The Waupun prison sits in the middle of a residential neighborhood (Photo | Wisconsin Examiner)

Former Waupun Correctional Institution (WCI) warden Randall Hepp was convicted of a misdemeanor Monday in the death of Donald Maier and fined $500 and court costs. Hepp pleaded no contest.

In June, Hepp was charged in Maier’s death. Maier’s mother sued Wisconsin Department of Corrections Secretary Jared Hoy, Hepp and others Monday, seeking compensatory and punitive damages. 

The lawsuit alleges that the defendants’ “lack of accommodation, deliberate indifference, and negligence in ignoring his rapidly and obviously deteriorating physical and mental health while he was in their care” caused Maier’s death. 

In June, the Examiner reported that Hepp and eight members of his staff had been charged with crimes related to the treatment of people incarcerated in the prison. Six staff members were charged along with Hepp in the death of Maier, who authorities said died due to dehydration and malnutrition, the Examiner reported in June. Seven incarcerated people have died at WCI since 2023, the Associated Press reported. 

A statement in a criminal complaint said Hepp didn’t oversee his staff to make sure they followed all policies/procedures. 

“Randall Hepp did not follow through the requirements of his position required by law as the staff at WCI are poorly trained on many policies and procedures regarding missed meal(s), water restrictions, medication refusals, round checks, and more,” the complaint stated. 

DA, Maier lawsuit tell different stories about Hepp

Earlier in the case, Hepp was charged with felony misconduct in public office. Penalties for a Class I felony are a fine up to $10,000 or up to three and a half years’ imprisonment, or both.

Hepp was convicted of violating law governing state or county institutions. The Class C misdemeanor comes with a fine up to $500 and up to 30 days imprisonment, or both. Hepp was not sentenced to imprisonment.

The Associated Press reported that Dodge County Circuit Court Judge Martin De Vries cited Hepp’s service record, lack of a criminal record and “‘subpar employees’” who failed to follow policy. 

Dodge County District Attorney Andrea Will lowered the charge to a misdemeanor in exchange for a no contest plea, the AP reported. Will told De Vries that she lowered the charge because Hepp was well respected within the Wisconsin Department of Corrections and didn’t know guards weren’t following policy, according to the AP. 

De Vries said the criminal charge against Hepp was “‘to some extent…symbolic,” the Post-Crescent reported. 

According to the Associated Press, Maier’s mother, Jeannette Maier, called Hepp’s sentence a “‘slap on the wrist.’” She said her son had been treated worse than a caged animal.  

“Nothing can bring my son back but I like to think we as a society would at least learn something from this tragedy so it never happens to someone else’s son,” she said in a statement, according to the AP.  

The lawsuit from Jeannette Maier alleges Hepp was aware of a “systemic lapse in enforcement” of the hunger strike and water shut-off protocols. It alleges that Hepp did not take action to attempt to make sure that the protocols were followed. 

The lawsuit also says Hepp was deliberately indifferent to a substantial risk regarding the most at-risk incarcerated people in the restricted housing unit. 

The risk, as described by the lawsuit, was that they were not receiving the level of care and supervision needed in order to afford them adequate medical and mental health evaluation and treatment and did not have humane conditions of confinement.  

This risk was created by understaffing, low morale and lack of adequate training, the lawsuit alleges. 

Sheriff supports conviction

Dodge County Sheriff Dale Schmidt released a statement on Facebook in support of the settlement and conviction. 

“I can understand why some may feel additional sanctions are warranted, but our court system must be blind to ‘feelings’ and ‘agendas’ and decisions made solely on the facts of the case,” Schmidt said. 

Schmidt said that “investigating and arresting Randall Hepp was one of the most difficult cases I have been part of, leading to some of the most difficult decisions I have had to make during my time as sheriff.” He said Gov. Tony Evers and then-Department of Corrections Secretary Kevin Carr put Hepp in a very difficult position. 

“Don’t get me wrong, he was the warden and was by law administratively responsible for Waupun Correctional Institution, and as a result, two deaths that occurred,” Schmidt said. “While we explored it, no Wisconsin or federal law directly tied back to his bosses, who failed to provide adequate resources or leadership.”

A sentencing memorandum by an attorney for Hepp said the former warden “was chosen to run Waupun because of his history of building great work environments and teams, creating positive institution culture and improving operations.” 

According to the memorandum, “Waupun Correctional was known to be the most challenging institution for correctional officers to work.”

“This institution was in complete [dysfunction], there was an extreme understaffing of uniformed positions and no goal to improve the staffing,” the memorandum stated. “There was a historically high vacancy rate that existed over a lengthy period of time that required officers to work an extremely unheard-of number of forced shifts further aggravating an already difficult situation and burning out among staff members. This situation contributed to the staff’s concerning level of apathy, distraction and a desire to transfer to other institutions.”

The memorandum said Hepp “became the primary and recurring voice” for the need to improve staffing at Waupun.

“Unfortunately, his voice was not heard,” the memorandum stated. 

“Many pieces to this puzzle” have not yet gone through the criminal justice system, Schmidt said, since cases are still being processed through the courts. 

One former Waupun employee pleaded no contest in September and was fined $250. Charges were dismissed against another, and other cases are pending, the Associated Press reported.

The Wisconsin Department of Corrections did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment on Hepp’s conviction on Tuesday afternoon.

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A seventh inmate has died at Wisconsin’s oldest prison, less than a year after the then-warden and multiple members of his staff were charged with misconduct and felony inmate abuse.

The state Department of Corrections offender website notes that 23-year-old Damien Evans died Tuesday at the Waupun Correctional Institution. The site does not offer any details. A Corrections spokesperson didn’t immediately return a message Wednesday. Dodge County Sheriff Dale Schmidt said in an email to The Associated Press that his agency is investigating Evans’ death but he had no information to share.

Online court records indicate Evans was sentenced in 2019 to seven years in prison for armed robbery and an additional two years to be served concurrently for bail jumping. Both cases were filed in Racine County.

Evans is the seventh Waupun inmate to have died in custody since June 2023. One killed himself, one died of a fentanyl overdose, one died of a stroke, and one died of dehydration and malnutrition. Another inmate, 66-year-old Jay Adkins, died in May. A sixth prisoner, 57-year-old Christopher McDonald, died in August.

The Dodge County Sheriff’s Office has said McDonald’s death appears to have been a suicide. He was sentenced to 999 years after pleading no contest to being a party to first-degree intentional homicide in 1992. Schmidt didn’t immediately respond to follow-up emails Wednesday afternoon seeking updates on the investigations into Adkins’ and McDonald’s deaths.

Prosecutors last year charged warden Randall Hepp with misconduct and eight members of his staff with felony inmate abuse in connection with the deaths of two of the prisoners, Cameron Williams and Donald Maier. Three of the eight staff members also were charged with misconduct. Hepp subsequently retired.

According to criminal complaints, Williams died of a stroke in October 2023. His body went undiscovered for at least 12 hours.

Maier died of dehydration and malnutrition. He had severe mental health problems but either refused or wasn’t given his medication in the eight days leading up to his February 2024 death.

Federal investigators also have been looking into an alleged smuggling ring involving Waupun prison employees. Gov. Tony Evers office has said the probe has resulted in the suspension of nearly a dozen employees. A former prison worker pleaded guilty in September to smuggling cellphones, tobacco and drugs into the facility in exchange for money.

Waupun inmates have filed a class-action lawsuit alleging mistreatment and a lack of health care.

The maximum-security prison was built in the 1850s. Republican and Democratic lawmakers alike have been calling for years to close it. Concerns about local job losses and the cost of building a replacement prison have stymied progress.

Evers, a Democrat, last month proposed a multitiered, $500 million plan for the state’s prisons that includes converting Waupun to a medium-security center focused on job training for inmates.

This story has been updated to correct that Evans is the seventh inmate to die at Waupun Correctional Institution since June 2023, instead of the sixth inmate, and to correct that one inmate killed himself, not two.

Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit and nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletters to get our investigative stories and Friday news roundup. This story is published in partnership with The Associated Press.

Seventh inmate dies at Wisconsin’s Waupun Correctional Institution is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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• Gov. Tony Evers is proposing a “domino series” of changes to state prisons, culminating with the closure of Green Bay Correctional Institution in 2029. The total cost would be just shy of $500 million.

• The plan calls for finishing a juvenile detention facility in Dane County in order to finally close Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake youth prisons in northern Wisconsin by 2029. The facility would be converted into an adult prison.

• Waupun Correctional Institution would be renovated; Stanley Correctional Institution would be converted into a maximum-security prison; and Sanger B. Powers Correctional Center in Brown County would add 200 beds.

• The plan also expands the number of inmates in the state’s existing earned release program by 1,000.

Gov. Tony Evers this week will propose a significant overhaul of Wisconsin’s corrections system, pushing a plan that would close one of the state’s two oldest prisons, renovate the other and convert the state’s youth prison into a facility for adult men. 

The proposal, which totals just shy of $500 million, will be included in the governor’s budget proposal, which he will unveil on Tuesday night. The governor shared details of the plan with reporters Friday morning.

The “domino series of facility changes, improvements and modernization efforts,” as Evers described them, would take place between approval of the budget and 2031. The proposal is the solution to the state’s skyrocketing prison population, Evers said, adding there is “not an alternative to my plan that is safer, faster and cheaper.”

The first step would be building a facility for youth offenders in Dane County, allowing the state to close its current beleaguered juvenile prison complex in Irma, home to Lincoln Hills School for boys and Copper Lake School for girls. The cost would be $130.7 million.

Completing the juvenile Dane County facility would be the latest step in a years-long effort to shutter Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake. A similar facility opened in Racine County earlier this month, with another juvenile facility in Milwaukee poised to open next year. With the addition of the Dane County facility, the state would be able to move youth offenders out of Lincoln Hills in early 2029, according to the Evers administration.

The Lincoln County complex would then undergo $9 million in renovations to be converted into a 500-bed, medium-security institution for men.

Another key piece of Evers’ plan would be converting Stanley Correctional Institution into a maximum-security facility for $8.8 million. That would allow the state to renovate Waupun Correctional Institution, the state’s oldest facility, where at times inmates were confined to their cells for months and denied medical care, according to an investigation by Wisconsin Watch and The New York Times. Waupun staff also have faced criminal charges following the deaths of five inmates. 

The estimated $245 million renovation would involve demolishing the prison’s existing cell halls and replacing them with new, medium-security facilities known as a “vocational village” — the first in Wisconsin based on a model used in other states. The facility would be “designed to expand job and workforce training to help make sure folks can be stable, gainfully employed and can positively contribute to our communities when they are released,” Evers said.

Under the plan, the John Burke Correctional Center in Waupun would also be converted to a 300-bed facility for women “with little to no capital cost,” said Jared Hoy, secretary of the Department of Corrections.

Green Bay Correctional Institution, constructed in 1898, would close under the proposal sometime in spring 2029 at a cost of $6.3 million. Many have pushed for the closure of the prison due to overcrowding, poor conditions and staffing issues.

To compensate for the lost beds, the last project in the “domino” series would add 200 beds to Sanger B. Powers Correctional Center in Brown County.

The governor’s budget will guarantee Green Bay staffers a role at another DOC facility to account for the prison’s closure, the Evers administration said. The facility would likely then be sold, the governor told reporters.

In totality, the plan aims to avoid building a new prison in Wisconsin, which the governor’s administration estimates would cost $1.2 billion and take a decade to construct. Evers said Friday that he had not discussed the plan with Republican lawmakers, but implied he was slated to meet with them over the weekend.

The state’s adult institutions were locking up more than 23,000 people as of Feb. 7. That’s more than 5,000 above the design capacity of Wisconsin’s prisons and more than 3,000 above levels four years ago when COVID-19 actions shrunk prisoner ranks.

Justice reform advocates have argued that Wisconsin can’t substantially improve conditions without decarceration, including releasing more inmates and diverting others to programs rather than prisons. 

Other states — some led by Republicans and some by Democrats — have managed to close prisons by adopting rehabilitation-focused reforms that cut thousands from the population. 

The governor is also seeking some policy changes that could trim the population. For example, he wants to expand the capacity of the state’s existing earned release program for nonviolent offenders with less than 48 months remaining on their sentences, allowing more inmates to access vocational training and treatment for substance use disorders.

Evers noted there are 12,000 inmates on a waiting list to access vocational programming, and expanding the earned release program would likely make another 1,000 inmates eligible for the program.

Tony Evers to propose $500 million prison overhaul, closing Green Bay facility by 2029 is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.