A TALE OF TWO JURISDICTIONS - Prison Policy Initiative · 6 A Tale of Two Jurisdictions 1993-95....

A TALE OF TWO JURISDICTIONS:Youth Crime and Detention Rates inMaryland & the District of Columbia

For a fair and effectiveyouth justice system

October 2001

Lisa Feldman, Michael Malesand Vincent Schiraldi.

A TALE OF TWO JURISDICTIONS:Youth Crime and Detention Rates inMaryland & the District of Columbia1

www.buildingblocksforyouth.org

The Building Blocks for Youth initiative has five major components:

(1) Research on the disparate impact of the justice system on minority youth, on the effects ofnew adult-court transfer legislation in the states, and on the privatization of juvenile justice facilitiesby for-profit corporations;

(2) Analyses of decisionmaking at critical points in the justice system, including arrest, detention,adjudication, and disposition;

(3) Direct advocacy on behalf of youth in the justice system, particularly on issues thatdisproportionately affect youth of color such as conditions of confinement in jails, prisons, andjuvenile facilities; access to counsel and adequacy of representation in juvenile court; and "zerotolerance" and other issues relating to school suspensions and expulsions;

(4) Constituency-building among African-American, Latino, and Native-American and otherminority organizations, as well as organizations in the medical, mental health, legal, lawenforcement, child welfare, civil rights, human rights, religious, victim's rights, and domesticviolence areas, at the national, state, and local levels;

(5) Development of communications strategies to provide timely, accurate, and relevantinformation to these constituencies, public officials, policymakers, the media, and the public.

The partners in the initiative are the Youth Law Center, American Bar Association Juvenile JusticeCenter, Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice, Juvenile Law Center, Minorities in LawEnforcement, National Council on Crime and Delinquency and Pretrial Services Resource Center.

The initiative is supported in part by the Annie E. Casey, Ford, Mott, MacArthur, Rockefeller andWilliam T. Grant foundations, and the Center on Crime, Communities & Culture of the OpenSociety Institute.

Points of view or opinions in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarilyrepresent the official position or policies of the supporting foundations.

http://www.buildingblocksforyouth.org/

3A Tale of Two Jurisdictions

I. Introduction

Several hundred thousand youth churnthrough our nation’s detention facilitieseach year – youth who have been arrested,but not convicted, of any charges. The useof detention has increased substantiallyover the past decade, as detentionpopulations grew by 38 percent between1987 and 1996.2 Overcrowding in juveniledetention facilities is common. Over 70percent of the detention facilities inAmerica are over their capacity.3

Additionally, youth of color aresignificantly overrepresented in detention.According to a 1999 report from the Officeof Juvenile Justice and DelinquencyPrevention, in 1996, African Americanyouth were nearly twice as likely to bedetained as white youth, even whencontrolling for offense behavior.4

Swimming against the tide of increasingdetention populations, the Annie E. CaseyFoundation launched its JuvenileDetention Alternatives Initiative (JDAI) in1993. The goals of the JDAI were “toreduce the number of childrenunnecessarily or inappropriately detained;to minimize the number of youth who failto appear in court or reoffend pendingadjudication; to redirect public fundstoward successful reform strategies; andto improve conditions of confinement.”5

With Casey support and through acombination of approaches includingexpediting case processing, developingalternatives to detention and creatingobjective detention screening instruments,officials in Multnomah County (Portland),Oregon and Cook County (Chicago),Illinois were able to substantially reducethe number of youth who they detainedwithout jeopardizing public safety. For

example, from 1993 to 2000, the numberof youth detained on an average day inCook County declined by 30 percent.Similarly, between 1994 and 2000, thenumber of youth referred to detention inMultnomah County declined by more thanhalf.6 From 1993 to 1999 (the latest yearavailable), violent youth arrests in CookCounty fell by 54 percent.7 From 1994 to2000, overall felony arrests for youth inMultnomah County declined by 45percent.8

With the growing use of detentionnationally as a “first line” response toallegations of juvenile delinquency and thegrowing number of minority youth who arebeing detained, it is reasonable to askabout the effectiveness of increasing theuse of detention as a crime control policyversus other policy alternatives.

Building Blocks for Youth, a nationalinitiative to promote a fair and effectiveyouth justice system, commissioned thisreport to determine whether it is possibleto reduce the number of youth in securedetention and place young people whohave gotten in trouble with the law incommunity programs, without incurringan increase in juvenile crime. Our analysisconcentrated on two neighboringjurisdictions – Washington, D.C. andMaryland – which have struggled tomanage their juvenile detentionpopulations during the 1990’s. BuildingBlocks also focused on these jurisdictionsbecause of their high rates ofdisproportionate minority confinement.For example, while African Americansmake up 32 percent of Maryland’s youth,African Americans are 64 percent ofdetained youth9 and 72 percent of youthwho are committed to state facilities afteradjudication.10 In D.C., the problem is

A Tale of Two Jurisdictions4

even worse. On most days, every youngperson at the Oak Hill Youth Center, theDistrict’s juvenile detention andcommitment facility, is a youth of color.11

The District of Columbia and Marylandprovide an interesting basis forcomparison because the two jurisdictionsemploy similar statutes regardingdelinquency jurisdiction, and similarprocesses for waiving a juvenile to theadult system.12 Both jurisdictions alsooperate detention systems that confineminority youth in numbers that aregreatly disproportionate to theirrepresentation in the general population.However, during the 1990’s, these twojurisdictions took dramatically differentapproaches to juvenile detention. Whilethe state of Maryland was increasing itsuse of detention, detention rates in theDistrict of Columbia declinedsubstantially. Furthermore, the District’stwo facility closures were caused largely, ifnot completely, by exogenous factors (alawsuit and an act of Congress), therebyallowing us to consider a sharp decline inthe use of detention that cannot be said tobe the result of a decline in crime rates.After a decade of heading in two decidedlydifferent directions, it is worthwhile toexamine the difference in outcomes.Specifically, this report will seek todetermine if the District of Columbia’ssubstantial decline in the use of detentioncame at the expense of public safety or,conversely, if Maryland’s increased use ofdetention was associated with improvedpublic safety.

II. Methodology

A. Detention Data

To carry out our analysis, we comparedthe available data on juvenile arrest ratesand detention rates in Washington, D.C.and the state of Maryland. Concurrently,we interviewed various experts who haveworked with either jurisdiction (or in somecases both) about the issues facingpolicymakers regarding juvenile justiceand to provide an historical context for thechanges in policies and practices.13 Wealso reviewed numerous newspaperarticles and reports commissioned by, andsubmitted to, government agenciesconcerning secure detention, and inparticular, the issues facing theCheltenham Youth Facility in Maryland,and the Oak Hill Youth Detention Center,the Cedar Knoll Youth Center, and theD.C. Receiving Home for Children(“Receiving Home”) in the District ofColumbia.

Data provided by the District of Columbiafor detained youth were highly inadequate,rendering analysis extremely difficult. Theabsence of adequate data demonstratethat the District of Columbia is inparticularly serious need of upgrading itsdata collection techniques if it is toproperly plan for the welfare of youth in itssystem and the public safety of itscitizens. Nevertheless, the issues raised bythe analysis offer some insights into therelationship between detention and arrestrates.

Data from the District of Columbia’s YouthServices Administration (YSA) are anestimate of average daily population,obtained in the following fashion. During


the 1990’s, the Youth ServicesAdministration detained youth in threeseparate locked facilities – Cedar Knoll(closed 1994); Receiving Home (closed1995); and Oak Hill (still in operation). Forthe Oak Hill population, at our requestYSA staff pulled random populationcounts for each month during the entiredecade, and averaged those to come upwith an average daily populationestimate.14

YSA was unable to generate detentionpopulation data for either the ReceivingHome or Cedar Knoll facilities for any ofthe years the facilities were in operation.

The Receiving Home was regularly over its38-bed capacity prior to its closure in1995. We used the conservative figure of50 youth detained on an average daybased on interviews conducted over thecourse of the past year and a review ofnumerous newspaper articles concerningthe facility. 15 We factored those 50 youthinto the District’s average daily populationcount up until 1995.

Cedar Knoll was a 225-bed facilityoperated in Laurel, Maryland and usedprimarily for pre-adjudicated youth. Again,according to numbers provided duringinterviews, it was estimated that 75percent of Cedar Knoll’s average dailypopulation were detained youth, orroughly 169 youth on an average day. Thisfigure was factored in to the District’saverage daily population estimate until1994 when Cedar Knoll was closed.

This allowed us to create estimates of theaverage daily population of youth indetention in D.C. Maryland detention datawas available from the MarylandDepartment of Juvenile Justice. We then

compared detention rates in D.C. andMaryland, both of which we express asrates per 1,000 youth age 10-17 in therespective jurisdictions.

In order to check on the detentionpopulation estimates for the District ofColumbia, JPI researchers contacted NateWilliams, Assistant DeputySuperintendent, Youth ServicesAdministration, Randy Moore, Chief CourtLiaison Officer for Youth ServicesAdministration, JoAnn Rohan, YouthTreatment Coordinator, Youth ServicesAdministration, and David Reiser, Jerry M.plaintiff’s counsel during most of the1990’s.16 All of those interviewed agreedthat the number of youth detained in theDistrict of Columbia declined substantiallywith the closure of Cedar Knoll and theReceiving Home and the placement of apopulation cap on Oak Hill. They werecomfortable with the estimates included inthis analysis, and could come up with nobetter method of obtaining detentionpopulation numbers for D.C. throughoutthe 1990’s.

B. Arrest data

Crime trends in D.C. and Maryland arecompared using juvenile arrest figures forviolent crime and property crime (the onlyavailable measures of juvenile crime)divided by the respective jurisdictions’population for each year. Juvenile arrestsare available for D.C. and for Marylandfrom 1990 to 1999. Population figures forthe District of Columbia and Maryland areavailable from the 1990 and 2000 Census.Populations for intervening years areestimated by interpolation. The 1999 or2000 figures, as applicable, are comparedto two periods during the 1990’s: theaverage for 1990-92 and the average for


1993-95. The three-year averages for thesetwo earlier periods are used to avoidfluctuations that would have been causedby using any single year’s data as thebasis for comparison.

III. Findings

A. Youth Crime and Detention Rates inMaryland and the District of Columbia

Overall, while the District of Columbiasharply reduced its use of detentionduring the 1990’s, its rates of juvenilecrime declined more markedly for violentoffenses and in similar fashion forproperty crime than the declineswitnessed in Maryland.

During the 1990’s, Maryland’s averagedaily population (ADP) held in juveniledetention facilities rose slightly (up 3percent), expressed as a rate per 1,000juveniles in its state population by year(Figure 1). Meanwhile, the District ofColumbia sharply reduced its juveniledetention rate (down 71 percent). Duringthat same period, D.C.’s violent juvenilecrime rate declined by 55 percent, morethan three times the decline in Maryland’sviolent juvenile crime rate (15 percent).Juvenile property crime declined at aboutthe same rate in D.C. as in Maryland (bothdown about 30 percent), although D.C.showed a larger overall decline from theearly 1990s.

-80%

-70%

-60%

-50%

-40%

-30%

-20%

-10%

0%

10%

Average Daily

Detention Population

Juvenile Violent

Crime Rate

+3%

-71%

-15%

-55%

Maryland

Maryland

D.C. D.C.

Figure I: Percent Change in Juvenile Detention and Arrest

Rates in Maryland and Washington, DC, 1990-92 to 1999

Source: Metropolitan Police Department (DC); Maryland State Police;

Maryland Department of Juvenile Justice; Youth Services Administration

(DC); The Washington Post; Interviews.


As such, while D.C.’s juvenile arrest ratefor Part I (felony) violent and propertyoffenses was 7 percent higher thanMaryland’s rate in the early 1990’s, by1999, D.C.’s juvenile Part I arrest rateswere 19 percent lower than Maryland’s.While the two jurisdictions have sharplydiffering rates and trends in juveniledetentions and arrests for violent crime, itdoes not appear that D.C.’s sharpdecrease in juvenile detentions over thedecade were accompanied by increases injuvenile offending. In fact, the offensesthat cause the most public concern,violent crime, declined more impressivelyin D.C. than they did in Maryland.

IV. Discussion

Ironically, during the last 15 years, boththe District of Columbia and the state ofMaryland have closed large locked youthinstitutions, without causing an increasein youth crime. A brief look at the changesin both systems, the forces that promptedthose changes, and the positive outcomesthat resulted from facility closures,provide some hopeful lessons for thefuture of detention reform in bothjurisdictions.

A. The Maryland Story

In 1988, the state of Maryland closeddown the Montrose Juvenile TrainingSchool. Although Montrose housed youthwho had already been adjudicated (asopposed to youth detained pre-adjudication, or pretrial), analogies can bedrawn between Maryland’s experienceclosing Montrose and the challenges itnow faces with its juvenile detentionpopulation.

Many factors dating back to the late1960’s led to the closure of Montrose,including a 1967 report by the U.S.Department of Health, Education, andWelfare (now Health and Human Services)which found “the overuse ofinstitutionalization”17 and a 1973 report bythe NAACP Legal Defense and EducationFund examining the State’s trainingschools, which found that there were toomany youth in juvenile institutions whodid not belong there.18 In 1986, the Stateestimated that 44 percent of the Montrosepopulation had been incarcerated for aviolation of probation, and most of theseviolations were for status offenses such astruancy.19

In response to the mounting pressures, inearly 1986 the State conducted ananalysis of its own on the necessity ofclosing the Montrose School. TheDepartment of Health and Mental Hygiene,the parent agency of the Juvenile ServicesAdministration at that time, reported, “atleast half of the youth do not need to bethere. Many youth in the remaining halfmay also be more appropriately served innon-institutional settings.”20

While D.C. sharply

reduced its use of

detention during the

1990’s and Maryland

increased detention,

D.C.’s rates of violent

juvenile crime declined

more markedly than

Maryland’s.


As the media learned about the conditionsat Montrose, and news of youthmistreatment and suicides appearedpublicly, the political pressure onpolicymakers to take action increased.Concurrently, the state was also facinglegal and fiscal pressures. Frustrated withthe state’s failure to improve theconditions at Montrose, Susan Leviton,from the University of Maryland School ofLaw, filed a class action suit against thefacility. The lawsuit alleged that Montrosesubjected youth to cruel and unusualpunishment and denied them due processprotections and adequate treatment.21

Soon after, the Sierra Club informed thestate of its intention to file a lawsuitregarding the wastewater treatmentsystem at Montrose.

In 1987, the state began the process ofclosing Montrose, which housed over 200post-adjudicated youth, after concluding,“even with constant improvements,continued operation of the MontroseSchool could no longer be considered goodpublic policy.”22 An evaluation conductedby the Center for the Study of Youth Policyat the University of Michigan reported thatless than 30 percent of Montrose youthhad been charged with any act of violence.They were largely status offenders(runaways and truants), misdemeanants,and property offenders.23

On March 11, 1988, with the help of theNational Center on Institutions andAlternatives, the last Montrose youth leftthe campus for an alternative placementand the facility was officially closed. Nearlyhalf of the youth were released withcommunity services and supervision intotheir own homes. Most others were placedsuccessfully into smaller, non-secureresidential programs. Ira Schwartz, formeradministrator of the Federal Office ofJuvenile Justice and DelinquencyPrevention and now Provost of TempleUniversity, identified the greatest lessonlearned from the closure of Montrose,“There is clearly strong evidence thatcommunity programs work and they donot compromise public safety and theyreduce recidivism. The number of kidsthat need to be under lock and key is very,very small.”24 A year after its closure, fewerthan 15 percent of youths released fromMontrose had been reincarcerated.25

Ironically, despite their success in closingthe Montrose Training School, and despitemany of the same factors being inevidence for their detained population (i.e.substandard conditions, youth chargedwith minor offenses, unnecessarydetention), Maryland officials consistentlyincreased the use of locked detention forpreadjudicated youth throughout thefollowing decade of the 1990’s. Thisresulted in overcrowding and substandardconditions for youth in detention inMaryland.

During the mid-1990’s, attention wasfocused specifically on the CheltenhamYouth Facility, Maryland’s largest andoldest detention facility. The CheltenhamYouth Facility was built in 1872 as theHouse of Reformation for Colored Boys.Although some structural repairs have

A year after its closure,

fewer than 15 percent

of youths released from

Montrose had been

reincarcerated.


been made in an attempt to bring thebuilding up to date, the facility has beencriticized for its “restrictive prison-likeatmosphere for children.”26

Bart Lubow, a Senior Associate at theAnnie E. Casey Foundation in Baltimoretoured the facility in 1995. He describedthe facility as “a pretty horrific place”where he found imminent risks forchildren and staff, including exposedmetal grating, urine soaked mattresses,violent graffiti on the walls, pealing paint,overpopulation of youth, a lack ofeducational and medical staff, andsecurity windows that were scratched overpreventing staff from seeing into rooms tocheck on kids.27 Similarly, a 1995 reporton the conditions in Cheltenham by theYouth Law Center described the facility assuffering from “chronic overcrowding,gross inadequacy of basic services andprograms, enormous difficulties inmanagement and operations in thecottages, and insufficient numbers of stafffor the population.”28

Mr. Lubow and others, including SusanLeviton from the Clinical Law Office at theUniversity of Maryland Law School inBaltimore and Mark Martin from thePublic Justice Center, began meeting withthe Maryland Department of JuvenileJustice (DJJ) to urge the agency to makeimprovements. Although some of theimmediate safety problems wereaddressed, the population managementproblem was not solved and the facilitystill lacked basic services and adequatesupervision.

In addition, as with Montrose, many of theyouth in Cheltenham were confined fornon-violent offenses. In 1996, whenCheltenham was operating at 155 percent

of capacity, the Annie E. CaseyFoundation commissioned the NationalCouncil on Crime and Delinquency to do aprofile of youth housed at the facility. Themajority of youth were detained for non-violent offenses such as drug involvementand theft. Over 30 percent had no prioradjudications and another 30 percent hadjust one prior adjudication.29 Only 12percent of the youth were housed forviolent felonies. A substantial majority ofthese youth were African American (81percent) and half were residents ofBaltimore City.30

Five years later, the majority of Maryland’sdetained youth were still confined for non-violent offenses. An analysis released bythe Maryland House of Delegates onMarch 5, 2001, found that only 10 percentof the youth in detention are detained forviolent offenses, and another 23 percentare detained for serious property crimes(See Figure II).31 This recent data confirmsthat predominately low-risk youth arebeing housed in Maryland’s securedetention facilities. A report by theMaryland Juvenile Justice Coalition found

Figure II: Youth in Detention in

Maryland by Type of Offense, 2000

Violent

Serious Property

Non-Violent

Source: Maryland Department of Juvenile Justice, 3/5/01


that “with a recidivism rate nearing 80percent, detention facilities and largeresidential placements in Maryland arefailing the youth they house, theirfamilies, and the public.”32

Based on reports of debilitating conditionsat Cheltenham and data questioning thenecessity of the growing use of detention,youth advocates from the MarylandJuvenile Justice Coalition stepped upefforts to close the facility. On March 1,2000, shortly after Bishop Robinson wasappointed Secretary of the Department ofJuvenile Justice, he stated that he feltthat Cheltenham “needs to bedemolished.”33 During the 2001 legislativesession, advocates and religious leaders inMaryland undertook a concerted effort toclose the Cheltenham Youth Facility.34 OnFebruary 28, 2001, Secretary Robinsontold the Maryland House JudiciaryCommittee that, “by March of next year,we won’t have any more than about 48beds at Cheltenham.” He furthercommented “We are well on our way toclosing it.”35 A week later, the House ofDelegates Appropriations Committeeexpressed their concerns over Cheltenhamand voted to tear it down and rebuild thefacility as well.36 Since the Marchhearings, the number of youth detainedstatewide in Maryland has declined by 7percent (32 youths).37

However, Maryland has not made anunequivocal commitment to reduce thenumber of locked beds and unnecessarydetention. Notwithstanding the decision todownsize Cheltenham, over the next twoyears Maryland is preparing to open a144-bed detention facility in BaltimoreCity, as well as 24-bed facilities in botheastern and western Maryland.

Following the successful closure of theMontrose Training School, Marylandofficials embarked upon a substantialincrease in their state’s detentionpopulation. A decade later, the state founditself with overcrowded and debilitatingdetention facilities, increasingly negativemedia attention and a well-organizedadvocacy community urging the closure ofthe decrepit Cheltenham facility and theestablishment of a model detentionsystem. While the state has moved to closeCheltenham and has reduced its detentionpopulation, the future of detention reformis still very much an open question inMaryland.

B. The District of Columbia Story

At the beginning of the 1990’s, the Districtof Columbia relied more heavily on lockeddetention than most jurisdictions.According to research conducted by theAnnie E. Casey Foundation, in 1992, theDistrict of Columbia had the nation’shighest juvenile detention rate.38 Fewdetention alternatives existed, and theDistrict operated three locked institutionsfor its youth, two of which were large(containing more than 200 youth); locateda significant distance from the families ofthe youths they housed; and containingmixed populations of pre- and post-adjudicated youths.

“We have proven that

having a system that is

less reliant on

confinement can work.”


Through a 15-year-long lawsuit, an act ofCongress, and the work of a courageousjudge, two of D.C.’s youth facilities wereclosed, some new detention alternativeswere created, and a population cap wasplaced on the one remaining facility. Inconjunction with the work of localadvocates and the University of theDistrict of Columbia Law School, thesefacility closures have helped tosubstantially reduce the use of lockeddetention in D.C. while youth crime in theDistrict has declined significantly.

Change was a long time coming. Since theearly 1980’s, children’s rights groups,juvenile justice system personnel,criminologists, and child advocates hadtried to convince the District to change theway its juvenile justice system didbusiness. Experts were brought in toevaluate the system and to advise on bestpractices; a lawsuit was filed, resulting ina consent decree and numerous remedialorders; and various statistical reportshighlighting the District’s overuse oflocked detention were produced.

In 1985, the D.C. Public Defender Service(PDS) filed a lawsuit against the Districtgovernment resulting in a 1986 consentdecree mandating that the governmentimprove the conditions of all of its juveniledetention facilities.39 This decree alsocalled for the closure of Cedar Knoll, oneof the District’s three secure facilities thathoused both detained and committedyouth. PDS negotiated with the District forthe next seven years about implementingcommunity-based programs asalternatives to secure detention to reduceovercrowding at Cedar Knoll. However,along with these negotiations and a courtorder imposing fines for overcrowdingentered in the late 1980’s, it would

eventually be the U.S. Congress thatsucceeded in closing Cedar Knoll.40

In the late 1980’s, Congress took CedarKnoll out of the D.C. Appropriations bill asa budget item in an attempt to bring aboutits closure. But rather than closing downthe facility, the District funded the facilityout of the budget of D.C.’s other juvenileinstitution, Oak Hill, with a budget line-item entitled the “Oak Hill Annex.” CedarKnoll continued to be funded this wayuntil 1992.41

In the winter of 1992, the National Councilon Crime and Delinquency describedCedar Knoll as “overcrowded, unsafe,inhumane, abusive, unresponsive toyouth’s needs, and tantamount toneglectful warehousing.” 42 There was alsoa lack of medical, educational, vocational,recreational, and mental health-relatedservices available to children indetention.43 The facility was so short-staffed and overcrowded that there weremore than fifteen escapes from CedarKnoll in February 1992 alone.44

When word spread that Cedar Knoll wasslated for closure in the consent decree,developers began to buy up the landaround the facility. Development, however,was contingent upon the detentioncenter’s closure. Over the next year-and-a-half, developers lobbied Congress to closethe facility. Concurrently, there was a rashof escapes by youth, resulting insignificant public pressure on StenyHoyer, Maryland’s CongressionalRepresentative and longtime critic of theDistrict’s youth detention center, to movethe District’s detention facility out ofMaryland.45


Meanwhile, the PDS obtained a courtorder to fine the District for violating theprovision requiring one youth per roomthat was stipulated in the Consent Decree,resulting in the District paying largefines.46 In May 1993, after accumulatingmore than $2 million in fines at $1,000/per day for each juvenile over capacity, theDistrict finally closed Cedar Knoll.47 D.C.Superior Court Judge Ricardo Urbina andthe plaintiffs agreed to let the District usethe money from the fines to developcommunity-based alternatives for itsyouth offenders. Of closing Cedar Knollwithout engendering an increase in youthcrime, David Reiser, former Jerry M.plaintiffs’ counsel noted, “We have proventhat having a system that is less reliant onconfinement can work.”

After Cedar Knoll was closed, D.C.’s tworemaining secure facilities, Oak Hill,which housed both detained andcommitted youth, and the D.C. ReceivingHome for Children, which housed onlydetained youth, initially becameovercrowded. With just a few communityalternatives in place for youth, judgesbecame increasingly frustrated with theYouth Services Administration and werereluctant to release youth from custody. Inturn, each day the facilities exceededcapacity, the District was again fined$1,000 per child they were over the cap.

In 1994 and 1995, YSA entered intoemergency contracts with Abraxas, theCenter on Juvenile and Criminal Justice(CJCJ),48 and the Consortium for YouthServices to provide community-baseddetention alternatives to youth. Anevaluation conducted by the AmericanCorrectional Association in 1996 of theConsortium for Youth Services and CJCJprograms found that the intervention

programs were able to reduce the re-arrestrate for program participants and increasethe rate at which youth appeared for courthearings.49 According to the ACAresearchers:

Clearly, both programs not only achieveda high degree of success, but they bothaccomplished more than expected bysuccessfully keeping clients beyond thedesigned length of their respectiveprograms. Such an accomplishment hasa direct consequence: namely, reducingthe cost of caring for problem youth. Bymaintaining their clients in the community,the intended outcome of reducing thenumber of juveniles in secure confinementhas been accomplished.50

In June 1995, the University of theDistrict of Columbia School of Law’sJuvenile Law Clinic (UDC) held aninfluential symposium, entitled “TheUnnecessary Detention of Children in theDistrict of Columbia,” during whichnumerous presentations were madedissecting the overuse of detention in theDistrict. In support of the Symposium,from February to March, 1995, the RobertF. Kennedy Memorial sponsored a month-long court monitoring project of D.C.detention hearings conducted by D.C.Action for Children which documented theoveruse of detention, the minor chargesfor which youths were detained, and theneed for better detention advocacy.51

One analysis presented at the Symposiumfound that thousands of youth per yearwere detained in the Receiving Home byprobation staff in violation of provisions ofD.C.’s juvenile statutes governingdetention of minors. Youths were detainedby police and probation as “dangerous” or“flight risks” one night, only to beevaluated by the same probation


department as non-dangerous andunlikely to flee – and recommended forrelease – the next.52

In August 1995, D.C. Juvenile CourtPresiding Judge George W. Mitchellcriticized the D.C. Receiving Home forChildren as “unacceptable for a civilizedcountry.”53 Buoyed by the informationpresented at the Symposium and shockedby conditions at the Receiving Home,Judge Mitchell ordered the facility to beclosed due to conditions he deemed unfitfor habitation by youth. The facility was soovercrowded that children in each of thefour units of the facility had to sleepdormitory-style on cots in recreationrooms. Children did not even receivesufficient food—some ate little other thanbologna sandwiches during their stay.

According the conference proceedingsfrom the Symposium:

Within two months of attending andparticipating in this Symposium, theHonorable George W. Mitchell, promptedby the outrageous conditions at theReceiving Home, ordered it closed. Thisjudicial act was both courageous andvisionary…the overwhelming majority ofchildren detained overnight prior to initialhearings were being held in contraventionof the governing standards.54

After the Receiving Home’s closure, thepopulation of D.C.’s remaining facility, theOak Hill Youth Detention Center, initiallysurged beyond the court-ordered capacityand the District was once again fined. Butthe system expanded some contracts fordetention alternatives and otherwiselearned to live within limits, again with nodetrimental impact on public safety.

Overall, from 1990 to 1999, the District ofColumbia closed two locked facilities foryouth and the average daily population ofdetained youths dropped from 411 to 124,a 70 percent decline. As locked detentionin D.C. decreased sharply, not only didyouth crime not increase, it decreasedsignificantly. During that same decade,youth violent arrest rates declined by 55percent, and youth property arrest ratesdeclined by 34 percent. According to DavidBrown, a former employee of both theDistrict of Columbia’s YSA and Maryland’sDJJ, “When the options were limited interms of secure beds, D.C. figured out away to handle it.”

The District of Columbia is preparing toclose Oak Hill and replace it with a facilityor facilities of as-yet undetermined size.Recently, the District’s Blue RibbonCommission on Youth Safety and JuvenileJustice Reform voted to recommend thatOak Hill be closed and replaced byseparate facilities which are small,homelike and as close to the youths’homes as is feasible. The Youth ServicesAdministration has recommended that a100-bed commitment facility beconstructed on the grounds of Oak Hill inMaryland and that an 80-bed detentionfacility be constructed on the grounds ofthe former Receiving Home in D.C. LikeMaryland, the future use of lockeddetention in D.C. is very much up in theair.

As locked detention in

D.C. decreased sharply,

not only did youth

crime not increase, it

decreased significantly.


IV.Conclusions and Recommendations

A 2001 report by the National ResearchCouncil found that nationally, “more andmore juveniles are being detained andincarcerated, even though there isevidence that most juveniles can betreated equally or more effectively in thecommunity than in secure confinement,without jeopardizing community safety.”55

Notably, the Council’s first recommend-ation calls for an increase in funding forcommunity-based programs for juveniles.

Although Maryland experienced declinesin violent youth crime during the 1990’s,these declines were significantly less thanthe drop in violent youth crime in D.C.,which sharply curtailed its use ofdetention during the 1990’s. Contrary topopular belief (but consistent withprevious studies), the Maryland/D.C.comparisons suggest that more detentionfor low-level offenses is not associatedwith greater public safety and may occupysystem resources that would be betterfocused on the relatively few youths andadults who commit serious, violent offenses.

As they struggle to decide the appropriatemix of locked facilities, staff secureprograms and community-based detentionalternatives, both Maryland and theDistrict of Columbia can take heart in thefact that they have limited the use oflocked custody in the past withoutjeopardizing public safety.

However, far more information should begathered and evaluated in both jurisdic-tions prior to making the leap into costlyfacility construction. Such a process hasbegun in Maryland. With the help offunding and technical assistance from theAnnie E. Casey Foundation, theDepartment of Juvenile Justice is workingwith the National Center on Institutionsand Alternatives to evaluate its pendingplacement population and makerecommendations on system efficienciesand detention alternatives that can impactits locked bed needs. Unfortunately, theMaryland Department of Juvenile Justiceis planning and building facilities beforecollecting and analyzing that importantdata.

The District of Columbia, which has comeso far in reducing its detention populationover the past decade, lags far behind in itsuse of data for planning purposes. Verylittle is known from a statisticalstandpoint about the needs of, and riskspresented by, D.C.’s detention population,making it virtually impossible to correctlyevaluate bed space needs. It is hearteningthat the Blue Ribbon Commission citedMissouri as a model to be emulated, sinceMissouri is increasingly relying on smallfacilities and an extensive array ofcommunity-based programs for delinquentyouth. Pursuant to an agreement in theJerry M. litigation, an assessment will beconducted to obtain necessary data anddetermine the number of locked beds andcommunity-based programming slotsneeded for D.C.’s committed youth.56 TheDistrict should do the same regardingdetained youth prior to constructing anynew detention facilities.

The unnecessary placement of a youngperson in detention can have serious

“Detention is the

gateway drug in

America’s addiction

to incarceration.”


consequences for a youth, and significantresource consequences for a jurisdiction.According to Lubow and Tulman,“unnecessary detention has deplorableconsequences… Detention increases thelikelihood of post-adjudicatoryincarceration”57 as well as exposing youthsto “negative peer culture and violence” andengendering substantial avoidable costs.As Bart Lubow has stated, “Detention isthe gateway drug in America’s addiction toincarceration.”

The findings of this analysis are mixed.First and foremost, it is clear that, duringthe 1990’s, the District of Columbia wasable to reduce its use of locked detentionwithout a negative impact on publicsafety. In fact, youth arrests fell in allcategories more sharply than they did inneighboring Maryland, which slightlyincreased its use of locked detentionduring the 1990’s.

Second, both Maryland and D.C. havesuccessfully closed locked institutions inthe past. In doing so, both reduced whatseveral studies found to be theunnecessary incarceration of their youngpeople.

Third, it took tremendous pressure – fromlawsuits, community and civil rightsorganizations, academics and the media –to convince these jurisdictions to do whatexperts and the data had shown early onto be sound public policy choices. Insteadof waiting for dramatic events like lawsuitsand embarrassing news reports, theBuilding Blocks for Youth Initiative offersthe following recommendations toward amore rational use of detention space forboth jurisdictions:

1. Both jurisdictions should conductthorough utilization reviews andpopulation profile analyses beforeundertaking additional construction.

Data – about the risks and needs of youngpeople currently and recently in thesystem, population trends, youths’ offensehistories and current charges, and youthcrime trends – should drive not onlydecisions about the size of lockedfacilities, but also the number of spacesneeded in staff secure, non-secure, andin-home detention alternatives. Withoutproper information, the construction ofexpensive facilities, which will be in usefor decades to come, is extremely illadvised.

2. The District of Columbia and thestate of Maryland should expand theuse of community-based programmingto create a continuum of detentionalternatives.

States around the country are developingeffective alternatives to locked detention.Several Casey Foundation-funded JDAIsites successfully established homeconfinement, detention foster care, dayprogramming, evening reporting centersand small, staff-secure shelters asalternatives to locked detention.58

The state of Maryland has taken somesteps toward this end, allocating $6million during this fiscal year, and another$12 million next year, for the creation ofcommunity-based alternatives. Despite itsearly use of programming in the mid-1990’s with funds from court-orderedfines, the District of Columbia has yet todevelop a full continuum of detentionalternatives. However, the District will nowbe able to access approximately $5 million


in federal funds from the Office of JuvenileJustice and Delinquency Prevention. Ithad not received funds for the past severalyears because of the District’s inability toproduce reliable data to meet reportingrequirements under the Federal JuvenileJustice and Delinquency Prevention Act.Ironically, that reporting failure, and thewindfall of federal dollars now available tothe District, can be used to the benefit ofD.C. youth, funding data collection andcommunity programming to reduce theunnecessary use of detention.59

3. Both jurisdictions should conduct athorough analysis of disproportionateminority confinement to ascertainwhether there is racialdisproportionality in their jurisdictionsand develop approaches to redress anyinequities uncovered.

Minority youth in Maryland and theDistrict of Columbia are confined far inexcess of their representation in thegeneral public. By using a data-drivenapproach, Multnomah County, Oregonand Santa Cruz County, California havebeen able to reduce disproportionateminority confinement without jeopardizingpublic safety. D.C. and Maryland shouldimmediately conduct assessments ofdisproportionality in their systems andtake steps to address them, modeled afterthe promising approaches used inMultnomah and Santa Cruz Counties.These include the development ofculturally-sensitive detention alternatives,the creation of risk assessmentinstruments, enhanced defense services,and expedited case processing, amongothers.60

4. Both systems should look tostandards promulgated by professionalorganizations before planning andconstructing secure youth facilities.

According to the standards promulgatedby the Institute of Judicial Administrationand the American Bar Association (IJA/ABA), secure detention facilities should be12 to 20 beds and commitment facilitiesshould be no larger than 20 beds. Bothshould be as close to the youths’ homecommunities as is feasible. With respect toproximity to the youth’s home community,the IJA/ABA offers the following:

Location of secure detention facilitiesshould take the following factors intoaccount:

A. facilitation of the maintenance of tiesbetween residents and theircommunity, family and friends;

B. accessibility to mass transit andhighways to facilitate visits by familyand friends;

C. accessibility of courts to avoidexcessive time spent in transit to andfrom the court and waiting in court;

D. proximity to concentrations of lawoffices to facilitate attorney-clientmeetings; and

E. use of community settings.61

Likewise, the National AdvisoryCommission on Criminal JusticeStandards and Goals provides that thetotal population of detention facilitiesshould not exceed 30 and that separate“living areas” within the facility should notexceed 10 to 12.62

In addition to the ABA and NationalAdvisory Commission standards, thedangers of large locked institutions for thecare and custody of young people have


been documented. For example, a seminalsurvey conducted by Abt Associates forthe Justice Department found suchinstitutions to be plagued by a litany ofproblems, including overcrowding, highrates of youth and staff injuries, suicidesand suicide attempts, inadequate healthcare, and inadequate educational services,among others. The authors noted:

Juvenile and staff injury rates were higherin crowded facilities, and juvenile-on-juvenile injury rates increased as thepercentage of juveniles housed in largedormitories increased… Suicidal behavioris a serious problem in juvenileconfinement facilities…One-third of thejuveniles in detention centers have healthscreenings done by staff who have notbeen trained by medical personnel toperform health screening.63

In constructing a 144-bed facility inBaltimore, Maryland has created a lockedinstitution much larger than called for bystandards. In the District of Columbia, theYouth Services Administration isproposing two facilities larger thannational standards call for. One of them,the proposed facility in Laurel, MD, is agreat distance from D.C. communities andis inaccessible by public transportation. Inthe absence of basic data on youth in thesystem and future trends, this is a recipefor fiscal waste and harmful public policy.

While both D.C. and Maryland have hadsuccess with facility closures in the past,both are now poised precariously withrespect to their detention systems. Bothjurisdictions have plans to close old,decrepit detention facilities. Officials inMaryland and D.C. must now decidewhether to recreate those largeinstitutions with which they are now both

having serious problems, or to create asystem with a blend of small locked andstaff-secure facilities, coupled with acontinuum of community-based programsfor their troubled youth.

Endnotes

1 Authored by Lisa Feldman, MichaelMales, and Vincent Schiraldi.

2 Rust, Bill (1999). Juvenile JailhouseRocked. AdvoCasey. Baltimore, MD,Annie E. Casey Foundation.

3 Snyder, Howard M. & Sickmund,Melissa (1999). Juvenile Offenders andVictims, 1999 Report. Washington,D.C.: Office of Juvenile Justice andDelinquency Prevention.

4 Ibid.5 A fuller discussion of the Annie E.

Casey Foundation’s Juvenile DetentionAlternatives Initiative can be obtainedby visiting their web site atwww.aecf.org.

6 In 1982, a federal lawsuit was filed bythe Portland Juvenile Rights Projectthat eventually resulted in a populationcap on the juvenile detention facility inMultnomah County. In 1994 thecounty opened a new detention facility.

7 Illinois Criminal Justice InformationAuthority, September 2001.

8 Law Enforcement Data SystemDivision, Oregon State Police,September 2001.

9 Throughout this report, “detained”youth will mean youth in lockedfacilities whose cases have not yet beenadjudicated as well as youth who areadjudicated and are awaitingplacement in another facility orprogram.


10 Department of Juvenile Justice (1995).1995 Report on the Overrepresentationof Minority Youth in the Juvenile JusticeSystem; Washington, D.C. U.S.Department of Justice.

11 See, for example, Annie E. CaseyFoundation (1992). Framework Paperon Juvenile Detention, Appendix 1: KeyJuvenile Detention Attributes by State.

12 Oldest age for original juvenile courtjurisdiction: 17; oldest age for juvenilecourt jurisdiction for dispositionalpurposes: 20. Both jurisdictionsemploy a waiver age of 15 for felonyoffenses; both jurisdictions have directfile provisions, allowing prosecutorsdiscretion to bring charges directly inadult court.

13 Persons interviewed over the course ofthis report include: David Brown,executive director of the National YouthEmployment Coalition and a formeremployee of both the District ofColumbia’s Youth ServicesAdministration and the MarylandDepartment of Juvenile Services;Susan Leviton, Law Professor,University of Maryland Law School;Bart Lubow, Senior Associate, Annie E.Casey Foundation; Louis Marmo,Program Manager, D.C. Superior CourtCourt Social Services; Randy Moore,Chief Court Liaison Officer, YouthServices Administration; David Reiser,former Public Defender, District ofColumbia, former plaintiff’s counsel,Jerry M. et al. vs. the District ofColumbia, et al.; Joann Rohan, YouthTreatment Coordinator, Youth ServicesAdministration; Ira Schwartz, TempleUniversity Provost and former Director,Office of Juvenile Justice andDelinquency Prevention; Mark Soler,President of the Youth Law Center;David Tracey, former Director,

Montrose Depopulation Project,National Center on Institutions andAlternatives; John Tuell, former DeputyDirector of the State and TribalAssistance Division of OJJDP; and NateWilliams, Assistant DeputySuperintendent Youth ServicesAdministration.

14 This estimate includes all years exceptfor 1993, for which YSA was unable toprovide any data. As a result,researchers averaged 1992 and 1994data to provide population data for1993.

15 In interviews with Nate Williams,Assistant Deputy Superintendent atYSA and David Reiser, former PublicDefender, there was general agreementthat 50 was a conservative estimate ofthe Receiving Home’s average dailypopulation during the early 1990’sleading up to its closure. A series ofarticles about the facility in theWashington Post corroborate this as aconservative estimate. “D.C. EmptiesDetention Center,” 6/2/93, lists theReceiving Home’s population at 40percent above its capacity of 38, orhousing about 58 kids; “JudgeSchedules Ruling on JuvenileDetention Fines,” 4/13/94, lists theReceiving Home’s population at 57; and“D.C. to Close Children’s ReceivingHome,” 8/13/94 states that theReceiving Home “has a capacity of 38children but has in recent monthshoused nearly twice that number.”

16 Jerry M. et. al vs. the District ofColumbia, et al. is a federal civil rightslawsuit over the conditions andservices for youth in detention facilitiesin the District of Columbia.

17 U.S. Department of Health, Education,and Welfare (1967). A Study andAssessment of Maryland’s Program and


Facilities for the Treatment and Controlof Juvenile Delinquency. Washington,D.C.: H.E.W.

18 NAACP (1973). A Call for Reform ofMaryland’s Training Schools, A Reportby the Task Force on Juvenile Justice.New York, NY: NAACP Legal Defenseand Educational Fund, Inc.

19 Butts, Jeffrey A. & Streit, Samuel(1988). Youth Corrections in Maryland:The Dawning of a New Era. Center forthe Study of Youth Policy, p.7.

20 Ibid.21 Ibid.22 Ibid.23 Ibid.24 Interview with Dr. Ira Schwartz, Provost

of Temple University, February 28,2001.

25 Butts & Streit, p.2.26 Interview with Susan Leviton, February

19, 2001.27 Interview with Bart Lubow, February

20, 2001.28 Youth Law Center (1995). “Cheltenham

Youth Facility Conditions Assessment,”Washington, D.C., p.4.

29 National Council on Crime andDelinquency (1996). MarylandDepartment of Juvenile JusticeCheltenham Youth Facility: YouthProfiles and Population Projections.Baltimore, MD: Annie E. CaseyFoundation.

30 Ibid.31 Legislative budget analysis of the

Maryland Department of JuvenileJustice, March 5, 2001.

32 MJJC (2001). Principles of a ModelJuvenile Justice System, Baltimore,MD: Maryland Juvenile JusticeCoalition.

33 Todd Richissin & Michael Dresser(2000). “Supervision of juvenilesexcoriated in report; Replace

Cheltenham Robinson urges,” TheBaltimore Sun, March 1, 2000.

34 Maureen O’Hagan (2001). “Groups UrgeClosing of Md. Youth Facility,” TheWashington Post, February 23, 2001.

35 Sarah Koenig (2001). “State Moves toShut Facility: Juvenile offenders to berelocated from Cheltenham: Populationto fall to 48.” The Baltimore Sun, March1, 2001.

36 Stephen Manning (2001). “Cuts forCheltenham approved by HouseCommittee.” The Associated Press,March 7, 2001.

37 According to data from MarylandDepartment of Juvenile Justice, therewere 434 youth locked in detentionstatewide on February 28, 2001 and402 youth in locked detention onOctober 1, 2001, a 7 percent decline inabout seven months.

38 Annie E. Casey Foundation (1992).39 A consent decree is a judicial decree

that sanctions a voluntary agreementbetween parties in dispute. A remedialorder is a court order intended toremedy a specific unfair or inhumanecondition.

40 This lawsuit resulted in theappointment of Michael L. Lewis asCourt Monitor to oversee theimprovements of the system in itsentirety.

41 Interview with David Brown, formerstaff, Youth Services Administration,February 16, 2001.

42 Robert F. Kennedy Memorial and theNational Council on Crime andDelinquency (NCCD) (1993). At theCrossroads: Juvenile Corrections in theDistrict of Columbia—Profiles ofCommitted Youth in Secure Care.Washington, D.C.: NCCD.

43 Interview with David Reiser, formerClass Council, Jerry M. et al. vs. the


District of Columbia, et al. and D.C.Public Defender,1988-1999. Theseconditions were also described in areport by Sheryl Brissett-Chapman,Jerry M. panelist, February 15, 1996,entitled Waiting…Youth in Trouble in theDistrict of Columbia: A Case Study forthe Jerry M. Panel.

44 Editorial (1992). “More trouble at CedarKnoll,” The Washington Post, April 1,1992.

45 Joe Donnelly (1994). “Tension overdetention: Juveniles housed at closedD.C. institution,” The Washington Post,April 22, 1994.

46 The single room regulation stipulatesthat there is to be no more than onechild per room, per facility.

47 Nancy Lewis (1994). “Judge’s costlyruling: Juveniles housed at closed D.C.institution,” The Washington Post,September 15, 1994.

48 The Justice Policy Institute, the policyarm of the Center on Juvenile andCriminal Justice, authored this report.

49 American Correctional Association(1996). Intervention ProgramsEvaluation Final Report. Washington,D.C.: Robert F. Kennedy MemorialJuvenile Justice Project, p.41.

50 Ibid.51 Seigel, Elizabeth (1995). “A Summary of

Data Collected by the RFK Memorial/D.C. Act Detention Study.” InSymposium: The UnnecessaryDetention of Children in the District ofColumbia, The District of Columbia LawReview, Volume 3, Fall 1995, Number2.

52 Escoto, Henry A. (1995). “Pre-InitialHearing Detention: Are PoliceDepartment and Social Service IntakeFollowing the Law?” In Symposium: theUnnecessary Detention of Children inthe District of Columbia, The District of

Columbia Law Review, Volume 3, Fall1995, Number 2.

53 Nancy Lewis (1995). “D.C. Judge ordersshutdown of Children’s ReceivingHome; Facility called ‘Unacceptable fora civilized country.’” The WashingtonPost, August 18, 1995.

54 Lubow, Bart & Tulman, Joseph (1995).The Unnecessary Detention of Childrenin the District of Columbia. Introductionto: Symposium: the UnnecessaryDetention of Children in the District ofColumbia, The District of Columbia LawReview, Volume 3, Fall 1995, Number2.

55 The National Academy of Sciences(2001). “Juvenile Justice, JuvenileCrime,” The Panel on Crime,Prevention, Treatment, and Control,Washington, D.C.: The NationalAcademy of Sciences.

56 Jerry M. v District of Columbia, CivilAction No. 1519-85 (IFP), StipulationRegarding Order B (Sept. 12, 2001).

57 Lubow and Tulman, 1995.58 DeMuro, Paul (1999). Consider the

Alternatives: Planning andImplementing Detention Alternatives.Pathways #4, Annie E. CaseyFoundation.

59 Interview, with John Tuell formerDeputy Director of the State and TribalAssistance Division of OJJDP, adivision responsible for administeringsix federally-funded grant programs,including the Formula Grants andJuvenile Accountability Incentive BlockGrant programs, September, 2001.

60 See, for example, Feyerherm, WilliamH., “Detention Reform andOverrepresentation: A SuccessfulSynergy,” Corrections ManagementQuarterly, 2000, and Cox, Judith A.,“Addressing DisproportionateRepresentation Within the Juvenile


Justice System,” Santa Cruz California,Santa Cruz County ProbationDepartment, September 2000. Thesuccessful efforts to reducedisproportionate minority confinementin Multnomah and Santa CruzCounties will be described in aPathways monograph from the AnnieE. Casey Foundation scheduled forpublication in Winter, 2002.

61 Allen M. Greenberg, Reporter (1996).“Standards Relating to Architecture ofFacilities,” Institute of JudicialAdministration and American BarAssociation Juvenile Justice StandardsAnnotated.

62 Ibid.63 Abt Associates, Conditions of

Confinement: Juvenile Detention andCorrections Facilities: ResearchSummary, Office of Juvenile Justiceand Delinquency Prevention, February1994.


Appendix: Changes in youth arrests and detentions in Maryland

and the District of Columbia during the 1990's

MARYLAND: Juvenile detentions and arrest rates Change, 1999 rate:

Avg annual: 1990 1993 1996 1999 v 90-92 v 93-95 v 96-98-92 -95 -98

Detention ADP* 349 390 446 440Detention rate** 0.71 0.74 0.78 0.74 3% 0% -6%

Violent crime arrests* 2,977 3,561 3,629 3,085Violent crime rate** 6.1 6.7 6.4 5.2 -15% -23% -19%

Property crime arrests* 15,290 15,174 14,834 12,389Property crime rate** 31.2 28.6 26.0 20.7 -34% -28% -20%

DC: Juvenile detentions and arrest rates Change, 1999 rate:

Avg annual: 1990 1993 1996 1999 v 90-92 v 93-95 v 96-98-92 -95 -98

Detention ADP* 411 284 161 124Detention rate** 9.04 6.17 3.47 2.64 -71% -57% -24%

Violent crime arrests* 664 717 522 305Violent crime rate** 14.6 15.6 11.2 6.5 -55% -58% -42%

Property crime arrests* 1,148 855 816 682Property crime rate** 25.2 18.6 17.5 14.5 -42% -22% -17%

*Average Daily Population and average annual arrests over 3-year period.

**Detention ADP and arrest rates per 1,000 youth age 10-17 by year.

Source: Metropolitan Police Department (DC); Maryland State Police; Maryland Department of Juvenile

Justice; Youth Services Administration (DC); The Washington Post; Interviews.


Acknowledgements:

This report is dedicated to the late CharlesRuff, former D.C. Corporation Counseland late Judge George W. Mitchell, formerD.C. Juvenile Court Presiding Judge, twomen who cared deeply about youngpeople.

The authors would like to thank thefollowing people for their invaluableknowledge and contributions to thisreport:

David Brown, former staff of the District ofColumbia’s Youth Services Administrationand the Maryland Department of JuvenileServices; Lakshmi Iyengar, MarylandDepartment of Juvenile Justice; SusanLeviton, Law Professor, University ofMaryland Law School; Bart Lubow, SeniorAssociate, Annie E. Casey Foundation;George Perkins, Deputy Administrator,Youth Services Administration; DavidReiser, former Public Defender, District ofColumbia; Marc Schindler, Staff Attorney,Youth Law Center; Ira Schwartz, TempleUniversity Provost and former Director,Office of Juvenile Justice and DelinquencyPrevention; Mark Soler, President of theYouth Law Center; and David Tracey,former Director, Montrose DepopulationProject, National Center on Institutionsand Alternatives.

Lisa Feldman

Lisa Feldman is a Research Consultant forthe Justice Policy Institute in Washington,D.C. A doctoral student in public policy atthe George Washington University, Ms.Feldman is concurrently a ResearchFellow for the Center for Excellence inMunicipal Management where she works

on research and training projects withD.C. government. She recently directedthe research component of a project tohelp guide the D.C. Child and FamilyServices Agency out of Receivership. Shehas also worked as a youth worker in ajuvenile detention facility in OaklandCounty, Michigan; a substance abusetherapist for a jail-based treatmentprogram in Macomb County, Michigan;and as a policy analyst for the WhiteHouse Office of National Drug ControlPolicy where she developed partnershipswith state and local governments arounddrug prevention and treatment foryouthful and adult offenders. Ms.Feldman has a Masters Degree inSociology from Wayne State University.

Mike A. Males

Michael Males is a Senior Researcher forthe Justice Policy Institute in SanFrancisco, CA and Washington, D.C. He isalso an instructor at the Department ofSociology, University of California, SantaCruz, and an independent researcher andconsultant in the areas of youth and socialissues. Dr. Males authored five books andover 35 journal articles, symposiums, andmedia reports focused on delinquency,pregnancy prevention, underage alcoholand tobacco, youth violence, and an arrayof other topics. His most recent book—released in March 2001—is entitled, Kids& Guns: How Politicians, Experts, and thePress Fabricate Fear of Youth, availablethrough Common Courage Press. Dr.Males holds a Ph.D. in Social Ecology,from the University of California, Irvine.


Vincent Schiraldi

Vincent Schiraldi is founder and presidentof the Center on Juvenile and CriminalJustice and its research and public policyarm, the Justice Policy Institute. He has a20-year history of research, publiceducation, and direct services in thecriminal/juvenile justice field. Mr.Schiraldi served on the California BlueRibbon Commission on Inmate PopulationManagement, the National CriminalJustice Commission, and the SanFrancisco Juvenile Probation Commissionand as an advisor to the CaliforniaCommission on the Status of AfricanAmerican Men. His research findings andcommentaries have been covered in printand on electronic media throughout thecountry including Nightline, the TodayShow, the New York Times, theWashington Post, the Los Angeles Times,the Christian Science Monitor, the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, evening newscastsfor ABC, CBS, and NBC; National PublicRadio, CNN, and the BBC, among others.He is a regular commentator onWashington, D.C.’s public radio station,WAMU. Mr. Schiraldi has a MastersDegree in Social Work from New YorkUniversity.

Youth Law Center1010 Vermont Avenue, N.W., Suite 310

Washington, DC 20005-4902202 637-0377

www.buildingblocksforyouth.org

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