State Inspector General: Ware Youth Center a safe, secure environment suitable juvenile detention center [Video]

BATON ROUGE — The Office of State Inspector General concluded that the Ware Youth Center, the Red River Parish youth detention center with inmates from across the state, to be “a safe and secure environment suitable to house juveniles who have entered Louisiana’s juvenile justice system” in a report released Thursday.

“During nine different visits to Ware, OIG investigators observed clean, safe and secure facilities and professional staff. Over the past three years, as part of its oversight responsibilities, OIG has physically visited every secure care facility operated by OJJ in the State of Louisiana,” the reports conclusions read. “The Ware campus compares favorably to those other facilities.”

The OIG report found that 68% of suicide attempts between 2018 and 2022 involved the same 10 inmates. More than half of the escapes involved the same five inmates.

The five highest offending juveniles were involved in an average of 42 incidents …