Major Reforms are Needed to Protect Youth in the Juvenile Justice System and to Increase Safety in Communities, Witnesses Tell House Panel
WASHINGTON, D.C. – As the Education and Labor Committee works to reauthorize Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act, the committee should implement significant policy changes that will spur systemic change, prevent juvenile delinquency, provide appropriate treatment and create safer communities, witnesses told the committee today. “By focusing early on to support youth with the right tools and resources, we can achieve the dual goal of both helping children at-risk become productive citizens and keeping our communities safe,” said U.S. Rep. George Miller (D-CA), chair of the committee. “We can do this with by pursuing an evidence-based, comprehensive approach to juvenile justice that works to prevent juvenile delinquency as well as intervene with services and treatments when appropriate.”
The Juvenile Justice Delinquency Protection Act (JJDPA) was originally passed in 1974 to support state and local justice systems specifically focused on the unique needs of youth. The law was last reauthorized in 2002 and promotes the humane treatment of children in the juvenile justice system through four “core protections” and authorizes grants to states and communities for prevention and intervention initiatives.
The protections include a requirement that prohibits states from detaining status offenders -- juveniles charged with crimes that wouldn’t be prosecuted if not for their age; removing youth under the jurisdiction of the juvenile court from adult lock ups; sight and sound protections to ensure juveniles held in adult lock ups have no sight or sound contact with adults and requirements for states to address the disproportionate number of minority youth at all points in the juvenile justice system.
Witnesses discussed the need to fix loopholes in the core protections, especially in regards to status offenders and jail removal.
“The underlying causes of status offenses are typically linked to problems at home and school, and to unmet trauma and mental health needs of young people. Locked detention is not designed to treat or to resolve such causes,” said A. Hasan Davis, Deputy Commissioner for Operations for the Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice. “More importantly, the negative outcomes that can arise from detention far outweigh any benefits of short-term confinement without access to critical services necessary to eliminate the reasons for the status offense.”
Tracy McClard of Jackson, Missouri urged the panel to consider completely removing youth from adult facilities. McClard’s son Jonathan hung himself after suffering abuse and torture at the hands of the adult inmates.
“Jonathan’s experience taught me that no child should be placed with adults no matter what, because when children are put in with adults they die - physically or mentally,” said McClard. “[I]f the goal of the juvenile and criminal justice system is to keep our communities safe, how safe can our communities be if a kid in Jonathan’s position would have spent five, ten, fifteen or more years in the conditions Jonathan faced and with the role models he had.”
Every year, 200,000 youth in this country are held, sentenced or incarcerated as adults. Children in adult jails are eight times more likely to commit suicide than in juvenile facilities, and 50 percent more likely to be attacked with a weapon, and much more likely to be raped.
Witnesses testified that a comprehensive approach, focusing on evidence-based alternatives to detention, can better serve juveniles and the community. In Clayton County, Georgia, for example, juvenile delinquency decreased by over fifty percvent after officials within the juvenile hjystice system changed their approach and started making more collaborative and evidenced-based decisions that focused on community-based alternatives to detention.
“Too often, the juvenile justice system is viewed as a single agency that exists separate and apart from other state agencies that work with youth,” said Steven C. Teske, a Judge for the Clayton County Juvenile Court in Georgia. “However, in order to achieve the desired outcome of the juvenile justice system - preventing delinquency for youth not involved in the system and keeping youth already in the system from re-offending - we must understand why youth are getting into trouble in the first place. By using a collaborative approach, we can identify the root causes for youth coming.”
Minority youth are disproportionally represented within the juvenile justice system. Specifically, in 2006, data show black youth were five times more likely to be detained than white youth. Witnesses testified that youth of color receive more harsh responses than white youth and the committee should take efforts to reduce the racial and ethnic disparities in the system.
“The extent of disproportionate minority contact and racial and ethnic disparities has reached a level crisis that must be addressed, and it is a crisis that can be addressed with a strategic and intentional approach,” said Michael Belton, Deputy Director of Juvenile Corrections in Ramsey County, MN.
Belton also discussed the need to properly use data to inform policies and practices, suggesting the committee’s reauthorization must include developing and implementing data systems that “identify where racial and ethnic disparities exist.”
Witness testimony and an archived webcast of the hearing are available here
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