Solnit workers say violent disturbances followed staffing warnings at the Middletown youth psychiatric facility 

NBC Connecticut Investigates is looking into safety concerns at the Solnit Children’s Center South Campus in Middletown after workers say two violent disturbances left multiple staff members hurt. 

More than half a dozen employees have gone out on workers’ comp due to the incidents, according to union delegates who work at the facility. 

Those workers say the warning signs were there before this all happened. 

The Solnit South hospital treats children ages 13 to 17 with severe mental illnesses and other issues. 

Two employees who are also SEIU 1199 union delegates told NBC Connecticut Investigates that staff had repeatedly raised concerns about staffing levels. 

They said they were not at the facility when the two most recent disturbances happened, but said the incidents were reported to them by co-workers who were there. 

“Some staff right now are just like in awe,” said Saleena White, a Solnit child services worker. “Some people who’ve been here 25, 30 years have never seen this.”

Darnell Ford, a lead child services worker at Solnit, said the situation is frightening. “It terrifies me.”

The union delegates said one disturbance happened on June 14 and another happened on June 20. 

They said the June 14 incident was especially serious and left 11 people hurt. 

White described a chaotic scene involving patients attacking staff, multiple restraints happening at once, and too few workers available to respond. 

After the first incident, the union sent an email to DCF Commissioner Susan Hamilton and others warning that another disturbance could happen. 

The union’s email said there were more than 130 coverage gaps for the weekend of June 20 and June 21. 

It also said the hospital superintendent was “downplaying our members’ injuries at every turn.” 

Ford said workers had been raising concerns long before the recent disturbances. 

“We have been talking about something unfortunate like this happening for at least the last two years,” Ford said. 

Both White and Ford testified to state lawmakers in February about what they described as severe staffing issues. 

In written testimony, Ford said workers had seen youth create weapons out of whatever they could get their hands on. 

White wrote that the units often feel like “a war zone.” 

State Sen. Matt Lesser, a Middletown Democrat, said a large percentage of DCF staff at Solnit South have been hurt on the job. 

Lesser said the legislature’s Appropriations Committee provided DCF with another $1 million in funding, in part because of issues at Solnit relayed to him by workers there. 

“That funding was not funding that DCF requested,” Lesser said. 

“DCF needs to come up and be honest to say what they need, so they can create a safe environment,” Lesser said. 

DCF told NBC Connecticut Investigates that Solnit South’s hospital is now under UConn Health after Solnit’s hospital license was transferred to UConn Health in April. 

That leaves a key question: whether DCF shared the staffing warnings it received with UConn Health. 

There is also a girls’ residential facility on the Solnit campus. 

After the two hospital disturbances, workers at the residential facility filed a working-under-protest form saying they were still severely understaffed. 

Dr. Andrew Agwunobi, CEO and Executive Vice President for Health Affairs at UConn Health and DCF’s Hamilton, issued a statement regarding Solnit:

Providing safe, high-quality care for the youth at Solnit Hospital remains our highest priority.  

Solnit Hospital became a part of UConn Health on April 15, 2026, and in partnership with the Department of Children and Families, we are working to ensure that patients receive the highest quality care in a safe and supportive environment.  While there were behavioral incidents in June, the staff handled these incidents appropriately and all patients remained safe. 

Leadership from DCF, UConn Health, and other state officials have been working continuously to understand and address the concerns of frontline workers, which includes enhancing staffing. We view the unions as valued partners in supporting the effective operation of Solnit hospital and we will continue to consult with them on these efforts as part of a collaborative relationship that brings all stakeholders to the table.

A prosecutor said Cole Werhan, the man charged with murdering a Duxbury, Massachusetts woman inside a Connecticut home, has several open domestic violence cases.

Police say Werhan killed 26-year-old Janina Brooke Murphy inside the Burlington, Connecticut home where she was living. Murphy was found at the bottom of a staircase on March 29, but no charges were filed until Tuesday.

Werhan was arraigned Wednesday in Torrington Superior Court in Connecticut. The judge accepted the prosecution’s request to continue holding Werhan on $5 million bond.

Murphy and Werhan were dating, the woman’s mother said. Beth Murphy told WBZ-TV that a detective said her daughter had wounds “all over her” and police were investigating her death as suspicious.

“It’s just been the worst time of my life as you can imagine,” Beth Murphy said. “He killed my baby.”

In court Wednesday, the prosecutor said Werhan is an “extreme danger to the community.”

Werhan currently has four domestic violence cases with different victims in each, the prosecutor said.

On June 3, Werhan was arrested in one of those cases. He was able to post the $750,000 bail and was released with an electronic monitoring device. Werhan has not been convicted of any crimes.

One of the alleged victims told police in an interview that he hit her, strangler her, and threatened to kill her multiple times.

His defense attorney argued that the $5 million bond was “simply not affordable,” and asked instead for $1 million bond. The judge sided with the prosecution.

In arguing for lower bond, Werhan’s attorney argued that he has always appeared in court for each of his cases and should not be considered a flight risk.

Werhan is next due to appear in court on June 30.

Lindsay Bolduc was a close friend of Murphy’s. Bolduc said Werhan and Murphy met playing video games online, and later moved in together.

“Crazy to think about the pit in my stomach I had. I just knew something was wrong,” Bolduc said.

Bolduc said she doesn’t only want people to remember Murphy as a victim.

“I just want people to remember that Brooke was a person, you know? She was so much more than this. She wasn’t just a victim,” she said.

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (WTNH) — A new report is highlighting deep economic and racial disparities across Connecticut’s public school districts, ranking the state among the most segregated in the country.

The study by the nonprofit Brown’s Promise found Connecticut has some of the nation’s most pronounced divides — placing sixth worst for economic segregation and 11th for racial segregation.

Researchers measured economic segregation by the percentage of students receiving free or reduced-price lunch.

According to the report, some of the highest concentrations of low-income students are found in districts just miles from the state’s wealthiest communities.

“We provide this measure of how much is it happening between districts, like across those district lines, versus inside districts like what you would find in larger school districts,” said Stephen Owens, a researcher with Brown’s Promise.

The findings may seem surprising, as Connecticut and other Northeastern states show higher levels of segregation than some Southern states that once legally enforced it.

But Owens said those historic boundaries — and the way communities developed — continue to shape access to education today.

“If your schools were built out of like the lines of the towns, the municipality, then it means that the residential patterns, where people choose to live or where they grew up, end up being copied right onto the schools,” he said.

State and local leaders across the political spectrum have long acknowledged with variations of a phrase that has become alarmingly common.

“You are essentially going to attend the school where your ZIP code is,” House Minority Leader Vincent Candelora said.

New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker said poverty plays a central role.

“It has nothing to do with the quality of education being provided. It has everything to do with poverty,” Elicker said.

Efforts to address the issue have long been debated at the state Capitol.

To varying degrees, Democrats have pushed for increased education funding, progressives often jousting with moderates about size and scale. Republicans tend to emphasize the charter school model. There is bipartisan agreement that the state’s current education aide system needs to be retooled.

Gov. Ned Lamont acknowledged the challenge, saying the state must continue working toward improvement.

“You’ve got to try every day to do better,” the Democrat said.

The issue is expected to play a major role in Connecticut’s upcoming gubernatorial race, with the three candidates offering their own solutions.