Juvenile Justice System

If 18-year-old Lamont Davis' trial and sentencing on attempted-murder charges are not flashing signs for juvenile justice reform, it is difficult to see what would be. Mr. Davis was convicted of a terrible shooting that badly injured 5-year-old Raven Wyatt. But the two life sentences plus 30 years he received, foreclosing any possible second chance, would shock those who founded the first juvenile courts a century ago. The original juvenile courts, initially established in Chicago in 1899 and later throughout the United States, placed rehabilitation ahead of punishment.

In the J. DeWeese Carter Center in Kent County, youths would pick fights that sometimes turned into melees, recalled Rodney Stallworth, who spent four months there last year on a drug charge. The detention system frustrated the 18-year-old East Baltimore resident, but he also called it a refuge. He sometimes acted out violently because he knew it would keep him there — and away from drugs and guns on the street. "Since we can't go home, we would try to send the staff home" angry, he said.

NEW YORK -- The nation was stunned recently when it learned that the two Chicago boys ages 7 and 8 who had been charged with the brutal sexual assault and murder of an 11-year-old girl in July couldn't have done it.After several weeks of media denunciation of the boys, prosecutors told the court that the state police lab had found semen on the victim's underwear. Forensic experts said it is only remotely possible for boys this young to produce semen.Prosecutors asked that charges against the boys be dropped "in the interests of justice."

Violence against juveniles has declined significantly in Baltimore in recent years as juvenile arrests have dropped and student graduations increased — a trend that the city schools chief said stills lags behind perceptions of the city's youths. "The fact that these things are coming together is … not an illusion," schools CEO Andrés Alonso said at a news conference at City Hall. "It's huge for the city. " Amid the continued decline in gun violence, which helped the city fall below 200 homicides last year for the first time since the 1970s, has been a sustained reduction in violence involving juveniles, officials say. Forty-two juveniles were shot or killed in 2011, down 67 percent from 2007 when 128 were shot or killed, statistics show.

Beautiful. The cops keep telling us we're losing control of our kids, and now a grand jury tells us we're losing the kids even when they're allegedly under control.The cops keep arresting these children who've moved directly from Mother Goose to Lady Cocaine. The playgrounds are now finishing schools for tomorrow's parasites. For this, the community keeps places like the Charles H. Hickey Jr. School, where the most troubling kids are taken for incarceration and, you should pardon the expression, correction.

Maryland's reliance on putting juveniles in detention centers has led to severe overcrowding in deplorable conditions, juvenile justice advocates told a state legislative committee yesterday. The advocates, who are pushing for several bills aimed at reforming the state Department of Juvenile Justice, also told the House Judiciary Committee that services in the detention centers do not meet the needs of the children. According to the Maryland Juvenile Justice Coalition, more than 7,000 children are placed in juvenile detention each year, and many of them are detained for nonviolent offenses.

THE recent series in documenting abuses of juvenile offenders in state boot camps comes on the heels of a scathing report by an international human rights group that criticized conditions for youths confined to Maryland's jails. These revelations raise serious concerns about the state's handling of juvenile offenders and should prompt elected officials to re-examine the overly punitive policies that have been implemented in recent years. "Maryland's jails are inappropriate places for youth, even for those accused of committing very serious crimes," the internationally acclaimed Human Rights Watch reported.

HEREWITH A tale of overnight change and reforms of longer duration. In 1987, then-Gov. William Donald Schaefer toured the old Montrose Training School for juvenile offenders. Shaken by the desperate conditions there, he issued a terse order to his juvenile services secretary, Linda Rossi. "Fix that place," he said. "It can't be fixed," she said. "It has to be closed." "Then close it," Mr. Schaefer said. Close it they did, virtually overnight and at some political risk. Many young offenders would be going into community-based programs.

A 17-year-old was sentenced to 40 years in prison yesterday in Baltimore County Circuit Court for sexually assaulting a nurse at the Charles H. Hickey Jr. School in an incident that permanently scarred the victim and highlighted problems in Maryland's juvenile justice system. Felix Fitzgerald received a life sentence with all but 40 years suspended by Judge Alexander Wright Jr. Fitzgerald, who pleaded guilty to first-degree sexual assault, expressed no remorse, but in a brief tirade, he told Wright that he only pleaded guilty June 28 because he was convinced he wouldn't get a fair trial.

Minors charged with serious crimes would be tried in open court, not in private, under legislation approved yesterday in the General Assembly.While critics say the legislation will do little to curb crime, proponents say it would focus needed public attention on Maryland's juvenile courts and direct the community's disapproval at young offenders, whose identities have been shielded.The measure would allow judges to close cases for "good cause," but proponents of the legislation said they expected that most proceedings would be open to the public.

A recent report from the National Council on Crime and Delinquency demonstrates clearly that the state's plan for a $100 million jail to house Baltimore City youths charged as adults is way out of line. But the answer is not necessarily a smaller jail, either. The NCCD details five scenarios that, when implemented, could eliminate the need for a new jail at all — an outcome that is not only financially advantageous to our city but a moral imperative. Today's juvenile justice system remains true to its origins.

Baltimore needs a better way to handle juveniles who are charged as adults. The current system of housing them in a wing of the city's detention center is dangerous and inefficient. But a new report from the National Council on Crime and Delinquency confirms what youth activists have been saying for six years — that a plan to fix the problem by building a $100 million, 230-bed juvenile jail next to the adult jail is the wrong approach. Gov. Martin O'Malley needs to scrap the current plan, which got its start under the Ehrlich administration, and at the very least propose something half the size, though some of the ideas in the report for further reducing the number of youths locked up while waiting for trials in adult court merit serious consideration.

The Sun editorial slamming departing Department of Juvenile Services Secretary Don DeVore ( "Still waiting for Superman," Nov. 21) is unfair, particularly in light of the same newspaper's recent reporting that since 2006, "the number of children killed in [Baltimore] has plunged by 80 percent, and the number of juveniles suspected in killings has dropped by about the same percentage. " As The Sun reported, Mr. DeVore collaborated to supervise the most at-risk youth closely and provide needed services and support.

Juvenile Services Secretary Donald W. DeVore announced Thursday that he's looking for jobs in other states and will not seek reappointment, making him the first Cabinet-level departure since Gov. Martin O'Malley won a second term. DeVore's four-year tenure atop the agency has earned mixed reviews from advocates and lawmakers; they applaud his efforts to physically revamp the state facilities but are frustrated that the agency has not beefed up its treatment and rehabilitation programs.

The two Honduran men sitting on the front steps of a Southeast Baltimore rowhouse couldn't help but chuckle at the sight of a 14-year-old girl clutching a silver revolver and demanding money. But Arteesha Holt wasn't like most girls her age. A tomboy who liked playing football and basketball, relatives say she also had an explosive temper and was prone to uncontrollable outbursts. Once, she destroyed her family's home, slinging an ashtray across the room, tearing pictures from the wall and kicking out a heating vent, all because her infant nephew stepped on a bowl of strawberries.

It's certainly welcome news that conditions in the Baltimore City Juvenile Justice Center have improved enough to persuade the U.S. Department of Justice to lift federal oversight of the youth lockup it has held under scrutiny since 2007. But just because the facility has been found to be "in substantial compliance" with minimum federal standards doesn't mean officials there won't continue to face huge challenges dealing with the city's most troubled youths. The center, which opened in 2003, was originally intended to house up to 144 youths, most of whom were either awaiting trial in the juvenile court system or long-term placement in a rehabilitation program.

It's certainly welcome news that conditions in the Baltimore City Juvenile Justice Center have improved enough to persuade the U.S. Department of Justice to lift federal oversight of the youth lockup it has held under scrutiny since 2007. But just because the facility has been found to be "in substantial compliance" with minimum federal standards doesn't mean officials there won't continue to face huge challenges dealing with the city's most troubled youths. The center, which opened in 2003, was originally intended to house up to 144 youths, most of whom were either awaiting trial in the juvenile court system or long-term placement in a rehabilitation program.

The case of 17-year-old Lamont Davis, who was arrested last month and charged as an adult with shooting a 5-year-old girl in the head and wounding another youth, should have been a wake-up call for the state Department of Juvenile Services. The teen had been under DJS monitoring for a year when the shooting occurred, and during that time he had been arrested four times. He was awaiting sentencing in juvenile court after confessing to an assault and robbery committed in April. Anyone looking at Mr. Davis' record could have guessed he should never have been allowed back on the streets.

If 18-year-old Lamont Davis' trial and sentencing on attempted-murder charges are not flashing signs for juvenile justice reform, it is difficult to see what would be. Mr. Davis was convicted of a terrible shooting that badly injured 5-year-old Raven Wyatt. But the two life sentences plus 30 years he received, foreclosing any possible second chance, would shock those who founded the first juvenile courts a century ago. The original juvenile courts, initially established in Chicago in 1899 and later throughout the United States, placed rehabilitation ahead of punishment.

A youngster is found delinquent - juvenile justice system parlance for guilty - for spray painting gang symbols on a wall. A police officer tells the principal that the youth could be headed for more trouble and warrants close watching. Seems like the prudent thing to do. But in Maryland, that exchange is against the law, a violation of secrecy rules governing juvenile proceedings in criminal courts. A top lawmaker in Annapolis, outraged that parents in Anne Arundel County didn't know gangs were active in their schools until a 14-year-old boy was killed last year in Crofton, is trying to undo those restrictions, hoping to create a better system of communications to combat gang activity.