ARCHIVES OF LEAD STORIES
January 8, 2004
State re-examining juvenile
justice system
Jeremy Schwab
Robert Gittens, recently appointed head of Governor
Mitt Romney’s Juvenile Justice Committee, has his hands
full.
Juvenile justice advocates are looking to his committee to rectify
what they say is lax enforcement of juvenile justice laws.
“If the Juvenile Justice Advisory Committee is well-led
and does its homework, they are going to call into question current
practices and demand new leadership from the Legislature and governor,”
said Lisa Thurau-Gray of Suffolk University’s Juvenile Justice
Center.
Gittens’ committee is allotted the task of monitoring the
state’s compliance with the federal Juvenile Justice Delinquency
Prevention Act. The act requires that states rectify disproportionate
involvement of young people of color in the criminal justice system.
It also mandates that states ensure separation between youth and
adult prisoners, keep status offenders such as underage drinkers
out of detention and remove juveniles detained with adults.
Gittens says reducing the number of minorities detained and caught
up in the criminal justice system is a major focus of his committee.
“We want to maintain public safety,” said the former
director of the Department of Youth Services. “There are
cases where a judge should hold juveniles in detention. But if
we had a certain number of community groups, we could set up an
array of alternatives. We could do day reporting, or have state
agencies and community organizations checking in on kids in their
homes or foster care.”
Being detained before going to court can negatively impact youths
psychologically, say some observers. The state may soon face a
class action lawsuit alleging that the frequent body cavity searches
of minors in pre-trial facilities is unnecessary and harmful.
“It is not clear to me at this point whether the [body search]
issue we would take up, maybe because of the narrow scope of the
issue,” said Gittens.
Until Romney established his JJAC, there was no effective advisory
committee on juvenile justice. The JJAC under former Governor
Jane Swift met roughly twice a year and only a handful of members
attended meetings, say juvenile justice advocates.
“Community groups were unhappy with work not done,”
said Emily Whiting, deputy director of juvenile and family programs
for the Executive Office of Public Safety. “Secretary [of
Public Safety] Ray Flynn wanted the new committee to more accurately
reflect our community — racial diversity, age and programmatic
diversity.”
Unlike the previous committee, the current one includes non-governmental
juvenile justice advocates. The committee aims to meet quarterly,
with eight subcommittees meeting every two months. In addition,
the Romney administration has created a new full-time staff position
to deal with juvenile justice issues.
“I am satisfied with the makeup of the committee,”
said Lael Chester, executive director of Citizens for Juvenile
Justice and a JJAC member. “It is not perfect but I think
this is a very good group with tremendous potential.”
In addition to monitoring compliance with federal laws, the JJAC
allocates federal juvenile justice program grants.
“I agree with the criticism [from activists] that the grants
in the past have not been well-targeted to the needs of communities
of color,” said Whiting. “I think it was a question
of who applied. We are doing an internal review. The JJAC needs
to provide technical assistance to agencies that could use help
applying. Most organizations when they apply have a gameplan but
don’t articulate it.”
This past summer, the federal government warned the state that
it could lose funding for juvenile justice programs if it did
not do a better job of enforcing sight and sound separation of
juvenile and adult prisoners.
“We will be visiting facilities and working with different
administrators to help them get in compliance,” said Whiting.
“For instance, in Dudley, adults could be sent to Uxbridge
on juvenile court days. In Leominster and Quincy, we are going
to build juvenile facilities. In Dorchester and Chelsea, we are
going to work to identify doors that need soundproofing.”
Besides monitoring compliance with federal law and issuing grants,
Gittens wants his committee to look at quality of life issues
that impact young people.
“I think more work needs to be done across systems —
social services, community organizations, schools to identify
kids with mental health problems at an early age,” he said.
“Hopefully we can help them before they enter the juvenile
justice system. We also need to look at the dramatic increase
in the number of girls coming into the juvenile justice system.
For those in the system, we need to look at, do we have services,
gender-specific counseling.”
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