The Agenda with Steve Paikin (Audio) - What's Going on at Ontario's Correctional Institutions?

Episode Date: May 15, 2025

The Maplehurst Correctional Complex is known as Ontario's deadliest and most overcrowded jail. In recent weeks, it's come under increased scrutiny after video footage from 2023 was released showing inmates facing collective punishment from guards in an incident one judge called a "gross display of power." Is Maplehurst an aberration or a sign of system-wide challenges? What kind of action could and should the province take? To discuss, we're joined by Demar Kemar Hewitt Executive director and general counsel at the Black Legal Action Centre Lee Chapelle Former inmate and president of Canadian Prison Consulting Brendan Kennedy Reporter on the Toronto Star's investigative team and Andrea Monteiro Founder of Ethical Correctional Consulting Inc., former director of corrections in the Yukon, and former manager of the Independent Review of Ontario Corrections See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

He was like a father figure to me. Unfortunately, found myself in a very vulnerable position. This is a story about a psychiatrist in Toronto accused of abusing two of his patients, which he denies. It's also a story about a system that is supposed to protect patients. From TVO Podcasts, I'm Krisha Collier, and this is The Oath. Subscribe today wherever you listen. The Maplehurst Correctional Complex is known

as Ontario's deadliest and most overcrowded jail. It's come under increased scrutiny after video footage from 2023 was released showing inmates facing collective punishment from guards in an incident one judge called a gross display of power. Is Maplehurst an aberration or a sign of system-wide problems? What kind of action should the province take? Let's get into that with Damar Kamar-Hewitt.

He's executive director and general counsel at the Black Legal Action Centre. Lee Chappelle is here, president of Canadian Prison Consulting. They're both with us from the provincial capital. And with us in studio, Andrea Montero, founder of Ethical Correctional Consulting, Inc. She's a former director of corrections in the Yukon. And Brendan Kennedy,

investigative reporter at the Toronto Star. And we're grateful to have you two here in our studio and to our friends, Damar and Lee and Points Beyond. Thanks for joining us on TVO tonight. We wanna start here by just getting some of the background in place. And we thank you at the Toronto Star for having done this work.

This is a clip from your podcast series, This Matters, in which a former Maplehurst inmate describes some of what's going down at Maplehurst. So Sheldon, if you would, let's roll that. They're using language, uttering threats, letting us know that they're not messing around. So that I could hear the screams and yelling of the other guys getting twisted up and zip-tied

and dragged out of their cell. So they pretty much knew what was coming. Brendan, how'd you find out about this story in the first place? Well, I was reporting on jail conditions across the province and then I started hearing from defense lawyers and from inmates about this incident that happened in December 2023. Tell us about the incident. What did happen? Yeah, so on December 20th, 2023, an inmate punched a guard and that inmate punched a guard. And that inmate was removed and charged with assault,

removed from the jail entirely. And then two days later, what they call the institutional crisis intervention team, kind of like an internal riot squad for the jail, then carried out this mass strip search of all the remaining inmates on the unit at Maplehurst. So the clips you saw there are some of what took place over two days, December 22nd and 23rd, 2023. So the inmates were, you know, you see these guards in full riot gear amassing information at the unit.

The inmates were already locked in their cells. The guards then approached them and strip searched them in their cells and carried them out in their underwear. Took them to a nearby hallway. Their hands were zip tied. And then trained their pepperball guns at the backs of their heads with their heads bowed. And then they were left in their underwear for the next day, for some of them two days, while they remained locked in their cells. Tell me this is an unusual situation for this facility. Yeah, this is an exceptional circumstance, what happened in this case, for sure. Is it according to protocol to have somebody on their knees with a gun pointed at the back of their head?

What happened in this case? I mean the the jail initially said that this was a level four search That you know this this takes place You know under certain circumstances What has since come out in various court hearings is that? This was contrary to ministry policy. This was excessive, disproportionate, unreasonable. They didn't do the formal risk assessment to justify this action. So yeah, it seems you know there are aspects of it that are still being litigated but it seems very clearly that

this was done as retribution for what happened two days earlier. And the original punch, do we know what precipitated that? No we don't. There's video of it. You can see that there seems to be a conversation between the guard and an inmate who's on the phone but we don't know exactly why that took place or what happened there. We do know that the inmate was subsequently immediately removed from the unit, transferred to a different jail we don't know exactly why that took place or what happened there. We do know that the inmate was subsequently immediately removed from the unit, transferred to a different jail,

and also charged with assault. Okay, let's get some feedback from everybody else. Damar, you've heard about this circumstance. Your reaction, please. We have, we have, Steve. And it's one that troubles us deeply at the Black Legal Action Center, where we do offer prison law services to inmates.

The reports that we usually get coming out of Maplehurst were generally always worrying. And to actually see it on video that it is not just the circumstances of inmate on inmate violence, but where the entire institution at Maplehurst set its eyes in such a violent way on inmates when they're meant to protect them and keep them secured while they await trial. And also keeping in mind that the majority of persons at Maplehurst are persons who are

presumed to be innocent because they have not yet stood trial. And to see them going through these circumstances in their innocent state is one that really worries us. Lee, can you talk to us about Maplehurst and tell us what reputation it has in the Ontario correctional world? Yes, Steve, it's on the top five list of problematic institutions, along with Toronto South,

Detention Center, Ottawa, Carleton, and London, London, Elgin, Middlesex comes to mind as institutions with historic problems. One thing I can say about Maplehurst, having our clients go through this period of time, and who are there presently, they are contending with unbelievable overcrowding challenges. And that's not to justify what happened there, but I'm just saying that's part of the equation. It's been a challenge in recent years. Andrea, as a former director of corrections, I'd like to know how you react when you hear these kinds of details. They're troubling. You know, the request to use specialty teams, such as ICED in this case, to do institutional searches is not uncommon in corrections.

But the particular incident that happened here in Maplehurst is, to me, unique and, frankly, illegal. There were rules and laws and regulations around how we do searches in correctional facilities and how we do searches and how we use force. And in the case here, those rules were followed. We don't know presumably what precipitated the original punch by the prisoner on the guard. Is it fair to say that this was an overreaction to whatever justification that prisoner felt in hitting that guard?

Well, I can't say whether it was an overreaction. I mean, what I can say is that institutional violence perpetrated against institutional staff is very concerning and it needs to be looked into. It needs to be investigated the same way that this Maplehurst incident needs to be investigated and people need to be held accountable. Okay in which case Brendan is the province investigating? Well we know that there was an internal investigation that was conducted last year.

And the report of that has been disclosed to lawyers. It's not been made public. I've been trying to get it. In what has happened in court, as Crown attorneys have referred to it and said that it found that the superintendent of Maple Hearth, Winston Wong, was inappropriately authorized this use of the ISA team and that it was excessive, disproportionate, and didn't follow ministry policy. But in

terms of what the ministry has said publicly, it's almost nothing. Demar, how much confidence would you have in an internal investigation done either by the facility itself or the Solicitor General's Ministry? Certainly, it concerns us, the parties that would be put together to do these investigations. It's the best that we will have to work with those, Steve, unfortunately, because as outside parties,

you can't compel a particular investigator, require a particular investigator. So we have to use the reports that are produced by the ministry and panel team to do these investigations. We've also seen the reports which are troubling themselves and for the fact that they haven't been made public, but they have been disclosed in court proceedings. As lawyers, we can't have that discussion externally, but it would be safe to say that the report, should it be made public, is one that will disturb even the most,

with every reason of a conscience, would be troubled by what is contained in the reports. Lee, can I get you on that as well? If the ministry or the facility itself investigates this, how confident should we be that they'll do a satisfactory job? I'm not happy to say that. I don't think there should be

a great deal of confidence at all. It's a very secretive corrections on a whole entity. And it's reminiscent of many other internal investigations and many other findings throughout the years that are conducted. There is a degree of acknowledgement as to what was wrong. Usually, there's a party or two that wears it. But ultimately, I don't think it really will cause or I'm being cynical here because I don't think it will. I do not think this will result in major changes. Why not? Well, this has been something that for dating back to 1986, I've seen the trajectory. And

through my research, when I wrote my book, it's back to the 1930s in Canada, the Fatton report, the Archambault or the Fatton Commission, the Archambault report. On and on, we have these incidents that come up that are egregious. Part of what I think the issue is from my perspective on this, Steve, is we're having a really tiny glimpse into something without context, a great deal of context. And it's something that I know from the fact that staff are feeling that they need to find a way to instill a fact that they're running the jail, not the unites, and they feel frustrated. And again, these are reasons as to what led up to it.

And it wasn't the appropriate action. But I think unless the culture and the issues that exist are addressed, this investigation will not accomplish a breakthrough. Well, let me pick up on that. Yeah, sorry, Brent, let me pick up on that. Yeah, sorry, Brent. Let's pick up on that. Because I will say that these issues will be litigated in court, I believe, because dozens of inmates are seeking stay of their charges, or in some cases,

sentence reductions. And so the full evidence hasn't been heard yet, but I believe it will eventually come out in court. Andrea, let me get you to follow up on Lee in as much as he's talked about the need for a cultural change in the way that the system approaches these kinds of issues. What does that mean?

We need a cultural change, and how do you make it happen? I think there's a lot of talk and corrections around a cultural change. And I think we have to understand that institutional violence, whether perpetrated against staff or perpetrated against residents, it doesn't happen in a vacuum. It's oftentimes a combination of a host of complex issues

and interconnected issues. So things like overcrowding, staff and management disconnect, union and management disconnect, lack of programming, deficiencies in retention of correctional staff, or deficiencies in training. I mean, many of our correctional officers, and this isn't unique to Ontario, there's an over-reliance and an over-dependence on training that's tactical in nature, as opposed to disengagement or de-escalation. So they raise temperatures instead of lower them.

Absolutely, and I think we need to think about how we're training our officers so that we don't escalate situations and turn them into violent situations when, in fact, they might not necessarily have needed to have gone that way. Damar, when you hear we need a cultural change in the corrections system, what does that

say to you? Well, the cultural change that I think we need is recognition that notwithstanding the overcrowding, notwithstanding the pressures of running a prison, notwithstanding feeling that you're outnumbered based on the number of staff and the number of inmates that you have at Maplehurst, the fact we all know that Maplehurst is running at 130% of its capacity, you do have inmates triple bunking in very small cells. But with all of that and the very difficult situations on which the correctional officers do have to work, the constitutional rights of citizens, the

constitutional rights of inmates continue, even while they're locked in prison, even while they're accused of committing an offense, and even while they have been convicted of committing an offense, your constitutional rights must be protected. And when you are taken into custody by the province or by the state, the Crown generally speaking, they take on the obligation of providing you the basics that are guaranteed to you by law, and also have that duty for as long as you're

in their custody to respect your rights, notwithstanding the pressures on which they have to work. Brendan, if we have an overcrowding problem, presumably we're building more prisons to deal with that. Is that the case? My understanding is that the province is planning to open new provincial jails. I don't know that there's any kind of opening date for that. And the pressures are happening right now. The system as a whole, according to the latest data that I've seen, is at 122% over capacity. And jails like Maplehurst, Demar mentioned over 30%.

The latest data I've seen in December, it was at 145% capacity. So in that case, you have nearly all of the inmates are triple bunked in cells meant for two. And I don't think it's a coincidence that the most overcrowded jail is also the jail with the most deaths, is also the jail where this incident happened. All of these issues kind of feed into each other.

Yeah, Lee, is that the case? Once you're in an overcrowded situation, that's the seed from which a whole lot of bad things grow? Definitely, I think that's bang on. That's a big part of the equation. You know, there's data that reflects this going back decades when you're looking at single bunking versus double bunking and issues existing within a prison setting.

So with single bunking, there tends to be a lot less violence and a lot less issues. Day to day, the more crowded it gets, it correlates with the more violence that occurs. It's under resourced, no question about it. I have a client that was sentenced in January this year to three years less a day, went to Maplehurst and four months later has yet to see a case management officer, yet to have an opportunity to work or program. This has such a carryover effect, domino effect that the institution is not functioning well on any front, with the exception of healthcare.

I've had good experience with healthcare at Maplehurst. Andrea, who's ultimately responsible for fixing this? I think we all are, Steve. I mean, I think, you know, in this conversation, and I agree with Tamar, you know, corrections has a responsibility to uphold the constitutional law, but we can't be expected to do that alone. We can't be expected to do that the way that we want to do that if we don't have the resources and the space we need to.

If we're working in crumbling institutions that are crumbling, their infrastructure is crumbling, or that they're so overcrowded that we can't do our jobs the way that we want to. I think as a society, we an obligation all of us to push against the tough on crime rhetoric to work together on how we could reduce the number of people that are currently sitting in provincial corrections on remand. That's not a corrections issue. Corrections doesn't choose who comes into

the doors. We're just responsible for taking care of them. I get what you're saying, that society's got to figure out a solution to all of this. But, Dimar, put yourself in the shoes of somebody who's an average Ontarian watching this right now, has never been inside a prison, has no intention of being inside a prison, doesn't know anybody inside a prison. How does that person feel that they are somehow

part of the solution? Well, to the extent that the political system in which we participate hold the political actors accountable, that's how we participate. Advocacy, what we do on our side, making sure that we keep the conversation going, keep the pressures on the persons who are responsible for making these decisions, or the persons who can make the pressures on the persons who are responsible for making these decisions,

or the persons who can make the change, that's how you get involved. But otherwise, you share the stories, share the stories of the persons who are involved in these situations, make sure that it doesn't go unnoticed, do whatever you can to pressure, you know, your member of parliament or your MPP,

all those persons, I believe that's how you participate. And outside of then just being generally involved in the discussions is one way of doing it. But ultimately, I do agree with Andrea that we all have some small parts to play, but the buck really stops at the ministry. I do, I take that position. There's no way of getting around that. It really stops at the persons who are in charge of these, maintaining these facilities. I wouldn't put so much of the burden on a society generally as a whole because we haven't trusted these persons to make these decisions on our behalf

and we can't all make decisions on how to run a prison. In which case, yeah, Brendan, please. You mentioned like the average person watching this. And I just have always felt that no matter where you are in the political spectrum, you should be concerned about improving jail conditions. If you see yourself as oriented towards social justice, and you believe that prisoners' human rights and dignity

should be respected, what happened in this case and what happens every day in provincial jails should be concerning to you. But also judges are routinely giving extra credit because of the harsh conditions in provincial jails. So judges are giving reduced sentences upon convictions because the conditions are so bad in Ontario's jails. And so if you're someone who thinks of yourself as like a law and order person or tough on crime, and you want people convicted of crimes to serve their full sentences, then you

should also be concerned about improving jail conditions. Do you think the people who are the decision makers in this case are adequately seized of this issue and appreciate how problematic it is to get to some solutions here? No. I think that their silence on this issue speaks to that. And I think part of that is because it's easier in a political campaign or an election campaign

to talk about being tough on crime. It's much more difficult to talk about solutions and it's much more difficult to talk about more nuanced problems, about things that will actually improve public safety rather than saying you're just going to crack down on crime. So Andrea, how do we get the decision makers to be more interested in solving this? I think a big piece of it is bringing awareness to the issues that are happening, and absolutely

that public awareness. I think making sure that we're holding our systems accountable. For me, a big piece rests with correctional oversight. We need an external oversight body. And there have been countless recommendations whether they're through coroner's inquest or whether it's through the work of the independent review of Ontario corrections that spoke to the need for oversight and external

oversight and we haven't seen that happen and I think those are some of the big things that we need to be doing in order to have the community be more aware and the public be more aware of what's actually happening and to hold the ministry accountable. We've had a guy on this program many times and you and I both know him, Howard Sapers, who has done numerous investigations on the correction system in this country and in this province. I don't know, do you need to get Howard back on the case and give him a full-time job to start exploring? I always love working with Howard so I'll never say no to that. I think what we really need is we need courageous leadership.

I think we need courageous leadership at the political level. I think we need courageous leadership at the bureaucratic level. Public service to me has always been about serving the public. It shouldn't be about your next job promotion or being re-elected. And I think we need to come back to that core fundamental belief

of why are we here. And it's the reason why I continue to do this work, not because it's easy, but it's because I know that the system can get better. Lee, let me ask you if there is, I don't know, is there a forum or is there a way for the decision makers, people who represent prisoners, people who represent the jail guards, people like all of the stakeholders, is there a place where they can all get together, exchange ideas, try to come up with some solutions together that would have legs, any of that happening? I would say no, there's little groups here and there that are always pushing for that.

I have yet to see something that's effective that part of the issue, Steve, from my perspective is, a big part of it is you've got the tough on crime and the port of public opinion today that's often driven by politicians and their rhetoric. Not necessarily fact-based, but designed to be a wedge issue. And frankly, when it comes to politics, tough on crime has won the majority of elections for the last 50 years. It sounds good, it sounds comforting, and it tends to be more effective. You don't want the soft on crime hung around your neck because for whatever reason, it's not effective again. When it comes to decision makers, I think the biggest issue that I've come to realize throughout the decades is it's so siloed. You've got corporate headquarters, which is where the minister, deputy minister,

you've got, you know, in provincial, national headquarters in federal. You've got regional directors. You've then got administrations for all the different jails, and then you have frontline staff. And the majority, and management's in there too, but the majority of these groups are not aligned. Frontline staff in particular get notices and memos about upcoming changes or things that the decision makers want to implement. And when they get it, they tend to, get it, they literally will roll it up,

throw it in the garbage and say, that comes from a glass tower. They have no idea what the reality is, day in and day out for me. So as long as it continues along the trajectory of poor communication and this division within corrections, I don't see a lot of positive changes, speaking of fact that needs to change. Well, that's Demara, I guess why I wonder whether there might be some value in trying to bring everybody together in some kind of correctional summit

to get to the bottom of this. Do you think there's any value in that? I would believe there's value in that, Steve, but I think we're forgetting something that's very important. We actually do have laws on the books here in Ontario on transforming the correctional services. The Correctional Services Transformation Act was passed back in, I believe, 2018, if my memory serves me correctly. It just has not been brought, promulgated yet and brought into force. So we

have laws that are intended coming from many of these coroner's inquiries, from many of these inquiries, from many of these conversations with recommendations and legal force on how to conduct operations in prison, segregation and all those things. But for one reason or another, the ministry has just not brought the law into force. And we don't know the reason behind it, if it's resources or otherwise. But certainly, we've had these conversations, and I see it would be beneficial to continue having them. But bringing the law into force would, of course, go a very long way in putting an immediate curb to many of these things that are happening in the prison, and start to make meaningful change that courts can enforce, that inmates can take action to enforce enforce because it's now prescribed in law. Andrea, let's follow up on that. I mean, putting a summit together is a bigger deal. Opening a new prison is a bigger deal. What's something immediately that could be done, could be brought to bear to

improve things right now? I think it's a, you know, I think it's a bit of what Lee touched on. I think there's a real disconnect between what's happening on the front lines and what's happening in the other organizations within large provincial ministries like the Solicitor General to support the front line. There's a real disconnect there and we saw that when we wrote our institutional violence reports in 2018. That staff really aren't feeling, the front line staff aren't feeling supported by their frontline managers within the institutions or by their senior leadership. So one easy thing that we could start doing is start

listening and actually having those communications, having those regional office staff, having those senior leadership staff actually go to the institutions and talk to the frontline staff about what they need and how to better support them. Because oftentimes our policies are being written at the corporate level and then issued to our institutions via memo without any training or any real collaborative input,

even during the design phase, to ensure that what's being drafted in these offices is actually implementable in the institution. So for me, a great example of that is segregation. It's one thing to say we're going to make changes to segregation in the law, which I completely agree with, but it's another thing to make sure that the institution actually has the resources to be able to implement those changes. And so for me it's we need law, we need the resources

to accompany the ability to implement the law, and then we need to train our staff appropriately and recognize the work that they're doing. Brendan, let me give you the last word on this based on your investigation all of the reporting that you've done how do we get some easy quick wins on this file? Oh I don't know if I have a easy quick I mean I think if there was an easy answer to this somebody would have done it already you know I think one thing we touched on a little bit today but but haven't gone into great detail about it,

is just the rates of remand in our prisons. We've never had four out of five prisoners in Ontario jails are legally innocent. They're there on remand. And we've never had rates that high before. So that is one issue. I know you've done shows on this topic. But in terms of improving the conditions,

I don't know that there's an easy fix. But I do think that there is a need for a cultural change, for sure. Should the superintendent of Maplehurst be fired? Well, he's not there anymore. It's not clear from the ministry whether he was fired or whether he left. He told us, or he told my colleague at his doorstep that he no longer works for the jail and it was a mutual decision. But we don't know exactly what took place but he's not

there anymore. But I mean like to quote one of the lawyers of the affected inmates, you know, for something like this to take place it's more than just one person. For, you know, inmates being left without their clothing for 24 to 48 hours after this incident took place, for everything that we've seen on the video, that is not just one person doing that. That is an institution wide problem. I want to thank the four of you for bringing this to our attention. And Mr. Director Sheldon, if I can get a four shot there we go. Thanks to Damar Kamar Hewitt from Black Legal Action Centre, Lee Chappell Canadian Prison Consulting,

Brendan Kennedy Toronto Stars Investigative Team, Andre Montero founder of Ethical Correctional Consulting Inc. Thanks to all of you for appearing on TVO tonight. Thanks. Hey Steve, have a good night sir.