Juvenile Services

(From the Maryland Politics blog) Maryland's embattled Juvenile Services secretary is stepping down to pursue "an opportunity in a different state," the agency announced this afternoon. The secretary, Donald W. DeVore, is the first cabinet-level departure since Gov. Martin O'Malley won a second term. DeVore's last year has rocked by the murder of a teacher, apparently at the hands of a student, at the Cheltenham Youth Facility in Prince George's County. State auditors also recently turned up chronic problems with the agency's procurement and bureaucratic procedures.

A 14-year-old boy has been charged with arson and illegal firearms use in connection with damage to a boat in northern Harford County, the Office of the State Fire Marshal said. A joint investigation by the fire marshal's office and the Harford County Sheriff's Office resulted in charges being brought against the juvenile, the fire marshal's office said in a news release. Investigators found a 16-foot bassmaster fishing boat located in the 4300 block of Auer Lane in Darlington had been heavily damaged by fire and that the 14-year-old and an 18-year-old were allegedly igniting fireworks Sunday at 10:30 a.m. Fire damage to the boat is estimated at $2,000, according to the fire marshal's office.

The report from Maryland Occupational Safety and Health (MOSH), this state's workplace safety enforcement agency, cites the Department of Juvenile Services for five serious safety violations in the aftermath of Ms. Hannah Wheeling's murder at the hand of one of her students ("Employees broke safety protocol the day teacher was killed," Aug. 21). Yet the recommendations to DJS might as well be stamped "Keep Up Business as Usual". The MOSH report cites the Department of Juvenile Services' existing safety protocols as sufficient to prevent future homicides of staff by residents when they are followed.

Violence is on the rise at a handful of Maryland's juvenile detention facilities. Staff members at the Victor Cullen Center used handcuffs to restrain youths nearly 200 times in 2011, up from 36 times in 2010. At Cheltenham Youth Facility, riots and other "group disturbances" took place 65 times in 2011, up from a dozen times in 2010. All of this information was readily available in a routine report on a state website, and helped lead to The Baltimore Sun's look this weekend at issues in the state Department of Juvenile Services . The document was filed under Gov. Martin O'Malley's StateStat program.

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.

Not even six months into her tenure as Maryland's independent monitor for juvenile services and Katherine A. Perez has shown that she takes her job quite seriously. In one week, she released a quarterly update of Department of Juvenile Services facilities and two special reports based on surprise visits to two centers. All three reports reinforce the dismally familiar picture of an agency that's not fully in control of its mission or of the young people in its care. DJS Secretary Kenneth C. Montague Jr.'s suggestion that the release of the reports was somehow politically motivated is a regrettable and inappropriate diversion.

Linda D'Amario Rossi, whose blunt, no-nonsense style as secretary of juvenile services has won her fans and critics in her 3 1/2 -year tenure here, said today she has been offered a job package in Rhode Island that Maryland simply cannot match.Rhode Island Gov. Bruce Sundlun was to announce today that he has offered Rossi the directorship of the state Department for Children and Families, a job to which Rossi was appointed in 1984, then promptly lost in 1985 when a new governor, Edward D. DiPrete, was elected.

The departure of Donald DeVore marks the end of yet another secretary who has failed to turn around Maryland's most troubled agency, the Department of Juvenile Services. Mr. DeVore announced Thursday that he would not seek reappointment and was considering career opportunities outside the state. His withdrawal perhaps just saves Gov. Martin O'Malley from having to fire him so that the department, which has been plagued by persistent organizational and security problems, can finally begin to move ahead.

William H. Brooks, a retired juvenile services supervisor, died of complications from cancer Feb. 18 at Northwest Hospital Center. The Randallstown resident was 67. Mr. Brooks retired in 1996 as a supervisor in the Department of Juvenile Services in Baltimore. He began his career in 1964 as a parole and probation officer, and later took a temporary assignment to head a state program to increase minority participation in the real estate industry, family members said. Born in Baltimore and raised on West Lexington Street, he was a 1955 graduate of Douglass High School and earned a business administration degree from what is now Morgan State University.

Nicola Denise Paylor, a case manager specialist with the Maryland Department of Juvenile Services, died of congestive heart failure Friday at Northwest Hospital Center. The Randallstown resident was 38. Born in Baltimore and raised in the Woodlawn area, she attended St. Cecilia Parochial School and John Paul Regional Catholic School. She was a 1988 graduate of Archbishop Keough High School. She earned a Bachelor of Science and a master's degree in criminal justice at Coppin State University.

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.

About 80 percent of the girls committed to residential treatment centers in Maryland were accused of nothing more serious than a misdemeanor, according to Department of Juvenile Services statistics for 2010. For boys, that figure was around 50 percent. "That disparity between boys and girls is troubling and quite large," said Juvenile Services Secretary Sam Abed. "It's something I'm concerned about. It's a very complicated question, but it's something that merits explanation," Abed said.

A second man who was shot Monday night in Southwest Baltimore has died from his injuries, police said as they released the names of both victims Wednesday. Steven Fields, 19, of the 700 block of Mt. Holly St., died Tuesday night at University Hospital, police said. Fields and John Edwards, 17, of the 3900 block of Edmondson Ave., were both shot in the head Monday at about 9:30 p.m. in the 3500 block of W. Mulberry St., police said. Edwards, the third juvenile homicide victim this year in Baltimore, died that night about an hour later.

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.

A North Carroll Middle School eighth-grader is being charged as a juvenile after he voluntarily surrendered a handgun he brought to the Hampstead school Wednesday, Oct. 26, to a school staff member he went to for help. Maryland State Police identified the student is a 15-year-old male. He is not being identified because he is being charged as a juvenile. According to police accounts, shortly before 11 a.m. Wednesday, the student was in the school lunchroom for his lunch period when he approached an assistant principal in the room and said he was troubled with thoughts of harming himself.

Sam Abed, Gov. Martin O'Malley's choice to lead the state's troubled Department of Juvenile Services, is a young man with lots of energy and fresh ideas about how to meet the needs of troubled youth — but not a lot of experience actually doing it. Mr. Abed, 35, is a former prosecutor and juvenile justice official from Virginia, where he served just under five years as deputy director of Virginia's Juvenile Justice Agency, which is part of...

Since Linda D'Amario Rossi came to Maryland to run the Department of Juvenile Services less than four years ago, she has quietly pursued a controversial path -- contracting out programs to private companies.Under Rossi, the department has added eight such alternative programs, ranging from the community-based Choice in South Baltimore to Youth Challenge, a residential-but-unlocked camp in Charles County. They provide an array of services tailored to meet the increasingly diverse needs of Maryland's juveniles, from community-based treatment to residential psychiatric care.

Gov. Martin O'Malley has chosen a former prosecutor and juvenile justice official from Virginia to take over Maryland's troubled Department of Juvenile Services, reeling from the slaying of a teacher last year and revelations of more than $170 million in unsanctioned contracts. O'Malley is expected to name Sam Abed, 35, today to succeed former Juvenile Services Secretary Donald DeVore. Abed, who began working last week, is scheduled to tour the crowded Baltimore City Juvenile Justice Center later in the day. "I am grateful that Sam chose to step forward and use his many talents to help us continue to make progress for Maryland's most vulnerable youth and their families," O'Malley said in a statement.

I believe that juvenile crime in Baltimore is less the failing of individuals and more the fault of flawed public policy. Children succeed when given opportunities for healthy development and avoid serious delinquent behaviors when services are available at the first sign of trouble. When opportunity and services are absent, as they are for many Baltimore city youth, growing up can be hard. Faced with barren environments — with few places to play, living in households on the verge of crisis, too many young people adopt dysfunctional behaviors for mere survival.