Micah Laureano died on August 27, 2024, as a result of an incident with a cellmate at the Green Bay Correctional Institution. (Photo source: Wisconsin Department of Corrections)
GREEN BAY, Wisconsin. – Sheriff’s officials are investigating a suspected murder at an aging maximum-security prison in northeastern Wisconsin, another in a string of inmate deaths at two of the state’s toughest prisons in the past year.
The Brown County Sheriff’s Department said in a news release Wednesday that officers were called to the Green Bay Correctional Institution in Allouez around 9:30 p.m. Tuesday because an inmate had no pulse and was not breathing. Micah Laureano, 19, was pronounced dead at the scene, the Sheriff’s Department said.
Initial investigations revealed that Laureano died in his cell by murder. Officials have identified Laureno’s 24-year-old cellmate as a suspect, the press release said.
According to online court records, Laureano was sentenced in January to two years in prison for aggravated assault in Waukesha County. He will spend the first year behind bars and the second year on extended probation. His attorney in the case, public defender Maura McMahon, described Laureano in an email to The Associated Press as a “funny, thoughtful young man and talented artist.”
Laureano’s cellmate was sentenced to 40 years in prison, 20 years behind bars and 20 years on extended probation, for attempted murder in Manitowoc County in January 2018. The cellmate was 18 at the time of the conviction. His attorney in the case did not immediately respond to an email.
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Asked for comment on the incident, state Department of Corrections spokeswoman Beth Williams Hardtke responded by email confirming that Laureano died Tuesday following an “incident in his cell.” She said no staff members were injured and law enforcement was investigating the incident. Jail operations are normal and all scheduled activities are continuing as usual, she said.
Laureano’s death is another blow to the prison service, which is struggling to protect inmates and prison staff amid aging facilities and chronic staff shortages.
Since June 2023, five inmates at the maximum-security Waupun Correctional Institution have died. Two of them committed suicide, one died of a fentanyl overdose, one died of a stroke, and one died of malnutrition and dehydration. Prosecutors last June charged former prison warden Randall Hepp and eight other Waupun employees with misconduct in connection with the stroke and malnutrition deaths.
Men incarcerated in Waupun have filed a class-action lawsuit alleging mistreatment, including denial of access to medical care, and the U.S. Department of Justice is investigating a possible smuggling ring at the prison.
Just weeks after charges were filed against Hepp and his associates in Waupun, Corey Proulx, a counselor at the state’s youth prison outside Irma, died after a 16-year-old inmate punched him in the face. His death sparked calls from facility staff and Republican lawmakers to overturn a court-imposed ban on pepper spray. The federal judge who imposed the ban in 2018 has so far denied their requests.
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Waupun opened in 1854. Green Bay Correctional Institution opened in 1898. Republicans have been calling for both prisons to be closed for years, saying they have outlived their usefulness. But concerns about job losses in communities and the cost of building a new prison, estimated at as much as $1 billion, have proven stumbling blocks. Democratic Gov. Tony Evers has tried to fix the prison system’s problems by giving guards pay raises.
