Nationally, on any given night, approximately 81,000 youth are confined to juvenile facilities and 10,000 children are held in adult jails and prisons. Approximately 1 in 10 young male high school dropouts is incarcerated or in juvenile detention. For African Americans, that number is 1 in 4. Research shows that just over two million youth under the age of 18 were arrested in 2008. Of these two million, about 95 percent had not been accused of violent crimes. In 2010, of the nearly 100,000 youth under the age of 18 who were serving time in a juvenile residential placement facility, 26 percent had been convicted of property crimes only, such as burglary, arson, or theft. Access to education both stems the tide of incarceration and improves inmates chances of re-acclimating to society after their release.
“Why should people be cut off from the logic of having a separate youth justice system—that people change, that people grow, that people should not be defined by an act—because they are a day over 18? A new Illinois reform (House Bill 531), signed into law this month by Governor J.B. Pritzker, defies the usual pattern that in the United States even bold youth justice reforms stop at the age of majority, if not earlier.“
The Appeal Political Report
April 25, 2019
Read More“Even without the research gold standard of double-blind randomized controlled trials, school-based restorative justice is considered a promising practice, with virtually all states in the nation having adopted it in some form. Very few studies, however, focus on the potential of restorative justice to reduce racial disparities in school discipline. Oakland, California, and Denver, Colorado, are leading the way.”
Salon
April 21, 2019
Read More“A sentence over 40 years is a de facto life sentence for juveniles, according to a new decision from the Illinois Supreme Court. The decision, released Thursday, offers hope of an earlier release for some people serving long sentences for crimes they committed as kids and bolsters the philosophy in the criminal justice system that kids should be treated differently than adults.“
WBEZ Chicago
April 18, 2019
Read More“As if schooling was not already jail-like enough, adding armed police officers to the mix confirms the metaphor. In public schools across the country, police officers are increasingly present, costing taxpayers millions of dollars for a vague notion of safety. In fact, some estimates suggest that over two-thirds of high school students currently attend a school with a police officer on site.“
Foundation for Economic Education
April 16, 2019
Read More“On a vote of 20-10, the Senate passed SB 1008 Tuesday. It is the distillation of several bills from earlier this session dealing with juvenile sentencing. The most significant proposals include: removing the requirement that 15-, 16- and 17-year-olds be charged as adults for certain crimes; establishing the process for "second look" hearings half-way through a sentence being served by a juvenile convicted in adult court; banning life sentences without the possibility of parole for juvenile offenders; and allowing hearings to determine if people in Oregon Youth Authority custody should be turned over to adult prisons when they reach 27.“
Salem Statesman Journal
April 16, 2019
Read More“Advocates see Close to Home, launched in New York City in 2012 when Michael Bloomberg was mayor, as one model that can be increasingly replicated nationwide. Rather than funneling children who had been determined by a Family Court judge to be “delinquent” to rural prisons, Close to Home allowed them, as the name suggests, to stay in rehabilitative facilities, usually group homes, near their families, allowing for visits and family counseling.“
The Nation
April 8, 2019
Read More“After removing her son, police charged Headley with resisting arrest, acting in a manner injurious to a child, obstructing governmental administration and trespassing. Headley was taken in handcuffs from the Brooklyn social services office. She spent five days in jail before being released and all charges were dropped. The New York City Council has since apologized to Headley.“
The Conversation
March 31, 2019
Read More“For example, the right to legal counsel is a fundamental constitutional right — yet I personally know that many children don’t fully understand the lawyer’s role (nor a judge or jury for that matter) in representing someone accused of a crime. How then can such a child knowingly and voluntarily waive the right to counsel?“
Honolulu Civil Beat
March 22, 2019
Read More“Prison reform is a major topic within the national political conversation. For many incarcerated people, the path to jail begins in the teen years; at any given time, roughly 50,000 young people are held in juvenile prisons. Johnnie McDaniels, former executive director of the Henley-Young Juvenile Justice Center, shares a brief but spectacular take on the "revolving door" of juvenile corrections.“
PBS News Hour
March 7, 2019
Read More“In this first phase of the Raise the Age law, the state will no longer automatically arrest, detain and prosecute 17-year-olds as adults when the teens are accused of nonviolent crimes. That change, advocates hope, will better rehabilitate youth, but many officials worry how it will affect an already underfunded and, often, outdated juvenile justice system.“
The Advocate
February 28, 2019
Read More“The most recent suit, filed in 2003 by a woman whose nephew was a ward of the state, led to 13 years of court-ordered monitoring to document and address systemic abuse and dangerous conditions at DJJ facilities. The lawsuit was settled by consent decree in 2016, suggesting that problems had been solved and the system was on the path to improvement. But in the nearly three years since, the CJCJ report says, conditions haven’t changed — and some things have gotten worse.“
Huffington Post
February 19, 2019
Read More“The fight for restorative justice is set against the backdrop of a district in crisis. Oakland Unified leaders say millions of dollars in budget cuts and school closures are required to keep the district solvent in the coming years. Meanwhile, teachers are poised to strike over a number of issues including pay and class sizes.“
EdSource
February 12, 2019
Read More“The Department of Justice abruptly ended its oversight of juvenile court in Tennessee’s Shelby County in October, saying it “applauds Shelby County’s reform efforts” and declaring it a success. But the department’s own monitor tells a different story: The county is still engaging in “blatantly unfair” practices that hurt children.“
The Appeal
February 1, 2019
Read More“While New York has long had the power to transfer inmates, defense lawyers and inmate advocates criticized the increase as an end-run around the city’s own rules, adding that it undermined Mayor Bill de Blasio’s promise to reform the criminal justice system.“
New York Times
December 28, 2018
Read More“In the last decade, 73 Duval County children have been arrested in cases of murder and manslaughter. Only one other county has more: Miami-Dade, which has nearly three times the youth population. Taking into account population differences, no other large county in Florida has a higher rate of minors arrested on these charges than Duval.“
Florida Times Union
December 14, 2018
Read More“The underlying purpose of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act is to use the promise of federal money to ensure four ‘core protections’ for children in states’ youth justice systems. These include not locking kids up for age-based ‘status offenses’ such as truancy, running away and curfew violations; removing them from adult jails, with few exceptions; always keeping them separate from adult inmates; and making states research and address racial disparities.“
The Marshall Project
December 13, 2018
Read More“Included in the bill are four core standards for state juvenile justice practice: not jailing youth for committing age-based status offenses like truancy and curfew violations; removing juvenile offenders from adult jails and prisons; ensuring sight and sound separation in the exception of any juveniles incarcerated in adult facilities; and committing to address disproportional minority contact (DMC) in the juvenile justice system.“
Sojourners
December 13, 2018
Read More“The underlying purpose of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act is to use the promise of federal money to ensure four “core protections” for children in states’ youth justice systems. These include not locking kids up for age-based “status offenses” such as truancy, running away and curfew violations; removing them from adult jails, with few exceptions; always keeping them separate from adult inmates; and making states research and address racial disparities.“
The Marshall Project
December 13, 2018
Read More“In Family Court hearings every month, the A.C.S. is quietly being granted arrest warrants to detain foster children like Nevayah, whose only transgression is leaving the agency’s care. The unusually draconian strategy has little precedent in any state’s foster care system, and it is unclear if the A.C.S. even has the authority to use such warrants under New York State law. “
New York Times
December 6, 2018
Read More“Doleac, the researcher, contends that even a well-intended program can be especially burdensome for low-income parents and kids who work hourly jobs. They often don’t have paid time off to deal with the court system.“
Denver Post
November 18, 2018
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