Aberdeen Youth Prison Chief Fired Over Harassment Claims He Calls Racial Setup

Kendrick Rochelle, the first superintendent of Harbor Heights, Washington's newest juvenile detention center in Aberdeen, was fired after an internal investigation substantiated allegations that he sexually harassed a former employee. Rochelle denies the allegations outright and says he believes he was targeted, at least in part, because of his race.

The investigation began after the former Harbor Heights employee reported the alleged harassment once she had already been let go, according to Washington State Standard. An internal investigator produced a report, later obtained through a public-records request, detailing a pattern of alleged conduct that stretched over months. The Washington State Department of Children, Youth and Families confirmed Rochelle was fired but declined to comment on the specifics of his case.

According to the investigator's report, the former employee alleged Rochelle repeatedly made her uncomfortable, telling her in June 2025 that she was a bad girl in high school and that she should be with someone older and more established. She said his comments made her feel disgusting as a human being. The employee also reported that Rochelle followed her on Facebook and Instagram, sent her a red-heart message during the night, and told her he noticed she no longer interacted with him as before.

Threats Allegedly Aimed at Her Child's Father

The former employee also reported that Rochelle threatened to take out her child's father and go to the opposite side of the prison, and that he suggested the father did not appreciate her. Per the investigator's report, Rochelle allegedly named five Harbor Heights residents who could attack the man. The employee said she resumed visiting Rochelle's office because she feared losing her job, and after she was fired, she messaged him to ask whether they could still be friends. Her mother separately reported that her daughter had told her about Rochelle's behavior.

Rochelle denies the sexual-harassment allegations entirely. He said he never commented on the employee's appearance, that the alleged threat comments never happened, and that the employee was not his type. He also said the employee, not him, initiated the personal conversations, and that following subordinates on social media could be taken out of context.

Rochelle is also accused of derisively calling incarcerated Harbor Heights men a racial slur and of asking the employee personal questions in his office with the door closed. He denies calling the young men that word. He said the allegations may have been motivated by his race, and that other Black Harbor Heights staffers have also undergone investigations. Nancy Gutierrez said in an email that employees may be reassigned or placed on alternative assignments during investigations, and that the department takes sexual harassment seriously.

A Formal Reason That Wasn't Harassment

Rochelle said the sexual-harassment allegations were not the formal reason given for his termination. The department reportedly cited poor performance instead. His supervisor told him it was not a good fit. Rochelle said the young men at Harbor Heights had been promised respect and additional programming that never materialized, and he blamed steep staff turnover on the state's own hiring practices.

Harbor Heights residents described Rochelle as respectful and caring, according to the same Washington State Standard report. Rochelle began his career as a correctional officer and went on to hold criminal-justice leadership roles in Ohio, Louisiana, Arkansas and Texas before leading the recruitment of young men transferred from Green Hill School to Harbor Heights. He is now living in a hotel in Lacey, is struggling to find work, and said he is considering a wrongful-termination lawsuit against the state.

A Banana, a Control Booth and Unclear Blame

Separately, a banana was taped to a Harbor Heights control-booth window, an incident the department said was not left on Rochelle's car. Rachel Ericson said it was unclear who had put the banana on a vehicle, though Department of Corrections employees were found responsible for the control-booth incident, and the DOC employee involved was instructed to discontinue the behavior.

A Facility Built to Ease Green Hill's Overcrowding

Harbor Heights opened in July 2025 on the grounds of the adult Stafford Creek Corrections Center in Aberdeen, under a memorandum of understanding between DCYF and the Department of Corrections that keeps adult corrections strictly in a landlord role, as The Daily World reported. The facility was initially designed to hold 46 people and now has capacity for 32 young men. It receives transfers from Green Hill School in Chehalis and runs a specialized cognitive behavioral model called the Ascend Program, which requires a minimum six-month commitment from voluntary transfer residents ages 18 to 25, per the department's facility page.

The project aimed to relieve overcrowding at Green Hill while offering a more restorative environment than traditional youth detention. Since Harbor Heights opened, DCYF has reported that 21 employees have been let go. Rob Schreiber has since been designated as Harbor Heights' superintendent on the agency's facility administration portal.

A System Under Strain Statewide

Rochelle's firing lands amid mounting evidence that Washington's juvenile rehabilitation system is straining across the board. In a July broadcast interview, Rochelle told KING 5 that DCYF set him up to fail, framing his firing as scapegoating for deeper structural problems rather than a personnel dispute. A state performance audit released in July by the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee found that 47% of frontline employees in Washington's juvenile rehabilitation system leave their jobs within a year.

Green Hill School, the primary facility from which Harbor Heights draws residents, has operated over its designed capacity of 180 young men since 2023, housing 196 residents at the end of June, according to the Mercer Island Reporter. Between 2022 and 2024, safety and security incidents there — fights, assaults on staff, and contraband seizures — more than quadrupled amid the persistent overcrowding, the Nisqually Valley News reported. Turnover in leadership has also been steep elsewhere in the system: Echo Glen in Snoqualmie has had nine leaders, and Green Hill has had three since 2020.

State spending on the juvenile rehabilitation program rose 71% between fiscal year 2020 and fiscal year 2025, climbing from $100 million to $171 million, driven largely by added security contracts and expanded staff positions, per KING 5's reporting. The 2026 legislative audit also found that roughly 25% of people in the system are serving adult sentences, contributing to longer stays and population stagnation. That capacity crunch traces in part to the 2022 closure of Naselle Youth Camp, which had previously housed between 8% and 18% of the state's juvenile rehabilitation population, according to the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee.