Juvenile Justice Information Exchange (https://jjie.org/tag/ptsd/)
When a student opened fire at her Detroit high school in November 2021, killing four students and injuring seven others, Rebekah Schuler let go of the idea of ever feeling truly safe in school again.
The U.S. Supreme Court last month affirmed that lifetime imprisonment without the possibility of parole is just punishment for Brett Jones, who was convicted in 2005 of murdering his grandfather, a tragedy that the then 15-year-old said was an act of self-defense.
Cassio Batteast, a community advocate in Jackson, recently sat down with 20 of the students in the local school district who were causing the most trouble.
Over weekly meetings, they gradually opened up to him. “I learned that 10 of the 20 had fathers who had been murdered or fathers who had murdered someone. Half,” he said.
As I try to grapple with the effects of PTSD and other effects of trauma I wanted to paint a very vivid picture of what a soul on fire looks like and feels like. Through poetry I am able to do this, so far after the actual experience of living in hell and chaos.
Flinching as a gunshot whizzes past your window. Covering your ears when a police car races down your street, sirens blaring. Walking past a drug deal on your block or a beating at your school.
Solitary confinement in juvenile facilities remains too widespread, is unnecessary and counterproductive, is unfairly applied and is harmful, a new report says.
Back in the fall of 2011, kids bullied Alycin Mabry so severely that her mom decided to home school the Atlanta 14-year-old. At the time, her mom Annise Mabry saw homeschooling as the shining answer the family needed. But today, Mabry says, it’s clear that their struggle was far from over. “Maybe two or three months into the online school, Ali started to become more and more isolated,” Mabry said. “I just couldn’t get her out of the room.
The girl is maybe 15 years old? She is standing in the back of a building, or maybe it’s an alley way. She has her arms wrapped around her body and her teeth are chattering. When the officer approaches and tells her to leave the alley way she shakes her head and refuses. The officer moves in closer and reiterates his order to leave. Suddenly the girl is lunging at him, screaming, “Don’t touch me! Don’t touch me! Get away from me!” She is pushing her hands out at him, then pointing her finger at the officer, ordering him to keep his distance.