Facility to Ease Prison Brutality Nears Completion

By Richard C. Widman

Staff Writer

MASSILLON Construction here of a $4-million facility expected to reduce brutality and homosexual rape of younger, weaker inmates at the Ohio Reformatory at Mansfield is nearing completion.

The first of 170 inmates to be transferred from the reformatory are to begin arriving June 9 at the sprawling brick Indian .River School being built in a cornfield two miles south of Massillon.

The decision to transfer to Indian River School those offenders from ages 16 to 21 sentenced by juvenile courts to the Mansfield Youth Center for offenses that would be felonies for adults was made at the direction of Gov. John J. Gilligan in the wake of stories in The Plain Dealer last August.

The stories detailed re ports of assaults on boys in the youth center, which is located on the reformatory's grounds, and attacks inside the reformatory walls.

The transfers to Indian River School were made possible by a decision of US. District Judge William K. Thomas in Cleveland.

Under existing law, the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction was required to accept at Mansfield those youths sentenced by juvenile courts.

The Indian River School is a facility of the Ohio Youth Commission, a separate state agency, which will operate it.

The new school is to be only a partial answer to the problem at the Mansfield facilities.

The vulnerable youths at Mansfield who were sentenced as adults will not be transferred and will continue to be prey for older, tougher inmates Younger inmates who were assaulted at Mansfield said that sometimes their attackers were bigger "streetwise" youths of the same age group who are to be transferred with them to Indian River School.

Harold T. Cowell, superintendent of Indian River School, said efforts would be made to separate aggressive inmates from vulnerable youths according to their criminal and institutional records.

There also are some problems built into Indian River School, which was designed in the style of a private boarding school for problem boys, rather than a maximum security facility for youths who have committed serious crimes.

In a recent tour of the

new school, Cowell pointed to a 16-foot fence, topped with barbed wire,being elected around the grounds. He said he had ordered open stairwells closed in with screens.

It would be too easy. Cowell explained, for inmates to attack another boy and throw him down an open stairwell.

He is not asking for changes in the construction of ceiling-high shower room walls which have only a narrow glass surveillance port which could easily become fogged or obscured with soap by an inmate planning an attack, thesuperintendent said.

Walls in shower rooms at the Mansfield facilities, scenes of assaults, were lowered after the newspaper reports.

Cowell said he would post guards at the shower rooms in his institution.

cell, except those assigned singly to a cell for protection.

Indian River School was built without bars. Each inmate is to be assigned an individual room. Doors are to be locked at night by guards.

"Separate rooms at night will eliminate a lot of trouble, and hopefully the staff can keep the rest of it down," Cowell said.

The rooms lack toilet or washing facilities.

Each room has a buzzer which the occupant may push to summon a guard if he needs to leave it during the night.

A dazzling light high on the wall near the ceiling cannot be dimmed or turned off from inside the room. The switch is in the corridor.

Although living quarters for boys in the Indian River School are spartan compared to the more comfortable cells for adult prisoners in the new maximum security prison at Lucasville, a few decorative touches soften the architectural disciplinary attitude.

The ceiling in the dining area is fitted for appearance sake with beams taken from old barns. A niche for a fireplace is built into the wall.

Cowell is counting on the staff and some first-rate programs, rather than the design of the structure, to make Indian River School a progressive facility.

Built for 192 inmates, it will have as staff of about 180, Cowell said.

The staff is to include 10 social workers, a psychologist, a full-time chaplain and a part-time chaplain, a part-time physician and a part-time dentist and at least one nurse on dtuy at all times.

Cowell said William J. Ensign, youth commission director, directed him to emphasize vocational education and related academic subjects.

The school will offer training in automobile mechanics and body repair, welding, building maintenance, masonry, food service, arts and crafts and laundry service.

The institution's high school will be accredited. It is to offer courses in language arts, the sciences, graphic arts, remedial reading and history, among others.

The school also is to offer

job-related subjects, including teaching youths how to apply for a job.

There are to be recreational programs, a varsity ical education program for basketball team and a physhigh school credit.

In the area of treatment. the school is to offer group counseling and religious programs.

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Cowell retired from the State Highway Patrol with the rank of major after 28 years service. He has served the youth commission as superintendent of the Fairfield School for Boys at Lancaster.

Cowell said he intends to meet with each new inmate as he arrives here and attempt to establish rapport.

Of his attitude toward young ofenders, Cowell remarked:

"You have to be honest with these boys. If you lie to them they won't respect you. You must be fair; you must be considerate; you must be compassionate; and you must be firm. Innates will accept a person who is firm, if he's fair.

Inmates at the Mansfield "They want to be treated Youth Center sleep in open like adults, like men," he dormitories, where attacks added. "They want their occur during the night. identity. They've lost it and Inmates inside the reforit's our job to bring it back matory walls live two to a to them."