Humane Exposures Blog

Last May legislation passed in the state of Florida, backed by Sen. J.D. Alexander (R-Lake Wales) among others,  was but  allowing any Florida county that could meet certain standards to take control of its own juvenile detention.Among other things this allows counties to move minors charged as juveniles into county jails. Two counties in the Sunshine State— Marion and Polk — already have made this change.

The state of Florida closed down the Polk Regional Juvenile Detention Center on the 27th of last October, and Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd debuted their new juvenile detention center that same month. Judd vows to cut in half the $3.2 million billed to the county each year by Juvenile Justice.

Treasure Coast sheriffs are not so quick to jump on the bandwagon, as Melissa Holsman of TCPalm reports:

Martin County Sheriff Robert Crowder said the county doesn’t deal with enough juvenile offenders to justify the costs of assuming the entire responsibility of housing juvenile offenders when the option exists to transfer the youths to the regional facility in Fort Pierce.

‘That’s a pretty drastic jump in expenses when you set up a facility,’ Crowder noted. ‘I think it’s a good idea the state is allowing local agencies to deal with this. But we have not done enough research here locally to take a firm position on this .’

Cost is one factor, and politicians on both sides are famous for neglecting to factor in start up costs when presenting their numbers. Another factor is staffing. In this case there were 73 state employees whose positions were put up for grabs by the changeover. Of those 42 put in applications at the new facility after Judd’s urging, and this is where the twist comes in.

You see only nine of them have been approved for hire, one is still pending. The reasons? Michael Pleasant at The Ledger shares the list:

Here’s what the Sheriff’s Office says kept the rest from getting through the hiring process:

Eleven did not pass a polygraph exam. The process involves a lengthy yes-or-no questionnaire and an interview based on the questions while hooked to a lie detector.

Six did not meet the agency’s general order standards, which set guidelines for several things including tattoos and past illegal drug use.

Four did not pass a background check, which could mean their criminal history disqualifies them or information they gave on applications turned out to be false or inaccurate.

One failed a psychological examination required for hire.

Ten withdrew their applications.

Judd has stated that the results of the polygraph tests in particular raised concerns. The state department on the other hand requires a background check, a drug screen and fingerprinting just like Judd’s facility, but does not require a polygraph.

No matter the issues surrounding the changeover there are massive concerns about its effect on Florida’s youth. The lack of specific training in dealing with youth offenders is one of the key arguments against this sort of incarceration.

Jacob Carpenter of The Naples Daily News brings us one vital argument in particular:

Lawanda Ravoira, director of a Jacksonville-based advocacy center for juvenile girls, said jail officials would be particularly unable to support victims of sexual abuse. Research suggests that 70 percent of girls who enter the juvenile justice system have been victims of emotional, physical or sexual abuse.

‘At best, it’s developmentally inappropriate,’ Ravoira said. ‘At worst, it increases the likelihood that young girls will be physically and sexually abused in those facilities.’

Roy Miller, president of the Tallahassee-based Children’s Campaign, a juvenile watchdog nonprofit has stated this new legislation “…sets us back 40 years.”

It is understandable for states and their counties to be finding ways to reduce costs, in this economic climate everyone is doing that. This is exactly why better measures that are more effective in the long term need consideration. Moving to county based incarceration looks initially cheaper but over the long term the truly cost effective approach is rehabilitation.

Image Source: Woody H1, used under it’s Creative Commons license

Mental focus, empathy, and optimism. These are three things lacking in the early lives of many children, particularly children who suffer the trials of homelessness or incarceration. Three things that actress Goldie Hawn wants to give to children everywhere.

Let’s start off with a quick video to get you up to speed and take it from there, shall we?

Developed by Hawn and neurologist Judy Willis the program uses short duration “brain breaks”  to help school children learn to regulate their own brains.

Three times daily, kids in the program are given three minute sessions of “mindfulness training.”  When totaled together the sessions cover four different 30 minute lessons.

• Quieting the mind.
• Our senses.
• Practical Applications.
• Mindfulness and ourselves in the world.

The short sessions seem to work beautifully as the children involved in the profess to really enjoy them and consistently tell their friends and families about their experiences.

Marianne Schnall recently interviewed Hawn for The Huffington Post. Here is an excerpt from it’s introduction:

Working with leading neuroscientists, educators and researchers, The Hawn Foundation has developed the MindUP program, a curriculum that has already been implemented in classrooms by over 1,000 educators throughout the United States, Canada and the U.K. — and they are receiving requests to bring their program to many other regions around the world such as Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. The cutting-edge curriculum features 15 carefully-thought out lessons designed to help children reduce stress and anxiety; improve concentration and academic performance; understand the brain science linking emotions, thoughts and behaviors; manage their emotions and behavior more effectively; develop greater empathy for others and the world; and learn to be optimistic and happy. It is a revolutionary undertaking that seeks to dramatically transform the way we view education, using methods that are backed up by the latest research about the brain — and they are already achieving impressive results in children who are learning in the MindUp classroom.

The interview goes into a great deal of depth on the subject, including detailed discussion of how the program is implemented, the findings so far, and the science supporting it. Read it here: Goldie Hawn Talks ‘MindUP’ and Her Mission to Bring Children Happiness.

As always the question is “just how effective is this approach?” While there are no completed studies of the program at this point, the initial findings of one currently in progress come to us through serendipity.

Peter B. Reiner, a contributing writer for Neuroethics at the Core,  ran into UBC Associate Professor Kim Schonert-Reich on a plane recently.  Schonert-Reich is one of the lead researchers on the efficacy of the MindUP™ curriculum on schoolchildren and her description on the astonishing results of the program led him to cover it in a recent post:

Kim is in the process of carrying out a proper experiment on the MindUP™ program, with some classes receive no training, others receiving sham training, and other getting the full MindUP™ curriculum. The results are not yet published, but even the non-quantitative results are compelling. When teachers who are not using the program see what a powerful positive effect it is having on kids in other classes, they clamour for having the curriculum included in their daily lesson plans.  High school teachers are starting to ask for a version of the program for their students.  It has turned into a full-fledged meme, spreading like wildfire in the absence of marketing. As an added benefit, MindUP™ is also making kids budding neurobiologists – each lesson is accompanied by a description of what goes on in the brain when one practices mindfulness, and kids apparently go home to their families and tell them about their brains.

Here’s a longer talk by Hawn for those who wish a more in depth examination of her views:

Early education and youth development are the most effective strategies for breaking the cycle of at-risk behavior, and helping our youth thrive. Programs like these can be a powerful weapon in the battle for our children’s futures. Forging a better present for those who are children now is the surest way to ensure a better future for them as they mature.

Bruce Perry, M.D., Ph.D., Senior Fellow, The ChildTrauma Academy and author of The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog and BORN FOR LOVE: Why Empathy Is Essential — and Endangered put it succinctly:

What we are as adults is the product of the world we experienced as children. The way a society functions is a reflection of the childrearing practices of that society. Today, we reap what we have sown.

One of the huge factors that can rob a child of opportunities in his future is lack of access to an education. It  is one of the great tragedies of juvenile life in America that so many of our youth find the path to their future limited by a lack of access to learning.

Today I’d like to point out a few organizations doing excellent work as they strive to break down barriers between kids and education.

Education Justice.org 

Education Justice at Education Law Center seeks high quality educational opportunity for all children, including low-income and minority children, children learning English, and children with disabilities.

As part of ELC, EdJustice offers support services to a network of litigators and other education advocates across the country to secure the Opportunity To Learn and equity in funding and learning resources. EdJustice and ELC help advocates press state and federal policymakers to extend the excellence in wealthy suburban schools to low-wealth urban and rural communities and children.

Coalition for Educational Justice 

The NYC Coalition for Educational Justice (CEJ) is organizing a parent-led movement for educational equity and excellence in the city’s public schools. We are a citywide collaborative of community-based organizations and unions whose members are parents, community residents and teachers. Together, we are fighting to ensure that every child in NYC receives a quality and well-rounded education.

Alliance for Educational Justice

The Alliance for Educational Justice (AEJ) is a new national alliance of youth organizing and intergenerational groups working for educational justice.  AEJ aims to bring grassroots groups together to bring about changes in federal education policy, build a national infrastructure for the education justice sector, and build the capacity of our organizations and our youth leaders to sustain and grow the progressive movement over the long haul.

The Education Justice Project 

The mission of the Education Justice project is to build a model college-in-prison program that demonstrates the positive impacts of higher education upon incarcerated people, their families, the communities from which they come, and society as a whole. While this group does not deal directly with children it is vital nonetheless.

Research is clear. College-in-prison programs reduce arrest, conviction, and reincarceration rates among released prisoners. Evidence has also linked the presence of college-in-prison programs to fewer disciplinary incidents within prison, finding that such programs produce safer environments for prisoners and staff alike. College-prison programs also have benefits for inmates’ families and, hence, their communities. The strongest predictor of whether a given person will attend college is whether her or his parents did. When an incarcerated person receives a college education, whether or not s/he is eventually released, his or her children are more likely to pursue their own educations.

Note: Regular Blogging will resume Monday as I am in the midst of a cross country move. Please aprdon any delay in replying to your comments. 

Image by sleepyneko, used under its Creative Commons license

The American juvenile justice system is fractured, costly, and inefficient.  American adults spend an amazing amount of time on Facebook.

Today I’m going to throw a spotlight on where those two subjects intersect. As you may have noticed, social media has become an instrumental tool for advocacy and activism over recent years.  It is only natural that we should find people and organizations mobilizing for reform of the way we treat juveniles.

Today I’m going to share a number of these with you, and since Facebook is the dominant platform at the moment let’s see what we can find there.  (The descriptions following each entry are directly quoted from each group’s Facebook page.)

The Virginia Juvenile Justice Association

Mission: To advocate for quality services for juveniles (due process, evidence-based practices, proven models,
program integrity/standards, outcome measures). To enhance the professionalism and skills of our members (professional development, skill building, practice improvement, resources, technical assistance,awards for excellence, recognition). To foster communication among our members (collaboration, networking, publications). To promote alternative approaches to resolving youth and family problems (diversion, risk-basedgraduated responses, least restrictive environment).

Coalition for Juvenile Justice

Mission: CJJ is a nationwide coalition of State Advisory Groups (SAGs) and allies dedicated to preventing children and youth from becoming involved in the courts and upholding the highest standards of care when youth are charged with wrongdoing and enter the justice system.

Since 1984, CJJ has supported a broad and active coalition across all 56 U.S. states, territories and the District of Columbia, as the nonprofit association of Governor-appointed SAG members operating under the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act (JJDPA), along with allied staff, individuals and organizations. CJJ members include concerned individuals, practitioners, advocates and youth who voluntarily serve at the state and national levels. CJJ is governed by an Executive Board of national and regional officers. All of CJJ’s formal positions on policy and related matters are developed and approved by a super-majority of the CJJ Council of SAGs. The Council comprises the Chairs or Chair-designees of SAGs holding membership in CJJ.

Connecticut Juvenile Justice Alliance

Mission: The mission of the Connecticut Juvenile Justice Alliance is to reduce the number of children and youth entering the juvenile and criminal justice system, and advocate a safe, effective, and fair system for those involved.

The Connecticut Juvenile Justice Alliance accomplishes its mission by serving as a catalyst for systems reform. The Alliance employs the following strategies in pursuit of its mission: Legislative education and advocacy; Strategic communications; Community organizing; as well as National, state, and local partnerships.

Citizens For Juvenile Justice

Mission: Citizens for Juvenile Justice (CfJJ) is the only independent, non-profit, statewide organization working exclusively to improve the juvenile justice system in Massachusetts. We advocate, convene, conduct research, and educate the public on important juvenile justice issues. We believe that both children in the system and public safety are best served by a fair and effective system that recognizes the ways children are different from adults and focuses primarily on their rehabilitation.

CfJJ advocates for a fair and effective juvenile justice system in Massachusetts, designed to promote the healthy development of children and youth so they can grow up to live as responsible and productive adults in our communities.

Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana

Mission: To transform the juvenile justice system into one that builds on the strengths of young people, families and communities to ensure children are given the greatest opportunities to grow and thrive.

These are all good starting points for those who wish to engage this topic on Facebook. If you know of any other resources on the topic of juvenile justice please leave a link in the comments. I’ll be doing a follow up to this post soon with even more resources, and if you suggest one I use I will happily provide credit.

Now, go explore Facebook!

Image Source: Max – B on Flickr, used under it’s Creative Commons license

Restorative justice is a theory of justice that emphasizes repairing the harm caused or revealed by criminal behaviour. It is best accomplished through cooperative processes that include all stakeholders.  –Restorative Justice Online

Rehabilitating and reintegrating wrongdoers into society at large has proven to be both less costly and more effective than traditional incarceration This is a proven fact, that can be easily verified. Our criminal justice system, with it’s incarceration mentality, all too often merely creates hardened criminals out of the  youths that enter its doors.

This is especially damaging to the African American portion of our population. In 2008 Pew Charitable Trusts reported that one out of every 15 black men over the age of 18 is serving time. For comparison only one out of 106 white men are incarcerated. One in every nine African American men between 20 and 34 are incarcerated, a striking contrast to the 1 in 30 of that age group across the rest of the general population.

Rebecca M. Stone of the Central Virginia Restorative Justice recently wrote the following on Bikyamasr:

There are no easy answers to the question of what to do about the disproportionate incarceration rates of young African American men. Nor is there a single solution to address the many layers of structural inequalities that perpetuate cycles of poverty and violence in their lives. We know that incarceration does not solve the problem of crime; this is evident in the fact that around 40 per cent of released inmates are back in prison within three years. For some people, prison can induce change, but the reality is that once within the ‘system’, many people tend to stay.

This makes it imperative that we find more ways to help kids re-integrate into society rather than simply stashing them out of sight behind bars. Once they enter jail or prison facilities their chances of recidivism go through the roof. Far better to help salvage these lives by helping them avoid such circumstances. Restorative justice is one way of attempting to do so.

In her writing Stone explains that restorative justice is more concerned with people and relationships than with simple legalities. Rather than looking at what law has been broken and the mandated penalty, a restorative justice approach looks more at what harm has been done, how it can be rectified, and who is responsible for fixing it.

Offenders are often brought together with their victims in order to apologize and collaboratively develop a plan for fixing the damage done by the crime. Offenders write apology letters to those they have wronged, talk about their actions, and actively participate in figuring out how to prevent it from happening again. Stone reports that offenders find the process much more demanding than the usual justice system because they are forced to see the results of their actions.

She also reports her own first hand experience with the effects of this approach:

 Restorative justice works. Last year the Albemarle County programme I am involved in in Virginia had an 11 per cent recidivism rate for young offenders. In comparison, there was a 23 per cent recidivism rate among young offenders in the same area who did not engage in a restorative justice process.

I’d say cutting recidivism in half is pretty fair evidence, wouldn’t you?

Toro, Dworsky, & Fowler (2007) report that youthful offenders are likely to experience homelessness disproportionately. For example, at one large youth shelter in New York, 30 percent of youth served had been arrested or incarcerated previously (Toro, et al., 2007). Additionally, because their homelessness forces them to spend more time than their housed peers in public spaces, homeless youth are more likely to have contact with the juvenile justice system for offenses such as loitering, camping, and panhandling (Sedlak & Bruce, 2010).
Youth Homelessness and Juvenile JusticeTheir offenses are generally non-violent but recurring, likely as a result of their lack of stable homes and frequent moves.

So begins the report entitled Best Practices In Interagency Collaboration: Youth Homelessness and Juvenile Justice (pdf) by the National Center for Homeless Education.

The report is designed to help juvenile justice professionals ranging from attorneys understand the structure of the juvenile court system and the   McKinneyVento Homeless Assistance Act. This act is a critical tool  homeless youth and the  juvenile justice agencies that serve them to not only get them into school, but they work with to enroll and succeed in school. Obviously we support this approach, just take a look at our HumaneSmarts program just recently launched. After all, education is crucial to helping at-risk youth move forward into productive lives

Various groups worthy of support exist with this end in mind. In Pennsylvania there is The Homeless Children’s Education Fund, whose mission is listed on their website as follows:

To serve as a voice for the homeless children of Allegheny County and to ensure they are afforded equal access to the same educational opportunities and experiences as their peers.

Another useful resource comes to us through The U.S. Department of Education – a consolidated page of grants for the education of homeless youth. Of course the resources available at the national level can often be confusing to navigate, which brings me to a webpage compiled in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Education Rights of Homeless Children by Michael A. O’Connor, Esq. on WriteLaw.

When the storm left 200,000 school age children homeless after it struck our part of the coast  he saw the need to create a document that would allow people to know exactly what they had available to them. As a native of New Orleans myself I salute him for that, it’s a fantastic array of information and links to reseources, all presented in plain English.

The bottom line is that education is vital under the best of circumstances, but for the homeless children of our country it can make a fundamental difference between a life of incarceration and a life that is livable. The direct co

Image Source: i5a, used under it’s Creative Commons license

It is often supposed that the threat of trial in an adult court will reduce crime. As with most fear based strategies it is far from the mark.

Does treating juveniles as adults help reduce crime? In a word, no.

Frontline answered this one succinctly in their website dedicated to juvenile justice:

To date, only two studies have examined whether stricter transfer laws result in lowered juvenile crime rates. Both found that there was no evidence to support that the laws had the intended effect.

Criminologists Simon Singer and David McDowell evaluated the effects of New York’s Juvenile Offender Law on the rate of serious juvenile crime. This landmark piece of legislation was passed in 1978, and lowered the age of criminal court jurisdiction to thirteen for murder, and to fourteen for rape, robbery, assault, and violent categories of burglary. Singer and McDowell analyzed juvenile arrest rates in New York for four years prior to the enactment of the law, and six years after. These rates were compared with those for control groups of thirteen and fourteen year olds in Philadelphia, and with slightly older offenders in New York. The researchers found that the threat of adult criminal sanctions had no effect on the levels of serious juvenile crime.

A later study by social scientists Eric Jensen and Linda Metsger reached a similar conclusion. They sought to evaluate the deterrent effect of the transfer statute passed in Idaho in 1981, which required that juveniles charged with certain serious crimes (murder, attempted murder, robbery, forcible rape, and mayhem) be tried as adults. They examined arrest rates for five years before and five years after the passage of the law, and found no evidence that it had any deterrent effect on the level of juvenile crime in Idaho. The researchers also compared the arrest rates for the target offenses with those in neighboring states Montana and Wyoming, which were demographically similar to Idaho, and had in place a discretionary waiver system similar to the system Idaho had before the new legislation. They found that juvenile arrests for the offenses targeted by the legislation actually increased in Idaho, while decreasing in the other two states.

Yet despite this we still have laws on the books all over the country that encourage sending underage offenders to adult courts. An unfortunate situation that disproportionately affects youth of color.

The study From Time-Out to Hard Time: Young Children in the Adult Criminal Justice System made several recommendations to national and state policymakers back in 2009.

• Children should be kept in the juvenile justice system and mandatory sentencing for young children in adult criminal court should be disallowed.
• Judges should have the discretion to take into account a youth offender’s attitudes toward rehabilitation.
• Regardless of sentence length, youth offenders should always be provided parole opportunities and should never be housed with the adult criminal population.

This is an approach to juvenile enforcement that is not only inhumane but also very costly to taxpayers. The time has come to change that.

Lets close with a slideshow of art created by incarcerated juveniles that was created as a companion to our upcoming book- Born, Not Raised. It should give you glimpse into the disturbing and hopeless world experienced by incarcerated juveniles. Imagine how much worse for those tried as adults and remanded to adult facilities.

Britain is set to take over the chairmanship of the Council of Europe soon and as a result they are considering their priorities for reforming the European court of human rights at Strasbourg. This is why so many eyes are looking towards the UK right now as the political class skirmishes over a proposal that would institute mandatory sentencing for juveniles found carrying knives.

British home secretary Theresa May and Justice Secretary Ken Clarke are having a fine old row. Earlier this October the two clashed when Theresa May clashed with Clarke during the Conservative party conference. A conference where he called her comments about the Human Rights Act both “laughable” and “childlike.” As you may imagine their relationship has been a bit chilly since.

At the core of this particular conflict is the Justice Secretary’s belief that mandatory sentencing is rarely effective, and that applying such sentencing to youth offenders is out of line. He has further stated that the occurrence of  mandatory sentences in British law are actually an innovation adopted from our side of the ocean here in America. Clarke quarrels with the basic assumption behind mandatory sentencing which he sees as an  assumption that judges can’t be trusted to sentence cases based on the individual circumstances of each case.

Clarke is reported by the UK Guardian as having said:

‘We have – because of the seriousness that we attach to knife crime and we think a strong message has got to be sent to people indulging in knife crime – agreed such a mandatory sentence for adults,’ said Clarke.

But, he added: ‘This is being tabled and that is the government’s proposal. The idea that mandatory sentences for certain types of offence, should be extended to young offenders, to children, to juveniles is a bit of a leap for the British judicial system.’

This is a hot topic in England following in the wake of the riots they experienced last August. A topic the justice secretary also touched on. Criticism made in hindsight is always easy. Dina Rickman brings us the pertinent quote in her piece on The Huffington Post:

‘It’s usually easy in the Dog and Duck 48 hours later, to start saying what the police should have done in an unexpected and violent situation… It was totally unexpected and the scale was a surprise to all of us.’

Of course Clarke has also made public comments that the rioters we part of a criminal “underclass,”  who exhibited a “irresponsible feckless reaction” from those involved. He also stated that the percentage of young people involved was lower because they have “not had time to get a conviction yet.”

No matter how you cut it things are pretty dicey in the UK right now for juveniles. If this goes through kids will suffer jail time for carrying a knife. While I doubt many would argue that kids with knives is something to endorse, the act remains that summary incarceration is not the solution.

Sen. Ronda Storms, chairwoman of the Senate Committee on Children, Families and Elder Affairs, is on the warpath in Tallahassee.

The Republican senator is not happy with the responses she is getting to her investigation of the Department of Juvenile Justice’s (DJJ) use of psychotropic drugs on the kids in it’s care. Critics of the practice call it “chemical restraint. ” Gayla Sumner, a spokesperson for the DJJ has stated that it is against the agency’s policy to use mind-altering drugs for discipline or punishment. On Tuesday the 18th Storms roundly blasted the DJJ in her committee and now she is turning up the heat.

With 34% of the minors in its system on psychotropic medication the DJJ certainly seems to require scrutiny. When DJJ secretary Wansley Walters, didn’t appear before Storms’ committee it was bad enough, but when another DJJ testimony included no mention that Walters believed the issue to be  serious enough that she ordered the investigation herself last May.

Dara Kam of the Palm Beach Post provides some details:

On Wednesday, Storms, R-Valrico, admonished Department of Juvenile Justice Secretary Wansley Walters in a letter after Walters failed to appear before Storms’ Children, Families and Elder Affairs Committee on Tuesday. At that meeting, Storms upbraided Walters’ aides for not being candid with the committee about the use of the mind-altering medicines.

Storms ordered Walters to appear at the committee’s next meeting in November.

On Thursday, in the Senate Criminal and Civil Justice Appropriations Committee, Storms ordered DJJ’s director for administrative services, Fred Schuknechts, to come back with a financial analysis of the department’s spending on psychotropic drugs ‘for your entire population for whatever the reason. … And I would like that post-haste.’

Skipping a meeting when you know you’re being investigated does not cast your case in a positive light. Whether there is anything wrong or not, and it does appear there probably is, that sort of behavior gives the appearance that something shady is going on.

In an extremely unflattering comparison Storms notes that the DJJ uses psychotropics almost three times as much as the Department of Children and Families. Margie Menzel, a writer for The Ledger, brings us the pertinent quote:

She also noted that DJJ’s 34 percent medication rate was much higher than the 14.8 percent rate of use of medication reported by another agency, the Department of Children and Families.

‘Our children in [DCF] care have been badly burned, some of them have been starved, some of them have been sexually molested, some of them have been abandoned,’ she told Anderson. ‘Your [DJJ] population cannot be more needy. Everyone in our population has had some form of maltreatment.’

If the DJJ provides Storms with the requested update the situation should return to committee soon.