Bowling Brook

Five months before a student at the Bowling Brook Preparatory School collapsed and died while being restrained by staff, the school's nurse told the Department of Juvenile Services that she was concerned about the safety of youths held there, according to documents obtained by The Sun. Janis Miller complained in August to the state about the staff's handling of several youths - including one who was badly bruised and scraped while being restrained....

Turn Bowling Brook into a model facility The tragedy at Bowling Brook Preparatory School and the announcement of the school's closing offer the state a rare opportunity to provide services for youths that it has not offered since it made the costly mistake of prematurely closing the Charles H. Hickey Jr. School ("Youth facility will be closed," March 3). It is time for the state to step up and purchase the Bowling Brook facility and make it a state-of-the-art youth placement center that would be a model for the nation.

Sheriff's deputies and state police are investigating the death of a 17-year-old East Baltimore youth who collapsed Tuesday evening while being restrained by staff at a privately run residential program for juvenile offenders. Isaiah Simmons III was pronounced dead at Carroll Hospital Center after paramedics found him in cardiac arrest at the Bowling Brook Preparatory School near Westminster, officials said. Staff at the school attempted to subdue the youth after an outburst in which he allegedly threatened to harm other students and school personnel, according to the Carroll County Sheriff's Office.

NATIONAL Prosecutors charge astronaut Florida prosecutors charged an astronaut yesterday with trying to kidnap a romantic rival, but they declined to file the attempted murder charge recommended by police. pg 3A Army secretary resigns Army Secretary Francis J. Harvey stepped down yesterday in the fallout from a scandal over substandard conditions for war-wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. pg 1A MARYLAND Bowling Brook to close Under pressure from the state, officials at Bowling Brook Preparatory School have agreed to close the 50-year-old reformatory where a student died five weeks ago while being restrained by staff.

Still smarting from a two-point home loss to No. 15 City last Thursday, Lake Clifton drilled visiting Walbrook, 73-46, last night by getting "back to the basics," coach Herman Harried said. "Fundamentals and the basics start with defense, and everybody communicated and played great defense tonight," Harried said of his No. 8 Lakers (8-1). Terrence Jones led four Lakers in double digits with 19 points, including five of his team's eight three-pointers. Jason Sharp followed with 17 points.

Bowling Brook Preparatory School was long regarded as a rare gem in Maryland's troubled juvenile justice system, a place that took in delinquent teens and turned them into well-mannered young men. The residential program for juvenile offenders has been the subject of intense criticism since a youth died there in January, yet some of its supporters were disappointed yesterday to learn that it will close next week. An emotional Del. Donald B. Elliot, a Republican representing parts of Carroll and Frederick counties, called the closing of Bowling Brook a "sad ending to an outstanding institution."

Under pressure from the state, officials at Bowling Brook Preparatory School have agreed to close the 50-year-old reformatory where a student died five weeks ago while being restrained by staff. The privately run residential program in Carroll County issued a statement that it will shut down Friday even as construction crews kept working on an addition funded in part by the state. In Annapolis, Maryland's new juvenile services secretary, Donald W. DeVore, said his agency probably would have acted to revoke Bowling Brook's license if the once highly regarded program for juvenile offenders hadn't decided on its own to close.

With the Bowling Brook Preparatory School set to close Friday and the death of student Isaiah Simmons ruled a homicide by the state medical examiner, attention shifts to a Carroll County grand jury and possible criminal charges against staff who were restraining the 17-year-old when he died Jan. 23. But the focus shouldn't remain only there. The state Department of Juvenile Services, which licenses and inspects facilities in which it places troubled youths, has as much to answer for as does the residential center in Carroll County.

Gov. Martin O'Malley is asking the legislature to add $21 million to the budget of Maryland's troubled juvenile services system, including money to open the state's first new residential treatment program for youth offenders in more than a decade, officials said yesterday. The state is leaning toward using the site of the former Victor Cullen Academy in Frederick County, which closed in 2002, according to new Juvenile Services Secretary Donald W. DeVore. Acknowledging the problems that have beset large facilities, he said the new program would be smaller than those the state has run in the past.

While players might enjoy blowout wins, coaches generally dislike them because they fear that their athletes will be lulled into a false sense of security.Bowling Brook coach Daryl Jackson was no different last night -- 24 hours after the Thoroughbreds had drubbed Odenton Christian, 71-7 -- and admitted that he was worried about facing the Maryland School for the Deaf.But senior center Darien Cook scored a game-high 20 points and hauled in eight rebounds as the host Thoroughbreds eased their coach's mind with a 71-26 rout of the Maryland School for the Deaf.

The directors of Silver Oak Academy, a new privately run facility for juvenile delinquents, gave tours to state officials and neighbors Thursday, pointing out that there is plenty of room to grow on 78 rural acres in Carroll County. Seventeen teenage boys now live there, though the Keymar campus can accommodate 150 or more. S. James Broman, president of Rite of Passage, the Nevada-based company that owns Silver Oak, said he is pleased Maryland gave his group "an opportunity to prove itself."

Maryland's Department of Juvenile Services seemed to have learned the right lessons from the death of Isaiah Simmons III, the 17-year-old Baltimore boy who was killed in 2007 while being restrained at the Bowling Brook youth lockup in Carroll County. The sprawling facility was closed, and state leaders rightly used the death as a rallying cry for finally moving Maryland toward a system of small facilities for juvenile offenders - no more than 48 beds each - located in or near the communities the youths came from and connected with comprehensive family services.

Facility likely to defy DJS reforms The Sun's editorial "A return to Bowling Brook" (Aug. 6) cautions the state, as it moves toward reopening Bowling Brook Preparatory School in Carroll County, to proceed in accordance with the Department of Juvenile Services' reform guidelines calling for "small" 48-bed treatment programs. Yet it appears unlikely that such an approach will be followed. Rite of Passage, the Nevada-based company that has applied for a license to run the Bowling Brook program, operates facilities in Western states that serve hundreds of children; its Ridge View facility in Colorado can house 500 youths.

A Nevada company is seeking a license to operate a program for juvenile offenders at the old Bowling Brook Preparatory School in Carroll County. The type of program and the number of clients Rite of Passage would serve are not yet publicly known. But as state officials review the company's request, Maryland's efforts to reform the juvenile justice system should be uppermost in their minds. Juvenile offenders who need residential treatment should be in programs that serve no more than 48 teenagers and are close to their homes.

A Nevada company that recently purchased the grounds of the Bowling Brook Preparatory School - a Carroll County youth lockup that was shuttered last year after a Baltimore boy died there - has applied for a state license to operate a juvenile program. Rite of Passage has been working for months to open a privately run facility for young offenders - a move that some advocates have said could contradict the state's new approach to treating juvenile delinquents in small residential settings.

After an intense, hourlong debate - and over the objections of the state comptroller - the Maryland Board of Public Works approved the transfer yesterday of Bowling Brook Preparatory School, clearing the way for a Nevada company to reopen the Carroll County facility for juvenile delinquents. Some youth advocates and state legislators criticized the Department of Juvenile Services for rushing forward with a plan that could result in a 173-bed, privately run facility, which they said contradicts the state's juvenile justice strategy of 48-bed regional treatment centers.

The state Department of Juvenile Services is moving to reopen Bowling Brook Preparatory School under new private management, potentially bringing back a Carroll County residence for troubled teenage boys that was closed last year when a youth died while being restrained by staff members. State juvenile service officials are expected today to ask the Board of Public Works in Annapolis to transfer the 16-acre property, which can house up to 173 boys, to a for-profit Nevada company called Rite of Passage.

The family of an East Baltimore teen who died at a Carroll County school for juvenile offenders filed a multimillion-dollar civil suit in federal court yesterday against the school, several of its employees and the state Department of Juvenile Services. The $207 million requested in compensatory damages - for negligence and wrongful death - represent $1 million for every minute that Isaiah Simmons III, who died January 2007 at Bowling Brook Preparatory School, suffered from the physical restraint "that caused his slow, agonizing and excruciating death," Steven H. Heisler, the family's attorney, said during a news conference.

A judge dismissed the charges against five counselors in the death of an East Baltimore teen at a Carroll County school for juvenile offenders, saying yesterday that a failure to call for help does not constitute reckless endangerment. Carroll County Circuit Judge Michael M. Galloway ruled that although counselors are accused of waiting 41 minutes to call 911, reckless endangerment charges should be dismissed because that law applies to acts, not failure to take action. The ruling outraged the mother of 17-year-old Isaiah Simmons, who died at the privately run Bowling Brook Preparatory School, and led her to renew her call for federal charges.

Things haven't been easy for Donald W. DeVore, the highly praised reformer Gov. Martin O'Malley brought in from Connecticut to fix Maryland's violence-prone juvenile justice system. As soon as he arrived in February, he found himself managing the fallout from the death a few weeks before of a Baltimore youth in a private detention facility. Three months later, he found himself explaining how 10 youths escaped from the Charles H. Hickey Jr. School - and why an automatic notification system for the school's neighbors failed.