Juno Provincial Penitentiary

The Juno Provincial Penitentiary (formerly known as the Juno Provincial Penitentiary and Sanatorium) is a retired provincial prison located in the eastern end of Juno, Plumas. It was operational from 1883 until 1989, and existed as a hybrid institution which housed a prison wing and health sanatorium wing from 1901 to the closure of the site, and despite being controlled and funded by the Province of Plumas, it frequently admitted prisoners and criminals from other PSAs, akin to the status of a federal penitentiary. During the years of its active operation, the penitentiary earned a reputation and notoriety of having exceptionally brutal conditions, and frequently housed death row inmates and long-term prisoners who died before their sentences could be completed. Continuous accusations of prison abuse, and later patient abuse within the institution eventually led to a thorough criminal investigation of the prison staff in the 1980s, and led to the prison's ultimate shut down.

When the sanatorium facility moved into the East Wing of the facility in 1901 to treat patients suffering with and health tourists, the resident inmates of the wing were relocated to the already fully-occupied West Wing, and were housed in the underground levels of the prison, which had originally served as  and cells for solitary confinement inmates. The prison wing of the institution was treated as maximum security, and the prisoners were completely segregated from the patients and the medical staff, with a large barricade was erected down the central tower with heavily guarded 24-hour hallways, and backup safety mechanisms to protect the sanatorium from a hypothetical prison break or disturbance. For over a century of its operation, there has never been a single case of inmates breaching the sanatorium, although there have been several notable escapes. Some of the most well-known and feared criminals including Sabi Amantea and Raging Walter were housed in the Juno Provincial Penitentiary.

Since 1989, the prison is owned and managed by the Royal Park Service as a contributing property, and is a listed site that forms a part of the. Public access has always been restricted, with most non-staff guests invited on a case-by-case basis, and constituting primarily university students and faculty, and private paranormal investigators, although only during the month of October each year. While there has been a push towards opening the penitentiary year-round to the general public, the complex would require millions of dollars in removal and structural improvements to conform with current provincial building codes and safety regulations, a move that was rejected by Plumasonian taxpayers. Guests require special masks and protective gear in order to enter and move throughout the building.

Due to its longstanding history of brutality and the high incidences of deaths occurring on the site, the enitentiary has been claimed to be one of the most paranormally active places in the world, and has frequently and consistently been ranked within the top 5 most haunted locations in Sierra. Numerous documented cases of paranormal activity including photographs, video footage, and eyewitness accounts allegedly pointing towards such have placed the Penitentiary firmly into the national folklore in Sierra. Juno, the town the penitentiary is a part of, has also been described as haunted in its own right. Due to limited, seasonal access to the penitentiary during the month of October, opportunity to enter and explore has always been in high demand, with plans by the Royal Park Service to increase its cap of total visitor admittance. Famous paranormal investigators, ghost hunters, psychics, demonologists, and amateur enthusiasts have visited the prison over the years, and the penitentiary has also been the site of a few films and television programs, further entrenching its iconic status as a haunted location.