Juvenile Justice Reform

Juvenile Justice Reform

• The polarized debate over Illinois’ youth prison closures
  WBEZ 
  Advocacy groups are applauding Illinois Governor Pat Quinn's proposal this week to close two youth prisons. But strong opposition is coming from the union representing prison workers and some local leaders.
• Radio host Dave Iverson: Phasing out juvenile justice
  KQED
  Governor Jerry Brown has proposed phasing out the state Division of Juvenile Justice over the next three years -- a move which the Legislative Analyst's Office says could save the state more than $100 million; but what's the real cost?
• Giving detainees access to outdoor recreation
  The Bay Citizen 
  How many adults does it take to supervise a playground? Too many, apparently, if the playground is at San Francisco’s Juvenile Justice Center.
• Teaching life skills to help troubled teens
  Cov-News 
  The Newton County Board of Commissioners approved Tuesday a contract with resident Melissa Tice to teach life skills courses to jail inmates who are serving terms of six months or longer in an effort to help them avoid returning to jail. The program will be paid through 2011 State Criminal Alien Assistance Program monies.
• Jerry Davich: Return visit to “Juvies” finds fewer kids, fewer dollars
  Post-Tribune 
  A recent visit to the Lake County Juvenile Justice Center in Crown Point, featured on MTV, found fewer kids and a dedicated staff.
  

Adolescent Substance Abuse Treatment - from Join Together, The Partnership at Drugfree.org

• Study: Alcohol in movies may lead to underage drinking Watching movies with scenes that feature alcohol consumption doubles the likelihood that teens will start drinking alcohol, according to a new study published in the journal BMJ Open.

Texas isn't the only state using animals to rehabilitate its juvenile hall residents. For the past 12 weeks, eight young men from the St. Johns Youth Academy in Florida have spent their Friday mornings caring for and learning about horses.

The program was started by college student Jovie Reeves, who grew up riding horses. Jovie joined employees at Haven Horse Ranch in showing the boys how to care for and ride the horses.

In the United States, there are more than 2,500 people serving life sentences without the possibility of parole for crimes committed as children (known as JLWOP). A new report from The Sentencing Project analyzes the findings of a first-ever national survey of JWOPers inmates, some of whom were sentenced at 13 years old. 
“Most juveniles serving life without parole sentences experienced trauma and neglect long before they engaged in their crimes,” explained report author Ashley Nellis. “The findings from this survey do not excuse the crimes committed but they help explain them. With time, rehabilitation and maturity, some of these youth could one day safely re-enter society and contribute positively to their families and their communities.”
 Among the findings:

• Teens sentenced to life without parole are 97% male and 60% African American.
• 79% of JLWOPers were exposed to high levels of violence in their homes.
• Nearly half experienced physical abuse.
• More than a quarter had a parent in prison and 60% had close relatives in prison.

South Carolina is expanding a program that focuses on young offenders—ages 17-25—who are amenable to rehabilitation and may be turned away from a life of crime.
Under South Carolina’s Youthful Offender Act, first-time offenders in that age group receive indeterminate sentences in conjunction with more intensive supervision aimed at reducing recidivism rates. Currently, this subset of offenders re-offends at a rate of 50 percent, considerably higher than the average rate for other adult offenders, which is only 30 percent.
The intensive supervision incorporates skill-building and education that is designed to ensure that the offenders have a trade and can earn a living outside of prison. The intensive supervision is also intended to build a community-based support system to ensure more effective reentry.
 
 

Feel good story of the day: A juvenile hall facility in Texas is using foster dogs to teach its teens compassion, respect and responsibility.

The Victoria Adopt-A-Pet Center and the Victoria Regional Juvenile Justice Center joined together to launch the Dream Seekers Animal Rescue and Training Program, which seeks to teach incarcerated teens about care, safety and training of pets. The hope is that through this program, the kids will develop patience, tolerance, responsibility, accoundability, dependability and compassion. The program is an extension of a previously established community service program where the teen inmates volunteer at the Adopt-A-Pet center once a week. 
Two of the participants, Devin Olguin and DeAndra Moffett, were featured in this recent AP story about the program and its impact. They are currently taking care of a daschund/terrier mix named Alice.  From the article:

Juvenile Justice Reform

• Georgia bill would make smuggling cell phones, cigarettes into youth detention centers a felony
  JJIE
  Smuggling cellphones or cigarettes into a Georgia youth prison would become a felony under a bill approved without opposition Thursday by the Georgia Senate. Under the bill, which still must pass the House of Representatives, violators could be sentenced to up to four years in prison upon conviction.
• Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice conducts comprehensive needs assessment
  SurfKy News Group
  The Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice recently completed an 18-month study of its training academy, thought to be the country’s first comprehensive job task analysis and needs assessment of a juvenile justice training program.
• Los Angeles City Council unanimously approves changes to daytime curfew law
  KPCC radio
  L.A. City Council unanimously voted this morning in favor of changes to the city's daytime curfew law to improve how the city deals with its truant students.
• Opinion: Make youth justice a safer situation
  Austin Statesman
  Recent Texas Tribune-New York Times revelations of ongoing safety concerns in Texas' juvenile justice system only confirm what the leading national research shows: Secure juvenile facilities are a taxpayer burden, work against rehabilitation and can make youths' problems worse.
• California Governor Jerry Brown’s plan to end juvenile justice division faces fight San Francisco Chronicle:
  A group of criminal justice leaders are preparing to fight a plan by Gov. Jerry Brown to entirely phase out the state's Division of Juvenile Justice over the next three years and return the most violent and troubled youths to county facilities, despite support for the proposal by some experts.
• Recent increases in drug arrests were for possession, not sales
  Jeffrey A. Butts
  Between 1991 and 2006, arrests for drug sales and manufacturing actually dropped 6 percent while arrests for possession climbed 139 percent. The same pattern was observed for arrests involving offenders of different ages, but the growth in drug possession arrests was sharpest among juveniles.

Adolecscent Substance Abuse Treatment

• Teens driving under the influence of marijuana
  Join Together at Drugfree.org
  According to a recent study, nearly one in five (19 percent) of teens say they have gotten behind the wheel after smoking marijuana.

Sitting behind her strikingly barren desk, with the bright, mid-winter sunlight breaking through the trees and streaming through her office windows, Martha Grace Duncan, a professor at the Emory University School of Law, in Atlanta recounts the case of nine-year-old Cameron Kocher. As she speaks her small, compact frame remains nearly motionless, betraying no emotion. But her eyes tell the story, portraying the internal mix-up of sadness, passion and nerdy intensity that she feels about the topic. Duncan may not wear her heart on her sleeve, but if you pay attention it’s not hard to find.
In March 1989, on a cold, snowy day in the Pocono Mountains of northeastern Pennsylvania, Kocher fatally shot a seven-year-old playmate with a high-powered hunting rifle. He had been playing video games with the girl at her house when she told him that she was better at the game than he. Soon, the girl went outside to ride snowmobiles with other friends and Kocher, angry that his parents wouldn’t let him join them, retrieved the rifle from his father’s gun cabinet, loaded it and pointed it out the window of his home. Then, as the girl rode with a friend on a snowmobile, Kocher shot her in the back.
Minutes later, as the girl lay dying in her living room, Kocher returned to the girl’s house telling another playmate, “If you don’t think about it, you won’t be sad.”
As Kocher’s case progressed through the courts, many took the quote, coupled with the shooting, as evidence of a cold, remorseless child. Uttering that sentence would have severe repercussions for Kocher, beginning with the question of whether he would be treated as an adult by the courts.
In 2002, Duncan published a lengthy article for the Columbia Law Review that explored how expectations of displays of remorse affect how children are treated in the juvenile justice system, particularly in adjudication and sentencing. Duncan, who also holds a doctorate in political science, applied elements of psychology, sociology and literature to several case studies in the article.

Right on Crime recently highlighted a Kentucky judge’s pilot program to better handle status offenders. Now the legislature, too, is joining the effort.
With a unanimous vote, the House Judiciary Committee in Kentucky recently approved establishing a task force, the “Unified Juvenile Code Task Force” to study the issues plaguing Kentucky’s juvenile justice system.
This comes after heightened public attention to the system following instances of delinquency charges filed against very young children—as young as five—as well as high rates of detention for status offenders.
If approved, the task force would study the system and recommend legislation for consideration in 2013.
Juvenile justice reforms in other states have produced savings of millions of dollars and more effective treatment for juvenile delinquents. Kentucky’s focus on this issue could bring the state’s system in line with those best practices and produce better outcomes for both the Bluegrass State’s taxpayers and juveniles.

Last week, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder announced the creation of the Michigan Committee on Juvenile Justice, an advisory board held within the Michigan Department of Human Services. The Committee was created by combining two commissions focused on juvenile justice issues. Executive Order 2012-1 established the 15-member committee to advise on juvenile justice issues and guide effective implementation of juvenile justice policies and programs.
From the release:

Previously, the 30-member Michigan Commission on Juvenile Justice and the nine-member Juvenile Accountability Block Grant Advisory both provided guidance to the governor. The new, smaller joint commission will provide better focus on issues and be more likely to meet quorum requirements. The membership of the new committee will also contain judges, members active within the community and law enforcement personnel. Prevention of juvenile delinquency will play a significant role in the committee's advisory function.
"The promotion of stronger families, healthier youth and safer communities in our state is of utmost importance," said Snyder. "With the merger of the two commissions and the appointments of these new committee members with such vast and pertinent experience, I am confident these changes will help produce effective and comprehensive strategies to address the issues of, and help reduce and prevent juvenile delinquency."

Click here to visit the Michigan Committee on Juvenile Justice's website.

The North Caroline Department of Juvenile Justice and Deliquency Prevention has an opening for a Reclaiming Futures Trainer who will provide training and technical assistance to existing and newly developed sites to help build statewide capacity for Reclaiming Futures. 
Description of Work
This position provides training and technical assistance to existing and newly developed Reclaiming Futures sites to help build statewide capacity for the program. Curriculum-based training, adaptation of the national RF curriculum to North Carolina, planning and further meeting the training needs at each site will be required. Must be able to conduct quality field research (raining methods, subject matter), have strong consultation and collaboration skills and work well as a team player.
Knowledge, Skills and Abilities
Effective methods/models of adult learning; multi-media tools and methods for delivering training; strong research skills (evaluating subject matter, lesson plans, curricula, etc); excellent oral and written communication skills; strong experince in delivering adult education/adult learning training using multiple methods and modes; strong coordination and management skills (multiple priorities and tasks); skills in evaluating training and quality improvement.