[2] In 1996, according to Joe Hopper, the commissioner of the Alabama Department of Corrections, the system's prison guard shortage was the most acute at Donaldson during that year.

[3] Donaldson was the main setting of the documentary film The Dhamma Brothers, which chronicles the establishment of a Vipassana meditation program for prisoners.

The Alabama Department of Corrections classifies Donaldson as a maximum security prison.

The agency uses Donaldson to house inmates who have multiple or repeated violent offenses and who ADOC cannot easily manage.

The correctional facility came under media scrutiny in 2022 after 7 inmates died within the span of one week.