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The 11th circuit is the Dade County

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https://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2020/436/BillText/Filed/PDF

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https://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/com_solitary_confinement_0.pdf

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Charging Youths As Adults Can Be A 'Cruel Wake-Up Call.' Is There Another Way?

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Charging Youths As Adults Can Be A 'Cruel Wake-Up Call.' Is There Another Way?

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WMFE Series: Young & Arrested
The moments inside a courtroom in Orlando in 2007 were quick and consequential for Marquis McKenzie. The 16-year-old stood handcuffed behind a lectern. A juvenile judge announced his charges, then apologized that he could no longer take up the case.

"You're being direct filed," he told McKenzie, who was accused of armed robbery over a cellphone and a wallet. "You understand what I'm saying? You're being charged as an adult now."

McKenzie remembers his mother wailing from the courtroom benches, begging the judge to reconsider.

"I had never been in that situation. I had gotten in trouble, but I had never gotten arrested," he recalls a decade later. "I just knew it was going to be a hell of a ride from there."

The juvenile judge's announcement meant that McKenzie was no longer solely subject to the rehabilitative services offered within Florida's juvenile system. He was now facing a 10-year sentence. A judge in one of the state's criminal courts would have the option of sending him two hours away to residential confinement at a youth facility, or to the juvenile section in one of Florida's medium security private prisons.

The latter is where McKenzie ended up. That same year, more than 3,600 other kids were direct filed and sent to adult court, too.

Across the country, lawmakers, juvenile justice advocates and community groups are shifting away from direct file, and rethinking their approach to handling kids and young adults who commit crimes. Florida, more than other states, has traditionally embraced an aggressive direct file system run by state attorneys who opt to transfer kids out of the juvenile court system and into the adult criminal system. The repercussions are great and the options for navigating the complex system are limited.

" Cruel wake-up call"

Florida was in the thick of its direct file culture when McKenzie's case was transferred to adult court. From 2006 to 2011, more than 15,600 youths passed through the adult criminal court system for violent and nonviolent offenses.

"That was a 'get tough' era in the United States," says Florida State University criminologist Carter Hay. "That was a time when there was a lot of concern about juvenile crime. There was a lot of media attention to the idea that there were these juvenile superpredators who were just a real threat to public safety."

Behind the trend were state attorneys, to whom Florida's direct file statute grants unfettered discretion to move any juvenile case to adult court without a judge's permission. The statute dates back to juvenile justice reform from the 1950s, when lawmakers were seeking to balance rehabilitation and punishment of youths who had committed heinous crimes. In the 1990s and into the 2000s, the direct file statute became the most used tool for handling children.

"A lot of these juveniles that have been through the system a lot, when they get arrested, their attitude is 'Nothing's going to happen to me. I'm a juvenile,' " says former 9th Circuit state attorney Jeff Ashton.

For more than 30 years he helped prosecute juvenile cases in Orange and Osceola counties, where McKenzie was direct filed. As state attorney, he spent four years having a final say over which cases got sent to adult court.

"When they get direct filed to adult, it's sort of this cruel wake-up call," he says.

According to Ashton, the direct file statute gives judges a "bigger toolbox" for deciding how to deal with youths who have committed crimes. It also allows for more nuances in how prosecutors across Florida's 20 circuits interpret the gravity of crimes and the potential threat a youth offender has on the overall safety of a community, criteria that arguably reflect personal values and interpretations of the law.

In a 2011 report, the U.S. Department of Justice identified Florida's direct file rate as disproportionately high compared to other states. The statute is hard to measure and easily classifiable as subjective. Human Rights Watch, in a report on juvenile justice, criticized Florida's direct file statute as an example of disparate treatment of people of color. Its report found that from 2008 to 2013, black boys in Florida were disproportionately sent to prison, whether for first- or second-time offenses.

That trend continues with data from the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice showing that 64 percent of kids sent to adult court in 2016 were black.
Measuring direct files across the country
Currently, 12 states and the District of Columbia allow prosecutors to make decisions on where kids end up based on a direct file statute. But one major roadblock has been measuring the consistencies and inconsistencies within the statute.

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"We have pretty decent estimates of the cases that go through juvenile court, everything from race and ethnicity to age and offense. But in criminal court - the ones that go straight there because the prosecutor said so or the legislator tried to say so - largely we have no clue what those cases are all about," says Melissa Sickmund, director of the National Center for Juvenile Justice. The private, nonprofit research organization has spent 40 years collecting and analyzing data on juvenile crime and delinquency in conjunction with the federal government.

For a long time, the focus of federal and state data has been the corrections system, which has limited the ability of researchers, policymakers and juvenile justice advocates to get a clear picture of the potential and shortcomings of the adult transfer system.

Juvenile justice in most states varies from county to county, without a standardized system for documenting, analyzing and disseminating statistics on kids who commit crimes or are at risk of doing so. The tradition within the juvenile justice system has been to decide the outcomes case by case, with individual values for what is in the best interest of the child having more weight than data.

"It makes it hard to do reform," says Sickmund. "You have a good intent and say we're going to do things differently, but then a few years down the road, it's hard to say whether that was a good decision or not because you don't know where you were."

Research has shown that taking kids out of the juvenile system and putting them in the adult system makes them worse off. One way to measure the impact of direct file is through recidivism: Was a youth rearrested after being sent to adult court and dismissed? Was he reconvicted for another offense? Was it for a serious charge that would have been a felony?

In 2014, the Pew Charitable Trusts conducted a survey of juvenile corrections agencies in all 50 states as part of its Public Safety Performance Project. The survey, which focused on measuring recidivism, found that 1 in 4 states does not regularly report the data needed to assess trends in where youths end up.

The survey displays the data states were collecting at the time and their varied standards. Language to describe recidivism - and the definition of the term itself - changes from state to state and over time. No project of its nature has been done since, according to Adam Gelb, director of the Public Safety Performance Project, largely because of the level of work and coordination involved.

"There were two real takeaways from the report," Gelb says. "One was that there needs to be much greater consistency in how states are collecting this information and, second, that they've actually got to make recidivism reduction a core part of their mission, and that means tracking it; using that data to make decisions about how to respond to these kids."
States in the midst of reform
Last year saw sweeping changes across the country in the nation's direct file trend. The most dramatic shift was in California where, last November, voters approved Proposition 57, which removes the unfettered discretion given to state prosecutors. The new law requires that kids eligible for a transfer to adult court first go before a juvenile judge, who is expected to consider the youth's case and the circumstances that led to it.

Prop 57 was the result of a major effort by juvenile justice advocates, who argued that sending kids directly to adult court undermined the rehabilitative mission of the juvenile system.

They voiced concern that California's direct file statute opened the door for longer sentences and psychological trauma of being processed through adult criminal court, which meant lifelong consequences for youths and their families.

In a report, the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice, a San Francisco-based nonprofit, noted disparities across counties in how the direct file statute was used, based on the political affiliations of district attorneys and the race and ethnicities of youths. According to Maureen Washburn, a policy analyst, an overall drop in juvenile crime in California helped make a case for reform. Lower numbers of youths in the system means more capacity to strengthen rehabilitative care. Less than a year into Prop 57's implementation, advocacy groups are planning to research and evaluate transfer hearings and, eventually consider phasing them out.

"The juvenile justice system in California is prepared and poised to manage all young people regardless of the seriousness of their offense in the juvenile justice system where they can truly receive the services and rehabilitation that they need to rejoin their families and community," Washburn says.

In 2016, lawmakers in Indiana approved an unprecedented state "reverse transfer" law, which allows kids sent to adult court to be placed back in a juvenile court if their adult charges are unsuccessful. The purpose of the change is to restore the possibility of exposing a kid to rehabilitative care within the juvenile justice system. In recent years, Indiana voters have reduced the number of offenses once protected under the direct file statute. Kids accused of criminal gang activity, intimidation and substance-abuse-related acts can now be seen in juvenile court.

"But we think there's still a lot more to do," says JauNae Hanger, president of the Children's Policy & Law Initiative of Indiana, a network of juvenile justice advocates.

She argues that Indiana and other states must reconsider the age at which brains have fully developed.

"What happens to the 18- to 25-year-old? Should we be treating them differently?" Hanger asks. "That's a long-term question for our state, how we treat youthful offenders systemically."
The community and change
Before landing in front of the judge 10 years ago, Marquis McKenzie had displayed the textbook signs of an "at risk youth" navigating the complexities of community in desperate need of economic resources. He vividly recalls moving with his mother when he was 8 to the Ivey Lane Homes, a housing project in Pine Hills, a predominantly black, mixed-income neighborhood on Orlando's west side. The community, once a suburban oasis for white middle class families, had earned the moniker "Crime Hills." McKenzie remembers being exposed to gang violence, drug deals, drug busts and burglaries.

Witnessing a domestic violence incident between his mother and her boyfriend ultimately drove him to get involved in street life, he says.

"She had to get eight stitches in her head. And after that, nothing else didn't really matter. That was my excuse to be harmful to people," he says.

When McKenzie was transferred to adult court, he took a youth defendant plea. Though facing 10 hard years in prison, he served two and was placed on four years of probation, which were reduced by half due to good behavior.

"Income is one of the biggest things," McKenzie, who is now 27, says of many teenagers who get in trouble. "It's kind of hard to tell them to put the gun down or stop stealing if you don't have a direct resource for them."

Today, McKenzie has two sons, ages 7 and 4. He started his own cleaning company, called The Dirt Master LLC, and has been training to teach remodeling, so he can equip youths with skills to repair their homes and, ultimately, their neighborhoods.

"A lot of people have broken sinks, tubs, holes in the walls," he says. "And I kind of strongly believe if you change the way somebody's living, you can impact their life forever."

" You could consider other options"

Orange County, where McKenzie was direct filed in 2007, has the highest number of direct files in Florida. And Pine Hills, where McKenzie grew up, has the highest concentration of juvenile arrests and direct files in Florida.

With support from the state attorney's office and the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice, community groups there are working to fill a gap that law enforcement cannot.

Let Your Voice Be Heard Inc. has become the biggest voice in Pine Hills, hosting job fairs, talking in schools about conflict resolution, and making on-call house visits for "crisis mentoring."

"We sit down and try to figure out what the case is with that particular individual. If we don't have the expertise that the child needs, then between 24 to 72 hours, we will contact the individuals for the parent to take the child to get further assistance for that particular situation," says Emery James, who helped found the nonprofit advocacy group with Miles Mulrain.

James was direct filed to prison at 15 for an armed robbery. Now, at 38, he is developing programs to keep kids out of the system.

"I've learned firsthand the detriments of negative situations and the psychological effects that it can have on a child's mind. By the grace of God, by me going through all the trials that I did, I can look back and say 'Wow, everybody's not going to make it out like that, doing 10 years or better in the system with all of the dehumanizing living conditions."

In the past five years, Florida's Department of Juvenile Justice has visibly shifted its focus to kids' unique needs based on a set of criteria including family situation, schooling, and mental and physical health histories. The agency has a sophisticated set of data available for law enforcement to make informed decisions on where it is best for a child to end up.

Ed Brodsky is state attorney for the 12th judicial circuit. In 24 years, part of them as a former assistant state attorney, he has handled dozens of criminal cases involving adults and youths. He has noticed a significant change in the prosecution model.

When asked a decade later whether a 16-year-old with McKenzie's case and circumstances would be direct filed, he responded, "You could consider other options."

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Florida's direct file rate has dropped since McKenzie was sent to adult court, and it continues to. The number of youths transferred under the direct file statute has decreased by 51 percent, from 15,665 to 7,619.

For McKenzie, that is promising, but the remnants of his past still haunt him. Earlier this year, he found himself in the back of a police car for not moving his parked car and resisting arrest for it - charges that were dropped.

"It would've been another stumbling block, especially if I'd have gotten convicted for it," he says. "[Police] already still look at the past that I have. It's like 'He's not done getting in trouble,' so it would have been even more for me to try to prove my point as a citizen out here and even for other felons who haven't made it to the point where I'm at. I'm just going to keep fighting until a door opens and my voice gets heard."

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Charging Youths As Adults Can Be A 'Cruel Wake-Up Call.' Is There Another Way?

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WMFE Series: Young & Arrested The moments inside a courtroom in Orlando in 2007 were quick and consequential for Marquis McKenzie. The 16-year-old stood handcuffed behind a lectern. A juvenile judge announced his charges, then apologized that he could no longer take up the case.

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2008–2009 Annual Report to the Florida Department of Education

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2008–2009 Annual Report to the Florida Department of Education

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Lawsuit challanges the solitary confinement of children who are charges as adults

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Lawsuit challanges the solitary confinement of children who are charges as adults

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Research shows putting young prisoners in solitary confinement is dangerous. Some lawmakers want to ban the practice

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Research shows putting young prisoners in solitary confinement is dangerous. Some lawmakers want to ban the practice

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Putting young prisoners in solitary confinement greatly increases the risk that they'll commit suicide. With that as a backdrop, a North Florida legislator is pushing legislation that would prevent the Florida Departments of Corrections and Juvenile Justice from holding anyone younger than 19 in solitary confinement - except under limited circumstances.

Sponsored by state Senator Bill Montford, the bill says prisoners younger than 19 could only be held in solitary confinement in an emergency or if they need to be isolated for medical reasons.

Scott McCoy with the Southern Poverty Law Center Action Center says solitary confinement for young prisoners is "an incredibly dangerous practice."

"Among incarcerated youth who commit suicide, 62 percent of them have been held in solitary confinement," McCoy said.

Karina Flores is a student at the College of Law at Florida State University. She blasted current state law, which imposes no limits on how long a child can stay in solitary confinement in Florida.

"Studies show confinement causes children to have severe mental health issues, which include depression, paranoia, increased risk of self-harm, and suicide," she said.

"It is beyond time for Florida to end this cruel, counterproductive practice," added Kirk Bailey, political director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida in a statement. "It is costly. It must stop."

Montford's bill is one of a number of measures filed this year in the Legislature that would eliminate solitary confinement. State House Rep. Ramon Alexander, Democrat from Leon County, has filed a similar bill in the House. And there are two other bills in the Senate that address solitary confinement: A proposal by Senator Gary Farmer, a Democrat from Broward County and similar proposal by Senator Perry Thurston, a Broward County Democrat.

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Research shows putting young prisoners in solitary confinement is dangerous. Some lawmakers want to ban the practice | Florida Phoenix

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Putting young prisoners in solitary confinement greatly increases the risk that they'll commit suicide. With that as a backdrop, a North Florida legislator is pushing legislation that would prevent the Florida Departments of Corrections and Juvenile Justice from holding anyone younger than 19 in solitary confinement - except under limited circumstances.

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Florida bill would eliminate confinement for juveniles in prison system

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Florida bill would eliminate confinement for juveniles in prison system

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TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Laurette Philipsen can sum up solitary confinement in a word: torture. While serving eight years for fraud as an adult, she says she spent nearly a month alone, in a small room, with no one to speak to and her food delivered through a slot.

"It is definitely torture," she said. "After three, four days, your mind starts to play games with you."

Philipsen's time in solitary is an experience that has stayed with her. She struggles with claustrophobia and sleeping issues.

The former inmate isn't alone. Research from the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry shows solitary confinement can lead to depression, anxiety, even psychosis in juveniles. As a result, seven states have passed bans to protect minors in the prison system.

"This should not be used as a disciplinary action," said Senator Bill Montford (D-Tallahassee). "We just got to use a little bit of common sense."

For a second time, Sen. Montford has created a bill that would make Florida the eighth state to outlaw the practice.

If approved, SB 436 would ensure those in Florida's prison system under 19 could only be isolated for emergencies or medical reasons. Solitary punishment for that age group would be forbidden.

"We know the downsides of solitary confinement," Montford said. "Why take the chance for the youth?"

Montford first pitched the policy late last session, which is why he thinks it failed in committee. Now that he has more time on his side, Montford is optimistic his bill, or two like it, will get approval next session.

Philipsen's experience has made her an advocate for the legislation. With the backing of Florida Cares, an advocacy group dedicated to helping prisoners, she's helped create a replica cell for people to experience solitary themselves.

Philipsen has challenged lawmakers to spend three minutes inside before deciding whether to support change.

"After three minutes, imagine spending months, years- days," she said. "I hope the parties on both sides realize the importance of this."

We reached out to both the Department of Corrections and Juvenile Justice for comment on this story. Each referred us to the other. Corrections has said in the past the department uses solitary confinement when "absolutely necessary" for security reasons or to manage prisons.

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Florida bill would eliminate solitary confinement for juveniles in prison system

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TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Laurette Philipsen can sum up solitary confinement in a word: torture. While serving eight years for fraud as an adult, she says she spent nearly a month alone, in a small room, with no one to speak to and her food delivered through a slot.

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Florida pushes back in battle over its solitary confinement policy 

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Florida pushes back in battle over its solitary confinement policy 

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TALLAHASSEE - In separate but parallel lawsuits, civil-rights and legal groups are challenging Florida's use of solitary confinement in prisons and juvenile detention centers - but are facing pushback from state agencies.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, Florida Legal Services and the Florida Justice Institute this year sued the state Department of Corrections and the Department of Juvenile Justice in federal court in Tallahassee, contending the agencies' practices on isolation are unconstitutionally cruel and unusual punishment.

But the agencies are fighting back against the allegations, with the latest salvo coming last week as the Department of Juvenile Justice filed a motion to dismiss the juvenile detention case and questioned the motives behind the lawsuit.

"Unfortunately, it is clear that plaintiffs' purpose in bringing this lawsuit is not to gain relief from some violation of constitutional rights," the Department of Juvenile Justice motion said. "Rather, it is to lobby this court to judicially impose a level of care that is commensurate with the position papers, opinions, and articles supplied by various advocacy groups."

The department argued the lawsuit, which was filed in September, is part of an effort by the groups to "move the needle toward their obvious goal of eliminating any form of confinement for juveniles."

Lawyers for the department also told the court that "there could be risks of harm to the other juveniles, or staff, if confinement is not utilized" because detention facilities can at times be dangerous.

But the lawsuit alleges there is growing consensus among medical and mental-health professionals that subjecting children to isolation can lead them to suffer from "heightened risk of psychological and physical harm."

"These policies and practices are inconsistent with evolving standards of decency in a civilized society," said the lawsuit, which names three teenage plaintiffs, one as young as 13, who were placed in isolation.

At juvenile detention centers, the use of confinement is limited to no more than eight hours unless an extension is granted because the minor "would imminently threaten his or her safety or the safety of others," according to court documents.

Data provided by the Southern Poverty Law Center shows the state placed more than 14,000 children in isolation while in the care of the juvenile justice department during the 2017-2018 fiscal year.

As lawyers for the plaintiffs prepare to respond to the Department of Juvenile Justice's motion to dismiss the case, a federal judge last month allowed the separate lawsuit challenging the Department of Corrections' confinement policies to continue.

In an Oct. 24 ruling, Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker rejected arguments made by the Department of Corrections, saying the arguments were based on a "fundamental misunderstanding" of the claims made in the lawsuit.

"This case is not about the type of restrictive housing or the specific prison where the plaintiffs were housed," Walker wrote. "Instead, plaintiffs allege a systematic, statewide policy of isolation."

In the 90-page lawsuit, which was filed in May, attorneys representing inmates argued that prison officials "discriminate against people with disabilities in its use of isolation" and are "deliberately indifferent to the substantial risk of harm caused" by isolation practices.

Shalini Goel Agarwal, a lawyer for the Southern Poverty Law Center, said Walker's ruling "accepts the premise that a correctional system, by creating various levels for solitary confinement, cannot evade the undeniable damage caused by locking people in tiny cells for nearly 24 hours a day."

Outside of court, the Department of Corrections has defended its use of confinement as a safety measure.

Michelle Glady, a department spokeswoman, told The News Service of Florida in May that confinement is used for security reasons or to effectively manage prisons. She added it is only used when "absolutely necessary."

After the judge's decision last month to allow the case to continue, the department is prepared to keep mounting a defense of the isolation practices.

"The department is moving forward with litigation," Glady said Thursday.

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Florida pushes back in battle over its solitary confinement policy

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TALLAHASSEE - In separate but parallel lawsuits, civil-rights and legal groups are challenging Florida's use of solitary confinement in prisons and juvenile detention centers - but are facing pushback from state agencies.

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Florida Lawsuit Challenges Use of Solitary Confinement for Youth (2019)

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Florida Lawsuit Challenges Use of Solitary Confinement for Youth (2019)

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https://www.stopsolitaryforkids.org/florida/

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The Florida Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) places hundreds of children in solitary confinement on any given day. The SPLC, Florida Legal Services and the Florida Justice Institute filed a federal class action lawsuit to end the use of solitary confinement in the state's juvenile detention facilities.

The lawsuit cites scientific, medical and mental health evidence likening solitary confinement to torture and demonstrating its dangers to the development and rehabilitation of children. The lawsuit challenges the department's policy in 21 state-operated secure detention facilities of isolating children in solitary confinement for minor misbehavior.

The lawsuit also describes the department's failure to provide children with access to school services, recreation or appropriate mental health services - heightening the risk of psychological damage from confinement. Children spend hours or days alone, behind solid, bolted steel doors in tiny cells, with nothing to do but stare at the walls, and without any therapeutic interventions.

Between July 1, 2017, and June 1, 2018, DJJ isolated 4,310 children in solitary confinement a total of 11,738 times, meaning that many children were put in isolation repeatedly. In total, DJJ locked up 14,010 children in FY 2017-18. This means that approximately 30 percent of children were isolated in solitary confinement at some point while locked up.

The suit argues that this practice violates the U.S. Constitution and discriminates against children with disabilities, in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act. The suit also argues that DJJ officials know about the damaging effects of solitary but have failed to address them.

The lawsuit's lead plaintiff, 13-year-old G.H., remained in solitary confinement at the Volusia Regional Juvenile Detention Center even after he attempted suicide in his confinement cell, and despite staff's awareness of the suicide risk. He was put in solitary for, among other things, play- fighting with another child in the facility.

African-American youth are disproportionately targeted for arrest and solitary confinement, according to research available at the time of the filing. They constitute 22 percent of Florida's public school enrollment, but 51 percent of juvenile arrests, over 60 percent of children in Department of Juvenile Justice secure detention and 70 percent of children in solitary confinement statewide.

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The Florida Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) places hundreds of children in solitary confinement on any given day. The SPLC, Florida Legal Services and the Florida Justice Institute filed a federal class action lawsuit to end the use of solitary confinement in the state's juvenile detention facilities.

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It presents information on everything from effects of solitary confinement, law suits against the practice and people that are involved in it.

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Florida Lawsuit Challenges Use of Solitary Confinement for Youth (2019)

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), Florida Legal Services (FLS), and the Florida Justice Institute (FJI) filed a federal class action lawsuit, G.H. v. Marstiller, against Florida's Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) to end the use of solitary confinement on behalf of more than 4,000 children in 21 state juvenile detention centers operated by DJJ. On December 6, 2019, the federal judge denied the defendant's motion to dismiss, citing fundamental differences between adults and children that are relevant in the
Eighth Amendment context, including when evaluating conditions of confinement.

Between July 1, 2017 and June 1, 2018, DJJ isolated 4,310 children in solitary confinement a total of 11,738 times, meaning that many children were put in isolation repeatedly. In total, DJJ locked up 14,010 children in FY 2017-18. This means that approximately 30 percent of children were isolated in solitary confinement at some point while locked up. African American youth are disproportionately targeted for solitary confinement. They constitute 22% of Florida's public school enrollment, but 51% of juvenile arrests, over 60% of children in DJJ secure detention, and 70% of children in solitary confinement statewide.

Southern Poverty Law Center Report on Solitary Confinement (2019)

The report - Solitary Confinement: Inhumane, Ineffective, and Wasteful - reviews research on solitary confinement andpresents the stories of three people who endured the practice, including a man who died by suicide after spending almost four years in solitary confinement in Florida's prisons. Read more on solitary in Florida from SPLC here.

Florida Legislation Introduced to Limit Solitary Confinement for Kids (2019)

In 2019, several bills to ban solitary confinement were introduced in the Florida legislature. See a Breakdown of Florida 2019 Solitary Bills.

Florida Senator Montford introduced SB 436 in October 2019, which would limit solitary confinement of youth 19 years old and under to situations. In those circumstances, isolation should not exceed 24 hours.

Florida Senator Perry Thurston also introduced SB 110, which would ban the Department of Corrections or a local government from subjecting youth to solitary confinement except under limited circumstances.

Representative Kamia Brown filed HB 557, which would require data collection regarding youthful offenders in DOC custody.

Representative Dianne Hart filed HB 531, which would, among other things, place limits on disciplinary confinement for all in DOC, not just juveniles.

Finally, Senator Farmer filed SB 762, which would place strict limits on the use of solitary confinement for both juveniles and adults.

Research shows putting young prisoners in solitary confinement is dangerous. Some lawmakers want to ban the practice (Florida Phoenix, Mar. 2019)

After a lawsuit filed by the Legal Aid Society of Palm Beach County and the Human Rights Defense Center, the Palm Beach County Jail agreed to a settlement that significantly limit isolation for youth. In October 2018, the Florida Department of Justice filed a Statement of Interest in the case. According to the complaint in the litigation, the adult county jail kept children as young as 16-years-old in solitary in for periods as long as 18 months without exercise, education, or treatment. The youth in question were awaiting trial, meaning they had not been found guilty of anything. In addition to the Palm Beach Sheriff, the suit names the County School Board as a defendant for violating the Americans With Disabilities Act by failing to provide legally required educational services to youth in solitary. The lawsuit focuses on young males in solitary, since girls under age 18 who are charged as adults are kept in the jail's medical unit.

Under the settlement, the jail will adopt new policy that still permits "segregated housing." The sheriff's department will use a rotating staff schedule to keep youth under the age of 18 who are charged as adults separated from other inmates to prevent isolation for administrative reasons. All youth in segregated housing will be permitted out of their cells "throughout the regular school day" with other youth in general population. These limits apply to all youth except those in protective custody.

Although the settlement does not limit the length of time that a youth can be in disciplinary solitary, it does mandates that, within 24 hours of isolation for any reason, the Sheriff's Office and the School Board must meet and agree how to "allow equal access" to educational services and out-of-cell programming, as well as refer the youth to a mental health professional for evaluation. The sheriff's office must also convene a weekly "Segregation Review Committee (SRC) meeting to review and plan for ways to accommodate each youth in segregation and evaluate alternative sanctions (alternative disciplinary sanctions must be established in an alternative behavior management policy, which must be drafted by Jan. 10, 2019).

FLORIDA SENATE BILL 812 (2013)

SB 812, or the Youth in Solitary Confinement Reduction Act, would have prohibited the Department of Corrections or a local facility from subjecting a youth to solitary confinement except under certain circumstances; prohibited youth from "emergency: cell confinement for more than 24 hours; prohibited a youth prisoner from being subjected to disciplinary cell confinement for more than 72 hours. The bill died in the Criminal Justice Committee in 2013.

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Florida Lawsuit Challenges Use of Solitary Confinement for Youth (2019) The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), Florida Legal Services (FLS), and the Florida Justice Institute (FJI) filed a federal class action lawsuit, G.H. v. Marstiller, against Florida's Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) to end the use of solitary confinement on behalf of more than 4,000 ...

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Bringing attention to the economic effect can bring change 

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Bringing attention to the economic effect can bring change 

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https://www.splcenter.org/news/2019/03/07/keeping-children-out-florida%E2%80%99s-adult-criminal-justice-system-would-have-positive-economic

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CENTER FOR CRIMINOLOGY AND PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH

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CENTER FOR CRIMINOLOGY AND PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH

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The Florida juvenile justice system came under scrutiny from the federal courts as a result of a federal class action lawsuit in 1983. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of a 14-year old boy referred to as and three other children who were confined at the Arthur G. Dozier Training School for Boys in Marianna, the Florida School for Boys in Okeechobee, and the Alyce D. McPherson School for Girls in Ocala. The Bobby M. complaint alleged inhumane conditions and treatment in the three existing training schools that served as Florida's highest security facilities for juvenile offenders.

Juvenile Justice Act of 1990

In response to the Bobby M. case, the Juvenile Justice Act of 1990 completely revamped Florida's juvenile justice system. The Juvenile Justice Act recognized similarities in the needs of delinquent and dependent children and authorized funding for enhanced prevention and early intervention service needs and risk assessments, reduction in the use of secure detention, alternative placement and supervision, and treatment programs to meet the needs of juveniles.

Quality Assurance Reviews

There was a consensus among DOE, the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services (HRS), and the Florida Legislature that a strong internal quality assurance (QA) review process was necessary to ensure more effective treatment for youth at risk, and in 1996, the Legislature created 1003.52, F.S., "Educational Services in DJJ Programs", which authorized DOE to conduct educational quality assurance reviews, annually revise the QA standards and key indicators, and write an annual report on the status of juvenile justice educational programs to be included in DJJ's Annual Report to the Legislature. This legislation defined the educational services that are required to be provided by a local school district to each DJJ detention center and commitment program. It also contained additional requirements for school districts and for evaluation of juvenile justice programs, including allocations of resources and teacher competencies.

In 1996, DOE awarded a project to the University of North Florida to coordinate the educational QA review process. Educational programs in 182 juvenile justice facilities were assessed using the four QA review standards. Key indicators for each standard were rated based on the quality of performance in the facility. In 1998, the project between DOE and the University of North Florida ended, and DOE awarded a new contract to Florida State University. On June 1, 1998, the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida State University began this project with DOE to conduct QA reviews and conduct research related to Florida's juvenile justice educational programs. This program was named the Juvenile Justice Educational Enhancement Program (JJEEP).

HB 349 Extensive reform in Juvenile Justice Education Programs

In 1999, the Florida Legislature passed HB 349. This bill required extensive reform in Florida's juvenile justice educational programs and maintained weighted funding for juvenile justice schools. The impact of HB 349 was felt at the state, district, and school levels and established an overall increase in accountability and responsibility. The major impact at the state level was to clearly place the accountability for and responsibility of juvenile justice education under the authority of the DOE and to establish a mechanism to ensure that research, QA, and technical assistance would be conducted to improve the quality of that education. Though these activities and principles were already guiding JJEEP's mission, HB 349 established them as law. More specifically, the bill required that research be conducted to identify best practices in juvenile justice education, allowed for sanctions to be placed on low performing schools, and mandated that technical assistance be provided to schools as needed. In addition, HB 349 clearly established the responsibility of the school districts to oversee the operation of juvenile justice schools.

The major impact of HB 349 at the school level included requirements for year-round schooling, waiving General Educational Development (GED) testing fees, developing academic improvement plans (AIPs) for all students, conducting specific academic record keeping, providing transition services and activities, developing a school improvement plan (SIP), and delivering appropriate curriculum and instruction to every student based on his or her individual requirements and needs.

Overall, this legislation clearly provided the beginning of a comprehensive structure and accountability system for Florida's juvenile justice education and established Florida as a national leader in juvenile justice education. Further, the passage of this bill, as well as other legislation has resulted not only in increasingly stringent accountability mechanisms but also in more positive outcomes for Florida's delinquent youths.

SB 2464

SB 2464 (2000) clarified, modified, and/or amended provisions in HB 349 (1999). In addition, the bill focused on three major studies conducted by DOE with assistance from JJEEP: a vocational/technical education study for incarcerated youths, a funding study to identify an appropriate funding level for juvenile justice education, and a facility space study to determine the available or needed classroom space for educational programs in DJJ facilities.

The vocational education study established the curriculum, goals, and outcome measures for vocational/technical programs in juvenile justice schools. The State Plan for Vocational Education for Youth in Juvenile Justice Commitment Facilities was completed and implemented during fall 2001. The plan outlined juvenile justice school requirements for offering vocational programming and increased JJEEP's QA monitoring of vocational curriculum and instruction.

The purpose of the funding study was to determine the precise funding level necessary to provide educational services in DJJ facilities. The study was submitted to the Governor of Florida and the Florida Legislature in 2001, recommending a cost factor of 1.602 for all nonspecial-education students and students with disabilities currently funded at levels I and II. The study's second recommendation required a QA standard for monitoring funding. Since 2001, JJEEP has required school districts to monitor educational funding, and DOE has annually reported the actual dollars spent in each juvenile justice school.

DOE conducted the facility space study to determine the adequacy of educational space within each juvenile justice facility. From this study, DOE and DJJ developed a three-year plan to address any facility deficiencies found. Recommendations for addressing these deficiencies included renovations/replacements and new construction/additions. The Florida Legislature did not fund these recommendations, which resulted in continued problems concerning the lack of sufficient educational space. JJEEP continues to address adequate educational space in facilities; however, since space is the responsibility of DJJ, both JJEEP and DOE are limited in monitoring and resolving issues regarding adequate educational space. Clearly, educational space is a continuing problem area that warrants more attention both in terms of funding for expanded space and designating DOE rather than DJJ as responsible for monitoring educational space related issues. SB 2464 also added several new requirements, including: (1) the development of a cooperative agreement between DJJ and DOE for the enhancement of juvenile justice educational services, (2) the requirement that youths who have not received a high school diploma or the equivalent participate in vocational/technical education (contingent upon funding availability) if they are not employed while in a DJJ program, and (3) the provision of educational services for minors in adult county jails.

In addition to SB 2464, DOE (in conjunction with JJEEP, DJJ, school districts, and education providers) developed the first State Board of Education Rule for juvenile justice education services. Rule 6A-6.05281, Education Services in Department of Juvenile Justice Programs was a key provision of HB 349 in 1999 and was enacted in 2000. The requirements established in this administrative rule include eligibility criteria for youths served in educational programs, the content and transfer of student records, entry and exit assessment, individual academic planning, transition services, instructional programming and academic expectations, qualifications of instructional staff, funding, contracting with private providers for the provision of educational services, interventions and sanctions for low performing programs, and interagency coordination. The requirements of this Rule closely followed the QA standards, which were developed based upon best practices identified in the literature. As a result, the Rule provided state administrative authority for the QA standards and indicators. Overall, the legislation passed in 2000 continued Florida's efforts to develop an information-based accountability system for juvenile justice education and provided the means of holding low performing programs accountable.

In 2001, there was little legislation specifically aimed at juvenile justice education. HB 267 (2001) required "no contact" orders for youths returning to school after release from DJJ. In particular, certain students are prohibited from attending the same school as their victim or their victim's siblings, and school principals are required to take specific actions when a student becomes the victim of a violent crime committed by a fellow student.

Just Read, Florida!

In September 2001, Governor Bush authorized the Just Read, Florida! initiative. This initiative relies on scientifically based research to improve current reading programs, standards, teaching strategies, and course requirements. Its goal is to have all children reading fluently by the end of the third grade and "for all students in Florida to be able to read on grade level or higher by 2012" (DOE, 2001, p.1). Because juvenile justice students tend to have larger reading deficiencies compared to children attending public schools, the goals established by the Just Read, Florida! initiative set a high bar for these students to meet. This initiative has led to the development of new QA standards for reading and numerous DOE technical assistance documents and trainings. The current benchmarks related to reading require identification of students who have reading deficiencies, provision of evidence-based reading programs and instruction for these identified students, monitoring of students' reading progress and growth, and administration of diagnostic assessments to those students who are not progressing in reading.

No Child Left Behind

In 2002 and 2003, major legislation affecting juvenile justice education resulted from the federal government enactment of No Child Left Behind (NCLB). This legislation posed unprecedented challenges for the reform of the country's school system. NCLB mandates that the country's juvenile justice schools meet the same high standards as all other elementary and secondary public schools.

Under NCLB, juvenile justice teachers must meet highly qualified teacher requirements, which include holding a bachelor's degree, having professional certification, and showing competency in each subject they teach. NCLB provides states with an outline of requirements to be followed in order for teachers to be considered highly qualified, yet allows a considerable amount of discretion in designing and defining the rules for certification and subject-area competency.

NCLB requirements for annual yearly progress (AYP) include requiring programs to show a 95% participation rate in the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT), FCAT performance results, Florida Writes assessment results, and graduation results. Meeting these requirements is particularly difficult for many juvenile justice schools due to several factors, including the short length of stay, the mobility of the students, and disproportionate educational deficiencies. Title I, Part D, requires an accountability and program evaluation system compatible with the smaller numbers of students, mobility issues, and temporary placements found in juvenile justice schools. All juvenile justice schools must receive a program evaluation, which includes the monitoring of student performance in the areas of maintaining and improving educational achievement, accruing school credits for grade promotion, making a successful transition back to school after release, completing high school and obtaining employment after release, and/or participating in post-secondary education and job training.

Since one of the goals of Title I, Part D, is to successfully return students to public schools after their release from institutions, transition services are strongly emphasized in the legislation. State and local education agencies are required to provide transition services and a means for incarcerated students to successfully return to school upon release. Federal funds are to be used for such purposes, and states must demonstrate progress on the development of effective transition services.

HB 1989 and SB 2564

In 2004, the Florida Legislature enacted HB 1989, the first state bill in three years that is specific to juvenile justice education. Among other initiatives, this bill requires the formation of several interagency committees to address different areas in juvenile justice education. The Legislature also enacted numerous general education and custody care bills: two education bills that directly affect juvenile justice education through middle grades reform and accelerated graduation options and SB 2564, which requires local counties to fund juvenile detention centers.

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History | Florida State College of Criminology & Criminal Justice

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The Florida juvenile justice system came under scrutiny from the federal courts as a result of a federal class action lawsuit in 1983. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of a 14-year old boy referred to as and three other children who were confined at the Arthur G.

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Lawsuit aims to end juvenile solitary confinement in Florida 

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Lawsuit aims to end juvenile solitary confinement in Florida 

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https://www.wjhg.com/content/news/Lawsuit-aims-to-end-juvenile-solitary-confinement-in-Florida-559617671.html

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Civil-rights groups sue over solitary confinement rules in Florida prisons, juvenile detention centers

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Civil-rights groups sue over solitary confinement rules in Florida prisons, juvenile detention centers

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TALLAHASSEE - In separate but parallel lawsuits, civil-rights and legal groups are challenging Florida's use of solitary confinement in prisons and juvenile detention centers, but they are facing pushback from state agencies.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, Florida Legal Services and the Florida Justice Institute this year sued the state Department of Corrections and the Department of Juvenile Justice in federal court in Tallahassee, contending the agencies' practices on isolation are unconstitutionally cruel and unusual punishment.

But the agencies are fighting the allegations, with the latest salvo coming last week as the Department of Juvenile Justice filed a motion to dismiss the juvenile detention case and questioned the motives behind the lawsuit.

"Unfortunately, it is clear that plaintiffs' purpose in bringing this lawsuit is not to gain relief from some violation of constitutional rights," the Department of Juvenile Justice motion said. "Rather, it is to lobby this court to judicially impose a level of care that is commensurate with the position papers, opinions, and articles supplied by various advocacy groups."

The department argued the lawsuit, which was filed in September, is part of an effort by the groups to "move the needle toward their obvious goal of eliminating any form of confinement for juveniles."

Lawyers for the department also told the court that "there could be risks of harm to the other juveniles, or staff, if confinement is not used because detention facilities can at times be dangerous.

But the lawsuits allege there is growing consensus among medical and mental-health professionals that subjecting children to isolation can lead them to suffer from "heightened risk of psychological and physical harm."

"These policies and practices are inconsistent with evolving standards of decency in a civilized society," said the lawsuit, which names three teenage plaintiffs, one as young as 13, who were placed in isolation.

At juvenile detention centers, the use of confinement is limited to no more than eight hours unless an extension is granted because the minor "would imminently threaten his or her safety or the safety of others," according to court documents.

Data provided by the Southern Poverty Law Center shows the state placed more than 14,000 children in isolation while in the care of the juvenile justice department during the 2017-2018 fiscal year.

As lawyers for the plaintiffs prepare to respond to the Department of Juvenile Justice's motion to dismiss the case, a federal judge last month allowed the separate lawsuit challenging the Department of Corrections' confinement policies to continue.

In an Oct. 24 ruling, Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker rejected arguments made by the Department of Corrections, saying the arguments were based on a "fundamental misunderstanding" of the claims made in the lawsuit.

In the 90-page lawsuit, filed in May, attorneys representing inmates argued that prison officials "discriminate against people with disabilities in its use of isolation" and are "deliberately indifferent to the substantial risk of harm caused" by isolation practices.

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Civil-rights groups sue over solitary confinement rules in Florida prisons, juvenile detention centers

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TALLAHASSEE - In separate but parallel lawsuits, civil-rights and legal groups are challenging Florida's use of solitary confinement in prisons and juvenile detention centers, but they are facing pushback from state agencies.

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Suit: Jail keeps teens in solitary for months without care, education

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Suit: Jail keeps teens in solitary for months without care, education

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One young inmate in solitary confinement at the Palm Beach County jail hallucinated, staring at the blank wall of his cell, thinking he was watching a television show, a federal lawsuit filed Thursday alleges.

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One young inmate in solitary confinement at the Palm Beach County jail hallucinated, staring at the blank wall of his cell, thinking he was watching a television show, a federal lawsuit filed Thursday alleges.

A 16-year-old got his teeth knocked out by deputies after flooding his cell with toilet water when his telephone privileges were cut short - a brief moment he could have contact with anyone.

Other juveniles begged deputies for water but were forced to drink the putrid discolored water from the sink attached to their toilet. "I'm not your water boy," the deputies barked back.

If these teens - in isolation for sometimes up to 16 consecutive months - complained, deputies threatened to send them to the mental health ward where they would be stripped naked then left in a freezing cell wearing only a paper gown that failed to cover their backside.

These are just some of the claims made in the class-action lawsuit against Sheriff Ric Bradshaw, the Palm Beach County School Board, schools Superintendent Donald Fennoy and others in the sheriff's department that calls for an end to solitary confinement for inmates under age 18.

Kalief Browder spent two of his three years at the infamous Rikers Island jail complex in solitary after being charged with stealing a backpack. When released, Browder committed suicide in 2015 at age 22.

"Because the adolescent brain is still in early stage development, it is quite susceptible to the harm," Neelakanta said. "When they are out of custody and receiving treatment, they don't trust anybody. They don't trust the adults and they don't trust anyone around them."

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Suit: Jail keeps teens in solitary for months without care, education

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One young inmate in solitary confinement at the Palm Beach County jail hallucinated, staring at the blank wall of his cell, thinking he was watching a television show, a federal lawsuit filed Thursday alleges.

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Legislative criteria for prosecution to direct file a minor

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The Florida Statutes

The 2019 Florida Statutes

F.S. 985.557

985.557  Direct filing of an information; discretionary criteria. -

(1)  DISCRETIONARY DIRECT FILE.-

(a)  With respect to any child who was 14 or 15 years of age at the time the alleged offense was committed, the state attorney may file an information when in the state attorney's judgment and discretion the public interest requires that adult sanctions be considered or imposed and when the offense charged is for the commission of, attempt to commit, or conspiracy to commit:

5.  Aggravated child abuse;

10.  Unlawful throwing, placing, or discharging of a destructive device or bomb;

11.  Armed burglary in violation of s. 810.02(2)(b) or specified burglary of a dwelling or structure in violation of s. 810.02(2)(c), or burglary with an assault or battery in violation of s. 810.02(2)(a);

13.  Any lewd or lascivious offense committed upon or in the presence of a person less than 16 years of age;

14.  Carrying, displaying, using, threatening, or attempting to use a weapon or firearm during the commission of a felony;

15.  Grand theft in violation of s. 812.014(2)(a);

16.  Possessing or discharging any weapon or firearm on school property in violation of s. 790.115;

17.  Home invasion robbery;

19.  Grand theft of a motor vehicle in violation of s. 812.014(2)(c)6. or grand theft of a motor vehicle valued at $20,000 or more in violation of s. 812.014(2)(b) if the child has a previous adjudication for grand theft of a motor vehicle in violation of s. 812.014(2)(c)6. or s. 812.014(2)(b).

(b)  With respect to any child who was 16 or 17 years of age at the time the alleged offense was committed, the state attorney may file an information when in the state attorney's judgment and discretion the public interest requires that adult sanctions be considered or imposed. However, the state attorney may not file an information on a child charged with a misdemeanor, unless the child has had at least two previous adjudications or adjudications withheld for delinquent acts, one of which involved an offense classified as a felony under state law.

(2)  EFFECT OF DIRECT FILE.-

(a)  Once a child has been transferred for criminal prosecution pursuant to an information and has been found to have committed the presenting offense or a lesser included offense, the child shall be handled thereafter in every respect as if an adult for any subsequent violation of state law, unless the court imposes juvenile sanctions under s. 985.565.

(b)  When a child is transferred for criminal prosecution as an adult, the court shall immediately transfer and certify to the adult circuit court all felony cases pertaining to the child, for prosecution of the child as an adult, which have not yet resulted in a plea of guilty or nolo contendere or in which a finding of guilt has not been made. If a child is acquitted of all charged offenses or lesser included offenses contained in the original case transferred to adult court, all felony cases that were transferred to adult court as a result of this paragraph shall be subject to the same penalties to which such cases would have been subject before being transferred to adult court.

(c)  When a child has been transferred for criminal prosecution as an adult and has been found to have committed a violation of state law, the disposition of the case may be made under s. 985.565 and may include the enforcement of any restitution ordered in any juvenile proceeding.

(3)  An information filed pursuant to this section may include all charges that are based on the same act, criminal episode, or transaction as the primary offenses.

History. - s. 35, ch. 97-238; s. 130, ch. 99-3; s. 15, ch. 99-201; s. 1, ch. 99-257; s. 26, ch. 99-284; s. 2, ch. 2000-119; s. 27, ch. 2000-135; s. 1, ch. 2000-136; s. 21, ch. 2001-125; s. 4, ch. 2001-185; s. 5, ch. 2006-51; s. 70, ch. 2006-120; s. 5, ch. 2011-200; s. 2, ch. 2016-7; s. 76, ch. 2019-167.

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Statutes & Constitution :View Statutes : Online Sunshine

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The Florida Statutes The 2019 Florida Statutes F.S. 985.557 985.557  Direct filing of an information; discretionary criteria.

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Trauma-informed Care in Juvenile Detention Is Not Enough

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Trauma-informed Care in Juvenile Detention Is Not Enough

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https://jjie.org/2019/11/25/trauma-informed-care-in-juvenile-detention-is-not-enough/

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Juvenile Justice Educational Enhancement Program (JJEEP)

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Juvenile Justice Educational Enhancement Program (JJEEP)

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From 1998 to 2010, the Juvenile Justice Educational Enhancement Program (JJEEP) developed, implemented, and maintained a research-driven system that informed policy, improved local educational program performance, and positively changed the lives of thousands of Florida delinquent and at-risk youths.

JJEEP served youth in all juvenile justice educational programs in the State of Florida. At its peak, there were more than 200 such programs, serving from 8 to 350 students at any given time. On an average day, there were approximately 10,000 youths in the Florida juvenile justice system and more than 30,000 youths received educational services each year.
JJEEP's mission was achieved by accomplishing the following:

establishing quality assurance standards that define the educational services that are expected to be delivered to students assigned to these programs;

conducting annual quality assurance reviews of the educational programs in all of Florida's juvenile justice facilities;

making recommendations for program improvement;

initiating a Corrective Action Process when major problems are observed;

providing technical assistance to improve juvenile justice educational programs;

conducting research that identifies and validates the most promising juvenile justice educational practices;

providing annual recommendations to the Florida Department of Education and the State Legislature on policies aimed at improving educational practices in juvenile justice educational programs;

recognizing teaching excellence and the contributions of teachers by selecting an annual juvenile justice teacher of the year

and conducting statewide conferences for juvenile justice educators.

JJEEP's primary goal was to ensure that each juvenile justice educational program in the State of Florida provided services of such a high quality that all young people transitioning back to their local communities will be prepared to return to school, work, and home settings as successful and well-educated citizens.
The major objectives included ensuring that each juvenile justice educational program in the State of Florida accomplished the following:

abided by all federal and state laws related to the educational process and the policies, rules, and regulations of the FLDOE;

provided the appropriate entry, on-site, and exit transition services for all students;

provided appropriate educational opportunities for students that include curriculum offerings, appropriate instructional delivery, classroom management, support services, and community support;

provided appropriate administrative activities that include smooth communication between all parties, employment of qualified personnel, opportunities for professional development, program evaluations, and reasonable funding and support

and school district provided necessary support and resources, which include maintaining an appropriate contract or cooperative agreement, providing local oversight and adequate support.

The JJEEP offices are located in Tallahassee, but the juvenile justice programs that are reviewed by JJEEP are located all over the State of Florida, from Pensacola to Jacksonville and from the Georgia line to Key West, with a heavier concentration in the Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, and Jacksonville metropolitan areas. Programs are located in the middle of large cities, in the suburbs, in small towns, in rural communities, and in remote wilderness areas.

Ultimately, JJEEP was recognized by the U.S. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) as an exemplary program and was funded to provide assistance to other states throughout the country regarding quality and accountability of education practices for incarcerated delinquent youth. The funding enabled JJEEP to host a series of national conferences and work directly with state leaders in juvenile justice education. The meetings, and subsequent targeted assistance to several states, focused upon the implementation of best-practices for the education of incarcerated delinquent youth.

Contacts

Principal Investigator: Thomas Blomberg, Ph.D., Dean and Sheldon L. Messinger Professor of Criminology

Dates: 1998-2010

Agency Sponsor: Florida Department of Education

Amount: $18 million

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Juvenile Justice Educational Enhancement Program (JJEEP) | Florida State College of Criminology & Criminal Justice

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From 1998 to 2010, the Juvenile Justice Educational Enhancement Program (JJEEP) developed, implemented, and maintained a research-driven system that informed policy, improved local educational program performance, and positively changed the lives of thousands of Florida delinquent and at-risk youths. JJEEP served youth in all juvenile justice educational programs in the State of Florida.

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Federal lawsuit seeks to ban solitary confinement for Florida children in juvenile detention 

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Federal lawsuit seeks to ban solitary confinement for Florida children in juvenile detention 

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The Southern Poverty Law Center joins with two other groups to condemn the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice for a practice they say causes psychological harm and increase the risk of suicide.

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TAMPA - More than 4,300 Florida children in juvenile detention centers spent time in solitary confinement over a 12-month period through June 2018, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.

That is almost one in three of all children serving juvenile sentences.

Now the Law Center is asking a federal court for a statewide ban on a practice that it equates to a form of torture it says causes psychological harm and increases the risk of suicide.

In a federal class action lawsuit filed in Tallahassee, the group claims that the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice uses solitary confinement for a "shocking" number of children as a punishment of choice and sometimes keeps children in isolation for longer than the 72 hours allowed under Florida rules without a hearing. The lawsuit was filed in conjunction with the non-profit groups Florida Legal Services and the Florida Justice Institute.

"DJJ officials know the damaging effects of isolation but have failed to address the situation," said Shalini Goel Agarwal, senior supervising attorney for the Law Center. "Children spend hours or days alone, behind solid, bolted steel doors in tiny cells, with nothing to do but stare at the walls, and without any therapeutic interventions."
RELATED STORY: Tampa forum focuses on reforming Florida's juvenile justice system
DJJ does not comment on pending litigation, spokeswoman Amanda Slama said Thursday.

The use of solitary confinement has been repeatedly challenged across the United States in recent years.

The American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry opposes the practice and warns it can lead to depression, anxiety and psychosis. And a 2009 U.S. Department of Justice survey of suicides in juvenile detention found that half of the 79 deaths reviewed were by children confined alone.

At least 20 states have banned or put severe restrictions on its use, including New Jersey, Illinois, Ohio, and Tennessee. In 2016, President Barack Obama enacted a ban for children in federal prisons through an executive order.

Florida has 21 juvenile detention centers operated by the department.

Youths can be confined for up to eight hours before it must be approved by a center superintendent. Supervisor are expected to review the need for confinement every three hours, which should include face-to-face contract with the youth unless they are sleeping.

Stays in solitary confinement that exceed 24 hours must be approved by a DJJ regional director.

Three youths identified only by their initials are listed as plaintiffs in the lawsuit.

B.W., a 16-year-old girl, was put in solitary confinement at the Duval Regional Juvenile Detention Center for not going to school even though she's pregnant, according to the lawsuit. She received no medical evaluation before being put in confinement for removing her ankle monitor, it states.

G.H., a 13-year-old boy, was kept in solitary confinement at the Volusia Regional Juvenile Detention Center even after he attempted suicide, the lawsuit states. He was put in solitary for play-fighting another child in the facility.

"Although many states have ended the use of solitary confinement for children because of the damage that it can cause, DJJ still subjects thousands of children to this cruel and inhumane form of punishment every year," said Andrea Costello, Director of the Institutional Legal Services Project at Florida Legal Services.

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Federal lawsuit seeks to ban solitary confinement for Florida children in juvenile detention

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TAMPA - More than 4,300 Florida children in juvenile detention centers spent time in solitary confinement over a 12-month period through June 2018, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. That is almost one in three of all children serving juvenile sentences.

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Placing juveniles in solitary confinement doesn't fix them. In fact, it makes them worse

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Placing juveniles in solitary confinement doesn't fix them. In fact, it makes them worse

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https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/policing/2019/01/11/policing-usa-juvenile-detention-solitary-confinement-mental-illness/2505702002/

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Children and Solitary Confinement: A Call to Action

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Children and Solitary Confinement: A Call to Action

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Florida lawsuit challenges use of solitary confinement for youth 

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Florida lawsuit challenges use of solitary confinement for youth 

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https://www.stopsolitaryforkids.org/florida/

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Miami leads in keeping kids out of jail, but most of Florida fails

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Miami leads in keeping kids out of jail, but most of Florida fails

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https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.miamiherald.com/news/local/crime/article238724693.html

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https://the-caruthers-institute.foleon.com/study/december-2019/executive-summary/

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JUVENILE JUSTICE STANDARDS AND TRAINING COMMISSION

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JUVENILE JUSTICE STANDARDS AND TRAINING COMMISSION

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DJJ Administrative Rule | Florida Department of Juvenile Justice

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Federal Lawsuit seeks to ban solitary confinement for Florida children in juvenile detention 

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Federal Lawsuit seeks to ban solitary confinement for Florida children in juvenile detention 

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https://www.tampabay.com/news/florida/2019/09/05/federal-lawsuit-seeks-to-ban-solitary-confinement-for-florida-children-in-juvenile-detention/

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http://www.djj.state.fl.us/partners/policies-resources/rule

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Florida shrugs off the cruelty of locking children in solitary cells | Fred Grimm

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Florida shrugs off the cruelty of locking children in solitary cells | Fred Grimm

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Florida continues to consign children to the sensory deprivation and unceasing loneliness of solitary confinement. As if the Department of Juvenile Justice still regards sadism as a best practice.

State lawyers last week asked a federal judge to dismiss a class-action lawsuit filed by the Southern Poverty Law Center, Florida Legal Services and the Florida Justice Institute seeking a judicial order banning solitary confinement in juvie lockups.

The state rejected the notion that prolonged isolation might have deleterious effects on young prisoners. Instead, DJJ claimed, the real intent of the lawsuit was to "move the needle toward their obvious goal of eliminating any form of confinement for juveniles."

The DJJ lawyers apparently hope the federal judge won't notice that 20 states and the Federal Bureau of Prison have either prohibited or severely limited the use of solitary confinement for kids without subsequently "eliminating any form of confinement for juveniles."

DJJ also claimed that the civil rights advocates behind the lawsuit wanted the judge to "impose a level of care that is commensurate with the position papers, opinions, and articles supplied by various advocacy groups." Those namby-pamby outfits worried about the effects of solitary confinement on children include the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, the American Medical Association, the National Commission on Correctional Health Care, the American Public Health Association and the Council of Juvenile Correctional Administrators'

And, oh, yeah, the U.S. Supreme Court, circa 1890, which noted that prisoners stuck in solitary "fell, after even a short confinement into a semi-fatuous condition, from which it was next to impossible to arouse them, and others became violently insane; others still, committed suicide; while those who stood the ordeal better were not generally reformed, and in most cases did not recover sufficient mental activity to be of any subsequent service to the community."

Of course, anyone with a lick of common sense could intuit that the road to mental health does not run through a stark concrete cell furnished only with a toilet, sink, perhaps a sleeping mat, illuminated from day to indistinguishable night by the pale glow of fluorescent lights. To most of us, the lawsuit's claim that juvenile solitary confinement leads to "insomnia, depression, hallucinations, agitation, anger, fear, distress, anxiety, sadness, mistrust, and feelings of hopelessness and abandonment" hardly reads like hyperbole.

Perhaps, lawyers for DJJ should argue, instead, that the cruel treatment of imprisoned children is integral to Florida's proud heritage. Exhibit A would be the Dozier School for Boys, the Marianna hellhole that administered savage beatings, rapes and outright killings for 111 iniquitous years before it was shuttered in 2011. (Dozier inspired "The Nickel Boys" by Colson Whitehead, whose 2016 novel "The Underground Railroad" won the Pulitzer Prize.)

Solitary confinement was also on the Dozier menu of horrors. Terry Burns, who was sentenced to the so-called reform school in 1962 at the age of 13, recalled spending a solid month confined to a dark, dank solitary cell, sleeping nude on a concrete floor with a metal bucket for a toilet.

Florida's appalling uses of solitary confinement are not just the stuff of distant history. In 2006, the late Meg Laughlin of the Tampa Bay Times discovered that an inmate named Ian Michael had spent the longest stretch of any Florida prisoner in solitary confinement. Michael, who was imprisoned at age 13 after he was sentenced as an adult for an attempted murder conviction, was entering his 15th year in the box. Half his life had been spent in solitary confinement. (Meg's story and the ensuing public outrage got him sprung from solitary. Michael was released from prison in 2016.)

The lawsuit claims that our modern-day DJJ sends about 14,000 kids a year to solitary. In a similar federal class-action suit, the same civil rights advocates assert that Florida is even more enthused about isolating adult prisoners. "Nearly one out of every seven individuals in isolation in the United States is in the custody of the Florida Department of Corrections. Every day, FDC isolates approximately 10,000 people in tiny, cramped cells for nearly 24 hours a day; many endure these conditions for months or years at a time . . . and severely restricts their access to normal human contact, exercise, rehabilitative programs, and mental stimulation."

Maybe it's too much to hope that the state prison system that inspired "Cool Hand Luke" might rethink solitary for adults. But kids in prolonged isolation? Florida needs to consign Dozier-style juvenile justice to history.

Fred Grimm, a longtime resident of Fort Lauderdale, has worked as a journalist in South Florida since 1976. Reach him by email at leogrimm@gmail.com or on Twitter: @grimm_fred

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Florida shrugs off the cruelty of locking children in solitary cells | Fred Grimm

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The Florida Department of Juvenile Justice ignores mental health dangers caused by solitary confinement. State lawyers last week asked a federal judge to dismiss a class-action lawsuit filed by lawyers for advocates seeking a judicial order banning solitary confinement in juvie lockups.

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Judge Rules Lawsuit Challenging Florida’s Solitary Confinement Of Children In Detention May Proceed

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Judge Rules Lawsuit Challenging Florida’s Solitary Confinement Of Children In Detention May Proceed

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https://www.splcenter.org/presscenter/judge-rules-lawsuit-challenging-floridas-solitary-confinement-children-detention-may

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Florida bill would eliminate solitary confinement for juveniles in prison system

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Florida bill would eliminate solitary confinement for juveniles in prison system

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https://www.abcactionnews.com/florida-bill-would-eliminate-solitary-confinement-for-juveniles-in-prison-system

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/we-are-just-destroying-these-kids-the-foster-children-growing-up-inside-detention-centers/2019/12/30/97f65f3a-eaa2-11e9-9c6d-436a0df4f31d_story.html

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Mental Health Among Children in Foster Care

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Mental Health Among Children in Foster Care

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https://www.safy.org/mental-health-among-children-in-foster-care/

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Frequent moves don't just hurt the kid's emotions-they hurt their brains

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Frequent moves don't just hurt the kid's emotions-they hurt their brains

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https://www.kansascity.com/news/special-reports/article238204784.html

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The cradle to Prison Pipeline- Children's Defense fund

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The cradle to Prison Pipeline- Children's Defense fund

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https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.childrensdefense.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/cradle-prison-pipeline-report-2007-full-lowres.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwjdiNPq3IXnAhVBp1kKHcWVABoQFjAXegQIAxAB&usg=AOvVaw1YNwwHLrOTHnQdL3nSxIXU

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Foster care programs can’t help teen’s needs

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Foster care programs can’t help teen’s needs

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Anber liked how her hair looked for the first time in more than a year. Curls cascaded down her back. Her lips shimmered peach.

Across the Fort Myers courthouse hall, a blond woman smiled, admiring Anber. Debbie Legg wore a silver cross necklace and silver bangles. She and Anber had planned Anber's ensemble together: a floral shirt, black pants and a purse.

A month ago, Anber and Debbie were strangers. Lately, they had been spending nearly every day together.

If all went as hoped this June afternoon in court, Anber would join Debbie and her husband of 35 years in their Cape Coral home. The couple ministers toteenagers and families in crisis. They wished to become Anber's foster parents.

"We're just pouring into her," Debbie said. "The more time she spends with me, it will make an impression on her, just by our way of life."

"She's a smart girl, but unfortunately the system has not done her any favors."

For the past eight months, the 17-year-old had been cycling in and out of group homes. Each new place stoked hope. But within weeks, Anber would run away, threaten suicide, violence or erupt in a rage after a conflict with staff or roommates.

The programs didn't seem capable of handling her behavior. They said as much. Her placement history repeats: provider requested change.

"She just doesn't seem to fit in anywhere," her grandmother Susie Hosher said.

****

Foster care data shows Anber is not an anomaly, rather a face of Florida's chronic foster care instability for troubled teenagers.

More than 50 foster children with Southwest Florida placements were moved 40 or more times, sometimes relocating thousands of miles and crisscrossing the country, according to data from roughly the past two decades compiled by the Children & Youth Law Clinic at the University of Miami School of Law.

The child who moved the most bounced to an estimated 125 places, spanning 12,000 miles, from 2005 to 2011. Another child racked up roughly 95 moves in less than 2 years ending this past summer.

Robert Latham, Children & Youth Law Clinic, University of Miami

Four or more placement changes, that is when harm really starts to set in.

They often shuffled between group homes, mental health crisis units and detention.

"Four or more placement changes, that is when harm really starts to set in," said Robert Latham, the Miami law clinic's associate director who analyzes the statewide data on an ongoing basis.

Placement instability can lead to behavioral problems and a struggle to forge meaningful attachments, according to the national foundation Casey Family Programs. It impacts sleep and school performance.

Anber hated switching schools with each move. She complained of being tired and sometimes cursed teachers who woke her, recent school records show. She became angry when put in an intensive intervention classroom.

"You just want to put me in stupid classes," she told staff. She pointed to a general education room, "I want to be in that class with normal kids."

For most foster children, though, placement instability is not the norm, said the CEO of Children's Network of Southwest Florida, which is contracted by the state to run foster care regionally. "What we strive for is two or less placements and we do a pretty fine job," Nadereh Salim said.

But teenagers with behavioral and mental health problems are hard to place.

"Our ability to place a 17-year-old with some sort of history with (the Department of Juvenile Justice) or coming out of some sort of a commitment program into a foster home is just not that great," she said. "We tell them this child just came out of a Baker Act unit and immediately people are thinking, 'What are the issues?'"

The system, Salim said, is facing an influx of teenagers whose parents refuse to pick them up from detention or mental health crisis units.

"They're at their wit's end and they say: 'I'm done.'"

The Department of Children and Families counted nearly 300 "lockouts" statewide in a recent yearlong period.

Yet the foster care system's inability to secure stability for traumatized and troubled teenagers is a well-recognized fracture in care. Costs for these children accumulate with the inordinate amount of time and resources child welfare workers invest in trying on solutions that don't fit.

This past summer, a Tampa area juvenile justice board asked state lawmakers to create a new system of care for foster children with juvenile records.

"The current systems," concluded the August 2019 Hillsborough County report, "are unable to properly serve this specific population."

"The utter lack of stability ... exacerbates existing trauma and creates new trauma" and "often leads directly to a downward spiral in an already stressful and chaotic series of events that creates more distrust, resentment and anger."

The board proposed court-ordered trauma-informed services to stabilize the children with secure placement as an option. That drew ire from child welfare and civil rights groups that argued children needed homes, not locked institutions.

Salim sees the need to better integrate child welfare, juvenile justice, behavioral health and substance abuse services.

"Maybe if we had such a system and we could get to these kids earlier," she said, "maybe we could actually do something positive and not let them just progress down the path where sometimes it just gets to be too late."

****

Recently, Anber had started daytime visits with Debbie. They swam, colored and sang songs they knew on the radio. Anber read from a devotional book, "Lord, I Want To Know You," that Debbie offered her.

Anber soaked in the calm. "Their house is more peaceful, and they have an understanding as to what I've went through. They're working with me about being able to dress myself and working on my maturity."

Debbie planned to arrange a personal trainer and make-up lessons for Anber.

In the evenings, Anber returned to a Fort Myers youth shelter to sleep.

During the day, when she wasn't with Debbie, Anber wiled away hours on her phone at foster care offices. It surprised Debbie that the system didn't offer something more productive.

"There should be life skills classes to teach that poor child something," she said. "Are we really doing any favors to our communities and these lives?"

It broke her heart to see how the system had pulled Anber from one crisis only to create others.

As the clock trudged toward 4 p.m., Anber peered down the hallway to the spot where people flowed off the elevator. Her smile vanished during a stretch of silence, "I thought my mom or grandma would be here."

She talked to her grandma often, but Anber couldn't remember the last time she talked to her mom. "She works so much. Then again, whenever she has her days off, once she gets her sleep in, least she can do is give me a call."

****

Anber, Debbie and her husband Allen slid into the bench before Magistrate Steven Studybaker. Karen Scott, Anber's former foster mother, sat behind them for back-up.

Karen knows the department well and is not a fan.

She is often in DCF courts to advocate for foster children and help other families navigate unknown terrain.

Karen recruited the couple to help Anber. It was unclear if the system had attempted to find Anber a foster home, which, after family or friends, is typically better for kids than group care.

DCF lawyer Marisol Perez recommended the goal be switched from reunification with parents to a placement change.

"This is going to be a real home for her," Perez said. "Mom has not completed any of her case plan tasks. The father has not either."

Anber's new case manager added news: Anber had finally agreed to counseling.

Perez turned to Debbie, "Have you been having visits with Anber?"

"Yes, every day, except yesterday," Debbie said. "She's really doing a great job."

Anber chimed in, "I really hope I can be placed with them soon, hopefully, because they seem like really good people and I really feel like this would work for me."

She dreaded another group home.

The court-appointed lawyer for Anber's mother spoke up, "Anber, how do you feel going on unsupervised visits with your mom?"

"Yes, that would be great."

Debbie lobbedKaren a worried look. Debbie's arm shot skyward.

"Sir," she asked Studybaker, "I was wondering if you will allow Karen to speak?"

Karen stood to testify.

"I have fostered Anber. She was my very first foster child, along with her brother. I have fostered five of the siblings of this mother. The mother is a drug user. She is currently living in a motel. She has influence over her children that is negative, harmful and invests no effort into their development."

Karen argued against unsupervised visits.

"I would suggest very strongly that Anber be protected and be allowed to develop a lovely relationship with a family that is going to be with her long term instead of this mother who has failed her for 17 years."

Studybaker paused before presenting some scenarios to Anber.

"Let's assume you and your mother are having an unsupervised visit and your mother would start to do something that is inappropriate or just plain dumb."

"I would call my case worker."

"No, she wouldn't," Karen whispered, crossing her leg.

Debbie nervously shifted to the edge of the bench. Her arm rose again.

"You probably already know this but when she was in care with her mother that there was no initiative of any kind for her mom to make her go to school or make her do anything really. ... So, there's just concerns about the initiative..."

Karen murmured, "and the history of abuse and neglect."

"And the history of abuse," Debbie added.

"Sir," Karen continued, "Anber has some mental health issues."

"She lacks that impulse control. Her mom has gotten her involved in very nefarious activities. Anber wants to do right."

In the end, the DCF lawyer recommended unsupervised visits with Anber's mother.

Studybaker sided with placing Anber with Debbie and her husband.

Upon hearing this, Anber grinned at Debbie and Karen. Debbie passed Anber her purse. The trio reconvened in the hall.

Karen Scott of KKIDS,Inc. and Anber's former foster mother

I know your mom loves you, but she doesn't love you in a way that protects you.

Karen drew Anber close before departing, "I know your mom loves you, but she doesn't love you in a way that protects you."

Debbie reached for Anber. Hand in hand, they walked toward something new.

****

A few days later, Anber moved into the room freshly painted seafoam green. The couple had bought a bed set and fresh linens and refinished the vanity.

Debbie soon asked Anber to forfeit her cellphone.

I have a solution, Debbie recalled Anber saying. You let me keep my phone andI'll abide by the rules.

"Nice try," Debbie said. "But that's not an option."

She felt terrible. Clearly the phone meant a lot to Anber. But Debbie didn't feel like she could run the home how she wished without knowing who Anber was connecting with.

For Anber, her phone was a lifeline, a connection to family, friends, videos that made her laugh and photos that made her smile.

She was not giving that up.

Anber stood up, walked downstairs, out the door and out of their lives.
Data journalist Janie Haseman contributed to this story.

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'She couldn't fit in.' Mental health programs couldn't help teen's needs, behavior

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Anber liked how her hair looked for the first time in more than a year. Curls cascaded down her back. Her lips shimmered peach. Across the Fort Myers courthouse hall, a blond woman smiled, admiring Anber. Debbie Legg wore a silver cross necklace and silver bangles.

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Journal Student Research on Adult Criminality Outcomes on Former Foster Care Youth

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Journal Student Research on Adult Criminality Outcomes on Former Foster Care Youth

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https://minds.wisconsin.edu/bitstream/handle/1793/77677/2016_JSR_Final_Online.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

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Foster Care Housing and Treatment Solution

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Foster Care Housing and Treatment Solution

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TAMPA - The head of Florida's child welfare system is backing a controversial proposal that would allow foster agencies to place children in secure facilities when they refuse placements and therapy.

The plan from the Hillsborough Juvenile Justice Advisory Board calls for a new state law allowing children to be forced into placements for up to 90 days through a court order. It is targeted at older foster children in Hillsborough who have been in both juvenile detention and the foster care system and who frequently refuse placements and end up sleeping in offices.

Florida Department of Children and Families Secretary Chad Poppell said he plans to talk to state lawmakers about introducing legislation based on the recommendation. It's unclear if the policy would be introduced statewide or piloted in Hillsborough County, where more children have refused placements than anywhere else in the state.

"We have to come up with a better way to support these children," Poppell said. "It's unacceptable to have kids in the office building sleeping every night."

His support comes despite growing opposition from groups including the ACLU of Florida, The Children's Campaign and leaders of local Guardian ad Litem groups, which are appointed by the courts to represent the best interests of foster children.
RELATED STORY: Problem foster kids could be locked up in 'secure' facility under new plan pushed by Tampa Bay child welfare agency
They say forcing children into facilities where they would be locked up would cause them more emotional harm. There is also concern that the state is pushing a juvenile justice type solution for a foster care problem.

Foster placement records show that many of the children refusing placements were bounced between dozens of foster families and group homes before they refused their first placement or ended up in juvenile detention.

"Kids have rights and we don't take away people's freedoms if there's not a really good reason to do so," said Michelle Morton, juvenile justice policy coordinator for the ACLU of Florida. "This is very troubling."

Mariela Ollen, circuit director for the Guardian ad Litem program in Pinellas and Pasco counties, said the community needs to provide more suitable foster homes so that children don't end up feeling worthless and rejected, often a precursor to them acting out.

"I am concerned about the additional trauma that something like this will cause our kids," she said. "I'm hoping the community all of a sudden comes together and sees the need for placements."

Tabitha Lambert, her counterpart in Hillsborough, has similar concerns and also questioned why certain stakeholders were omitted from the committee that drew up the plan.

It included representatives from the juvenile justice system and Eckerd Connects, which runs foster care across Tampa Bay. But it did not include Guardian ad Litem groups, foster parents or dependency attorneys.

"It's preached that we need to work together to benefit our kids yet you leave key players out of the equation," Lambert said. "I don't think that bodes well."

The plan was hammered out during meetings dating back to March that were open to the public, said Elvin Martinez, the committee chair. Among those taking part were Hillsborough County Commissioner Kimberly Overman and representatives from the Sheriff's Office and the county's Children's Services Department.

"I didn't go out and recruit anyone to participate. That's fair criticism," Martinez said. "I didn't intend it to be any kind of secret or to intentionally exclude their viewpoint."

Hillsborough's juvenile justice advisory board was asked to work on the foster care issue by Simone Marstiller, secretary of the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice.

Her involvement reflects the overlap between the two systems. More than 70 percent of children in one Hillsborough juvenile justice residential program had experienced contact with the foster care system, according to the committee's report.

Some of those who refuse placements are categorized as "night-to-night" placements, children with no permanent foster home. Their lack of stability results in poor diets and inadequate sleep, the committee's report states. Then they start failing at school, beginning a downward spiral that produces resentment, distrust and anger at being let down repeatedly.

RELATED STORY: Nowhere to call home: Thousands of foster children move so much they risk psychological harm

The use of secure facilities would be a last resort for those children, Martinez said. The plan also calls for intensive therapy and other services to try and stabilize children so they can go to a regular foster home.

An independent evaluation of the child would be conducted before a court hearing, at which the child would have representation. The placement would be reviewed by a court every 45 days.

In Hillsborough, the secure unit would be an unused building at the Juvenile Justice campus on East Columbus Drive that was previously used as a "consequence unit" for children in custody. There would also be a non-secure facility with up to 15 beds.

"We're not suggesting we take foster children and put them in handcuffs and lock them up," Martinez said. "I would argue a night to night placement is just as bad."

Currently, child welfare agencies have no legal remedy when foster children refuse to go to group homes or foster families. Children under the care of the state are exempt from a law that allows parents to petition for court-ordered placements for children they can no longer control.

Roy Miller, president of the Tallahassee non-profit The Children's Campaign, said children coming out of juvenile detention need support to deal with issues like substance abuse and mental health, services that lawmakers have cut from juvenile justice budgets over the past decade.

"It's a rather ineffective response to a chronic population of children we've known about for several years whose behavior is the result of a failed system," he said.

It's not just Hillsborough that is struggling with children refusing placements, Poppell said. But other communities have fewer such children, allowing them to spend more time and resources providing therapy.

Hillsborough, has a "critical mass of 20 to 40 children" who are starting to teach other foster children how to refuse placements," Poppell said.

The secretary, who was appointed by Gov. Ron DeSantis in 2018, acknowledged that the behavior of some children was the result of failings in the foster care system, such as children being moved from home to home and the high turnover of case managers.

"The issue today is we have children in deep need of services," he said. "Looking at criminal behavior and number of placements, these kids need help and so we're trying to find a way we can get them to stop and let us help them."

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DCF Secretary backs plan to use secure facility for problem foster kids even as opposition grows

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TAMPA - The head of Florida's child welfare system is backing a controversial proposal that would allow foster agencies to place children in secure facilities when they refuse placements and therapy. The plan from the Hillsborough Juvenile Justice Advisory Board calls for a new state law allowing children to be forced into placements for up to 90 days through a court order.

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With two more jail deaths, public defender again raises neglect concerns

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With two more jail deaths, public defender again raises neglect concerns

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Broward's public defenders say another spate of deaths, suicides and disturbing episodes inside Broward jails this year suggest a failure by facilities to medically assess and treat inmates.

"I again feel compelled to write to demand that you exercise a sense of urgency in addressing the repetitive series of medical neglect with concrete and transparent solutions," read a letter signed by Broward Public Defender Howard Finkelstein and Executive Chief Assistant Public Defender Gordon Weekes.

The letter was prompted by two inmates' deaths within 24 hours of each other earlier this month and included a list of detailed episodes alleging medical neglect and an indifference to mental illness by Broward jail officials.

On Dec. 8, inmate Richard Cramer died by suicide after being in prison for less than three weeks, according to the letter. On Dec. 9, Ryan Bergin died while in a prison detox program. The death was ruled a suicide, while the letter said "those circumstances are suspect."

A spokeswoman from the Broward Sheriff's Office said in a statement Friday that investigations into the in-custody deaths mentioned in the letter were already underway. The spokeswoman also said the Public Defender's Office has sent similar letters in the past, "in which most of the allegations were determined to be unfounded."

In June, the Public Defender's Office sent such a letter to BSO after two inmates were found dead and a third cut off his own penis while in solitary confinement at the Broward Main Jail. That letter also made reference to a mentally ill inmate in solitary confinement who delivered her own baby in April at the North Broward Jail in Pompano Beach.

In Wednesday's letter, the Public Defender's Office detailed the suicide of 17-year-old Sonny Rugani on Sept. 4 and alleged that prison medical personnel failed to act on his "continuous cries for help." The letter also said that Rugani was on suicide watch after being transferred from a juvenile detention center to the adult jail, where he killed himself two months later.

Finkelstein and Weekes said there was not enough urgency displayed by BSO in addressing the root causes of all these episodes. "To continue on this path of pursuing never-ending investigations that rarely amount to change, and offering platitudes of goodwill without meaningful corrective action is tantamount to deliberate indifference to the suffering of the people within your care," they wrote.

On Friday, Weekes said had not yet heard directly from the Sheriff's Office in regards to the most recent letter.

He mentioned that after the June letter, the agency responded days later to some of his initial allegations.

In that response, a sheriff's spokeswoman said that by submitting their concerns to the news media instead of traditional communication channels, the Public Defender's Office seemed intent to "incite public opinion and score political points rather than to address a genuine concern for inmate welfare."

The spokeswoman also defended the Sheriff's Office's medical treatment of inmates, saying that they are provided round-the-clock access to medical and mental health services and often are sent to outside health care facilities when necessary.

Weekes said the string of recent incidents proved those claims false. "It's like they are racing to the bottom of the barrel with the way they treat folks in jail," he said.

He pointed to Sept. 11, when inmate Frank Jordan was taken to Broward court in a wheelchair. When he arrived, Jordan was non-responsive and drooling from his mouth, according to Wednesday's letter. Jordan had previously sustained a stroke while in custody, according to the letter. The letter alleges that despite the "unnerving sight" of his condition, Jordan was initially returned to the jail until the court intervened and had him transported to a hospital.

Weekes said Jordan lived, but the fact that nobody thought it was a problem to roll the man into court that day was telling. "It exemplifies about how detached they are to the way people are treated in their care," he said.

According to Weekes, one of the larger problems with the healthcare system for Broward inmates is that it is run by a private company, Wellpath, which he said creates extra steps to get inmates access to care.

He said generally inmates must put in medical requests through a portal system that is reviewed by a nurse and goes through more review before care is administered. "But some issues you can't put into a portal system: like a stroke." He said prisons need providers that are more proactive in monitoring and maintaining patient care.

In a statement, a spokeswoman for Wellpath said the company delivers high quality care to all patients but did not respond directly to the Public Defender's claims. "Today, correctional institutions have many patients with acute mental health illnesses and substance use disorders and we are continually evolving to meet the needs of our patients," she added.

Latest Broward County News

Each letter sent this year to BSO by the Public Defender's Office was addressed to Sheriff Gregory Tony, but Weekes said that the issues his office are highlighting are not anomalies that began this year.

Tony was appointed in January by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis.

"He inherited this mess," Weekes Jr. said of Sheriff Tony. "But the bottom line is that it can't continue."

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With two more jail deaths, public defender again raises neglect concerns

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The Broward Public Defender's Office said recent deaths and disturbing episodes inside Broward jails this year suggest a failure to medically assess and treat inmates. The Sheriff's Office defended the medical treatment of inmates, saying that they are provided round-the-clock access to medical and mental health services.

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Every day, children in the justice system face solitary confinement, strip searches, shackling, pepper spray, restraints, and physical and sexual abuse. Children may be locked in cells as small as seven-by-ten feet, 22 to 24 hours per day, with no personal belongings, no access to educational services, counseling or mental health treatment, no interaction with peers and with nothing more than a lightly padded concrete slab to sleep on. They may be pepper-sprayed for simple rule violations, strip-searched after family visits, or shackled when they leave their cells.

There is no evidence demonstrating that these practices reduce violence in youth facilities; in fact, research shows that they often make things worse. If parents treated their own kids this way, we would call it child abuse.

Harsh Conditions: Government-Sanctioned Child Abuse

Harsh conditions or practices in youth prisons interfere with normal child development, traumatize youth, exacerbate physical and emotional disabilities and cause serious life-long health problems. Solitary confinement can cause permanent psychological damage and may lead to self-harm, psychosis, and suicide - in adults as well youth. Strip searches likewise are traumatic, degrading, and humiliating. Children, especially those who have experienced sexual abuse, can be re-traumatized by strip searches and often feel violated or sexually abused by these searches. Although federal law prohibits sexual violence against incarcerated youth and adults, children still remain at risk of sexual assault in both juvenile and adult facilities.

Studies suggest that youth of color, LGBTQ youth, gender-non-conforming youth, and youth with disabilities are more likely to be placed in solitary confinement - which administrators sometimes justify as necessary "for their own protection," or because the facility lacks appropriate services or accommodations.

The Movement To Keep Kids Safe

Juvenile Law Center is one of the leading advocates for the abolition of solitary confinement and other harmful conditions that youth face in the justice system. Juvenile Law Center's work focuses on: eliminating solitary confinement, strip searches, and the use of excessive force against kids; keeping kids safe from harm - whether from facility staff, other youth, or themselves; ensuring kids have developmentally appropriate care, treatment and programming; fair treatment, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, or disability status; and reducing the over-incarceration of youth and promoting alternatives to incarceration.

We use multiple strategies in our work, including federal and state legislative or executive branch advocacy, litigation, publication of resource materials or research, and professional training and public education. For example, in 2016, we filed a class action lawsuit with the ACLU of Wisconsin and Quarles & Brady, LLP challenging widespread use of solitary confinement, pepper spray and the practice of chaining youth to tables in two youth facilities, Lincoln Hills School for Boys and Copper Lake School for Girls. We are also proud to be part of a nationwide coalition to end solitary confinement for kids.

Image credit: © Richard Ross, juvenile-in-justice.com

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Solitary Confinement & Harsh Conditions | Juvenile Law Center

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Every day, children in the justice system face solitary confinement, strip searches, shackling, pepper spray, restraints, and physical and sexual abuse. Children may be locked in cells as small as seven-by-ten feet, 22 to 24 hours per day, with no personal belongings, no access to educational services, counseling or mental health treatment, no interaction with peers and with nothing more than a lightly padded concrete slab to sleep on.

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http://www.floridaschildrenfirst.org/foster-cares-looming-crisis/

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Challenges Facing Florida’s Community-Based Child Welfare System

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Challenges Facing Florida’s Community-Based Child Welfare System

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"Foster youth are up to 10 times more likely to enter the juvenile justice system than their counterparts in the general population and 25 percent of youth who age out of child welfare are incarcerated within two years of leaving the system."

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Proposed DCF changes could divert millions from South Florida or send kids here for care

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Proposed DCF changes could divert millions from South Florida or send kids here for care

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https://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article237016359.html

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‘We are just destroying these kids’: The foster children growing up inside detention centers -Mel M.

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‘We are just destroying these kids’: The foster children growing up inside detention centers -Mel M.

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The Donald R. Kuhn Juvenile Center in Julian, W.Va., where Geard Mitchell, now 17, spent part of his childhood. A lawsuit says 10 states' agencies tasked with caring for children failed, "jeopardizing their most basic needs." (Sarah L. Voisin/The Washington Post)

Though he's never been convicted of a crime, Geard Mitchell spent part of his childhood in a juvenile detention center, at times sleeping on cement floors under harsh fluorescent lights left on through the night during lockdowns.

He attended high school by clicking through online courses and had "no one to talk to but the walls" because of restrictions on phone calls. He attended group therapy with teens accused of rape, when what he really needed was grief therapy to process his mother's death.

Daily life became so torturous that Geard scratched up his face to look like a methamphetamine addict, hoping that "they would transfer me to somewhere more normal, like rehab."

"I knew it was wrong to lie," said Geard, 17, sitting in a courthouse in this town of shuttered coal fields and boarded-up shops. "But I was locked up with kids who were rapists and murderers. One kid even beat up a judge like it was nothing. That's just not me."

Geard's only crime was being a foster child in an era when a surging number of biological parents are falling into the grips of drug addiction and child welfare systems are struggling with a shortage of foster parents. In hasty attempts to address the problem, case workers and courts have been funneling children into crowded emergency shelters, hotels, out-of-state institutions and youth prisons - cold, isolating and often dangerous facilities not built to house innocent children for years.

"We are just destroying these kids. They're warehoused into emergency shelters, out-of-state institutions and juvenile detention centers, which can cause lifelong emotional trauma - their childhoods spent segregated from the outside world," said Marcia Lowry, executive director of A Better Childhood (ABC), a nonprofit child advocacy organization.

The nonprofit has filed lawsuits against 10 states alleging that agencies tasked with caring for children instead "infringe upon the rights of . . . foster children, jeopardizing their most basic needs." The most recent lawsuit was filed against West Virginia in the fall.

West Virginia has one of the highest rates of children living in congregate care - such as group homes, detention centers and residential treatment facilities - with 71 percent of foster children aged 12 to 17 in such institutions, according to the lawsuit.

Because foster care is a decentralized system, nationwide figures are hard to come by. As of 2013, about 56,000 foster children were living in congregate care, or about 14 percent of the foster child population, according to a report by the federal Children's Bureau. Many states have experienced significant increases in the years since.

Compared with foster children living with families, those housed in congregate care settings are more likely to drop out of high school, commit crimes and develop mental health problems, according to research by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, a philanthropic organization focused on children's issues.

Growing up in institutions was seen as so harmful to a child's development that the United States's orphanages were largely shut down after World War II. What formed in their place is today's foster care system, which emphasizes integrating children into family life, backed by mental health services and public schools.

But foster care systems are now so overloaded that institutionalizing children is becoming more common, and access to critical services - such as counseling, caseworkers and education - is limited, Lowry said.

Inside West Virginia's opioid battle

In a recent letter to the Washington state legislature, the secretary of the state's Department of Children, Youth and Families, Ross Hunter, wrote that the shortage of foster parents trained to handle children with trauma and behavioral needs has led to more than 2,000 instances of foster children staying overnight in hotels and, in a few cases, in social worker offices in 2019.

The use of expensive one-night placements comes "at extraordinary cost and detriment to the child," Hunter wrote. In an interview, he said the state is "frantically trying to solve this problem" by obtaining more funding and training for foster parents.

The use of juvenile detention centers varies among states. In some cases, such as Geard's, foster children have been integrated with criminally convicted youths, subject to some of the same rules and living conditions. In others, as in Oregon, foster children are housed in separate wings, sometimes refurbished to more closely resemble dormitory living.

Since settling a 2016 lawsuit, Oregon has reduced the practice of housing children in offices and hotels. But as many as 10 foster children are still housed in hotels each night, said Lisa Morawski, communications director for the state's Department of Human Services. Others have been assigned to live in refurbished juvenile detention centers and, in one case, a former police station that was renovated with new flooring, paint and decor.

Those facilities house "residential treatment programs" for children identified as having intensive psychiatric or behavioral issues, said Jake Sunderland, a spokesperson for the Oregon Department of Human Services.

Oregon state Sen. Sara Gelser (D), who chairs the Senate Committee on Human Services, said the state has made progress in recent months by improving the facilities and significantly reducing the number of foster children in refurbished detention centers. But she's still concerned about sending foster children to out-of-state institutions.

"When foster kids walk through a door that says 'jail,' it tells them they've done something wrong and even criminal - that they are at fault for their own trauma and abuse," Gelser said. "Environment and setting matter. It tells kids who they are and what the system believes about them."

Runaways have become a growing problem as foster children flee such institutions and turn up months later in trouble with the police or facing jail time. Last year, there were 791 reported runaway incidents in West Virginia's foster care system, which has a population of about 6,800 children. Jeremiah Samples, the deputy secretary of the state Department of Health and Human Resources (DHHR), called the number "gut-wrenching."

The state is on track to eclipse that number this year, he said.

DHHR officials said they cannot comment on the experiences detailed in the lawsuit because of privacy laws, but agency leaders said they're making efforts to address the foster care crisis. West Virginia's foster care population has increased 67 percent since 2013, according to state data.

Agency Secretary Bill Crouch said the West Virginia legislature "made child welfare a priority" by passing a bill in March that allows the agency to contract with private, managed care organization Aetna Better Health of West Virginia. Aetna plans to tailor mental health programs for foster children and help provide biological families with support before their children end up in the system.

He added that the state is working to hire more social workers and increase pay, to put more resources into recruiting foster parents, and to reduce reliance on institutions.

A changed child

On his first day at a West Virginia detention center, Arther Yoho witnessed a staffer slam an older child's head into a sink during a fight, according to his foster care records. The next morning, he woke up to a younger child screaming, as another youth whacked his head with a bar of soap in a pillowcase, a hazing method called locksocking.

Yoho, then 13, was told he would only have to stay at the detention center for a month. But he spent more than two years at the facility with 27 juvenile convicts, records show. He ran away with other residents several times, past the gates and into the nearby woods.

"I got real bad anger issues from living there," said Yoho, now 19 and aged out of the foster system. He shrugged and stared at the ground.

"I also know how to earn respect when I need to," he said.

The stocky blond loves "football, basketball, any sport" and enjoys reading mythology novels. His pale cheeks flush pink when he admits to being a fan of the "girly" vampire romance series Twilight.

But after years surviving in juvenile detention, he couldn't adjust to family life when he was finally placed with foster parents Rich Minnis and Clare Chesnavage.

"Clare and Rich would get frustrated with me because I would ask to stand up, ask to use the bathroom, ask to eat, ask to do everything, because that's the way it was in the detention center," Yoho said.

His siblings were killed by their adoptive mother. He was left in foster care to suffer a more common fate.

He also would overreact to suggestions - like how to improve his basketball game - by fighting perceived insults at home and at school.

By the time Yoho became a part of their family, Minnis said, "he was done with people." In an attempt to improve his ability to develop relationships, the couple drove Yoho to daily therapy sessions and enrolled him in team sports and DJ lessons, an activity in which he showed interest.

But ultimately, Yoho pulled a pocket knife on Chesnavage during a fight about cleaning his room and was removed from their home after three years - his longest of 18 placements. His struggle to find a permanent home has continued with his recent eviction from a house in Fairmont, W.Va., a town that he calls "Methmont" because of a spate of drug busts.

Karen Betler, Yoho's court-appointed special advocate since he entered the system at 7 years old, said she repeatedly asked the court to remove Yoho from the institutions and the detention center. But she was told there were no foster families available to take him at those times.

"He was not criminally minded. He was such a smart kid," said Betler, who hosted Yoho at her home during Christmas for years. "Institutional life just made him tough."

Some advocates have put their hope in a sweeping federal reform known as the Family First Prevention Services Act, which aims to keep children with their biological families.

The act will offer at-home parenting classes, mental health care and, in some cases, substance abuse treatment, with affordable child care at rehab centers.

Pushed by foster care alumni, the act also aims to restrict federal spending for group homes and other congregate care facilities that house six or more children. It requires a judge's approval to keep a child in an institution for longer stays.

States are scheduled to implement the group-home changes by October 2021, though they can request extensions in certain circumstances.

Critics worry that Family First will be slow and complicated to fully implement. It also might drain funds from a system that is already drowning, they say.

"But just because it's going to be hard and take a long time, that doesn't mean we don't do it," said David Sanders, executive vice president of systems improvement for Casey Family Programs, a nonprofit child-protection reform group.

"I believe it's the obligation for a state government to make sure that children are in settings where they can thrive. That is not detention centers or group homes, and we all recognize that," Sanders said. "Adoption, reunification or family settings is what states have to move towards."

A new chapter

Geard's most lasting memories of his mother are coloring while sitting in her lap at their Staten Island home. She died of an overdose when he was 8 years old, and his father was unable to care for him, according to the ABC lawsuit.

He was sent to his paternal uncle's home in West Virginia, where the lawsuit alleges he endured two years of physical abuse - teachers reported that his hands were too wounded to write - before the state took custody of him, according to state records.

While his younger sisters were quickly adopted, Geard cycled through emergency shelters, group homes and a juvenile detention facility.

At age 11, he was placed in a temporary shelter used to handle the overflow of foster children, where he says he was ridiculed daily by older teenage boys.

At one point, he devised a noose from his belt and attempted to "leave this planet." A staff member found him, which Geard believes was "my mother watching over me from heaven."

He attempted to take his life again a year later.

With no foster families available, Geard landed at the Donald R. Kuhn Juvenile Center - a facility with barbed wire - in 2018, according to the lawsuit.

Geard's maternal uncle, Jesus Rosario, said he tried to adopt him for the last five years, but case workers rarely called him back. It took more than two years of calls to get the required home study, he said.

"When my sister died, it was like he just disappeared into this system," said Rosario, who lives in Ohio. "And it took me years to track down how to find him."

One judge's tough approach to foster care: It's only for the really extreme cases

Geard's luck recently changed, just months before his 18th birthday.

As Geard stood with his hands clasped behind his back, his posture military stiff, at a county courthouse hearing about his next placement, Judge William S. Thompson said, "We have some good news, for once."

Thompson decided to release Geard from the system early into the custody of Rosario, whose home study was finally approved.

"You've got a chance now. I want you to take it," Thompson said.

Breaking his often stoic demeanor, Geard wiped away tears, smiling softly. He thanked the judge and his state-appointed attorney, Scott Briscoe, who served as guardian ad litem to three foster care children in the ABC lawsuit, "for being my champion."

Briscoe had called him weekly for years, noticing he was a hard worker and talented artist. Now, Geard hopes to train to be a tattoo artist. After his hearing, he showed drawings from his portfolio, particularly one of his favorites of an angel cradling a young child, which represents his mother and himself.

The drawings are in black-and-white, "because coloring reminds me of her too much," he said.

As they prepared to drive to Ohio, Rosario set up a video chat with his family to welcome Geard. His wife and two young children - ages 8 months and 3 years old - smiled and waved at Geard.

"It's a new chapter for me," he said, as the tiny town of drug rehab centers, pawnshops and billboards seeking new foster parents faded in his rearview.

"It's my story. I can't change it," he added, saying he's glad to be a part of the lawsuit. "But I don't want other foster kids to go through this too. I want to help stop them from spending their childhoods locked up."

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'We are just destroying these kids': The foster children growing up inside detention centers

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Though he's never been convicted of a crime, Geard Mitchell spent part of his childhood in a juvenile detention center, at times sleeping on cement floors under harsh fluorescent lights left on through the night during lockdowns. He attended high school by clicking through online courses and had "no one to talk to but the walls" because of restrictions on phone calls.

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Foster kids aging out of system have more options, but basics like housing still a challenge

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Foster kids aging out of system have more options, but basics like housing still a challenge

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http://www.floridaschildrenfirst.org/foster-kids-aging-out-of-system-have-more-options-but-basics-like-housing-still-a-challenge/

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Florida: $60,000 Settlement for Juvenile Offender Raped During “Test of Heart” Ritual

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Florida: $60,000 Settlement for Juvenile Offender Raped During “Test of Heart” Ritual

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“R.W. suffered a nightmare at Sumter. Unfortunately, his experience is not unique. A culture of brutality persists within the Florida Department of Corrections (FDOC), and what R.W. endured is just another example of why children do not belong in the adult prison system.” -- Miriam Haskell

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by David M. Reutter

A Florida juvenile offender who was beaten and raped by other prisoners as a guard stood by and watched has received a $60,000 settlement from the state.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, Florida imprisons more children in adult prisons than any other state in the nation. Some are as young as 14. Because Florida recognizes that such young offenders would be vulnerable if placed in the general population with adults, it separates them from that population.

As previously reported in PLN, the violence in the juvenile-only units includes a hazing ritual called a "test of heart." [See: PLN, May 2016, p.49]. While at the Sumter Correctional Institution (SCI), which houses more than 100 prisoners under the age of 18, a juvenile identified as R.W. was attacked in July 2013 during a test of heart.

SCI is a split compound; half is general population for adults and the other half is the juvenile-only section referred to as the "Annex." The facility also contains one dormitory for a juvenile boot camp. SCI is seriously understaffed, and most employees have less than two-years' experience.

As a result, violence in the juvenile-only units is epidemic. R.W. was given a choice of paying for protection or undergoing a test of heart. The payment option is never ending, and as SCI severely limits or prohibits juveniles from using the canteen, the payment option can result in a youth having to give up all the canteen items he is allowed to buy.

R.W., unable to pay, was warned of retaliation for "snitching." He had heard stories from another prisoner who sought help from a guard, who simply replied "welcome to prison." R.W. entered a dorm bathroom to wash up on July 24, 2013 and was approached by another prisoner, who initiated the test of heart ritual by slapping him.

Unbeknownst to R.W., six other juveniles were hiding in the bathroom area. They joined in and began assaulting him, as guard Bruce A. Kiser, Jr. sat in the glass-enclosed guards' station, which provided a full view of the bathroom.

A lawsuit filed by R.W. alleged that "Kiser stepped outside the officer's station towards the youth gathered near the bathroom to watch the attack," but "took no action" and returned to the guard's station. The beating lasted almost 30 minutes.

R.W. was stabbed more than 100 times with pieces of sharpened barbed-wire, choked and raped with a broomstick. "It was torture," he said. "I knew the guard could see what was happening, yet he did nothing. I have never felt so afraid or so alone."

"R.W. suffered a nightmare at Sumter," added Miriam Haskell, an attorney with the Southern Poverty Law Center, which, along with the Florida Institutional Legal Services Project of Florida Legal Services, represented R.W. in his subsequent suit. "Unfortunately, his experience is not unique. A culture of brutality persists within the Florida Department of Corrections (FDOC), and what R.W. endured is just another example of why children do not belong in the adult prison system."

The $60,000 settlement agreement was reached on October 27, 2017. What happened to R.W. was not specific to SCI; in December 2016, the Florida Department of Corrections agreed to pay $700,000 to a youth who was permanently injured after undergoing a test of heart at the Lancaster Correctional Institution. See: R.W. v. Kiser, U.S.D.C. (M.D. Fla.), Case No. 5:16-cv-00045-WTH-PRL.

Additional source: www.splcenter.org

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Florida: $60,000 Settlement for Juvenile Offender Raped During "Test of Heart" Ritual

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by David M. Reutter A Florida juvenile offender who was beaten and raped by other prisoners as a guard stood by and watched has received a $60,000 settlement from the state. According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, Florida imprisons more children in adult prisons than any other state in the nation.

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Before Foster Child Naika Venant's Suicide on Facebook Live, Florida Failed to Help Her

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Before Foster Child Naika Venant's Suicide on Facebook Live, Florida Failed to Help Her

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Shows a child who took her life a few years ago and was unfairly treated in the foster system. She was in and out of the juvenile system, had mental health issues and was NOT properly handled

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Still dressed in her school uniform, Naika Venant went live on Facebook at 6:12 p.m. November 10, 2016. Earlier that day, the 13-year-old foster child from Miami had stolen a phone from her caseworker. Now, as an audience of three watched her video feed, she clumsily navigated the iPhone's camera, flipping through filters before settling on one in black-and-white.

"The regular one is ugly as hell," she complained.

Someone commented about seeing her in handcuffs at school three days earlier, so Naika explained how she had been committed to a mental-health facility after running into traffic when a teacher tried to search her bag for marijuana.

"They said I walked in front o f cars. And I ain't go to jail - they Baker Acted me," she clarified. "They put me in the crazy house for the people who want to kill theyselves. Like, why would I want to kill myself? Explain me this."

During her eighth-grade year, Naika spent hours documenting her life on Facebook Live. With her tough exterior and class-clown quips, it was easy for her to dismiss concerns that she was depressed or suicidal. But already in her short life, Naika had expressed thoughts of self-harm on at least five occasions and been hospitalized three times under the Baker Act, a state law that allows officials to detain anyone threatening to hurt themselves.

From the age of 6, she had been in and out of Florida's foster-care system after the state received a report that her mother had whipped her with a belt more than 30 times. Since then, records show Naika had been sexually abused, psychologically evaluated, hospitalized for sickle cell anemia, diagnosed with anxiety and posttraumatic stress disorders, medicated with Adderall and Zoloft, arrested for criminal mischief, and expelled from her charter school.

The trauma she experienced and the behavioral problems she exhibited were well known to the child-welfare agencies responsible for her care. But despite being under the watchful eye of dozens of doctors, therapists, foster parents, and caseworkers, Naika received no meaningful intervention. Instead, the system continued to lead her down a dangerous path, shuffling the teen to more than a dozen foster homes in the last eight months of 2016. It was in one of those homes that she entered the bathroom, logged into Facebook, and hanged herself while filming her final live-stream.

"Trafficking and trauma, the opioid epidemic... are really having a profound impact on kids."

Naika's death on January 22, 2017, led to national outrage, finger-pointing among agencies, and leadership shake-ups within Our Kids, the Miami-based contractor responsible for her foster-care placements. Attorneys acting on behalf of Naika's estate - which includes her allegedly abusive mother - have now filed suit against Our Kids, the Florida Department of Children and Families (DCF), five other child-welfare agencies, and two of Naika's foster parents. Most damning, the lawsuit claims Naika's civil rights were violated when she was housed in multiple inappropriate foster placements, which denied her the safety and stability she required - ultimately leading to her tragic and untimely death at the age of 14.

"We are hoping to obtain justice for the emotional anguish that Naika suffered as a result of her sexual abuse in foster care and the failures of the Miami-Dade child protection system that bounced her in and out of 16 inappropriate placements during the last eight months of her life," says attorney Stacie Schmerling of Talenfeld Law, a children's advocacy firm that filed the case.

A DCF spokeswoman declined to comment on the pending lawsuit. Our Kids CEO Michael Williams, who joined the organization five months after Naika's death, also said he could not respond to questions specifically about the case. But in an interview with New Times, he acknowledged agencies throughout Florida have had trouble placing children who need specialized medical or mental-health care.

"Trafficking and trauma, the opioid epidemic - all those things are really having a profound impact on kids and the adolescents and teens," Williams said. "Trying to find the right clinical set of services to meet their needs is a challenge everyone is facing across the state."

Naika Marie Venant was born in 2002 to 17-year-old Gina Caze in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Shortly after giving birth, Caze moved to Florida, leaving behind her daughter with the baby's grandmother. Naika would be 18 months old before she was reunited with her mother in the United States.

By DCF's account, Naika's early years in Florida were marked by instability and abuse. At 4 years old, she was left home alone without food or water on at least one occasion. Another time, while hospitalized at age 5 for sickle cell anemia, her mother claimed she was "a liar and a faker" and threatened to send her back to Haiti. After she was taken into state custody at age 6, Naika told therapists she had slept in the same room as her mother's boyfriends and had been exposed to "sex movies."

Her caseworkers believed that exposure was one reason the girl repeatedly engaged in inappropriate sexual behavior with other children. In 2009, when Naika was 6, DCF received an abuse hotline report that she had been inappropriately touched by a classmate at school. An investigation revealed Naika had also engaged in sexual activity with another student, according to the lawsuit.

Although her foster parents were supposed to implement a sexual-safety plan that involved near-constant supervision, her attorneys say that didn't happen. At one foster home in 2009, she engaged in child-on-child sexual activity with her foster mother's son while the two were unsupervised. Throughout the year, according to the lawsuit, she was repeatedly sexually assaulted by a foster boy more than twice her age. (A DCF report says the boy denied assaulting Naika and claimed she was the aggressor.)

At the same home, Naika's foster mother allegedly used physical discipline, on one occasion "resulting in physical injury that was still visible a week later." Our Kids and DCF placed Naika's foster mother on a corrective action plan but did not remove the girl from the home, the suit alleges.

During this time, she was misbehaving at school and demonstrating sexually reactive behaviors, such as exposing herself to classmates, Naika's attorneys say. In June 2010, she received her first psychosexual evaluation, where the assessor determined she needed specialized treatment for sexually abused children. While being examined, Naika also expressed thoughts of self-harm and suicidal ideations. She was only 7 years old.

Later that month, she was reunified with her biological mother with the idea that Naika would continue to receive court-ordered behavioral and mental-health services. But the lawsuit says that by then, her behavior had grown so bad that Caze could no longer care for her. After running away from home, Naika was placed back in foster care for two months in 2014 and then again for a third time beginning in April 2016. She would remain in state care until the day she died.

Naika expressed sadness that her mother "didn't want her back."

In the last months of her life, Naika went from earning A's and B's in school to flunking two of her classes, including math, her best subject. She was diagnosed with major depression and placed on an increased dosage of Zoloft. On January 7, two weeks before her death, she was hospitalized for sickle cell complications and expressed she "did not want to die," according to the lawsuit.

In a conversation with her caseworker days before her death, Naika expressed sadness that her mother "didn't want her back" and that she would soon age out of the foster system, according to a report issued by DCF in response to her death. But Naika also talked positively about her plans to graduate from high school and start college.

In the report, DCF noted that Naika's "poor familial environments," including her multiple placements and home life with her mother, were a key suicidal risk factor. The agency also faulted Naika's Facebook followers for "urging her to take her own life, calling her vile names, and claiming the situation was either 'fake' or 'all an act.'" The report then cited a comment Caze allegedly posted on her daughter's final live-stream:

"Using the screen name 'Gina Alexis,' the following statement was allegedly written by Naika's mother in the moments leading up to her daughter's death: #ADHD games played u sad little DCF custody jit that's why u where u at for this dumb shit n more u keep crying wolf u dead u will get buried life goes on after a jit that doesn't listen to there parents trying to be grown seeking boys and girls attention instead of her books."

It appears from the report that DCF did not verify whether the comment actually came from Naika's mother. Caze did not respond to an interview request from New Times, but in prior interviews she has denied encouraging her daughter to kill herself.

"I didn't taunt her - I didn't know what she was even doing yet - I thought it was a hoax because when I saw it, other people were saying it was fake, so I did too," Caze told FloridaPolitics.com.

"I still haven't seen the [video] stream to this day. In the comment, I don't see a mother saying, 'Do it,' I see a mother saying, 'Don't - stop,' because here's the reality of what can happen if she did do it, and what she needed to be doing instead of playing with Facebook males and females - stick to your books."

In the same report from DCF, the state acknowledged a shortage of therapeutic foster homes at the time of Naika's death. Unsurprisingly, foster-care placement is a major theme of the new lawsuit. According to the complaint, the ink was barely dry on Majorie Janvier's foster-care license when Our Kids assigned Naika to move into Janvier's two-bedroom apartment in Miami Gardens. Records show DCF issued Janvier's license December 19, 2016; she was given Naika and two other foster children just two days later.

The lawsuit says Janvier, who had a 15-month-old son, had no experience as a foster mother and had never parented more than one child at a time. She also wasn't equipped to take in a teenager like Naika, who had been diagnosed with sickle cell anemia.

In Florida, foster children with serious medical or emotional needs are supposed to be placed in therapeutic foster homes where they can receive specialized care. Therapeutic foster parents complete 30 hours of initial clinical training, plus eight to ten hours of training every six months, and must be available 24 hours a day to respond to crises. They are supported by a treatment team of health-care professionals, including a physician and a psychiatrist.

Naika's attorneys argue she should have been in a therapeutic foster home all along. And they say it was clear she required special attention from the time she entered the foster-care system. Instead, the lawsuit suggests Our Kids repeatedly placed Naika in traditional foster homes because there was a shortage of therapeutic parents.

Our Kids CEO Michael Williams says that theory is an assumption that has yet to be proven. But he points out that an agency such as Our Kids has little authority to recruit more therapeutic foster parents. In Florida, therapeutic foster homes are overseen by Medicaid, not by DCF or its independent contractors. That was news to Williams, who came to Our Kids from Connecticut's Department of Children and Families.

"The difference is, in Connecticut, we had control of our therapeutic foster-care system," he says. "We managed it, we grew it, we regulated it, so we could blend it in our recruitment efforts with our regular foster care."

"A regular foster parent wouldn't know what to do with a child like her."

The DCF report issued in the wake of Naika's death says behavioral-health providers - which are independent organizations that serve children with disabilities and mental-health needs - are typically responsible for recruiting therapeutic foster parents. But the state suggested Our Kids should take a more active role by recommending good candidates.

In February 2017, one month after Naika died, DCF found that Our Kids had 25 children on a waitlist for specialized therapeutic foster homes. Three-quarters of those kids were 13 or older.

Many of them were waiting to be moved from one therapeutic placement to another due to "disruption." Behavioral issues were a key factor in Naika's case too: DCF records show disciplinary problems made it difficult for Our Kids to find her a stable foster home.

At least five of Naika's foster parents complained they could not handle her, and she was kicked out of group homes at least three times. In 2016, she was reassigned to 16 foster placements, including five where she stayed only one night, the lawsuit says. Janvier's apartment in Miami Gardens would be her last home.

Evin Daly, a guardian ad litem and former chief operating officer of the Family Resource Center of South Florida - a case-management agency licensed by Our Kids - says there's no way Naika should have been placed with a new foster parent like Janvier, let alone in a home with multiple other foster children.

"Children with behavioral problems who are runaways and have sexualized behaviors really need a one-on-one placement," he says. "A regular foster parent wouldn't know what to do with a child like her."

Because of the improper placement, Daly says Our Kids ultimately shares responsibility for Naika's death. But he also acknowledges the challenges foster-care agencies face in finding qualified homes for children with behavioral problems.

"It's easy to place a baby; it's hard to place an unruly teen," he says. "The placement was a bad placement, but where else is she going to go?"

(Janvier did not respond to a request for comment from New Times.)

Ultimately, Daly says he sees Naika's death as the tragic result of a girl abandoned by her mother and a broken foster-care system that has yet to be fixed.

"At the end of the day, it's a little girl who's never going to live a life now," he says. "I wish there was a happy ending for these kids, but there's not."

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florida department of children and families

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Before Foster Child Naika Venant's Suicide on Facebook Live, Florida Failed to Help Her

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Still dressed in her school uniform, Naika Venant went live on Facebook at 6:12 p.m. November 10, 2016. Earlier that day, the 13-year-old foster child from Miami had stolen a phone from her caseworker. Now, as an audience of three watched her video feed, she clumsily navigated the iPhone's camera,...

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Keyla. Millet-Florida Sued for Keeping Kids in Solitary Confinement

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Keyla. Millet-Florida Sued for Keeping Kids in Solitary Confinement

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https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/florida-department-of-juvenile-justice-sued-for-isolating-kids-in-solitary-confinement-11260512

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Plan to use secure facility for Hillsborough’s problem foster teens is ‘ludicrous,’ sheriff says

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Plan to use secure facility for Hillsborough’s problem foster teens is ‘ludicrous,’ sheriff says

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https://www.tampabay.com/news/hillsborough/2019/10/17/plan-to-use-secure-facility-for-hillsboroughs-problem-foster-teens-is-ludicrous-sheriff-says/

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Florida’s Child Welfare System Faces Difficulties

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Florida’s Child Welfare System Faces Difficulties

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http://www.floridapoliticalreview.com/floridas-child-welfare-system-faces-difficulties/

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Citizens Commission on Human Rights, CCHR

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The answer is, "not so well," according to recent investigations. Apparently what happens is this: children are first taken out of abusive or neglectful homes and put into the foster care system, presumably to be given the chance at better lives. So far, so good. However, removal from one environment that has victimized them, and entry into another highly questionable one, is the surprising discovery of government and media investigations into the matter. What was found is that the chosen method of treatment in many cases is child drugging - excessive, unnecessary, and at extremely high doses.

This is not to mention the exorbitant cost of these drugs paid with Medicaid funds, which American taxpayers trust will be spent constructively and responsibly. Some states spend so much on psychiatric drugs that it will become necessary to divert funds from education and social services to keep covering the costs. In the state of Massachusetts, for example, almost 40% of foster children were found to be on at least one psychotropic drug.

Troubled children entering foster care are routinely interviewed by cold clinicians, sometimes for just 15 minutes or less, hastily pronounced "disordered", and then medicated. Most often prescribed are the newer class of drugs called "antipsychotics" intended for seriously ill adults, not for the most commonly diagnosed childhood "disorder", "ADHD". Inappropriate application of these heavy drugs seems inexplicable until one considers that these newer antipsychotics are more heavily advertised and higher priced. This leads one to ask if those factors are influencing doctors more than the welfare of their patients, especially in light of kickbacks offered by some drug companies for prescribing their brand.

These antipsychotic drugs were not even tested for children; but now their liberal clinical use has proven them destructive, often tragically so. The 2009 case of seven-year-old Gabriel Myers who committed suicide while under foster care was traced to multiple high dose drugs prescribed by his Medicaid psychiatrist. Rather than the wake-up call his death should have been, this kind of dangerous drugging has been allowed to continue and pervade the foster care system. Statistically, foster children are given over ten times as many drugs as those outside the system. Apparently, out of the public view or a parent's watchful eye, anything can happen. Now, however, government officials and Medicaid have been alerted, and have instituted reporting requirements to prevent this, and have dismissed some of the high-prescribers in their employ.

One could ask if these drugs are at all effective in fixing what is wrong. Not according to the children themselves, or their foster parents, who spoke out in a three part ABC program portraying this disturbing scene in America. ABC's long-term investigation exposed the fact that Medicaid psychiatrists, rather than offering the sincere concern, attention, and compassion thus far lacking in these children's lives, find it simpler to fix them with drugs. What was also exposed is that the side effects of child drugging are often so severe that a second drug is given to combat them, then another to combat newer side effects, and so on until as many as five drugs are prescribed for one child. Side effects are sometimes irreversible, such as diabetes, neuro-muscular deterioration, and the most tragic of all - suicide.

Many foster children described what they experienced in foster care. They spoke not about the nurturing welcome one hopes would greet them when entering foster care, but about the incorrect diagnoses and bags of meds they were handed. One child described his medicated state as like a pile of bricks on his head weighing him down. Though it would seem less likely that a child could "act out" with his muscles and psyche shackled; actual films showed extreme tantrums while under medication, which subsided when the medications were withdrawn.

Some children told of being on drugs beginning at age six, and continuing throughout their foster "care". Even when placed in temporary homes, foster parents were pressured to keep them drugged up. One foster family chose to pay for an independent therapist who suspected that the heavy cocktail of drugs was causing the extreme behavior he witnessed. When weaned off the heavy "cocktail" of meds, this child's behavior radically improved. One teen in foster care gained over 100 pounds as a side effect of her medication, putting her at risk for diabetes.

Another foster child from an earlier investigation told her story of being placed in a home with over a dozen foster kids, all under heavy medication. Unhappy about being unable to interact with them because they were so out of it, she was sent to a psychiatrist. Her first visit resulted in being labeled bi-polar for being "depressed", and she was prescribed Prozac and Seroquel. Subsequent visits were stressful to her because the doctor would first and last ask her about the drugs. She feared, if she said anything negative about them, that he would raise the dose or add more. Seeing the heavily drugged kids at home, she wanted no part of it. Taking her meds, she said, would knock her out so that she could not stay awake at school. Such foster child drugging is clearly both counter-productive and oppressive. Though America's duty is to protect and foster the physical and mental well being of these children, the real beneficiary of the current program seems to be the pharmaceutical industry.

It seems obvious to state that abusive and neglectful homes caused the emotional states of these children. Anger, frustration and other emotions are the consequence of disordered and destructive environments. One child trauma authority said that the failure of many psychiatrists to understand this, and their blaming brain-based disorders instead, is leading to all the child drugging. Nurturing, improved environments and rehabilitating therapy are what is needed. An ABC correspondent questioned how the costs of such a program would be covered. On an immediate look, resources may seem to be lacking. But if the current expenditure of millions of Medicaid dollars on expensive drugs were eliminated and re-allocated, the funds would then be available to rehabilitate foster children with proven, positive methods carrying none of the dangerous side effects of child drugging.
Like Candy? Foster Kids Get More Antipsychotics // Pharmalot Study Finds Foster Children Often Given Antipsychosis Drugs - NYTimes.com The Children's Monitor | On Our Watch Why Are So Many Foster Care Children Taking Antipsychotics? | TIME Healthland Foster Kids More Likely To Be Given Psychotropic Drugs - Capsules - The KHN Blog Psychiatric Drugs in the Foster Care System

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How Are America's Foster Children Being Treated?

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The answer is, "not so well," according to recent investigations. Apparently what happens is this: children are first taken out of abusive or neglectful homes and put into the foster care system, presumably to be given the chance at better lives. So far, so good.

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It's long past time to change the way we refer to children in foster care.

Whether it's called foster care or the child welfare system, those archaic terms diminish what is really going on. These children are victims of the worst abuse, neglect, sex trafficking and other traumas. If it was called the "child victim and well-being system," maybe the egregiousness of children sleeping in offices or gas station parking lots, and spending significant years of their childhood in antiseptic rooms and scary facilities, would be better understood. And perhaps concerned Floridians and their legislators would hit the reset button on locking up child victims of trauma "for their own good" instead of rushing to change Florida's child welfare policies, as the 13th Judicial Circuit's Ad Hoc Committee on Dually-Involved Youth is proposing in Hillsborough County.

Although the committee's recommendations are well-intended, they are a rush to a solution that addresses the wrong problem. The instability for approximately 20 dually-involved Hillsborough children is a symptom of an underlying ailment caused by failing to meet their needs for more than two decades.

Recently released research on the status of Florida girls by the Delores Barr Weaver Policy Center presents eye-opening facts about current levels of child trauma that have been overlooked and underrepresented in the existing narrative of Hillsborough's placement instabilities, which is heavy on blaming child victims for system failures and inefficiencies.

According to the latest research, one in 10 Florida girls report having been raped. One in three feel unsafe at school, and 13 percent feel unsafe in their neighborhoods. More than one in three experience depression, and one in five have seriously contemplated suicide.

What makes this research relevant to the present Hillsborough County child welfare crisis is it recognizes that service and care models based on controlling children's behaviors, rather than meeting trauma-based needs, will and do fail. The same thing can be said about the boys.

Traumatized victims cannot - and should not - be coerced into therapy. Citizens need to red flag comments like these when they appear. Florida's Baker Act offers protections to those who are not an immediate threat to themselves or others. It's time for Florida to quit trying to drag dependent child victims of abuse and trauma into lock-up facilities when they don't meet the Baker Act guidelines.

Although the ad hoc committee's 40-page report references trauma, it appears to be a sideways gesture to prevent push back. In fact, the report lacks specificity on the exact traumas these children have suffered. What are their ages, genders, ethnicity and other demographic factor,s and what are their individual stories bundled together? There is also no specific mention about service gaps or in-depth analysis of unmet needs in Hillsborough County surrounding the problem.

Just as troubling is the insulated process the ad hoc committee took at vetting its unsound proposals. To our knowledge, the findings weren't presented to the 13th Judicial Circuit's Juvenile Justice Advisory Board for public discussion, testimony and a formal vote. Nor were committee meetings publicized widely outside of Hillsborough County so groups with similar missions and innovative solutions working in other regions could weigh in.

Since the stakes are high with proposed child welfare and juvenile justice policy changes impacting child victims statewide, Department of Children and Families Secretary Chad Poppell should convene a statewide work group composed of diverse organizations from throughout Florida, including non-state-funded advocates. Those outside the local system can often help insiders see the system in ways that they cannot currently see.

When dealing with our most vulnerable children, urgency is important. But it's also just as important to get it right.
Roy Miller is president of the Children's Campaign in Tallahassee, a nonprofit that advocates for the health, safety, education and well-being of Florida's children.

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It's long past time to change the way we refer to children in foster care. Whether it's called foster care or the child welfare system, those archaic terms diminish what is really going on. These children are victims of the worst abuse, neglect, sex trafficking and other traumas.

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Problem foster kids could be locked up in ‘secure’ facility under new plan pushed by Tampa Bay child welfare agency

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Problem foster kids could be locked up in ‘secure’ facility under new plan pushed by Tampa Bay child welfare agency

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https://www.tampabay.com/news/hillsborough/2019/09/09/problem-foster-kids-could-be-locked-up-in-secure-facility-under-new-plan-pushed-by-tampa-bay-child-welfare-agency/

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Florida plans to send troubled kids in child welfare to this location 

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Florida plans to send troubled kids in child welfare to this location 

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https://www.tampabay.com/florida-politics/buzz/2019/11/07/florida-plans-to-send-troubled-kids-in-child-welfare-to-this-location/

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Florida's Child Welfare Statistics At a glance - September 2019

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Florida's Child Welfare Statistics At a glance - September 2019

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An entire database for child welfare in florida
Link:https://www.myflfamilies.com/programs/childwelfare/dashboard/

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Innovative Project Maps the Movement of Foster Care + This is not okay – Visualizing foster care placement instability

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Innovative Project Maps the Movement of Foster Care + This is not okay – Visualizing foster care placement instability

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Remember the name, Robert Latham
Link to article: https://chronicleofsocialchange.org/child-welfare-2/project-mapping-movement-in-florida-foster-care/33503
Link to project website: https://robertlathamesq.org/this-is-not-okay-visualizing-foster-care-placement-instability

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Florida Lawsuit Challenges Use of Solitary Confinement for Youth (2019)

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Florida Lawsuit Challenges Use of Solitary Confinement for Youth (2019)

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Florida Lawsuit Challenges Use of Solitary Confinement for Youth (2019)

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), Florida Legal Services (FLS), and the Florida Justice Institute (FJI) filed a federal class action lawsuit, G.H. v. Marstiller, against Florida's Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) to end the use of solitary confinement on behalf of more than 4,000 children in 21 state juvenile detention centers operated by DJJ. On December 6, 2019, the federal judge denied the defendant's motion to dismiss, citing fundamental differences between adults and children that are relevant in the
Eighth Amendment context, including when evaluating conditions of confinement.

Between July 1, 2017 and June 1, 2018, DJJ isolated 4,310 children in solitary confinement a total of 11,738 times, meaning that many children were put in isolation repeatedly. In total, DJJ locked up 14,010 children in FY 2017-18. This means that approximately 30 percent of children were isolated in solitary confinement at some point while locked up. African American youth are disproportionately targeted for solitary confinement. They constitute 22% of Florida's public school enrollment, but 51% of juvenile arrests, over 60% of children in DJJ secure detention, and 70% of children in solitary confinement statewide.

Southern Poverty Law Center Report on Solitary Confinement (2019)

The report - Solitary Confinement: Inhumane, Ineffective, and Wasteful - reviews research on solitary confinement andpresents the stories of three people who endured the practice, including a man who died by suicide after spending almost four years in solitary confinement in Florida's prisons. Read more on solitary in Florida from SPLC here.

Florida Legislation Introduced to Limit Solitary Confinement for Kids (2019)

In 2019, several bills to ban solitary confinement were introduced in the Florida legislature. See a Breakdown of Florida 2019 Solitary Bills.

Florida Senator Montford introduced SB 436 in October 2019, which would limit solitary confinement of youth 19 years old and under to situations. In those circumstances, isolation should not exceed 24 hours.

Florida Senator Perry Thurston also introduced SB 110, which would ban the Department of Corrections or a local government from subjecting youth to solitary confinement except under limited circumstances.

Representative Kamia Brown filed HB 557, which would require data collection regarding youthful offenders in DOC custody.

Representative Dianne Hart filed HB 531, which would, among other things, place limits on disciplinary confinement for all in DOC, not just juveniles.

Finally, Senator Farmer filed SB 762, which would place strict limits on the use of solitary confinement for both juveniles and adults.

Research shows putting young prisoners in solitary confinement is dangerous. Some lawmakers want to ban the practice (Florida Phoenix, Mar. 2019)

After a lawsuit filed by the Legal Aid Society of Palm Beach County and the Human Rights Defense Center, the Palm Beach County Jail agreed to a settlement that significantly limit isolation for youth. In October 2018, the Florida Department of Justice filed a Statement of Interest in the case. According to the complaint in the litigation, the adult county jail kept children as young as 16-years-old in solitary in for periods as long as 18 months without exercise, education, or treatment. The youth in question were awaiting trial, meaning they had not been found guilty of anything. In addition to the Palm Beach Sheriff, the suit names the County School Board as a defendant for violating the Americans With Disabilities Act by failing to provide legally required educational services to youth in solitary. The lawsuit focuses on young males in solitary, since girls under age 18 who are charged as adults are kept in the jail's medical unit.

Under the settlement, the jail will adopt new policy that still permits "segregated housing." The sheriff's department will use a rotating staff schedule to keep youth under the age of 18 who are charged as adults separated from other inmates to prevent isolation for administrative reasons. All youth in segregated housing will be permitted out of their cells "throughout the regular school day" with other youth in general population. These limits apply to all youth except those in protective custody.

Although the settlement does not limit the length of time that a youth can be in disciplinary solitary, it does mandates that, within 24 hours of isolation for any reason, the Sheriff's Office and the School Board must meet and agree how to "allow equal access" to educational services and out-of-cell programming, as well as refer the youth to a mental health professional for evaluation. The sheriff's office must also convene a weekly "Segregation Review Committee (SRC) meeting to review and plan for ways to accommodate each youth in segregation and evaluate alternative sanctions (alternative disciplinary sanctions must be established in an alternative behavior management policy, which must be drafted by Jan. 10, 2019).

FLORIDA SENATE BILL 812 (2013)

SB 812, or the Youth in Solitary Confinement Reduction Act, would have prohibited the Department of Corrections or a local facility from subjecting a youth to solitary confinement except under certain circumstances; prohibited youth from "emergency: cell confinement for more than 24 hours; prohibited a youth prisoner from being subjected to disciplinary cell confinement for more than 72 hours. The bill died in the Criminal Justice Committee in 2013.

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Florida Lawsuit Challenges Use of Solitary Confinement for Youth (2019) The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), Florida Legal Services (FLS), and the Florida Justice Institute (FJI) filed a federal class action lawsuit, G.H. v. Marstiller, against Florida's Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) to end the use of solitary confinement on behalf of more than 4,000 ...

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Florida’s Prosecution of children as adults under “direct file”

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Florida’s Prosecution of children as adults under “direct file”

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https://www.hrw.org/report/2014/04/10/branded-life/floridas-prosecution-children-adults-under-its-direct-file-statute

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DCF Secretary backs plan to use secure facility for problem foster kids even as opposition grows

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DCF Secretary backs plan to use secure facility for problem foster kids even as opposition grows

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Link: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.tampabay.com/florida-politics/2019/09/23/dcf-secretary-backs-plan-to-use-secure-facility-for-problem-foster-kids-even-as-opposition-grows/?outputType=amp

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Jacksonville home for teen delinquents shut down after decade of criticism, 1,800 police calls

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Jacksonville home for teen delinquents shut down after decade of criticism, 1,800 police calls

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Link: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.jacksonville.com/news/20191119/jacksonville-home-for-teen-delinquents-shut-down-after-decade-of-criticism-1800-police-calls?template=ampart

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Reforming Juvenile Detention in Florida 

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Reforming Juvenile Detention in Florida 

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The study is a fair assessment of the condi-
tions of confinement, needs of youth entering the
system, and services received as reported by youth and staff. It also estimates the number of youth that could safely be placed in a non-secure alternative environment, thus reducing the overall burden on the system.
That anonymous post was me but I can't delete it

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Reforming Juvenile Detention in Florida 

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Reforming Juvenile Detention in Florida 

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The study is a fair assessment of the condi-
tions of confinement, needs of youth entering the
system, and services received as reported by youth and staff. It also estimates the number of youth that could safely be placed in a non-secure alternative environment, thus reducing the overall burden on the system.

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Trauma-informed Care in Juvenile Detention Is Not Enough

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Trauma-informed Care in Juvenile Detention Is Not Enough

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Alexander Image/Shutterstock

While Florida has taken steps toward integrating trauma-informed practices in the juvenile justice system, the state needs to reconsider its treatment of youth. Notably, utilizing trauma-informed care in the juvenile justice system, while necessary, is not sufficient - prevention should be the goal, with trauma-informed services implemented in all child-involved systems. The state must also stop incarcerating children with adults and offer all juveniles in detention/incarceration access to trauma-informed services.

Florida has one of the highest incarceration rates in the country, and leads the nation in the number of children prosecuted as adults and the number of children incarcerated in adult facilities. Currently, over 14,000 youths are in juvenile detention and hundreds of others are direct-filed and placed into adult correctional facilities each year.

More than 60% of these direct-file cases are for nonviolent offenses like drug use, disorderly conduct, probation violations, property crimes and status offenses. The sentences imposed on the direct-filed children are often so short that the majority are released before their 25 th birthdays, leading one to wonder whether such transfers are necessary.

The trauma we inflict

Furthermore, decades of research prove that extreme isolation can cause serious psychological, physical and developmental harm. Solitary is also far more dangerous for children and people with disabilities, as it impairs much needed social interaction and emotional development. Research also shows that youth incarcerated with adults are subjected to increased risks of violence and a robust culture of criminal behavior, while also denied access to the programs provided to juveniles housed in youth facilities.

In addition, the behaviors of children in the juvenile justice system could have been addressed in a number of healthier ways and environments. We have found through our education advocacy and representation of students in special education proceedings statewide that, oftentimes, schools punitively discipline children for behaviors that are simply manifestations of trauma they have experienced.

Instead of providing mental health support to meet students' trauma-related needs, many schools subject students to punitive and counter-productive suspensions, expulsions, involuntary transfers and referrals to law enforcement that push them out of school and into the criminal justice system.

Indeed, while the state Department of Juvenile Justice, the Florida Department of Children and Families and the Florida Department of Education are all child-centered systems, the education system is the only one that interacts with all children. Thus, schools are the ideal vehicle for delivering trauma-informed services to at-risk youth while prison/detention systems, are less than ideal vehicles for delivering trauma-informed care given their inherently traumatic environments.

Incorporating ACEs and trauma-informed care

Specifically, the authors found that high ACE scores correlated to: chromosome damage; functional changes to the developing brain; having 50+ sexual partners; intercourse before 15; becoming pregnant as a teenager; increased odds of smoking, heavy drinking, incarceration and morbid obesity; increased risk for poor educational and employment outcomes; increased risk for recent violence, and significant increased odds of developing heart disease, cancer, chronic lung disease, skeletal fractures and liver disease. Children with four or more ACEs are up to 12 times as likely to experience the above compared to children with fewer ACES.

Next steps

But the state needs to take steps as well to ensure that trauma-informed care is provided to all juveniles in the justice system, and to help reduce the trauma of the system by ending the prosecution of minors as adults, especially for nonviolent offenses, and provide alternatives so that children are never housed with adults or placed in extreme isolation.
Samantha Howell is the pro bono director at Southern Legal Counsel , a statewide not-for-profit public interest law firm focused on assisting individuals who would not otherwise have access to the justice system through systemic change efforts and impact litigation.

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Trauma-informed Care in Juvenile Detention Is Not Enough

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While Florida has taken steps toward integrating trauma-informed practices in the juvenile justice system, the state needs to reconsider its treatment of youth. Notably, utilizing trauma-informed care in the juvenile justice system, while necessary, is not sufficient - prevention should be the goal, with trauma-informed services implemented in all child-involved systems. The state must also stop incarcerating children with adults and offer all juveniles in detention/incarceration access to trauma-informed services.

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https://www.correctionalofficeredu.org/florida/

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Breifing Report: Analysis of the Effect of First Time Secure Detention Stays due to Failure to Appear (FTA) in Florida.

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Breifing Report: Analysis of the Effect of First Time Secure Detention Stays due to Failure to Appear (FTA) in Florida.

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In keeping with the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative (JDAI) and the
Florida Department of Juvenile Justice’s (FDJJ) Roadmap to System Excellence, the Department has examined
the relationship between first time detention stays for failures to appear (FTA) in court and subsequent
recidivism and re-confinement. The findings from this analysis will aid in understanding the way FDJJ handles
youth who fail to appear in court for misdemeanor offenses. Specifically, does detaining this population of youth
lead to significantly worse outcomes for youth than if they had been allowed to await their court for misdemeanor offenses. Specifically, does detaining this population of youth
lead to significantly worse outcomes for youth than if they had been allowed to await their court date in the community?
Link: http://www.djj.state.fl.us/docs/research2/briefing-report-fta-(august-2016).pdf?sfvrsn=2

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Florida’s troubled teens don’t belong in ‘the hole’

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Florida’s troubled teens don’t belong in ‘the hole’

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Florida Youth offender system sets teens back socially and isolation has a negative effect on teens in system.

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The use of solitary confinement for children and juveniles has been prohibited in federal prisons, but Florida continues this practice, despite its harmful effects.

The "hole," as solitary confinement is often called, consists of tiny cells where young offenders are placed in isolation for 22 to 24 hours a day. For weeks or months at a time, incarcerated youth are deprived of meaningful social contact, recreational activities, education and even sunlight.

Catherine Jones was 14 when she was sent to Lowell Correctional Institution, an adult women's prison in Florida. Because she was so young and the prison did not have housing for juveniles, she was put in solitary confinement for four months in part to separate her from the general inmate population.

"This was supposedly for my safety, but emotionally and mentally it affected me in ways far worse," Catherine said.

The child's sources of entertainment were often limited to counting the bricks on the wall and keeping insects as pets just to have company.

During confinement, Catherine was prohibited from talking to other inmates in nearby cells. This lack of interaction caused her to grow accustomed to solitude. Unable to develop social skills, she struggled to form personal relationships when she was released into the general population.

Her story shows how subjecting young offenders to solitary confinement can hurt their chances of being rehabilitated.

The U.S. Department of Justice issued a report indicating that prolonged use of solitary confinement for youthful offenders can cause lasting psychiatric consequences. Because their brains are still developing, they are more susceptible to mental illnesses such as depression, anxiety and psychosis. The study also highlighted that nearly half of suicides occurring in juvenile facilities happened in solitary confinement.

In an effort to curb this practice, Florida legislators have introduced a variety of criminal justice reform bills for the 2020 legislative session.

Sen. Perry Thurston of Plantation, Sen. Bill Montford of Tallahassee, Rep. Ramon Alexander of Tallahassee and Rep. Fentrice Driskell of Tampa have each introduced bills prohibiting youth from being placed in solitary confinement except in limited circumstances.

The enactment of these bills will provide basic safeguards to incarcerated youth. It will ensure that if a juvenile has to be placed in emergency confinement, facility staff members would be required to provide mental health checks by a clinician, document all procedures and limit the confinement duration.

States have a responsibility to protect the public from juveniles who commit crimes. But states also have a duty to ensure that troubled youth are able to reintegrate into the community once they are released. The first step to achieve this goal, which many states have already done, is to restrict the use of solitary confinement on youth offenders. Hopefully by next spring, Florida will be next.

To voice your support for these bills, you can reach out to these legislators from South Florida who all serve on the House Criminal Justice Subcommittee and will be voting on these matters:

Taynah Diniz-Alves is a second-year law student at Florida State University College of Law and is a legal intern for the Children in Prison Project at FSU's Public Interest Law Center.

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Florida's troubled teens don't belong in 'the hole' | Opinion

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The use of solitary confinement for children and juveniles has been prohibited in federal prisons, but Florida continues this practice, despite its harmful effects. The "hole," as solitary confinement is often called, consists of tiny cells where young offenders are placed in isolation for 22 to 24 hours a day.

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Steps taken to improve juvenile Justice direct-care screening and training 

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Steps taken to improve juvenile Justice direct-care screening and training 

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http://www.oppaga.state.fl.us/MonitorDocs/Reports/pdf/1042rpt.pdf

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Florida's Juvenile Justice System Cries Out for Reform

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Florida's Juvenile Justice System Cries Out for Reform

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Editorial concerning political involvement and a "fight club."

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Florida's Department of Juvenile Justice defines its mission as "reducing juvenile delinquency through effective prevention, intervention and treatment services that strengthen families and turn around the lives of troubled youth." But a two-year investigation by the Miami Herald, whose shocking findings were published by the newspaper this week in a six-part series, raises serious doubts about whether DJJ is fulfilling its mission - especially the part about turning around young lives.

The series drew quick notice from a key legislator, who vowed to dig further into its findings and pursue reforms. It deserves the same level of attention and commitment to action from the agency and Gov. Rick Scott, not just for the sake of the juvenile detainees and their families but for every Floridian who counts on DJJ to advance public safety. Meeting that goal depends on successfully rehabilitating as many young offenders as possible.

The series, called Fight Club, spotlighted appalling abuses in the juvenile justice system in facilities around the state. Herald reporters found that some staff in those facilities, to impose discipline or simply entertain themselves, organized fights between detained teens. Staff bribed them with food or other rewards to attack each other; sometimes staff even bet on the outcome. The clashes could be brutal; at least one teen died.

The Herald also uncovered hundreds of accusations over the past decade of physical and sexual abuse of teens by staff, who had not been routinely subjected to thorough background checks before being hired. Reporters found hundreds of staff working in juvenile facilities had been fired for wrongdoing in previous jobs in adult prisons or jails. And the newspaper found that DJJ investigated almost 1,500 allegations of staff failing to report abusive treatment of teens, or lying about it. Medical care was substandard, and sometimes withheld from teens accused of faking their ailments.

The Herald series cited low pay for staff as a primary factor behind chronic problems in the state's juvenile justice system. DJJ employees start out making less than $26,000 a year. But private operators, who run all of the agency's residential facilities, often pay even less than the state. The starting salary at the largest private operator, in charge of 28 programs, is less than $20,000.

DJJ responded indignantly to the Herald's series, arguing it "blatantly neglects to recognize DJJ's years of aggressive, innovative reform efforts and nationally recognized success serving Florida's youth and communities." Successes cited by the agency include Florida's juvenile arrest rate falling to a 40-year low, the residential detention rate for teens considered "low-moderate risk" plummeting by 60 percent, and the recidivism rate for teens on probation reaching an all-time low.

These are indeed accomplishments, but they don't excuse the abuses uncovered by the Herald. And state statistics also indicate 45 percent of Florida teens released from juvenile justice residential programs in 2015 were found guilty of a new offense or pleaded guilty to one within a year. The Herald called the state's juvenile justice programs "an on-ramp for the adult prison system."

The newspaper's reporting already has spurred some action. After the Herald asked for personnel records, DJJ adopted a new system for conducting background checks of job candidates, though the agency can't require its private operators to use the same system without rewriting their state contracts. And a couple of weeks ago, with publication of the newspaper's series looming, Scott proposed a 10 percent salary hike for the state's juvenile detention and probation officers.

This week state Sen. Jeff Brandes, a St. Petersburg Republican who chairs his chamber's subcommittee on spending for criminal and civil justice, said more reforms are needed at DJJ. Other subcommittee members questioned whether the Legislature made a mistake in 2011 when it privatized residential detention for juveniles. Straight answers to these and other important questions, along with reforms, are more likely if Scott and DJJ leaders acknowledge the agency's serious problems and commit to solutions.

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Florida's juvenile justice system cries out for reform

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Florida's Department of Juvenile Justice defines its mission as "reducing juvenile delinquency through effective prevention, intervention and treatment services that strengthen families and turn around the lives of troubled youth."

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Miami Correction Officers Charged in teen's death used bribery system, indictment says 

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Miami Correction Officers Charged in teen's death used bribery system, indictment says 

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correctional officers are bribing detainees to hurt other detainees using small snacks so that they don't get the punishment.

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Dangling rewards and special privileges before young inmates, an officer at Miami's juvenile lockup masterminded an attack on another inmate who was beaten so severely that he died, according to a federal indictment unsealed Monday.

As part of a coded bounty system known in prison vernacular as "honey-bunning" - for the sweet rolls sometimes offered as rewards - detention officer Antwan Lenard Johnson ordered the attack on 17-year-old Elord Revolte at the Miami-Dade Juvenile Detention Center in August 2015, the indictment says. The document refers to the victim as "E.R." because he was a minor at the time of his death.

At a news conference, federal prosecutors in Miami announced charges Monday afternoon against Johnson for civil rights violations that resulted in Revolte's death.

"This cannot and will not stand," said Benjamin Greenberg, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Florida. "The United States Constitution protects every person in the country, including those who are detained in juvenile detention facilities. When an officer abuses his or her badge and violates the civil rights of another person, this office and the FBI will hold that officer accountable."

Greenberg acknowledged that the practice of honey-bunning is commonly used at juvenile detention centers in Florida. However, he declined to comment on the specifics of any other investigations.

Johnson "operated a bounty system in order to help ensure obedience and officer respect," the indictment alleges. He also encouraged juvenile detainees, in exchange for rewards and privileges such as extra recreational time or snacks, to assault Revolte, it says.

Last fall, the Miami Herald series "Fight Club" examined a statewide system in Florida in which officers use honey buns, candy bars and other food from employee vending machines to entice their young wards to use violence on another inmate as a form of punishment.

The Department of Juvenile Justice has previously denied that it was aware of such a system, according to The Herald. In a statement Monday, Secretary Christina Daly, the head of the department, said it was moving to fire Johnson.

"It is our expectation that any staff who jeopardize the safety of youth be held fully accountable for their actions, including criminal prosecution," she said. "The behavior detailed in the indictment is appalling and inexcusable."

Daly added that the department would work with the relevant agencies involved, and that it also cooperated with the Miami-Dade Police Department and the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office during their investigations, although those resulted in no criminal charges.

According to federal prosecutors, Johnson used coded language, such as "off my face," and nonverbal gestures, including nods, to signal other juvenile offenders to attack Revolte.

The inmates took part so that they wouldn't be targeted themselves, prosecutors said.

Johnson wanted Revolte punished because the teenager had been acting out and had questioned Johnson's authority, prosecutors said at the news conference.

On Aug. 30, about 15 to 20 detainees punched and kicked Revolte in a part of the center known as Module 9, reported NBC Miami. While he was assessed by medical personnel following the brutality, he wasn't taken to a hospital until another checkup almost a day later, according to a review. He died at the hospital.

The juveniles who took part were briefly locked in their cells. After help arrived, and mere minutes after the assault occurred, prosecutors say, Johnson and another guard acting under his direction unlocked all of the cells so that the juveniles could return to the common area, where they would receive their prize: watching TV.

"While unlocking the cells, Johnson acknowledged and fist-bumped the juvenile who had initiated the attack," said Greenberg.

An inspector general's report following Revolte's death - the second last year involving a juvenile held in state custody - found that a system of employee failures led to the melee and that officers were not forthcoming about how many people were involved.

The report also noted discrepancies between Johnson's testimony about what he witnessed when the fight broke out and the written reports he had filed.

Video surveillance viewed as part of the report, however, said Johnson and another detention officer appeared to respond appropriately and attempted to defuse the situation.

Following the attack, the Department of Juvenile Justice said, five employees either quit or were fired and seven other workers were reprimanded.

Three days before the attack, Revolte was arrested in the South Beach neighborhood of Miami on an armed robbery charge, according to The Herald. He had run away from a Miami Beach foster home.

Prosecutors had been deciding whether to charge him as an adult at the time of his death.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott told NBC News last fall that the allegations of detention officers exploiting juveniles to fight were "unacceptable."

"The goal is constantly to hold people accountable, and also constantly try to figure out how can you improve so there's less of a chance of this happening," he said.

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Guard at juvenile lockup charged with ordering inmates to beat up teen

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Dangling rewards and special privileges before young inmates, an officer at Miami's juvenile lockup masterminded an attack on another inmate who was beaten so severely that he died, according to a federal indictment unsealed Monday.

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Every year thousands of youth are charged with misdemeanor obstruction/resisting arrest without
violence. Misdemeanor obstruction is usually not the most serious charge of an arresting event, but
helps lead the youth further into the justice system based on the youth’s behaviors preceding the
charge. This briefing report examines who is being charged with misdemeanor obstruction/resisting
without violence, and the characteristics of those youth in comparison to youth without the charge.

Link:http://www.djj.state.fl.us/docs/research2/briefing-report-obstruction.pdf?sfvrsn=0

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How Florida keeps kids in the criminal justice system 

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How Florida keeps kids in the criminal justice system 

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Each year, millions of children flock to Orange County, Florida, to visit Disney World. But in the background, there is a darker story at work.

Orange County has the highest number of juvenile arrests in the state. From June 2015 to June 2016, police arrested more young people in Orange County than Miami-Dade County, where the population is almost double. Nearly 64 percent of those incarcerated are African American boys.

In a new five-part series called " Young & Arrested," Renata Sago, a reporter for WMFE, explores how the state's approach to crime may have created a cycle of recidivism that keeps kids from finding a life outside the criminal justice system.

"When a juvenile offender is arrested, it's becoming a bit more complex because they're being arrested for more severe crimes - I'm talking armed robberies, car burglaries," she says. "The issue here is they're being penalized for more severe crimes, and the approaches to them are a bit more severe."

Sago points to Marquis McKenzie, who went to prison at 16 and was recently arrested again at the age of 26. As a teenager, McKenzie was "direct filed," which means that "his case was moved from the juvenile court system to the adult criminal court system," Sago reports.

"In this instance, there was a prosecutor who looked at this case - he was a first-time offender - and they said, 'Hey, he needs to be sent to adult court,'" she says. "In Florida, prosecutors have what's called prosecutorial discretion, so there's a chance that you might get a young man, a young woman who commits the same offense, and they are not sent to adult court where chances are they will get a more severe penalty for what they have done."

According to Sago, McKenzie went through the system but was released early for good behavior. He wound up attending community college for a period and started his own business later on. But McKenzie was recently arrested for illegally parking outside of a club and for resisting arrest.

"You have whole generations that had some [kind] of run-in with the law," Sago says.

LeRoy Pernell, a former public defender and a dean at Florida A&M University, says that slapping severe punishments on children and identifying individuals as a problem early on in life can have long-lasting consequences.

"If you're told you're a problem long enough, and if you start to believe you're a problem long enough, you're going to need some serious psychological help to get past that," he says. "We don't really plan for that anymore - systems don't really know how to deal with that."

At 13 years old, Jaylon Cobb was labeled "high risk" for being involved in a gang and dropping out of school. At 14, he was sent to residential confinement, Sago says, for an armed robbery. He attributes this to his early life in Apopka, Florida.

"My father's a drug dealer, my uncles are drug dealers, my grandma used to sell drugs, my mamma - she talked to nothing but drug dealers," Cobb says. "That's all I really knew for a point in my life. You know, I hang around with thieves, sooner or later I'm going to pick up some tendencies."

According to Sago, Cobb, who is now 20 years old, believes he is escaping the cycle of recidivism because he received support from a woman at a juvenile defense clinic. But when kids are charged with a felony, it follows them for the rest of their lives. They can't vote, it becomes more difficult to get a job and they lose out on some of the most formative years of their lives.

"The kids who are breaking into houses and stealing cars, they're not just bad kids," says Katherine Puzone, an associate professor at Barry University who oversees the school's juvenile defense clinic. "It's a lot more complicated than that, and the more I learn about it, the more I think, you know, we're kind of putting the judgments of middle-class white people on kids who are living in a society that most of us can't even imagine."
This story originally aired on The Takeaway.

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How Florida keeps kids in the criminal justice system

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Each year, millions of children flock to Orange County, Florida, to visit Disney World. But in the background, there is a darker story at work. Orange County has the highest number of juvenile arrests in the state. From June 2015 to June 2016, police arrested more young people in Orange County than Miami-Dade County, where the population is almost double.

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Florida Is by Far the Worst State for Kids Up Against the Law

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Florida Is by Far the Worst State for Kids Up Against the Law

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Many of the kids that go into the JJS never get out of the criminal system in Florida, causing most of those kids to go to adult prison and become convicted felons.

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This story was co-published with The Marshall Project.

Last week, the Florida Supreme Court ruled in Falcon v. State that juveniles not convicted of murder may not be sentenced to life in prison, and that even those convicted of murder may not be sentenced to life without parole, citing a US Supreme Court precedent that children are inherently less culpable and more amenable to rehabilitation.

This week, in the wake of that decision, approximately 200 inmates in Florida's prisons-those who are serving life in prison for crimes they committed as juveniles-may begin applying to have their sentences retroactively reduced.

"It's a major landmark, what we're seeing with Falcon," says Tania Galloni of the Southern Poverty Law Center's branch in Florida. "This is a huge deal for juveniles in the state of Florida."

But for Florida juveniles accused of lesser crimes-in other words, crimes that were never punishable by a sentence of life in prison-the outlook in the Sunshine State remains exceedingly dark. In fact, by most available metrics, Florida remains the worst state in the country to be a child in the justice system.

"It has been and, I think, continues to be the worst state for young people accused of crimes," says Mishi Faruqee, an expert on juvenile justice for the ACLU. " North Carolina and New York are unique for the lowest maximum age of juvenile jurisdiction. But otherwise, Florida is absolutely the unique state."

Below, a rundown of the most critical ways in which Florida is decidedly not the state where children want to find themselves on the wrong side of the law.

Florida transfers more juveniles to adult court than any other state.

Florida is "the clear outlier" in terms of how many children it transfers to adult court, even among states with similar reporting practices, according to the most recent available data from the federal Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. The state transfers juveniles at eight times the rate of California, a state with similar transfer laws and reporting.

Between 2003 and 2008, Florida transferred an average of 164.7 juveniles per 100,000; the next highest rate was Oregon's, which transferred an average of 95.6.

And most of these youngsters diverted to adult courts are charged with nonviolent crimes. Florida transfers children for drug and property offenses at an abnormally high rate. Over the last five years, over 12,000 juveniles in the state have been transferred to face adult charges, 60 percent for nonviolent crimes and only 2.7 percent for murder.

These extraordinary numbers are mainly the result of the nation's most expansive law allowing prosecutors the discretion to "direct file" juvenile cases in adult court. Prosecutors in Florida may "direct file" the cases of all 16 and 17-year-olds, as well as those of any 14- and 15-year-olds charged with a range of offenses against persons or property-and even some misdemeanors.

And the choice to transfer these children to adult court is entirely the prosecutor's. There is no hearing, no burden on the prosecutor to explain his or her reasoning, no opportunity for the defendant's lawyer to make counter-arguments. Neither the judge in juvenile court nor the judge in adult court may dispute the prosecutor's unilateral decision.

What's even scarier for children in this situation is that prosecutors in Florida truly use this power, frequently as a source of leverage to coerce pleas and keep cases from going to trial, according to a 2014 report by Human Rights Watch that analyzed juvenile cases around the state.

Because the threat of adult court-and, with it, adult jailing-is so real, many juveniles plead guilty before they have the chance to assert their right to see the evidence against them.

Finally, once in adult court, the consequences for children are severe. They face much longer sentences (though not life without parole, as a result of Falcon). Their rehabilitation is not an explicit intention of the proceedings, as it would have been in juvenile court; nor does the judge have any obligation to make the proceedings more comprehensible to a child, as a judge in juvenile court would. And they are saddled with a lifelong criminal record, precluding them from taking out student loans before ever applying for college, and disabling them from voting before they ever got to vote.

Florida holds more juveniles in adult facilities than any other state.

But extensive transfer to adult court is not the full extent of Florida's abnormal treatment of juveniles. The state also houses more juveniles in adult facilities than 28 other states combined, according to the most recent reported data from 2009.

The reason? In Florida, by statute, all juveniles charged as adults in adult court are held pretrial in adult facilities.

In these adult facilities, juveniles are often farther from their families; they are not offered age-appropriate educational programming; and they are at greater risk of experiencing-or, also traumatic, witnessing-violence, sexual abuse, or suicide. (To wit, in the past few months, we have learned that prison officials at a Florida prison regularly "gassed" inmates with chemicals as punishment for filing grievances, and that a record 346 deaths occurred in the state's prisons in 2014.)

For children charged as adults in Florida, serving time in dangerous Florida prisons is adult punishment indeed.

Florida is one of only a few states that has privatized all of its juvenile correctional facilities.

Florida also takes an unusual approach to how it imprisons juveniles who aren't transferred to adult facilities. Namely, all of the state's juvenile correctional facilities are privately operated. Not a single one is publicly-run, subject to full oversight by public officials.

Twenty-eight of these juvenile facilities are operated by G4S, a multinational security and risk-management corporation. Nine of the facilities are operated by Youth Services International (YSI), a company with such a history of sexual abuse scandals that only Florida has signed contracts for youth facilities with them in recent years.

Rays of hope?

But all is not hopeless for juveniles in Florida's justice system, according to many advocates. Under the leadership of two consecutive secretaries-first Wansley Waters and now Christina Daly-the state's Department of Juvenile Justice has shifted toward a more rehabilitative approach, according to Deb Brodsky of the Project on Accountable Justice, a Florida-based organization that collects data on criminal justice.

"Over the last five years," she says, "DJJ has tried to divert a lot of these kids out of the system, by reducing the number of beds instead of charging so many of them."

Five different bills that would eliminate or greatly limit prosecutors' discretion to "direct file" have made significant headway in the Florida legislature. One bill moved out of a House committee in early March-by a 12 to 1 vote. Another bill, the subject of a hearing this week in the Senate, would put the decision to transfer juveniles to adult court in the hands of a judge, not prosecutors, and would prohibit the holding of juveniles in adult facilities.

These bills enjoy the support of an increasingly broad coalition, according to Galloni, one that has emerged as the citizens of Florida learn more and more about their state's unique treatment of juveniles.

"At one of the hearings," she says, "everyone from the James Madison Institute [a conservative think tank] to Human Rights Watch to the PTA was in attendance. And that's because the story has gotten out about Florida's frankly embarrassing status as the worst of the worst in some of these categories related to juveniles."

As Brodsky puts it, "Sunlight is a powerful disinfectant."

This article was reported by Eli Hager for The Marshall Project, a nonprofit news organization focused on the US criminal justice system. You can sign-up for their newsletter, or follow The Marshall Project on Facebook or Twitter.

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​Florida Is by Far the Worst State for Kids Up Against the Law

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This story was co-published with The Marshall Project. Last week, the Florida Supreme Court ruled in Falcon v. State that juveniles not convicted of murder may not be sentenced to life in prison, and that even those convicted of murder may not be sentenced to life without parole, citing a US Supreme Court precedent that children are inherently less culpable and more amenable to rehabilitation.

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Dark Secrets of Floridas juvenile justice

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Dark Secrets of Floridas juvenile justice

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Detainees are being physically harassed, and correctional officers are getting little to no punishment for it, by bribing detainees to harm others detainees.

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Briefing Report: Recidivism Time to Failure by Placement and Risk Level 

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Briefing Report: Recidivism Time to Failure by Placement and Risk Level 

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The purpose of this brief is to examine the length of time between successful completion of a Florida
Department of Juvenile Justice placement and subsequent recidivism for those youth that do re-
offend within one year. The analysis will examine this “time to failure” across various placement
types, as well as across risk to re-offend levels and demographics.

Link: http://www.djj.state.fl.us/docs/research2/briefing-report-recidivism-time-to-failure.pdf?sfvrsn=2

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Officers officiated juvenile fights "fight club" leading to teen's death

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Officers officiated juvenile fights "fight club" leading to teen's death

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http://www.flnaacp.com/naacp/florida-naacp-calls-on-the-department-of-justice-to-investigate-the-florida-department-of-juvenile-justice-for-abuse-misconduct-and-poor-management-of-youth-detention-facilities/

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After reports of violence, low pay, wretched conditions, Scott signs juvenile justice reforms

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After reports of violence, low pay, wretched conditions, Scott signs juvenile justice reforms

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https://www.miamiherald.com/news/special-reports/florida-prisons/article206947724.html

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Article about officer officiated fights.
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/special-reports/florida-prisons/article177510156.html

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Dark secrets of Florida juvenile justice: ‘honey-bun hits,’ illicit sex, cover-ups

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Dark secrets of Florida juvenile justice: ‘honey-bun hits,’ illicit sex, cover-ups

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Article about multiple cases where unqualified officers abuse of the kids and create violence and this corruption is overlooked.
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/special-reports/florida-prisons/article177883676.html

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Florida Sued for Keeping Kids in Solitary Confinement

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Florida Sued for Keeping Kids in Solitary Confinement

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More than 4,300 children have been held in solitary confinement over the past year in conditions that a United Nations special report on torture calls "cruel, inhuman, or degrading." https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/florida-department-of-juvenile-justice-sued-for-isolating-kids-in-solitary-confinement-11260512

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Dark secrets of Florida's juvenile justice system

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Dark secrets of Florida's juvenile justice system

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Article about Elord Rovelt's death.

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/special-reports/florida-prisons/article177883676.html

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Florida must reform its brutal juvenile prisons

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Florida must reform its brutal juvenile prisons

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Article about "test of heart" specially in Lancaster Correctional Institution.

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First of two parts

The men and boys in Florida's youthful offender prisons call it a "test of heart."

But the name belies the brutality involved.

It's a vicious initiation that welcomes young newcomers into the violent den of this state's youthful offender prisons.

In the tests' wake, young men have been left horribly injured, permanently disfigured.

A newcomer who endures the beatings - and sometimes rape - doesn't have to pay at the commissary for his protection from future mistreatment and rape.

Those who prove unable to endure are targeted for future abuses.

It's so common that guards and inmates both know it by the same name - "test of heart."

These brutal initiations should be a shrill warning for legislators and others that things haven't just gone awry but have gone off the rails.

There are four youthful offender prisons in the state, some of them wings of prisons where older inmates are also housed.

In these, some 2,000 young people are placed.

Make no mistake; these facilities are not juvenile detention centers, which care for the state's delinquent and at-risk youth. They are instead prisons overseen by the Florida Department of Corrections.

For months, Miami Rep. David Richardson has visited Florida's youthful offender prisons and collected information from nearly 90 current and past youthful offenders.

He says violence is rampant and gangs abound.

SAVAGERY UNLEASHED

The most recent volley in the fight to subdue the violence in the state's youthful offender prisons was fired by the Southern Poverty Law Center at the end of January when it filed suit against a prison guard at Sumter Correctional Institute who had allegedly witnessed - but did nothing to stop - a "test of heart."

The suit was filed in behalf of R.W. against Corrections Officer Bruce Kiser.

The victim's name is being withheld as a rape victim.

R.W.'s test came a few weeks after he was admitted to Sumter. The then-17-year-old had been brought there after he violated his probation.

He was soon told that he must pay for his safety by using his own money to buy items from the prison commissary to distribute to other inmates.

If not, he'd be forced to fight in a "test of heart."

But R.W. had no money to pay the price for his safety, the lawsuit says.

His punishment came in a savage half-hour encounter with several other young inmates. A jagged piece of metal fencing was used to stab him multiple times.

One young man finally grabbed a broom and raped him with it as the young man was passed out on the floor.

This all happened while Kiser watched but did not intervene, says Miriam Haskell, an attorney with the SPLC.

A DEVASTATING PATTERN

R.W. suffered his "test of heart" in 2013. Juvenile advocates say cases like his are common although Richardson says the violence has declined in the last year.

At Lancaster Correctional Institution - which Richardson says is the worst for inmate-on-inmate violence - it often occurs in the many hidden corners of the prison, the laundry area or under a tree in the recreation yard.

In fact, Lancaster was the setting that same year for a "test of heart" for a 19-year-old.

He was attacked by a gang of young men, according to a Miami Herald investigation. He was beaten and assaulted with a broom handle, just like R.W. But unlike R.W., the 19-year-old's rectum was ruptured.

He underwent an emergency colostomy and has since racked up thousands of dollars in medical treatment.

Just a year after R.W. was attacked, a second young man was also apparently attacked in Lancaster. Another inmate's mother, Karen Garcia from Brevard County, said her son saw Yalex R. Tirado beaten by a group of inmates wielding a broom handle as a battering weapon.

Several of Tirado's ribs were broken, and he was placed in solitary confinement. Tirado died just two days later - only six days after he turned 20.

That case is still being investigated by the state.

And inmates aren't the only predators in the system, the Miami Herald found.

Youthful offender prison guards have been arrested on charges of battering inmates. Others have forced the young men under their care to engage in rigorous exercise in the heat without providing them adequate water.

Richardson says that while Lancaster is the worst for inmate-on-inmate violence, it's Sumter where officer-on-inmate violence is the worst.

R.W. today is still incarcerated but has been moved to a different youthful offender prison.

He won't be released until 2017.

His attorney believes he's still at risk for violence as long as he remains in a violence-prone system.

Floridians should press for changes in an abusive system.

Sunday: Some juvenile facilities need to be closed now as part of a major reform of Florida's juvenile system.

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Florida must reform its brutal juvenile prisons

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First of two partsThe men and boys in Florida's youthful offender prisons call it a "test of heart."But the name belies the brutality involved. It's a vicious initiation that welcomes young newcomers into the violent den of this state's youthful offender prisons. In the tests' wake, young men have been left horribly injured, permanently disfigured.

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Reentry of Young Offenders from the Juvenile Justice System: A developmental Perspective

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Reentry of Young Offenders from the Juvenile Justice System: A developmental Perspective

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Abstract

This article presents a developmental perspective on the reentry of young offenders into the community. We begin with a discussion of the psychosocial tasks of late adolescence. Next, we discuss contextual influences on the successful negotiation of these psychosocial tasks. Third, we examine whether and to what extent the contexts to which young offenders are exposed in the justice system are likely to facilitate normative psychosocial development. Finally, we argue that the psychosocial development of youthful offenders is disrupted, or "arrested," by their experiences within the justice system. Interventions designed to facilitate the successful reentry of young offenders into the community must be informed by what we know about healthy psychosocial development in late adolescence.

Keywords: youth reentry, community reintegration, youth incarceration

Historically, professionals have advertised two dismal findings about young offenders reentering the community from the justice system-that nothing works (i.e., youthful offenders cannot be rehabilitated) (e.g., Martinson, 1974) and that there are no success stories (i.e., delinquents are destined for failure) (e.g., Farrington, Gallagher, Morley, St. Ledger, & West, 1988). Delinquents are forecasted to show poor adult outcomes (e.g., unemployment, welfare dependence, mental health problems), drain millions of dollars from social services agencies, and pass their legacy of problems to the next generation of teenagers. Indeed, it is well established that young offenders show poor adjustment as young adults, precisely during the years when most people gain the level of education and training that serve as the foundation for their future achievements ( William T. Grant Foundation Commission on Work, Family and Citizenship, 1988).

This article tries to shed light on three important questions about the reentry of young offenders (those between the ages of 16 and 24) to the community from the juvenile or adult justice system: (a) why these youth face great challenges during this process; (b) why certain individuals achieve positive turning points in early adulthood and others do not; and (c) how programming in the justice system might increase the number of adult success stories. Framing this discussion is the very important and difficult mission of the justice system-that of deterring crime while balancing the interests of public safety and the needs of individual adolescents.

Adolescent Offenders: Superpredators or Troubled Teens?

The United States juvenile justice system processes more than 2.5 million juvenile arrests over the course of a year and makes decisions about nearly 5,000 delinquency cases every day. According to these statistics, the system affects the lives of between 8% and 10% of all American youths between the ages of 10 and 17, a figure that has almost quadrupled within the past few decades ( Puzzanchera, Stahl, et al., 2002). In addition to the large number of young people in the juvenile justice system are a substantial number of late adolescents and young adults in the criminal justice system. More than one fifth of individuals in state or federal prisons and jails are between the ages of 18 and 24 ( Beck, Karberg, & Harrison, 2002), and many of these individuals will have spent some portion of their adolescent years in incarceration.

Usually, the public perception of youthful offending focuses on the criminal and sometimes callous side of young offenders-that they account for one in every five arrests in the United States, including 16% of violence-related and 32% of property-related crimes ( Snyder, 2002), and cause substantial economic, physical, and emotional hardships for their victims, the families of their victims (as well as their own families), and the larger community. The most damaging depictions of young offenders as superpredators or psychopaths-in-training emerged in the mid-1990s ( McCollum, 1996) following a period when youth violence in this country was at its highest in contemporary times. Such images caused citizens to fear for their safety and policy makers to get "tough on crime," the idea being that punitive, no-nonsense responses (e.g., incarceration) would keep dangerous youths off of the streets, prevent them from reoffending, and ultimately, preserve public safety.

There is a less frightening, but equally worrisome, depiction of young offenders that is usually not advertised to the public, however. It is the portrait of youth whose development is marked by the accumulation of disadvantage ( Sampson & Laub, 1997) and whose considerable problems suggest that they are more in need of treatment than punishment. The image highlights the troubled aspects of these young offenders' lives-that they often struggle with multiple problems at home, school, and in their communities prior to their first contact with the court and that they often lack the individual, family, or neighborhood resources to improve their situations. It is well established that most young offenders evince some combination of the following problems: poor school performance (e.g., truancy, low grades), mental health problems (e.g., substance abuse, depression), unstable and unsupportive family relationships, poverty- and crime-ridden communities, delinquent peer influences, and the absence of positive role models ( Hawkins et al., 1998). We also know that ethnic minority youth, particularly Black males, are overrepresented at every stage of the justice system process and disproportionately afflicted with problems associated with court involvement, especially at the deep end. For example, Black and Hispanic youth make up about 15% and 16% of the general juvenile population, respectively, yet account for about 45% and 20%, respectively, of the near 109,000 adolescents who, on any given day, are in residential placement within the juvenile justice system. In contrast, White teenagers account for about 80% of the general youth population but only 40% of adolescents in residential facilities ( Puzzanchera, Kang, et al., 2002; Sickmund, 2000, 2002; Snyder, 1999).

Adult Outcomes for Adolescents in the Justice System

Despite its putatively rehabilitative aims, it is all too often the case that young offenders finish their time with the justice system and move into the adult world with just as many, if not more, problems than when they first entered. It is well established that, as a group, delinquent youth show poor adjustment as adults and have trouble achieving traditional markers of adult success. In particular, they are notorious for experiencing educational failure and having problems securing later employment. According to one study, only 12% of formerly incarcerated adolescents (74% less than the national average) received their high school diploma or General Equivalency Degree (GED) as young adults ( Habermann & Quinn, 1986; National Center for Education Statistics, 2001). This finding has significant implications because educational attainment is so strongly linked to both employment and earnings. It is not surprising that incarcerated adolescents have a hard time finding employment as adults, and their contact with the justice system has lasting adverse effects on their legal earnings ( Fagan & Freeman, 1999; Freeman, 1992; Ward & Tittle, 1993; Wolfgang, Thornberry, & Figlio, 1987).

Notably, young offenders show worrisome adult outcomes even when compared to other vulnerable groups. The most discouraging comparisons are in the domains of educational attainment and employment. In a recent study of teenagers "on the outs"-a term that young offenders use to describe their transition from residential facilities back to the community-only about 30% of young adults were engaged in either school or work 12 months after their release ( Bullis et al., 2002). The authors contrasted this statistic with engagement levels of 65% for adolescents exiting programs for emotional disturbances and 75% for those leaving special education programs. That nearly 70% of court-involved youth were idle, that is, not attending school or working ( Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2002), 12 months after they left residential facilities is especially disconcerting given that only 8.8% of teenagers and young adults in this country share this vulnerable predicament, 14.3%, 14.2%, and 7.7%, respectively, of Black, Hispanic, and White individuals ( Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics, 1998).

Being an Adult Versus Becoming an Adult: The Importance of Psychological Development for Making a Successful Transition to Adulthood

In American society, adulthood is typically defined by status markers, like the accomplishments people achieve (e.g., high school diploma, job), the problems they have (e.g., arrests, mental health disorders), and the roles they fill (e.g., parent, spouse). There is reason to believe, however, that adolescents need to reach some level of psychosocial preparedness to successfully take on these adult roles and responsibilities. Indeed, in their seminal studies of delinquent youth, Gleuck and Gleuck (1974) found that it was not the achievement of any particular age or event but rather the achievement of "adequate maturation" that helped individuals change their deviant ways and adopt adult-like responsibilities. Accordingly, if we want to improve adult outcomes for delinquent youth, we need to understand not only what characterizes successful ex-offenders with respect to their roles and activities (e.g., employed, drug-free), or in terms of the social bonds that help them to desist from delinquent activity (e.g., having a supportive relationship with a spouse), but also the factors that underlie these "status" outcomes ( National Research Council, 1993). In other words, we need to understand the processes that help young offenders become healthy and productive adults.

What is sorely missing from our understanding of delinquent youths' transition to adulthood is a focus on psychological development during adolescence, specifically, a focus on how youths develop a level of maturity that helps them to create and take advantage of healthy turning points in their lives. In this article, we argue that this maturation process reflects the development of psychosocial capacities that help adolescents make a successful transition to adulthood. We consider these capacities to be a specific and understudied component of human capital, "psychosocial capital," if you will, because they provide resources for adolescents and young adults to create and take advantage of positive life experiences. Three principles serve to guide our discussion: (a) that important psychosocial capacities develop during late adolescence that permit the successful transition into adult roles and responsibilities (see Steinberg, 2002); (b) that the development of psychosocial capacities is greatly influenced by the context in which it takes place (e.g., family, peer group) (see Bronfenbrenner & Morris, 1998); and (c) that by facilitating the psychosocial development of young offenders, justice system practitioners and policy makers can improve the odds that delinquent youth will go on to become healthy and productive adults.

Psychosocial Capacities That Promote the Development of Successful Adults

During late adolescence, young people are expected to take on more mature roles and responsibilities and figure out how to become healthy and responsible members of society. Adult outcomes depend heavily on what happens during these years because the experiences of adolescence lay the foundation for what individuals will be able to accomplish in the next stage of their lives. Making a successful transition from the dependency of adolescence to the self-sufficiency of adulthood is a process that requires the coordination of many skills. These capacities are epitomized in a concept called psychosocial maturity ( Greenberger, 1984) and require development across three important domains: mastery and competence, interpersonal relationships and social functioning, and self-definition and self-governance (see Steinberg, 2002). To achieve sufficient psychosocial maturity and, along with it, the abilities to function as independent and productive adults, youths in contemporary industrialized society need to complete a series of developmental tasks in each of these three areas. The time during which these tasks need to be successfully completed is bound by the ages of 16 and 24, a transitional period that spans the years of late adolescence and early adulthood.

It is important to describe these developmental tasks in some detail in order to ask whether and in what ways experiences within the justice system can hinder successful psychosocial development. With regard to mastery and competence, by the end of the transitional period, mature individuals are expected to have developed the knowledge and skills necessary to understand, participate in, and enjoy society's activities of production, leisure, and culture. They are expected to have achieved levels of education and vocational training so that they can learn to function as productive members of society. With regard to interpersonal relationships and social functioning, by the end of the transition, mature individuals are expected to have the social skills necessary to interact appropriately with others and be able to establish and maintain intimate relationships that are satisfying to themselves and their partners. They are expected to function cooperatively and collaboratively in groups and feel, as well as exercise responsibility, toward the larger community in which they live. And with regard to self-definition and self-governance, by the time they enter their mid-20s, mature individuals are expected to have developed a positive sense of their own worth as individuals and the capacity to behave responsibly and morally in the absence of externally imposed supervision. They are expected to be independent and know how to set and achieve personal goals that are meaningful to them (see, e.g., Greenberger & Sorensen, 1974). Although it is not expected that these tasks are completed by the end of adolescence ( Valde, 1996; Whitbourne & Tesch, 1985), it is expected that adolescents make significant headway in each of the three domains before they move into their early adult years ( Erikson, 1959/1980) (see Appendix).

In general, researchers have found that people who show high versus low levels of psychosocial maturity (e.g., individuals who relate well to others, are able to secure or keep a job, successfully manage their day-to-day lives without an adult to oversee their actions, etc.) make more socially responsible decisions and show healthier outcomes as young adults ( Greenberger, 1982; Steinberg & Cauffman, 1996). It is reasonable to assume that psychosocially mature individuals are successful during this transition precisely because they are prepared to handle the roles and responsibilities that accompany adulthood-roles and responsibilities that, in contemporary society, require interpersonal skills, instrumental competence, and responsible autonomy. Mature individuals have presumably developed the ability to manage their environment in a way that they can create opportunities that are consistent with their personal goals (e.g., because they possess the level of competence needed to get the job that they want) and also take advantage of the opportunities (e.g., because they possess the level of responsibility needed to maintain the job).

The Role of Context in Facilitating Psychosocial Development

It is well established that the successful completion of the developmental tasks of late adolescence, and the achievement of psychosocial maturity, results from reciprocal interactions between individuals and their social environments ( Bronfenbrenner, 1979; Bronfenbrenner & Morris, 1998). The different settings and activities in which adolescents participate (e.g., family, peer group, school, workplace, and for many delinquent youth, correctional facilities) can be seen as learning environments that provide "opportunity structures" for development ( Larson & Verma, 1999). To the extent that they offer adequate support, opportunities, and resources for personal growth (i.e., developmentally appropriate experiences), social settings play a critical role in facilitating youths' psychosocial development (see Appendix).

No single context has received as much concerted research attention as the family (see Collins & Laursen, 2004, for a review). A large body of research suggests that caring, committed, and supportive parents or guardians-those who are both responsive and demanding (a combination known as "authoritative" parenting)-provide a mix of structure and freedom that facilitates adolescents' healthy psychosocial development and their transition to adulthood ( Baumrind, 1991; Grotevant, 1998; Steinberg, Elmen, & Mounts, 1989).

As adolescents explore their social settings and spend more time away from their parents, peer influences play an increasingly important role in youths' psychosocial development ( Brown, 2004). Relationships with prosocial peers, in particular, are important in three different but interrelated respects. First, the normative pressures in prosocial peer groups lead adolescents toward adult-approved activities and deter them from antisocial behavior. Second, social support in prosocial peer groups accentuates the beneficial effect of social support at home and compensates for family relationships that are not sufficiently supportive. Finally, the quality of intimate friendships with prosocial peers contributes to adolescents' mental health and adjustment in its own right.

Outside of the family and peer settings, characteristics of broader contexts like the school, workplace, and neighborhood have significant effects on youths' psychosocial development and, ultimately, their successful transition into adult roles and responsibilities ( Graber, Brooks-Gunn, & Petersen, 1996). More specifically, each of these contexts provides a wealth of activities and social interactions that can promote adolescents' development in the areas of competence, self-governance, and interpersonal functioning (see Larson, 2000; National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, 2002). In addition to fostering academic skills, the school setting gives youths opportunities to forge relationships with positive role models (e.g., teachers), improve their interpersonal skills with peers, and participate in different leadership and extracurricular activities (e.g., athletic teams, student council) (see Eccles & Templeton, 2002). The work setting, while providing vocational skills, can also provide youths opportunities to establish a path to financial independence, learn about expectations that society has for adults, and practice exercising responsible behavior (e.g., showing up for work on time) ( Greenberger & Steinberg, 1986; Mortimer, Finch, Ryu, Shanahan, et al., 1996). The neighborhood setting, while offering job opportunities, can also provide adolescents resources like youth groups and other community programs in which adolescents can develop social competence, prosocial peer networks, and civic commitment (see Leventhal & Brooks-Gunn, 2004, for a review). Indeed, research has shown that participation in structured and goal-oriented extracurricular activities, work experiences, and neighborhood programs is related to positive adolescent outcomes like low levels of problem behaviors, high degrees of academic success, and high levels of psychosocial maturity (see National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, 2002). Researchers have found that these healthy outcomes are related not only to the skills that adolescents develop through the activities but also to the social capital that these youths accrue by establishing relationships with prosocial peers and adults ( McLaughlin, 2000).

Ideally, the additive and interactive influences of the family, peer group, school, workplace, and neighborhood contexts facilitate healthy psychosocial development and prepare adolescents to make a successful transition to adulthood. It is a process that, under the best of circumstances, is promoted by the support and protection of adults, a sense of purposefulness about the future, and the freedom to explore possible life directions in the realms of family, education, work, love, and friendship ( Arnett, 2000; Steinberg, 2002). With the gradual development of independence, responsibility, and interpersonal and instrumental competence, adolescents can take advantage of positive opportunities that are presented to them and, it is hoped, create new ones that will help them to become healthy and productive adults.

Does the Justice System Facilitate a Healthy Transition to Adulthood?

The notion that the justice system should create an environment that facilitates young offenders' psychosocial development is easier said than done. Although the juvenile justice system was originally established with the ideal of promoting the development of troubled youth, its current mission has to uphold two potentially contradictory functions: rehabilitation, an aim that inherently strives to facilitate psychosocial development and adolescents' successful transition to adulthood, and punishment, an aim that does not and that, in extreme form, may actually impede these processes. It is this conflict between social control (exacting punishment in the best interest of public safety) and social welfare (providing treatment in the best interest of individual youths' needs) that frames service delivery in the justice system and that can, ultimately, constrain efforts to facilitate young offenders' successful transition to adulthood. This challenge is even greater with regard to young offenders in the contemporary criminal justice system, where the goal of rehabilitation clearly is secondary to the goal of punishment.

From a rehabilitative perspective, the court's main responsibility is to provide treatment to prevent the further development of antisocial or other problems. The approach presumes that adolescents commit crimes because of circumstances that have failed them (e.g., lack of parental support) and that youths alone should not be held accountable for the acts. According to this model, society is, in part, responsible for not having provided adolescent offenders with adequate support and protection, and it is the function of the court to act as a benevolent caretaker or parens patriae (ultimate parent).

In recent years, despite the well-documented needs of delinquent youth, the contemporary juvenile court has made increasing commitments to the ideals of punishment and retribution ( Feld, 1998). No doubt, the mission of the court has shifted toward assigning punitive sanctions and ensuring public safety in response to the surge of youth violence that occurred between the late 1980s and mid-1990s. Yet, although serious juvenile crime has declined consistently and considerably since then ( Snyder & Sickmund, 1999), policy makers have maintained a "get tough" approach to youthful offending. Indeed, between 1992 and 1995, the legislatures in 47 states and the District of Columbia toughened their juvenile justice laws so that increasing numbers of adolescents could be prosecuted as adults ( Torbet, Gable, & Hurst, 1996).

From the punishment perspective, it is assumed that youths make deliberate choices to commit crimes and that they should be held accountable for their actions, regardless of their cognitive abilities, psychosocial immaturity, or age. The severity of punishment is linked to the seriousness of the crime, the idea being that the experience of severe sanctions will deter youths from breaking the law in the future. This shift toward punishment has continued despite mounting general evidence that punitive sanctions are less effective at reducing crime than are rehabilitative responses ( Lipsey & Wilson, 1998; Loesel, 1995) and despite specific evidence that adolescents who are prosecuted as adults are 30% more likely than those who are processed in the juvenile justice system to be rearrested, both sooner and for more serious offenses ( Bishop, Frazier, Lanza-Kaduce, & Winner, 1996; Fagan, 1995). Thus, contrary to popular belief and current policy trends, a punitive orientation to crime neither reduces recidivism nor preserves public safety ( Fagan, 1990).

In light of the evidence in support of approaches that emphasize treatment over punishment, it seems likely that rehabilitative responses to youthful offending are in a better position to facilitate adolescents' transition to adulthood. Given what we know about the typical adult outcomes of court-involved youth, it is reasonable to assume that many of these adolescents exit the justice system and move into adulthood psychosocially ill-equipped to manage adult roles and responsibilities. To improve young offenders' chances of becoming healthy and productive adults, therefore, we argue that practitioners and policy makers need to shift at least some of the juvenile court's emphasis back toward rehabilitation and strike a new balance between punishment and treatment. Although the juvenile court must uphold its responsibility to adequately punish youths for their crimes, it must simultaneously honor its responsibility to not impede young offenders' development such that it compromises their chances of making a successful transition to adulthood. By placing more emphasis on facilitating the psychosocial development of delinquent youth, interventions in the justice system can increase the chances that these adolescents will have healthy turning point opportunities after they exit the justice system and, perhaps more important, that they will be psychosocially equipped to translate these experiences into positive adult outcomes.

Finding the Balance Between Punishment and Rehabilitation: A Consideration of Three Challenges That Face the Justice System

A rehabilitative stance toward young offenders draws attention to three challenges that need to be addressed if practitioners and policy makers want to improve adult outcomes for court-involved youth: (a) that the system may not provide young offenders developmentally appropriate experiences that facilitate their transition to adulthood; (b) that many young offenders have serious mental health and educational deficiencies that challenge their achievement of psychosocial maturity; and (c) that the system may expose young offenders to harmful experiences (e.g., violence, trauma) that serve to send adolescents out of the system with more problems than when they entered. With an understanding of each of these challenges, practitioners and policy makers can better decide how to facilitate youths' psychosocial development, while balancing the punishment and treatment goals of the justice system.

Facilitating the Development of Psychosocial Maturity in a Punitive Setting

To serve the dual interests of the juvenile court-to both punish misdeeds and rehabilitate antisocial youth-the current justice system faces a thorny challenge. At a time when adolescents require experiences that promote the development of responsible autonomy and competent interpersonal relationships, however, current methods of punishment, such as incarceration in a secure facility, all but preclude the facilitation of psychosocial development. The most restrictive settings (i.e., detention, secure treatment, and incarceration) face the greatest challenge in this respect. Detention and secure treatment facilities mandate behavioral and educational goals within a secured, controlled context. As a result, healthy exploration that permits adolescents to develop a sense of mastery, forge relationships with prosocial friends, and experiment with romantic partners is almost always precluded for adolescents living in a secure facility.

We acknowledge that some rehabilitative attempts are made within highly restrictive, secure settings, mainly by providing adolescents with training in education and job skills at correctional facilities. At the same time, though, the system's effort to train adolescents for school and work may not, in itself, facilitate adequate psychosocial development. Without consistent support from significant adults and enough freedom to exercise autonomy, the gradual process of maturation-to learn self-direction, social perspective, and responsibility-may be effectively cut off.

Perhaps the greatest constraint set by detention and incarceration for adolescents is the necessity to move out of their home, away from the security of family. Sending an adolescent away from home for several months entails a serious disruption of informal care that can curtail psychosocial development. As adolescents are striving for a sense of who they are among others, gaining perspective on their actions and its consequences requires the support, guidance, and modeling of significant adults. And despite the stereotype of offenders' parents as a uniformly bad influence on their behavior and development, recent research indicates that the family environments of serious youthful offenders are far more heterogeneous than widely believed ( Steinberg & Chung, 2003). An overly punitive orientation within the justice system likely hinders processes of normative psychosocial development by disrupting offenders' relationships with parents, teachers, and other sources of adult support and guidance.

In addition, while away from home, detained youth have virtually no opportunity to build prosocial peer or romantic relationships because social interactions are under close scrutiny, and the only peers in residence are other delinquent youth. With limited opportunity for positive peer socialization or romance, incarcerated adolescents are effectively precluded from one of the most important sources of social development during the adolescent period ( Patterson, Capaldi, & Bank, 1991). Further, the loss of consistent support from intimate friends and romantic partners while away from home can have important consequences for young offenders. Ethnographic work suggests that the consistent acceptance and support of female friends and romantic partners provides male young adult offenders reason and strength to follow through on conventional goals ( Hughes, 1998).

Providing detainees adequate peer support is a tremendous challenge in correctional facilities because fellow residents share a delinquent past, and coeducational housing is not practicable or safe. In the best case scenario, facilities housing young offenders may structure their programs to provide on-site activities, such as athletic leagues, to promote cooperative effort, sportsmanship, and team commitment among residents. In this way, although adolescents may not necessarily enjoy close, satisfying relationships with prosocial friends while they are detained, they may learn the value of commitment, support, and sportsmanship and maintain those values within the relationships they choose when they return home.

The most potentially damaging aspect of adolescents' passage through the justice system is its effects on individuals' sense of competence and orientation toward the future. Early criminal labeling and serious sanctions can alter adolescents' goals because convictions for felony offenses preclude adolescents' eligibility for a variety of careers ( Moffitt, 1993). The psychological effect of this early labeling may be seen in delinquent youths' views of the future. Oyserman and Markus (1990) found indirect support for this link in their comparison of delinquents' and nondelinquents' "possible selves." Whereas nondelinquent youths' self-conceptions showed a balance between fears and expectations, delinquent youths' fears about themselves exceeded their hopes and expectations. The long-term developmental effect of labeling can be tremendous, as youth may respond to society's recrimination by withdrawing further from conventional activities and seeking support, approval, and esteem from deviant peers and criminal networks.

Providing Mental Health Treatment for Vulnerable Youth in an Inherently Unhealthy Setting

The majority of young offenders in the justice system enter the system with liabilities that interfere with normative psychosocial development under the best of circumstances. Accordingly, a second important challenge facing the justice system is to provide delinquent youth adequate treatment for mental health and learning problems. Recent studies reflect tremendous unmet mental health need within delinquent populations. A recent epidemiological study of juvenile detainees reported that nearly two thirds of male, and three quarters of female, detainees have one or more clinical psychiatric disorders ( Teplin, 2002). Although estimates vary, most recent analyses indicate that rates of mental disturbance among juvenile offenders are three times as high as in the general population of adolescents ( Grisso, in press). Many advocates today suggest, in fact, that the juvenile justice system has become a de facto service system for disadvantaged, minority youth ( Knitzer, 1996). Learning disorders and physical disabilities as well as mental health problems are also common among juvenile delinquents ( National Council on Disability, 2003), and because of psychosocial dysfunction and truancy, most young offenders perform well below their age range academically regardless of their abilities ( Foley, 2001). Delinquent youths' psychological vulnerability is usually coupled with a high level of familial risk and low levels of adequate support for guiding adolescents through important developmental transitions. Multiple early familial precursors of antisocial behavior, including parental criminality ( Farrington, 1989), familial poverty, poor parent-child relationships, and lax parental monitoring, are common in the histories of serious adolescent offenders ( Hawkins et al., 1998; Lipsey & Derzon, 1998).

Addressing the mental health treatment needs of juvenile detainees would be a daunting task even for the most specialized service providers. As it is currently designed, however, the justice system is neither equipped nor philosophically driven to effectively address the mental health needs of delinquent youth ( Cocozza & Skowyra, 2000; Soler, 2002; Tolan & Gorman-Smith, 1997). The punitive stance of the juvenile court since Gault has brought into question court-involved youths' entitlement to mental health treatment. Even when entitlement to treatment is clear, the justice system lacks the resources, coordination, and training to provide effective treatment. Court personnel, including probation officers, judges, and defense counsel, often do not understand the results of mental health evaluations or the most appropriate targeting of mental health services for youth because they have limited training in child development or clinical psychology. Crucial ingredients of effective mental health services, such as individualized treatment, targeted assessments, targeted psychiatric treatment, family-based services, and adequate follow-up, are often missing within residential treatment facilities and almost entirely absent within detention and incarceration ( Soler, 2002).

Because mental health treatment is currently secondary to retribution in the justice system, the system does not systematically consider the long-term consequences of young offenders' unmet mental health needs. Current longitudinal studies suggest that the social burden of delinquent adolescents' unmet mental health needs is tremendous. When left untreated, childhood psychological problems may worsen and result in serious and costly psychiatric morbidity by adulthood ( Moffitt, Caspi, Harrington, & Milne, 2002). Antisocial adolescents who are the most psychologically vulnerable are also more likely to have problems adjusting to positive adult roles.

The Mission to Protect in a Harmful Setting

The punitive trend in juvenile sentencing has compounded the burden of protecting youth in justice facilities ( Feld, 1998). In recent years, evaluations of juvenile correctional facilities have documented numerous hazards and abuses endemic to incarceration. A national evaluation sponsored by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) found widespread overcrowding at juvenile facilities, with 62% of all delinquent males residing in overcrowded facilities ( Snyder & Sickmund, 1995). Overcrowding creates tremendous tensions between and among staff and residents, strains available service resources within facilities, and inevitably encourages authoritarian styles of control, including the increased use of restraints and isolation for managing misbehavior ( Parent et al., 1994). Evaluations of several states' juvenile facilities have reported physical punishment and humiliation by staff, and staff's failure to prevent inmate aggression or homosexual rape by inmates ( Bartollas, Miller, & Dinitz, 1976; Lerner, 1986). The toll of increasing violence and authoritarian control at juvenile facilities is reflected in data from a recent report indicating that each month, 2000 juvenile residents are injured and 970 youth attempt suicide ( Snyder, Sickmund, & Poe-Yamagata, 1996). In response to these violent trends, advocates have recommended national mandates to reduce overcrowding, provide more individualized treatment, and increase system accountability for abuses at juvenile facilities ( Fagan, 1990). Yet, even if minimal protections are mandated, the institutional housing of delinquent youth for punitive purposes presents inherent potential for youth to experience and observe violence and aggression, which can cause or exacerbate psychological problems ( Sampson & Lauritsen, 1994). Youthful offenders are at even greater risk within adult correctional facilities, where they are frequently victimized by adult offenders ( Fagan, Forst, & Vivona, 1989).

Even in the absence of overt violence, the deterrent model of many juvenile facilities may inadvertently promote deviant relationships and irresponsibility, particularly when milieu or group interventions are used ( Dishion, McCord, & Poulin, 1999). Moreover, because court decisions to place youth in secure facilities are based primarily on adolescents' history of prior arrests, and secondarily on their mental health needs and the availability of appropriate caregivers, there is often a mismatch between an offender's service needs and the services that are available to him or her ( Lyons, Baerger, Quigley, Erlich, & Griffin, 2001).

Inevitably, group interventions involve aggregating youth with a history of antisocial behavior. Several experimental studies of peer group interventions for adolescent problem behavior have shown that this method at best produces no effect and at worst has iatrogenic effects on adolescent problem behavior ( Dishion et al., 1999). The iatrogenic (i.e., harmful but unintended) effect of peer group interventions is linked to the amount of time deviant peers spend together and the degree of social dysfunction and deviance among the youths.

The iatrogenic effects of spending time with a concentrated collection of antisocial peers are exacerbated when adolescents are placed in facilities that house adult criminals along with young offenders. Not only do these placements put adolescents into close contact with adults who have long antisocial histories, but they also expose youths to violence and sexual assault, both of which can hinder normal psychosocial development. It is not surprising that rates of attempted suicide are higher among juveniles in adult facilities than among their counterparts in placements designed for adolescents ( Bishop et al., 1996).

Conclusions

Discussions of justice policy and practice seldom consider the psychosocial needs of late adolescents, focusing instead on the primary goal of deterring offenders from future criminal behavior and, secondarily, on facilitating the educational and occupational success of youths who are exiting the justice system. As a consequence, justice systems emphasize punishment, which presumably promotes desistance, and academic or vocational training, which presumably facilitate future success in school and work.

Although we agree that punishment and training are important components of the justice system's response to youthful offending, they alone are unlikely to suffice. To make a successful transition into adult roles, individuals need to exit late adolescence with sufficient psychosocial maturity to make autonomous decisions, establish competent interpersonal relationships, and exercise self-governance. These capacities are not likely to be promoted by punishment, classroom instruction, or job training.

The widespread failure of punishment and training approaches to the rehabilitation of young offenders is readily apparent in the statistics on the adult outcomes of individuals who have penetrated deeply into the justice system. Although it is not clear what proportion of these adult difficulties are attributable to the characteristics and life circumstances of the offenders that got them into the justice system in the first place, and what proportion are attributable to these individuals' experiences in the justice system, it is clear that the justice system does little to treat the problems offenders bring with them when they enter the system, little to promote the successful development of offenders while they are in the system, and little to protect offenders from the potential iatrogenic effects of system involvement. Indeed, the best predictors of successful adulthood among young offenders inhere in the quality of relationships they form after exiting the system and not in the experiences they have while exposed to the system's sanctions and interventions. The capacity of ex-offenders to form and maintain these high quality relationships, however, likely depends on their level of psychosocial development.

The considerable problems faced by young offenders as they move into adulthood suggest that they lack many of the foundational psychosocial capacities requisite for the successful transition into adult roles. Put most bluntly, however, the context of justice system intervention is one that is more likely to arrest individuals' development than promote it. The deficiency inherent in an overly punitive approach to justice system intervention is that punishment, although an effective deterrent against future offending, does little more than reduce recidivism (and it may not even do this very effectively). Punishment does nothing to prepare young people for the successful reentry into the community and, as such, heightens the chances that the young offender will experience failure in the worlds of education and work and in the establishment of healthy interpersonal relationships. The deficiency inherent in the approach to rehabilitation that emphasizes training and skill acquisition alone is that it fails to address the underlying psychosocial capacities necessary to translate these skills into gainful employment. Thus, for example, a young offender may leave a residential treatment program that offers training in automotive repair with the ability to fix a car but without the psychosocial capacities necessary for being able to report to work on time each day or manage his earnings.

Our analysis suggests that we need to reexamine the goals and methods of the justice system from a developmental perspective if we are to facilitate the successful transition of young offenders into adult roles and responsibilities. Such a perspective identifies the specific psychosocial tasks of late adolescence and asks how their negotiation is facilitated by the context in which young people come of age. As we have suggested, the necessary conditions for successful psychosocial development in late adolescence include the presence of supportive adults as well as opportunities to develop responsible autonomy, acquire important competencies, and establish positive relationships with prosocial peers. Although it is unrealistic to expect a justice system with the dual challenges of punishment and rehabilitation to replicate perfectly the conditions known to facilitate healthy development among nonoffenders, it is not unrealistic to ask that the system, at the very least, keep these considerations in mind.

Biographies

Laurence Steinberg, Ph.D., is the distinguished university professor of psychology at Temple University and the director of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Adolescent Development and Juvenile Justice. His research focuses on socioemotional development in adolescence and, specifically, on the ways in which juvenile justice policy can be informed by the study of normative and atypical development during adolescence.

He Len Chung, M.A., is a clinical psychology graduate student at Temple University, currently completing an internship at Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic. She is interested in the effect of environmental stress on family relationships and, in particular, how this area of research can improve services for adolescents in the juvenile justice system.

Michelle Little, M.A., is a graduate student in developmental psychology at Temple University. Her research focuses on the psychosocial adaptation of adolescents within the juvenile justice system.

Appendix

Three Components of Psychosocial Maturity

Mastery and Competence

Interpersonal Relationships and Social Functioning

Self-Definition and Self-Governance

Contexts Affecting the Psychosocial Maturity of Young Offenders

Correctional Facilities

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REENTRY OF YOUNG OFFENDERS FROM THE JUSTICE SYSTEM: A Developmental Perspective

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This article presents a developmental perspective on the reentry of young offenders into the community. We begin with a discussion of the psychosocial tasks of late adolescence. Next, we discuss contextual influences on the successful negotiation of these psychosocial tasks.

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Florida's Juvenile Justice System Cries Out for Reform

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Florida's Juvenile Justice System Cries Out for Reform

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Florida's Department of Juvenile Justice defines its mission as "reducing juvenile delinquency through effective prevention, intervention and treatment services that strengthen families and turn around the lives of troubled youth." But a two-year investigation by the Miami Herald, whose shocking findings were published by the newspaper this week in a six-part series, raises serious doubts about whether DJJ is fulfilling its mission - especially the part about turning around young lives.

The series drew quick notice from a key legislator, who vowed to dig further into its findings and pursue reforms. It deserves the same level of attention and commitment to action from the agency and Gov. Rick Scott, not just for the sake of the juvenile detainees and their families but for every Floridian who counts on DJJ to advance public safety. Meeting that goal depends on successfully rehabilitating as many young offenders as possible.

The series, called Fight Club, spotlighted appalling abuses in the juvenile justice system in facilities around the state. Herald reporters found that some staff in those facilities, to impose discipline or simply entertain themselves, organized fights between detained teens. Staff bribed them with food or other rewards to attack each other; sometimes staff even bet on the outcome. The clashes could be brutal; at least one teen died.

The Herald also uncovered hundreds of accusations over the past decade of physical and sexual abuse of teens by staff, who had not been routinely subjected to thorough background checks before being hired. Reporters found hundreds of staff working in juvenile facilities had been fired for wrongdoing in previous jobs in adult prisons or jails. And the newspaper found that DJJ investigated almost 1,500 allegations of staff failing to report abusive treatment of teens, or lying about it. Medical care was substandard, and sometimes withheld from teens accused of faking their ailments.

The Herald series cited low pay for staff as a primary factor behind chronic problems in the state's juvenile justice system. DJJ employees start out making less than $26,000 a year. But private operators, who run all of the agency's residential facilities, often pay even less than the state. The starting salary at the largest private operator, in charge of 28 programs, is less than $20,000.

DJJ responded indignantly to the Herald's series, arguing it "blatantly neglects to recognize DJJ's years of aggressive, innovative reform efforts and nationally recognized success serving Florida's youth and communities." Successes cited by the agency include Florida's juvenile arrest rate falling to a 40-year low, the residential detention rate for teens considered "low-moderate risk" plummeting by 60 percent, and the recidivism rate for teens on probation reaching an all-time low.

These are indeed accomplishments, but they don't excuse the abuses uncovered by the Herald. And state statistics also indicate 45 percent of Florida teens released from juvenile justice residential programs in 2015 were found guilty of a new offense or pleaded guilty to one within a year. The Herald called the state's juvenile justice programs "an on-ramp for the adult prison system."

The newspaper's reporting already has spurred some action. After the Herald asked for personnel records, DJJ adopted a new system for conducting background checks of job candidates, though the agency can't require its private operators to use the same system without rewriting their state contracts. And a couple of weeks ago, with publication of the newspaper's series looming, Scott proposed a 10 percent salary hike for the state's juvenile detention and probation officers.

This week state Sen. Jeff Brandes, a St. Petersburg Republican who chairs his chamber's subcommittee on spending for criminal and civil justice, said more reforms are needed at DJJ. Other subcommittee members questioned whether the Legislature made a mistake in 2011 when it privatized residential detention for juveniles. Straight answers to these and other important questions, along with reforms, are more likely if Scott and DJJ leaders acknowledge the agency's serious problems and commit to solutions.

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Florida's juvenile justice system cries out for reform

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Florida's Department of Juvenile Justice defines its mission as "reducing juvenile delinquency through effective prevention, intervention and treatment services that strengthen families and turn around the lives of troubled youth."

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Stories from the field: SPLC works to end violence in Florida youth prisons

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Stories from the field: SPLC works to end violence in Florida youth prisons

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In-depth posts from past prisoners and the abuse within the system

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I am fearful for my life. Please place me in protective custody. I have just been TOH'd.
These were the words of youths imprisoned at Lancaster Correctional Institution in Central Florida. Some of them had been beaten by other prisoners during attacks known as "tests of heart." Others had been threatened with such attacks.

A "test of heart" - or "TOH" - is a term I have come to know all too well in my research into Florida's youthful offender prisons. New arrivals are told by other prisoners to hand over their money or food, or suffer the consequences - a "test of heart." The prison's guards not only allowed the attacks, but sometimes condoned them.

I was stunned by what I read in the incident reports from Lancaster, the largest youthful offender prison operated by the Florida Department of Corrections. Recently, the agency stopped sending people classified as "youthful offenders" - some of the youngest people in the system - to Lancaster. They're now incarcerated at four other prisons across the state.

Unfortunately, tests of heart weren't unique to Lancaster. The violence can be found at other youthful offender facilities in Florida. The reports I read from Lancaster merely exemplified the violent conditions the SPLC is working to end throughout Florida. One of the reports described a young person who had been a victim of two "test of heart" incidents where he was "hit multiple times in the face, head, and ribs with a lock in a sock."

How did this happen?

Did the reporting officer really learn of this incident for the first time after seeing the victim walk into the cafeteria with a huge gash on his eye? Or did the guard assigned to that dorm look the other way as it happened?

Another youth was called into a room by a prisoner only to be beaten by five to seven others.

This violence is even more disturbing in light of the fact that the prison had been housing children since its inception in 1971. Lancaster started as a co-ed juvenile detention facility under the Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services. In 1979, it was converted to a youthful offender facility as part of an effort to protect incarcerated people under 25 from coming in contact with older prisoners with long criminal histories.

While it was called a "youthful offender facility," Lancaster was, for all intents and purposes, an adult prison. This remains the case for the other Florida prisons that house youthful offenders. Young people held in these facilities live in terror at night, desperate to protect themselves. One incident report from Lancaster described how a young person in fear of his life urged officials to protect him, showing them the cuts and marks on his body.

I couldn't help but to think how the young person in that report is someone's son pleading for help, desperate to be spared from more violence. No one should have to beg for his safety.

Unfortunately, young people in Florida's youthful offender prisons still find themselves exposed to dangerous situations. Earlier this year, the SPLC filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of a young person who was beaten and raped with a broomstick as part of a "test of heart" assault at the Sumter Correctional Institution, about 100 miles south of Lancaster.

He was just 17.

The lawsuit describes how a guard was stationed in front of the area where the attack happened but did nothing to stop the beating. He never even reported it. The guard, however, remains employed to this day. The utter disregard for the safety and well-being of young people in these facilities has become sickeningly familiar in Florida.

It must end.

That's why I will continue my work to uncover these abuses. It's why I won't forget the pleas for help in the incident reports. And it's why the SPLC won't stop until these young people no longer endure such violence.
Michelle Jack Llosa is a senior community advocate in the SPLC's Florida office.

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Stories from the field: SPLC works to end violence in Florida youth prisons

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I am fearful for my life. Please place me in protective custody. I have just been TOH'd. These were the words of youths imprisoned at Lancaster Correctional Institution in Central Florida. Some of them had been beaten by other prisoners during attacks known as "tests of heart."

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Florida’s juvenile justice system fails to protect youth from brutal abuse

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Florida’s juvenile justice system fails to protect youth from brutal abuse

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A general overview of the aspects that are most important to target and specific names of reps working for and against improbable of policy.