Southeast State Correctional Complex, formerly the Otter Creek Correctional Center, is a medium-security prison located in

Wheelwright, Kentucky Wheelwright is a List of cities in Kentucky, home rule-class city in Floyd County, Kentucky, Floyd County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 509 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, down from 780 in 2010 United States Census, 2 ...

. The facility is owned by

CoreCivic CoreCivic, Inc. formerly the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), is a company that owns and manages private prisons and detention centers and operates others on a concession basis. Co-founded in 1983 in Nashville, Tennessee, by Thomas W. B ...

and is operated by the

Kentucky Department of Corrections The Kentucky Department of Corrections is a state agency of the Kentucky Justice & Public Safety Cabinet that operates state-owned adult correctional facilities and provides oversight for and sets standards for county jails. They also provide tra ...

. The prison has housed both male and female inmates at different times, from

Kentucky Kentucky (, ), officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio to the north, West Virginia to the ...

and from

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; ) is an island U.S. state, state of the United States, in the Pacific Ocean about southwest of the U.S. mainland. One of the two Non-contiguous United States, non-contiguous U.S. states (along with Alaska), it is the only sta ...

. The prison opened in 1981. In 2008, a secretarial employee of the center fatally shot herself in the office of then-warden Joyce Arnold, raising questions about how the weapon had been smuggled in past security. Amid other allegations of mismanagement and poor medical care, Hawaii removed its 168 female inmates from Otter Creek beginning in 2009 over multiple charges of sexual abuse. Kentucky removed its state inmates from Otter Creek in 2012. The facility remained vacant from 2012 until 2020. On October 18, 2019, Kentucky Governor

Matt Bevin Matthew Griswold Bevin (; born January 9, 1967) is an American businessman and politician. A member of the Republican Party, he served as the 62nd governor of Kentucky from 2015 to 2019. He is currently the CEO of Neuronetrix Solutions, LLC. Bo ...

announced that the Commonwealth of Kentucky would enter into a ten-year agreement with CoreCivic to lease and reopen the facility. The prison, which was renamed the Southeast State Correctional Complex, will be operated and staffed by the Kentucky Department of Corrections and will be managed under the same rules and procedures as state owned prisons. In May 2020, Bevin's successor,

Andy Beshear Andrew Graham Beshear ( ; born November 29, 1977) is an American attorney and politician serving as the 63rd governor of Kentucky since 2019. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 50th attorney gen ...

, announced that the prison would reopen in September 2020. The facility officially reopened under state management in September 2022 housing male inmates.Gov. Beshear Announces Plan to Open Southeast State Correctional Complex in Wheelwright
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References

External links

Southeast State Correctional Complex
Buildings and structures in Floyd County, Kentucky Prisons in Kentucky CoreCivic 1981 establishments in Kentucky 2012 disestablishments in Kentucky 2020 establishments in Kentucky {{US-prison-stub