oversees MacLaren, told the grand jury that staff do not track whether assaults or fights are gang-related, nor provide any treatment program that specifically addresses gang activity, which the grand jury found “concerning and contrary to the safety of the institution.” While prison officials reported there are programs that address youth anger, aggression and regulation of emotions by emphasizing positive social and emotional skills, the grand jury found that insufficient.
The report also highlighted the problem of sexual abuse of youth in custody, noting that multiple complaints of sexual abuse and misconduct were part of the extensive backlog of unaddressed complaints made to the Professional Standards Office, the unit within the Oregon Youth Authority responsible for the investigation of complaints.
Records showed the former chief investigator, Raymond Byrd , had failed to review and sign off on an estimated 3,000 complaints dating to 2018. Investigations into another 733 cases had not been completed, records showed. The chief investigator abruptly resigned and Gov. Tina Kotek subsequently fired the longtime youth authority director Joe O’Leary, as the scale of the backlog came into public view.
More than 70 people have now alleged in pending federal lawsuits that they were abused by a former doctor who worked in the medical clinic of MacLaren for more than 40 years. The doctor died in February.
“The issue of sexual abuse in a closed custody facility is expansive in scope and complexity. It needs further and deeper investigation than this grand jury can meaningfully address,” the report said. “However, to ensure the safety of youth in MacLaren, allegations of sexual abuse must be promptly and thoroughly investigated, and resolved in a timely manner.”
The grand jury issued a host of recommendations and also called for an independent audit to determine the effectiveness of MacLaren’s current rehabilitation programming for youth.
In response, MacLaren’s superintendent Troy Britting last month laid out in a written memo the work already underway to improve security with metal detectors at the entrance gate, reinforced perimeter fencing, periodic deployment of drug-sniffing dogs to detect and deter contraband, and increased mediation, conflict resolution programs and mentors for youth.
MacLaren also has improved its work with Oregon State Police , the agency responsible for investigating serious crimes inside MacLaren, according to Britting, who was named superintendent about two weeks before the grand jury began its investigation. That’s led to more timely investigations, he said. In 2024, the state police received 218 referrals for investigations stemming from complaints at MacLaren, representing 64% of all Oregon Youth Authority investigations.
The youth prison plans to form a new gang intervention team. It also will provide more long-term violence prevention programming in its “safety intervention unit,” a rebranded isolation unit that holds teens or young men in danger of hurting themselves or others. The unit operates in the Rockaway building, recently renovated to offer more light and open spaces.
“I appreciate the grand jury’s attention to these issues and your commitment to oversight. The work ahead is substantial, but I believe we are on the right path. With continued support, transparency, and accountability, I am confident that MacLaren can become a safer, more stable, and more effective environment for the youth we serve,” Britting’s memo said.
Oregon Youth Authority “embraces transparency as the cornerstone of public confidence. We were grateful for the opportunity to support Marion County’s grand jury process, and we thank the jurors and staff for their work,” said Will Howell , the agency’s spokesperson. “The report confirms our internal assessments, and the public can have full confidence that work is well underway to address the concerns within OYA’s control and budget.”
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