New Mexico jail: Michael Brown portrait with short light brown hair and beard smiles into camera sitting in turquoise plastic chair in prisoner visiting room wearing navy blue prison uniform with heavily black tatooed arms on lap and fingers interlaced.

Behind bars since age 16, juvenile lifer watches New Mexico struggle over sentencing reform

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Michael is one of dozens of people in New Mexico who received what juvenile justice reformists call “de-facto life sentences” — sentences so long they will likely never be released — for crimes committed as minors. He is a vocal supporter of youth sentencing reforms that died in the state legislature earlier this year, part of a national movement to rehabilitate juvenile offenders and make them eligible for parole earlier.  

youth justice disabled people legal guardianship: illustration of an antique 2-sided scale with colorful pastel cloud background

Opinion: Vulnerable youth need justice, and legal aid needs community

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Everyone deserves access to justice. Eight years ago, I took a chance that the community would show up to support legal services – and justice – for vulnerable kids and young adults. 

I’ll never forget the first client who walked through our doors or any of the clients I’ve represented. As I step down from leading Arizona Legal Women and Youth Services (ALWAYS) and turn the reins over to a brilliant successor, I can’t help but reflect on all that I’ve learned, felt, and hoped during my time running a legal aid center. At ALWAYS, we serve human trafficking survivors and children and young adults affected by homelessness, abuse, and the foster care system. With the exception of trafficking survivors, everyone we serve is 24 years old or younger.

JJIE Hub Latest Resources::Weathered Stone Slabs With the Words "Juvenile Court Entrance" Engraved

Latest on the JJIE Hub: Sept 2021

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Juvenile Justice Resource Hub curates research on juvenile justice policy and practice, reviews of innovative programs and various other explorations and advisories on topics including justice reform, mental and behavioral health, gun violence, foster care, racial and economic parity/disparities. 

316 people are shot every day in America. Here are 5 stories

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They panic if a balloon pops. They hold dying family members. They push their wounded bodies to heal and scroll longingly through photos and videos of their lost loved ones. Behind the statistics and the political blame game over rising gun violence are the victims. The spike plaguing many American cities this year has lawmakers reeling and police scrambling, though homicide rates are not rising as high as the double-digit jumps seen in 2020. Still, according to the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, 316 people are shot every day in the U.S. and 106 of them die.

NY juvenile crime law: Green Double door entry to brick building with "Juvenile Division" sign above doors

Homicide likely to be only crime charged to New Yorkers under 12

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Unless accused of criminally negligent homicide, no child younger than 12 could be legally arrested, detained or brought before a judge, according to legislation New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo appears poised to sign. Approved by the state’s legislature, the bill undoes a 1909 law allowing the arrests of kids as young as 7.

NYC parade honors essential youth workers

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During the rollercoaster ride of a pandemic, it was Maxene Foster’s job to help make sure that cash-strapped Bronx residents got fed, were safely sheltered and so forth. For those efforts, the 20-year employee of Bronxworks, was tapped to represent the 900 staffers of that nonprofit agency during that rarest of Big Apple events: a ticker-tape parade. The ticker-tape, New York City parade celebrated youth probation officers, along with workers from nonprofit agencies, transit and other institutions deemed essential workplaces during the pandemic.

NY marijuana laws: Two hand-rolled marijuana joints rest on lid and glass jar lying on its side with marijuana buds in it.

Legalizing recreational marijuana likely means fewer arrests of juveniles of color

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The new law is retroactive. It allows persons to have prior marijuana-related convictions for which, under the new rules, they would not be arrested, to be expunged from their record. Expungement of prior records was critical to ensuring fairer justice for communities disproportionately policed, arrested and affected by drug policies, said New York State Assembly Majority Leader Crystal Peoples-Stokes (D-Buffalo). “Black communities, brown communities, have always been the target of these laws,” Peoples-Stokes said. “If we’re going to take the market above ground, we have to remove those convictions.”

South Carolina juvenile detention reform: Woman with long light brown hair wearing black and white striped top holding papers up with her right hand stands behind a wood and brass podium speaking into a microphone.

Parents and corrections officers fault South Carolina juvenile facilities before state senate

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Though technically it was against the rules, a juvenile corrections officer had been watching and chuckling along as a group of girl detainees enjoyed riding a foam mattress down a flight of stairs at a Union, S.C. detention facility in November 2020. Declaring the scene a riot, the supervising officer ordered his underlings to search the girls. In front of male officers the girls were forced to strip down to their bras and panties.

Lead Poisoning & Juvenile Sentencing: Judge's brown wood gavel resting on two gray books on a white table with gold weight scales to right

Opinion: Lead Exposure’s Link to Crime Should Shape Criminal Sentencing, Early Release 

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Pure Earth and UNICEF reported in 2020 that, globally, one out of three children are exposed to dangerous levels of lead, a poison that gets into the bloodstream, then impairs the brain and the body in many ways.

The United States has made great progress toward reducing lead exposure from gasoline and paint. But more work is needed to protect all American children, including those whose exposure to lead during early childhood — and even while in their mother’s womb — has been linked to behaviors landing them in the juvenile justice system.

SC juvenile prison: Several workers in black pants and blue uniform shirts hold hand-printed signs and stand in protest of poor working conditions

South Carolina Juvenile Prison Workers Walk Out In Protest

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COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — About two dozen correctional officers and teachers at South Carolina's beleaguered juvenile justice agency joined an impromptu walkout Friday, protesting what they describe as low staffing, poor pay and mismanagement. The walkout from the agency's Broad River Road complex in Columbia follows weeks of legislative scrutiny into the agency after an  audit released in April found an uptick in violence, a failure to maintain adequate security staffing and many other deep-rooted problems.