Juvenile Offenders

Lawyers for a Harford County teen accused of killing his father last year attempted to convince a judge Friday that it would be unconstitutional to try the 17-year-old as an adult. Robert C. Richardson III's attorneys also said the boy is suffering from the effects of isolation at the county jail, asking at a motions hearing for their client to be transferred to a facility for juveniles. They said he is being held in solitary confinement at the Harford County Detention Center. "The jail in Harford County does not have the capability to address the needs of juvenile offenders and juvenile inmates," lawyer Kay Beehler said at a hearing Friday in Harford County Circuit Court.

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.

After more than a decade's worth of tough-on-crime policies dumped more juvenile offenders into adult prisons, the pendulum is swinging back, according to two new studies. A majority of Americans polled in MacArthur Foundation-sponsored surveys favor rehabilitation over incarceration and are willing to spend more money toward that end. The public's preference should be reflected in juvenile justice policies and law, but attitudes in many state capitals will have to change for that to happen.

Forty-one minutes. That's how much time elapsed before counselors at the Bowling Brook Preparatory School called an ambulance for a 17-year-old student who had passed out while staffers restrained him. The staff allegedly held off calling 911 because they thought the unresponsive youth was faking. It was a miscalculation that likely cost Isaiah Simmons his life, and a shocking revelation in a case that has led to the closure of the Bowling Brook school and overdue reforms in the treatment of juvenile offenders in the state's care.

When juvenile offenders under the supervision of the state show up dead in Baltimore or are charged with murder, something's got to give. Somebody has to start asking questions about the teenagers, their daily lives and the system overseeing them. Those questions have been asked and provoked a more comprehensive review of hundreds of Baltimore cases, and the results so far are damning. A lax system of supervision, overwhelmed caseworkers and poor administrative oversight, all of which suggest a system that needs a comprehensive overhaul.

There's no disagreement that juvenile offenders need help, not just for their own sake but also for the well-being of society as a whole. But the question of who decides precisely what that help will be has been a matter of contention between the circuit courts and the Department of Juvenile Services. In simplistic terms, the conflict is between judges, who are accountable for protecting the public from lawbreakers, and the Department of Juvenile Services, which is responsible for administering a budget approved by the governor and the General Assembly.

The trumpeted increase in the state budget for services to juvenile offenders is somewhat of a mirage. More than half of the $29.6 million increase to the Department of Juvenile Services is to cover a shortfall in the agency's costs to house juvenile offenders in private residential treatment facilities, and not to fund new programs. While Gov. Martin O'Malley continues to reform the beleaguered system, the primary focus is in providing safe, secure facilities to treat Maryland's most troubled juveniles.

HARFORD COUNTY Board OKs block schedule, raises graduation standards The Harford County school board has approved a broad plan that makes it tougher to get a high school diploma and puts all high schools but one on a new class schedule. Students need to complete more credits - 26 instead of 21 - to graduate, as well as take a fourth year of math. Students also will take four career-related courses and complete off-campus internships. The reform package passed, 5-2, Monday. The proposal also puts eight of the county's nine high schools on a four-period-a-day format, with most classes meeting for 90 minutes.

In what would be a major policy change, court proceedings involving juveniles charged with serious offenses would be open to the public under legislation proposed by the Glendening administration and some lawmakers.While critics say the move would do little to curb crime, proponents say it would focus needed public attention on Maryland's juvenile courts and direct the community's shame on young offenders, whose identities have been shielded."Too often, the criminal and the system itself could hide behind the cloak of confidentiality," said Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, who helped develop the proposal.

Seven juveniles on their way to church escaped from the Charles H. Hickey Jr. School in Baltimore County yesterday morning after they threw pepper in the faces of a bus driver and three youth counselors, Maryland State Police said.Six of the youths were captured by the state police shortly after the 10:14 a.m. incident. The seventh youth was caught at 3:50 p.m.State police and school officials did not identify the fugitives from the state's school for juvenile offenders because they are juveniles.