What do Teens in Prison Need to be Successful?

By |

Imagine being ripped from your safe, normal professional life and thrust into federal prison for a year, for something stupid you did when you were a teenager, or even a young adult.

Piper Kerman doesn't have to imagine it, because that's exactly what happened to her. She was locked up in a federal prison at age 34 for a drug crime she committed in her early 20s. Because Kerman spent a year living in close quarters with many women, including 18- and 19-year-old girls, she has an unusual, nearly first-hand perspective on what teens in prison need to be successful. Here's her suggestions about what they need:

Positive attention. Kerman found the teens in particular were incredibly responsive to positive attention, creating significant opportunities for change -- opportunities that were often missed.

Cracking the Unpleasant Dealing in Walnut Grove

By |

National Public Radio has done a series on the nation’s largest juvenile justice detention facility in the small town of Walnut Grove, Miss. The story was triggered, in part, by a civil rights lawsuit brought by the Montgomery, Ala.,-based Southern Poverty Law Center and the American Civil Liberties Union.  The suit against the private operator of the facility, GEO Group, claims that inmates are held in inhuman conditions, that sex takes place between female guards and male inmates and that inmate-on- inmate violence is rampant. In mid-2010 the Louisiana-based GEO Group was awarded a contract by the Georgia Department of Corrections to operate a 1,500 adult correctional detention in Milledgeville.

Eric Holder on Juvenile Justice

By |

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said this week the Department of Justice would put a priority on improving the nation’s juvenile justice system. In a speech to the National Association of Counties Legislative Conference, Holder said the Department would place an emphasis on forming community partnerships and using evidence-based research in dealing with the issue. The attorney general also told the conference that it was time to answer some difficult questions concerning crime and race and the treatment of children. “Why,” Holder asked, “is it that, although African-American youth make up 16 percent of the overall youth population, they make up more than half of the juvenile population arrested for committing a violent crime? Why is it that abused and neglected children are 11 times more likely than their non-abused and non-neglected peers to be arrested for criminal behavior?

Deal to Create Bipartisan Special Council on Criminal Justice Reform in Georgia

By |

Governor Deal is set to announce the formation of a Special Council on Criminal Justice Reform on Wednesday.  An unusual coalition of state leaders will join him, including Supreme Court Chief Justice Carol Hunstein, House Minority Leader Stacey Abrams, Lt. Governor Casey Cagle and House Speaker David Ralston.   The Council will spend the next year studying what to do about Georgia’s packed prisons and juvenile detention centers, how to reduce the bill of more than $1.4 billion, and alternatives to incarceration.  Recommendations are due in January 2012. The event takes place at 1:45pm at the Capitol.

Black Caucus Meets with Deal, Says He’s Open to Reassessing SB440

By |

Legislation passed nearly 20 years ago mandating that some children be prosecuted as adults and locked up for years is getting a fresh look from members of the general assembly and possibly the governor. JJIE.org has confirmed that in a recent meeting with some Georgia Legislative Black Caucus members, new Governor Nathan Deal stated that he is willing to reassess Senate Bills 440 and 441. The development comes on the heels of prison overcrowding concerns Governor Deal, a former juvenile court judge, expressed last month during his first state-of –the-state address. “The governor has indicated that he is open to discussions about this; the speaker of the house (David Ralston) said the same when we met with him a few days later,” says Georgia State Senator Emmanuel Jones (D-10) “Texas and Alabama are taking the lead on reforming these laws. These laws were passed during a time 15 to 16 years ago when both parties were trying to ‘out tough’ each other on crime.

Steve Reba: Adult by Fiat, Perseverance by Child

By |

One of the first children—pardon me, one of the first thirteen-year-old adults—that  Georgia automatically transferred to the criminal justice system has spent more than half of his seventeen years in the hole.  

His knuckles bear the scars of an antipathy to abusive power and injustice, as does his disciplinary record.  And while his moral compass is quite in line with what passes for heroism on the outside, on the inside, such defense of principle usually leaves you bantering with desolation’s four walls. There was the correctional officer who took a stack of his neatly written letters asking for legal assistance that the boy was planning to send once he could afford postage. After tossing them on the ground, the officer urinated on the pleas for help in front of the seventeen-year-old.  Or, there was the klansman correctional officer at Alto who constantly referred to him as “nigger slave.” As you’ve likely deduced, his response to both resulted in injury to the officers, years in solitary, and retributive cruelty from the friends of those he beat, which kept the cycle spinning. His are the kind of prison offenses that make parole difficult.  In a history-written-by-those-who-conquer situation, facts of these incidents are generally not included in the summaries supplied to the parole board.

Child Trauma Linked To Prison Time

By |

The majority of American youth behind bars have suffered trauma during their childhoods, a newly released report by the Justice Policy Institute (JPI) says. According to Healing Invisible Wounds: Why Investing in Trauma-Informed Care for Children Makes Sense, of the more than 93,000 children currently incarcerated, between 75 and 93 percent have experienced at least one traumatic experience, including sexual abuse, war, community violence, neglect and maltreatment. “Incarcerated youth already face significant challenges, but youth who have experienced trauma are even more acutely affected,” says author Dr. Erica Adams. The brief, published by the Washington, D.C.-based organization that promotes the reduction of the nation’s prison population, notes that youth who engage in delinquent behavior should be held accountable but also strongly suggests that judges consider  trauma exposure when deciding where youth are placed. Young people who receive treatment in the community tend to have better outcomes than those placed in correctional facilities, the report says. “We simply cannot afford to ignore the evidence and prevalence of the long-term effects of untreated childhood trauma,” says JPI Executive Director Tracy Velázquez.

Prison costs burden Georgia as other states test alternatives

By |

Georgia taxpayers spend $1 billion dollars a year locking up criminals in prison.  An eye-opening analysis by the Atlanta Journal Constitution shows one in 70 Georgians is behind bars and each offender costs $49 a day.  It is not because the state has more crime, but because sentencing laws are tougher here, keeping criminals behind bars longer.  In the first of a two-part series, the AJC raises questions about Georgia’s tough-on-crime stand, and whether it’s worth the cost at a time when the state is cutting teachers, transportation and critical programs.  Even some conservative policymakers like former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Georgia) are studying alternatives to prison.  In a surprising interview, Gingrich argues treatment programs for non-violent offenders work, and can be safer and less expensive. In part two, the AJC reports about 2-thirds of inmates locked up are non-violent. For them, alternatives such as drug courts and work-release might work and save money.  Other states across the south, such as Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Texas are working on research-based alternatives.