view full story- Juvenile justice in Louisiana making transition from confinement to treatment
This isn't the same Louisiana lock-up where a teenager died after a guard knocked him to the ground seven years ago, one of the last horrors to unfold at a youth prison before the state ended its historic practice of treating juvenile delinquents the same as adult convicts. For starters, the 132-bed riverside campus is called the Bridge City Center for Youth, not a "correctional" facility. Instead of a warden, Linda London is the director.
Bridge City, in short, is the promise of a sea change in Louisiana juvenile justice, said Mary Livers, who a year ago became the Office of Juvenile Justice deputy secretary, inheriting a system only five years into transition from confinement to treatment, and an eventual end to sending juveniles hundreds of miles away from home.
Pete Adams, far left, Executive Director of the Louisiana District Attorneys Association, joins other justice and state officials entering Harmony dormitory Tuesday during a tour of the Bridge City Center for Youth.
Kristi Spinosa of the Louisiana District Attorneys Association, Ralph E. Brandt Jr. of the Orleans Parish District Attorney's Office, and Joe Waitz Jr., Terrebonne Parish District Attorney, listen to residents of Harmony dormitory during a tour of the Bridge City Center for Youth.
Bridge City is one of three state "secure care" centers for juveniles; the others are the Swanson center in Monroe, where more than 200 juveniles are held, and the Jetson facility outside Baton Rouge that is home to about 80 youngsters. All three are for boys only; girls are sent to the Ware Youth Center in Coushatta and only the Monroe facility has not fully adopted the "Missouri model,'' named after the state that 17 years ago changed from prisons to treatment centers for juveniles.
Five years ago, Louisiana accepted "the Missouri model,'' sought after across the nation as the answer to juvenile rehabilitation, and began using a therapy method of treating juveniles as troubled children, as the state code demands, rather than as miniature adult convicts held behind the same brand of razor wire and cell bars.
"We're trying to lower their risk so they can return to the community and be not-at-risk to the community and for the rest of their lives," Livers said Tuesday before leading a small group of prosecutors and legislators on a tour of the grounds and dorms at the Bridge City.
"I'd like to shut down all of the buildings that have cells," Livers said, referring to the juvenile lockup in Monroe. "We will shutter them. In the last year, we are not locking kids up and leaving them in private cells."
At the behest of a federal court's oversight, Louisiana's youth centers now have fewer than 500 juveniles under 24-hour care instead of 2,000. Most come from New Orleans, and then from Lafayette or Shreveport. Forty percent have been diagnosed with severe mental illness.click here for full article
Published February 23, 2010 - The Times-Picayune
Officials issue last warning to parents of truant children
Since August 2009, the East Baton Rouge School Board, the district attorney and several others have set out to control the number of truant children in East Baton Rouge and this week is the last chance for some parents to explain why their children have excessive absences or those adults will face jail time. So far, more than 3,000 parents have been questioned.
Last year, the East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff's Office knocked on doors to find missing children. Deputies have picked them up off the streets and now, officials are trying to teach the parents just how serious they are. Three parents have been cited during the 2010 school year.
According to school officials, between August and December 2009, more than 9,000 students missed five or more days of school. Five missed days are enough to be considered truant. This year, in January alone, more than 1,000 kids have missed too many days. Record keeping problems may account for some of those numbers. Some parents told workers they've sent written excuses with their children, but they are still counted as absent.
Skipping school is still considered a problem, though. In some cases, parents drop the kids off at school, but the students just don't find their way to class. In those cases, the problem could be handled in juvenile court. There are some cases of children who have 20 or 30 unexcused absences in 2010. If there's not a valid reason, those cases will be sent to law enforcement.
"And now, all the parents are calling the office because they don't want to go to jail," said Doris Dickerson with the Child Welfare & Attendance office.
For nine years, Dickerson has worked to get kids off the streets and into their seats in the classroom. She said in the past, parents didn't have many answers for those absences. Now, the possibility of jail time and fines are changing that.
"There are some valid reasons," said Kelly Bonaventure, the juvenile coordinator with the District Attorney's Office. "There's some cases we've run across that the child is not getting up to get on the school bus."
WAFB - Baton Rouge - February 23, 2010 Louisiana Sues Death Row Inmates To Block Lethal Injection Lawsuits
On February 15th, the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections filed a countersuit against every death row inmate within the state in response to an earlier lawsuit claiming that Louisiana’s lethal injection procedure is in violation of state law. All death row inmates within the state were formally served papers in this effort to put to rest any further lawsuits claiming that Louisiana’s lethal injection procedure is subject to the state’s Administrative Procedure Act, and that, currently, the procedure does not comply with that Act. The initial suit was filed by the Capital Post Conviction Project of Louisiana (CPCPL) on behalf of death row prisoner Nathaniel Code. In that suit, the CPCPL stated that Louisiana had not met the requirements of its own Administrative Procedures Act in creating guidelines for execution by lethal injection. Attorneys for the CPCPL argued the state procedure ought to specify exactly what drugs should be used to kill prisoners rather than simply calling for the administration of drugs. District Judge Michael Caldwell of Baton Rouge dismissed Nathaniel Code’s suit, which would have halted all executions in Louisiana until the Corrections Department brought its procedures in line with state law. Attorneys for the state argued that Louisiana’s three-drug lethal injection protocol was not subject to the Administrative Procedures Act; the judge agreed, and threw out the suit. By its countersuit, the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections is asking the Court to formally declare, once and for all, that the state’s lethal injection protocol is not subject to the Louisiana Administrative Procedure Act.
Predictably, national coverage of this countersuit has been negative. To review some of this coverage, click here.
Supreme Court Dismisses Challenge to Ruling on Forensic Experts
Defendants will still have the right to demand live testimony from lab technicians and other experts who prepare reports for the prosecution…
David G. Savage for the L.A. Times Reporting from Washington - The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a pending challenge to a ruling last year requiring lab technicians and other forensic specialists to be available to testify at trials.
In last year's 5-4 decision, the justices said the experts who prepare lab reports are "witnesses" for the prosecution and therefore must be prepared to be cross-examined by the lawyer for the accused.
Justice Antonin Scalia said the Constitution gave defendants a right to be "confronted" with all the witnesses against them, including lab technicians. Prior to the ruling, prosecutors in many states simply introduced a lab report as evidence -- saying, for example, that the white powder found with the defendant was cocaine.
The four dissenters said the decision would be an expensive headache for prosecutors nationwide. Earlier this month, the justices heard arguments in a Virginia case where prosecutors urged the high court to reverse its ruling.
The retirement of Justice David H. Souter, who had joined the 5-4 majority, and his replacement by Justice Sonia Sotomayor led to speculation that the court might take the usual step of reversing a recent ruling.
But Monday, the court issued a one-line order that sends the Virginia case back to a state court for another hearing.
The action leaves intact the ruling that gives defendants the right to demand live testimony from experts who prepare reports for the prosecution.
*A detailed analysis of the above case, Briscoe, et al., v. Virginia, and of Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts can be seen here
