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All in Juvenile Justice News
The Racial and Ethnic Disparities Initiative of the Alachua County Sheriff's Office is not only working, it is changing the lives of our citizens.
The R.E.D. initiative started back in 2012 long before it had a name. The School Resource Bureau changed its policies when our on-campus arrest numbers reached the hundreds and were way out of control. We stopped arresting for probation violations and petty misdemeanor crimes and started doing what we were supposed to do - educate our children.
The North Bend Police Department has adopted a new program to help juvenile offenders, one that also gives power back to the victims.
Chief Robert Kappelman first heard of "restorative justice" when he was still working for his old department in Wisconsin, where troubled youth had no place to go. The juvenile detention center had closed, so his department was forced to find an alternative method, and "rightly so, because locking kids up is not the best way to change future behavior and we know that," Kappelman said.
Local juvenile justice advocates opposed to incarceration of youth offenders attended a public meeting Wednesday to criticize Milwaukee County administrators who havE recommended building a state-financed 36-bed secure facility here as an alternative to the troubled Lincoln Hills boys prison in northern Wisconsin.
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — Next month, Tennessee lawmakers will consider changing the way juveniles are prosecuted. A juvenile justice task force has come up six tentative recommendations that would help rehabilitate juvenile offenders.
We got a copy of the suggestions from State Senator Mark Norris's office. He's the chairman of that task force.
In an effort to help young people transition from juvenile-justice back to their original schools or other educational settings, the U.S. Department of Education released various resources last week to help them, educators, and other navigate the process.
The new set of materials includes a guide for those leaving juvenile-justice facilities, a toolkit for administrators and other educators to assist youth in the juvenile-justice system, as well was
The “most wonderful time of the year” may be the hardest for tens of thousands of young people locked up for the holidays.
But many states try — within the confines of security rules, budgets and protocols — to make the season a little brighter for youthful offenders, who often are housed far from home
LOS ANGELES — Manuel Dircio, 20, a business administration student at Fullerton College boasts a 4.0 GPA.
He is also a recovering alcoholic with a history of arrest and incarceration in juvenile detention — not quite what you’d expect from a seemingly model college student with a stellar grade point.
Weeks after voters overwhelmingly passed Proposition 57, the Ventura County District Attorney's Office and prosecutors across the state have initiated their own policies concerning juvenile offenders who face criminal charges as adults.
Under the Public Safety and Rehabilitation Act, which took effect the day after the Nov. 8 election, prosecutors no longer have the ability to directly file complaints in adult court involving felony crimes allegedly committed by minors. It also includes
In late November, Youth Services Insider reported on the possibility that Robert Woodson, Sr., president of the Center for Neighborhood Enterprise, would lead the Department of Housing and Urban Development for President-Elect Donald Trump. Woodson has worked at HUD before, is an advisor on poverty issues for Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.), and has overseen the development of a successful violence prevention model.
The U.S. Department of Education has released new guides and resources to help justice-involved youth make a successful transition back to traditional school settings. These resources promote successful transitions by emphasizing the importance of early planning and working with family, mentors, facility staff, and school employees at every stage of the process.
The resources include a guide written for incarcerated youth; a newly updated transition toolkit and resource guide for practitioners in juvenile justice facilities; a document detailing education programs in juvenile justice facilities from the most recent Civil Rights Data Collection; and a website that provides technical assistance to support youth with disability as they transition out of juvenile justice facilities.
A task force recommended Thursday that Maryland lawmakers drastically curtail when the state's juvenile justice system can strip-search young people in its custody.
The panel voted 10-9 to ban strip searches unless there is an "articulated, reasonable belief" that a youth is concealing drugs, keys or anything that could be used as a weapon. Such searches could only be authorized by a juvenile detention facility's superintendent, administrator or a designee.
The Department of Juvenile Services oversees facilities that detain youths ages 11 to 20.
A policy encouraged by Gov. Rick Scott to not arrest non-violent juvenile offenders and instead give them alternative sanctions, for example, make them take part in teen court.
When it comes to overhauling its juvenile justice system, Virginia has garnered a reputation as a model of teamwork and progress. Yet even in a state poised to set a national standard, it’s still bedeviled by some of the same problems seen in other states, thanks in part to an outdated national attitude that juvenile offenders only deserve punishment.
The American Civil Liberties Union is applauding indictments announced this week against four guards at the Illinois Youth Center in St. Charles, where law enforcement officials say detainees were encouraged to attack others as a form of discipline.
West Virginia is one of only a few states with rising levels of young people behind bars, and advocates say part of the issue is a lack of behavioral health care. (WV Virginia Center on Budget and Policy)
CHARLESTON, W. Va. – Lack of behavioral health care for children may be undermining West Virginia's efforts to reduce truancy, cut juvenile incarceration and improve foster care, advocates say.
Rochester, N.Y. — (WHAM) - It is designed to help young men and women in trouble with the law, but many close to the juvenile justice system say it is failing them and putting the lives of others in the community in danger.
There is a push for reform to bring the juvenile justice system up to speed with crimes being committed by kids and teens today. Many say a local, high profile case is a prime example as to why change is needed.
A group of Republican and Libertarian groups spoke today in support of conservative-led juvenile justice reform, including an update to the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act (JJDPA).
“By not addressing criminal justice, from the ground level, with kids, we are missing an opportunity,” said Arthur Rizer, the justice policy director at the R Street Institute. “Conservatives hold up family as bedrock, but too often we are deaf to the basic needs of families. As conservatives we have to stop caring only about kids when they’re in the womb.”
It’s 6 p.m. on a Wednesday and a group of Davis High students have just listened to the charges against one of their peers.
It might have been for criminal mischief, it might have been for shoplifting. It might have been for possession of tobacco or for trespassing.
But now it is up to those students to determine the sentence.
“Hood rat.”
That’s what a person called Amber Wederski when she was 10 years old sitting at the bus stop. It’s the moment, Wederski said, that made her feel like she was different — the “bad seed” other kids were not allowed to see. She was “going nowhere fast.”
“I had teachers, I had guidance counselors, who didn’t believe in me,” she said. “They treated me different, so I always felt like I was different.”
Fourteen years later, Wederski is on track to graduating from Warner Pacific College with a bachelor’s degree in human development.
The eyes of the nation might be on President-Elect Donald Trump as he builds out his administration, but reformers holding out hope for progress might be wise to divert their gazes somewhere closer.
