In 1861, Brockway became the superintendent of the prison in Detroit, where he attempted to introduce work and release supervision programs and "indeterminate sentences".

In 1869, Brockway drafted a law, passed by the Michigan legislature but overturned by the state Supreme Court, that would allow for the conditional and discretionary release of "common prostitutes.

Grounding his claims in anecdotal and eugenic "prison science," Brockway publicly advocated for the reformatory's provision of Christian moral education paired with manual labor as a means of reforming the individual incarcerated therein.

An investigation by the State Board of Charities revealed that Brockway himself regularly inflicted violent corporal punishment on individuals incarcerated there, and utilized forced labor, solitary confinement for negligible offenses, refusal of medical care, and starvation as methods of governance.

[5] In his research on the investigation, Alexander Pisciotta writes, "The final report of the committee, released on 14 March 1894, was unequivocal; its findings were unanimously endorsed by the ten members of the New York State Board of Charities: 'That the charges and the allegations against the general superintendent Z.R.

Brockway of 'cruel, brutal, excessive, degrading and unusual punishment of the inmates' are proven and most amply sustained by the evidence, and that he is guilty of the same.