SPARTA, Ga.––Prisons are not inviting places. At their worst, they are a place of sorrow. At their best, prisons are a place to wait out the dull, slow passage of time. Prisons are not naturally a place of hope. Hancock State Prison, a concrete outpost in the sparsely-populated, wooded expanse of east-central Georgia, is no different. Continue Reading →
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Boys Growing Up to be Boys: Mandatory Minimums and Teens in Adult Prisons
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For teens sentenced as adults under Georgia’s SB 400, a paucity of resources create reentry challenges (and increased likelihood of recidivism) upon release
Additional reporting by Clay Duda
ATLANTA––In the best of situations, teen boys struggle with growing into good men. The challenge becomes enormous for Georgia teens convicted in adult court of certain violent crimes—the so-called Seven Deadly Sins—and subsequently locked away in adult prisons. In 1994, responding to rising juvenile crime rates and fears of a generation of teen “super-predators,” Georgia passed legislation requiring any kid age 13 to 17 accused of committing one of seven serious, violent crimes be transferred out of the juvenile system to face an adult court. Conviction meant a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years with no parole. With few positive role models and few opportunities for education while inside the prison walls, many former inmates convicted under the law say they are ill-prepared for life on the outside—a life requiring Social Security numbers, credit scores, balanced checkbooks and an entirely different set of interpersonal skills than those they’d learned in prison. Continue Reading →
Filed under: Community-Based Alternatives, News
Georgia Juvenile Justice Reform Bill Clears Committee
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A major reformation of Georgia’s juvenile justice system took a significant step toward passage in the state’s General Assembly Tuesday after it was voted out of the House Judiciary Committee. As JJIE reported earlier this month, the 244-page House Bill 242 grew out of a recommendation report from the Georgia Criminal Justice Reform Council and a years-long effort to update the state’s juvenile code. Much of the bill is modeled on reforms in other states such as Texas and Ohio. “The way we’re doing things now is not good for the children, so we’re altering those programs,” the bill’s sponsor and chairman of the committee, state Rep. Wendell Willard, R-Sandy Springs, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution Tuesday. The bill includes reforms meant to address high recidivism rates and ease overcrowding in detention centers by placing a greater emphasis on community-based alternatives. Continue Reading →
Filed under: Legislation, News
Georgia’s High Court Chief Justice Calls for Reform
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A call for juvenile justice reform, in Georgia and across the nation, was the main focus of Georgia’s State of the Judiciary Address today. Speaking before the state’s General Assembly in her fourth and final address, Georgia state Supreme Court Chief Justice Carol Hunstein, said the majority of kids in the juvenile justice system deserve a second chance. “When did we stop believing that children are different from adults and that teenagers do stupid things, act impulsively and consider themselves immortal?” she asked. “When did we forget what we were like as teenagers?”
To read the entire prepared address click here. Continue Reading →
Filed under: Legislation, News
JJIE Adds New York Metro Bureau
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JJIE announced Wednesday the expansion of its juvenile justice coverage through the opening of a metropolitan New York news bureau. Housed at the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism, the new bureau is funded by a three-year, $255,000 grant from the Tow Foundation. The bureau will feature in-depth reporting from CUNY journalism students and will be run by journalist and adjunct professor Daryl Khan, who has written for The New York Times, Newsday and the Boston Globe. Leonard Witt, executive director of the Center for Sustainable Journalism, which publishes JJIE, said the addition of the New York Metro Bureau’s in-depth reporting fills a critical gap in juvenile justice coverage. “This gives us a presence in a major metropolitan region,” Witt said. Continue Reading →
Filed under: News, Opportunities, Center for Sustainable Journalism, City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism, CUNY, Daryl Khan, Juvenile Justice J-School Collaborative, New York bureau
California Guarantees Chance at Parole for Juveniles Facing Life Sentences
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With the signature of Governor Jerry Brown, California, minus a few exceptions, joins the handful of states that guarantee an opportunity at parole to juveniles convicted of murder. After serving 15 years, most of California’s roughly 300 so-called juvenile lifers will get a chance to ask for something they thought they would never see: a reduced sentence. The new law allows judges to reduce a life-without-parole sentence to a 25-years-to-life sentence. That means the possibility of an appointment with the parole board. “It’s very exciting, it’s huge,” said Dana Isaac, director of the Project to End Juvenile Life Without Parole at the University of San Francisco School of Law. Continue Reading →
Filed under: Juvenile Indigent Defense, Legislation, News, California, Governor, Jerry Brown, juvenile justice, leland yee
VIDEO: A Former Georgia State Child Advocate Explains His Work Helping Kids in Guatemala
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The Georgia Juvenile Services Association (GJSA) recently wrapped its 2012 Training Summit in Savannah, Ga., an annual chance for juvenile court workers from across the state to share knowledge, network and blow off steam away from the daily pressures and demands of their often stressful work. GJSA members include employees at all levels of the state’s Department of Juvenile Justice, juvenile courts, county departments of family and children services and other organizations dedicated to helping children. Giving the keynote address Aug. 22 was Georgia’s former Child Advocate, Tom Rawlings, who spoke about lessons he has learned from his current job as Director of International Justice Mission’s Guatemala field office. There, Rawlings manages “a multidisciplinary team of attorneys, investigators, social works and psychiatrists which essentially acts as a combination district attorney’s office and child advocacy center,” he said. Continue Reading →
Filed under: News, Georgia, Georgia Juvenile Services Association, GJSA, Guatemala, International Justice Mission, juvenile justice, Office of the Child Advocate
Despite Criticism ‘Beyond Scared Straight’ Premieres 3rd Season, Experts Look to Alternative Programs
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The controversial A&E Network series “Beyond Scared Straight” returns August 20 for a third season. If this 30-second teaser from A&E is any indication, viewers can expect more episodes filled with inmates and prison guards yelling at, verbally abusing and intimidating at-risk teens, with the apparent goal of creating “powerful experiences” that “break down walls” so that “kids will listen,” according to the video. But while the television show may be enormously popular with viewers – in 2011 receiving A&E’s highest ratings ever for a series premier – experts nearly unanimously agree that Scared Straight-style programs create higher incidences of recidivism and do more harm than good for teens, and they can point to nearly 30 years of research as evidence. “It is more likely to create kids who are going to get in trouble,” Joe Vignati, national juvenile justice specialist on the Executive Board of the Coalition for Juvenile Justice, told JJIE in January 2011, when the series first premiered. In a 2000 report by Anthony Petrosino, Carolyn Turpin-Petrosino and James O. Finckenauer that examines the effectiveness of Scared Straight-style programs, the authors write, “Few programs were as popular or well intentioned as Scared Straight. Continue Reading →
Filed under: Events, Scared Straight, A&E Network, Anthony Petrosino, at risk, Beyond Scared Straight, Campbell, juvenile justice
The $1 Million TED Talk
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Bryan Stevenson didn’t want to go to TED, the genre-defying annual conference full of big thinkers and big ideas. He brushed it off, claimed he was too busy and, besides, he didn’t know anything about it. He was preparing for a big case that was just days away – one that could result in a total ban on juveniles being sentenced to life without parole. Winning the case is a cornerstone goal of a litigation campaign by Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), the Alabama nonprofit Stevenson founded to fight discrimination and injustice in the legal system. “Well, I have to say I wasn’t really interested in going,” Stevenson said in a recent interview. Continue Reading →
Filed under: News, Priority, $1 Million TED Talk, Bryan Stevneson, JLWOP, juvenile detention, Supreme Court, TED
BREAKING: Supreme Court Strikes Down Juvenile Mandatory LWOP
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Updated: 12:07 p.m. In a 5-4 decision issued Monday morning, the Supreme Court ruled the Eighth Amendment prohibits mandatory sentences of life without possibility of parole for juveniles (JLWOP). The decision stems from two cases—Jackson v Hobbs and Miller v Alabama—involving 14-year-olds convicted of murder and sentenced to mandatory life terms.
Justice Elena Kagan wrote the majority opinion, holding that mandatory JLWOP violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment, citing as precedent Roper v Simmons. “That right ‘flows from the basic “precept of justice that punishment for crime should be graduated and proportioned,” to both the offender and the offense,’ ” Kagan wrote. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the dissenting opinion. Continue Reading →