Gaps in Mental Illness Checks Swallow Juvenile Victims

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The family of 19-year-old Ashley Smith says guards watched and did nothing as the young woman strangled herself to death in an Ontario prison cell. Smith spent her teen years in and out of juvenile custody and, once in the adult system, had her mental illness answered by physical abuse, her family alleges in a legal battle to find out more about their daughter’s death. For youth incarcerated in the United States, the mental care they get — or don’t — varies. “In some places, all of this is really done quite well,” said Preston Elrod, a professor in the Department of Criminal Justice at Eastern Kentucky University and a juvenile justice specialist. “But in other places, none of it is done well.”

About 70 percent of young people who come into an institution have a diagnosable mental health disorder or symptoms of one, according to Gina Vincent, a psychiatry professor from the University of Massachusetts Medical School, in a 2012 report about screening and assessment in juvenile justice systems.

Rules vary by state, though in many places, children will not stay in the juvenile detention system, receiving what juvenile-tailored services exist, as long as Smith did: her 18th birthday.

New Research Examines Long Term Links Between Juvenile Detention and Psychiatric Disorders

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A new study published in the Archives of General Psychiatry finds that, five years after being released from one Illinois juvenile detention center, more than 45 percent of male former detainees, and almost 30 percent of female former detainees, had been diagnosed with at least one psychiatric disorder associated with mental impairment. The study, conducted by the Northwestern Project with support from the National Institution on Drug Abuse and the National Institute of Mental Health, examined more than 1,800 detainees, ranging in ages from 10 to 18, at Chicago’s Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center. According to researchers, the report is the first longitudinal study to fully track psychiatric disorders in juveniles following release from detention. Researchers said that half of the center’s former male detainees had been diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder not associated with impairment, while more than 40 percent of female ex-detainees has been diagnosed with at least one or more disorders not commonly associated with mental impairment. The most common disorders noted were substance abuse issues, with researchers saying the male ex-detainees were two to three times likelier to develop problems with alcohol and illicit drugs than female ex-detainees.

Safe Start Center Provides Best Practices for Working with Young Victims of Trauma

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The Safe Start Center recently released a publication that outlines the best practices for youth service providers working with children that have experienced victimization or severe trauma. “Victimization and Trauma Experienced by Children and Youth: Implications for Legal Advocates” addresses numerous topics, including the best available assessments and treatments for trauma-related stress in young people. The brief, the seventh entry in “Moving from Evidence to Action: The Safe Start Center Series on Children Exposed to Violence,” contains suggestions for experts in both the juvenile justice field as well as the field of child welfare, providing attorneys and court-appointed advocates with specialized information about trauma-informed practices. The brief lists several symptoms of traumatic stress for workers in the juvenile justice and child welfare systems to note, in addition to multiple screening and assessment instruments commonly used to address past traumatic experiences and exposure to violence by young people. The Safe Start Center notes numerous emerging, evidence-supported interventions, such as Child-Parent Psychotherapy (CPP) and Trauma Affect Regulation: Guide for Education and Therapy (TARGET) as promising programs for the treatment and rehabilitation of young people effected by trauma and victimization.