Posts
Join us for the CARES Family & Friends Call
Tuesday, August 4th at 8:00 pm
when we welcome
Jose G.
CARES is honored to present Jose G. who paroled under SB 260 two months ago after many years in prison. When he reflects on his life, he remembers a family that was loving at times, but his childhood was marked by abuse and abandonment. He was 12 when his father died from an overdose, and soon after Jose was also separated from his mother. Looking back, he sees that he ran from the pain in his young life and turned to gangs. At seventeen he committed a murder, was tried as an adult, and sentenced to life in prison. For a number of years he continued as a gang member, digging deeper into a dark hole.
Join us to hear his remarkable story of transformation and how he moved from that dark place to become a man who left the gang lifestyle far behind, earned an A.A. degree in sociology and behavioral science, and won release. He is now working as an intern at the Anti-Recidivism Coalition and seeks to help others. He hopes to enroll in college and says "ultimately I just want to live and love. I want to be the complete opposite of what I was for so long."
Jose will talk with CARES about the key factors he found helpful in turning his life around; describe his experience with SB 260 and the board; and answer questions from family and friends of youth sentenced to adults.
Please join us! Meet this special person,
welcome him home, and learn from him.
JUST CALL TO JOIN!
Call: (805) 399-1000 Code: 817682#
Tuesday, August 4, 2015
Thursday, July 16, 2015
Texas Failing Traumatized Girls
http://www.texascjc.org/girls-experiences-system
Girls' Experiences in the System
Report: Girls’ Experiences in the Texas Juvenile Justice System (Oct 2012)
Press Release: Texas Failing Traumatized Girls (Oct 24, 2012)
Half of all youth referred to the Texas juvenile justice system each year have previously experienced a significant traumatic event. This trauma can cause a youth’s stress response to be over-reactive, leading to delinquent behavior. In a secure facility, the youth’s over-reactive stress response can lead to discipline problems and deeper system involvement. In fact, recent research has revealed that a youth’s past experience with trauma is a major predictor – and for girls, the largest predictor – of the youth’s assignment to increasingly serious secure placements in the Texas juvenile justice system.
Unfortunately, Girls’ Experiences in the Texas Juvenile Justice System, a new report by TCJC, shows that Texas is failing many of these traumatized children. Half of the girls interviewed at the Ron Jackson State Juvenile Correctional Complex report that their previous time in county juvenile facilities either did not help or actually did more harm than good for dealing with their past trauma. Tragically, eight percent report that their time at Ron Jackson is doing more harm than good, suggesting that our juvenile justice system may be re-traumatizing many of these youth.
These issues call for a system-wide response. Many of the experiences that the girls report in these interviews – including negative interactions with staff, severe isolation from family, and youth-on-youth violence – match the experiences that boys in state custody reported in a TCJC survey earlier this year. As Texas moves forward with reforms to address those concerns, we should increase funding for trauma counseling in the juvenile system, and we should revisit the policies and procedures in our juvenile facilities to respond better to the vulnerabilities and triggers of traumatized youth.
RECOMMENDATION: Increase funding support for local programs that keep youth in their home counties.
http://www.texascjc.org/girls-experiences-system
Girls' Experiences in the System
Report: Girls’ Experiences in the Texas Juvenile Justice System (Oct 2012)
Press Release: Texas Failing Traumatized Girls (Oct 24, 2012)
Half of all youth referred to the Texas juvenile justice system each year have previously experienced a significant traumatic event. This trauma can cause a youth’s stress response to be over-reactive, leading to delinquent behavior. In a secure facility, the youth’s over-reactive stress response can lead to discipline problems and deeper system involvement. In fact, recent research has revealed that a youth’s past experience with trauma is a major predictor – and for girls, the largest predictor – of the youth’s assignment to increasingly serious secure placements in the Texas juvenile justice system.
Unfortunately, Girls’ Experiences in the Texas Juvenile Justice System, a new report by TCJC, shows that Texas is failing many of these traumatized children. Half of the girls interviewed at the Ron Jackson State Juvenile Correctional Complex report that their previous time in county juvenile facilities either did not help or actually did more harm than good for dealing with their past trauma. Tragically, eight percent report that their time at Ron Jackson is doing more harm than good, suggesting that our juvenile justice system may be re-traumatizing many of these youth.
These issues call for a system-wide response. Many of the experiences that the girls report in these interviews – including negative interactions with staff, severe isolation from family, and youth-on-youth violence – match the experiences that boys in state custody reported in a TCJC survey earlier this year. As Texas moves forward with reforms to address those concerns, we should increase funding for trauma counseling in the juvenile system, and we should revisit the policies and procedures in our juvenile facilities to respond better to the vulnerabilities and triggers of traumatized youth.
RECOMMENDATION: Increase funding support for local programs that keep youth in their home counties.
http://www.texascjc.org/girls-experiences-system
Friday, July 3, 2015
Cruel & All Too Usual A Terrifying Glimce Into The Life In Prison As A Kid
http://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/cruel-and-all-too-usual/
-
WARNING: The Following Video, Obtained By The Huffington Post, Show The Rough Treatment Of A Minor By Correctional Officers & May bE Disturbing To Some Viewers.
If You are In A public Place Headphones Are Advisable:
-
http://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/cruel-and-all-too-usual/
-
>Cruel & All Too Usual A Terrifying Glimce Into The Life In Prison As A Kid By Dana Liebelson.
When the video above was filmed, the girl on the bed was 17 years old. For the purposes of this story, I’ll call her Jamie. There was a time when she liked acting in goofy comedy skits at her Detroit church or crawling into bed with her grandmother to watch TV. She loved to sing—her favorite artist was Chris Brown—but she was too shy to perform in front of other people.
Jamie, whose mother was addicted to crack cocaine, was adopted when she was 3. At high school, she fell in with a wayward crowd and started drinking and smoking weed. Since she didn't always get along with her adoptive mom, she lived with a close family friend from her church whom she referred to as her sister. One fall day in 2011, they got into a bad fight over their living arrangements. The friend told police that Jamie threw a brick at her, hitting her in the chest, and then banged the brick so hard on the front door that she broke the glass mail chute. Jamie denies the assault—and the police report notes that the brick may not have hit her friend—but she admitted to officers that she was “mad” and “trying to get back in the house.” The Wayne County court gave her two concurrent six-month sentences, for assault and destruction of a building.
In a wealthier Michigan county, kids convicted of minor offenses are almost always sentenced to community service, like helping out at the local science center. Doug Mullkoff, a criminal defense attorney in Ann Arbor, told me that prison in such circumstances is "virtually unheard of." But Jamie is from Detroit, and in January 2012, she was sent to the Women’s Huron Valley Correctional Facility, a prison that holds inmates convicted of crimes like first-degree homicide. From this point onward, her world was largely governed by codes and practices and assumptions designed for adult criminals.
Jamie is 20 now, but her soft brown eyes make her seem younger. When she first came to prison, women old enough to be her mother told her she was cute and promised to take care of her. “They rub on you and stuff, I can’t stand it,” she said. In the seven months before her 18th birthday, prison records show that Jamie was housed with at least three adult cellmates, including one in her 50s who had a history of cocaine possession. Jamie said she was also around adults in the showers and the yard. She had a bunkmate who did drugs she had never been around before, “something you snort.”
In this environment, Jamie found it hard to stay out of trouble. And when trouble came, she didn’t know how to explain herself to the guards. According to Chris Gautz, a spokesman for the Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC), Jamie “failed in every instance” to meet good-behavior standards that under Michigan law allow certain inmates to have their records scrubbed clean after they serve their sentences. In June 2012, Jamie’s special status was revoked and she was resentenced to up to five years in prison for her original crime. In May, Michigan Republican Governor Rick Snyder signed a law that limits the circumstances under which kids with Jamie’s status can be sent to prison. However, he stressed that youth can still be placed in prison to “protect public safety.”
When this news sank in, Jamie snapped. On June 15, 2012, she started yelling so loud and for so long that a correctional officer complained in the logbook that the noise was giving her a headache. Then she climbed on her sink and threatened to kill herself. A group of officers in gas masks hauled her out of her cell as she begged them to put her down. Chemical gas that had been used to subdue another inmate lingered in the hallway, Jamie later recalled, and she started to cough. The officers pressed a spit guard on her face and fastened straps on her arms and legs and chest, a practice known as five-point restraint. Jamie became more and more distressed, but at no point did the officers attempt to calm her or even explain what they were doing. “[There was] snot coming out of my nose. I’m trying to sit up,” she said. “I’m coughing and crying at the same time, and basically the officer said I spit on her and they still tied me down.” She recalled pleading with the guards, “I’m like only 17, you can’t do this to me.”
A page from a guard’s observation log on June 15, obtained through a FOIA request.
After Jamie had been restrained, the logbook shows that she was left tied to a bed for nearly 24 hours. No therapist appears to have visited her during this time. Jamie said that on another occasion, she was restrained for days and urinated on herself. “I’ve had dreams about being held down; nobody can hear me or nothing. It’s terrifying,” she said. The MDOC declined to comment on detailed questions related to her treatment because they concerned “pending litigation” and “personal medical information.”
Jamie had never attempted suicide until she went to prison and her fellow inmates taught her how to cut herself. Over the course of several weeks in June, according to the prison log, she tried to hang herself with socks tied around her neck, to cut herself with wall scrapings and rocks and a comb, to eat paint chips off her door, and to scratch a wound on her arm with empty mayonnaise packets. She told a staff member she wanted her arm to get infected, amputated, and sent to her parents.
A checklist from the June 15, 2012 incident report when Jamie was placed in restraints.The cause of the incident is marked as "none apparent."
The treatment of kids in adult lockups recently received a rare burst of attention with the suicide of Kalief Browder on June 8 of this year. Browder was sent to the jail on Rikers Island at the age of 16 after being accused of stealing a backpack. During the three years he spent there before the charges were thrown out, he was brutally assaulted by both inmates and guards and spent about two years in solitary confinement. His case has drawn attention to what the Justice Department called a “dangerous place for adolescents” with a “pervasive climate of fear.” But the problem runs far deeper than one jail gone rogue.
In the course of reporting on a lawsuit against the Michigan prison system, I obtained a series of videos depicting the treatment of underage inmates in adult facilities, as well as hundreds of prison documents through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests and other sources. (Jamie is a plaintiff in the lawsuit.) These materials show under-18-year-olds being restrained, held in solitary confinement, forcibly extracted from their cells, tasered, and allegedly sexually assaulted. Some of these incidents would not violate any official rulebook, but are simply accepted practices inside adult correctional institutions.
In 1822, when prison reformers in New York proposed the nation’s first juvenile institution, they saw the need to keep children separate from adults as “too obvious to require any argument.” The juvenile justice system was founded on the idea that young people are capable of change, and so society has a responsibility to help them overcome early mistakes in life. More recent science has only confirmed this principle. Because adolescents’ brains are still developing, their patterns of behavior not yet fixed, they have a far better chance of being rehabilitated than adults. And yet this potential is lost in prisons and jails, which barely recognize any distinction between adults and minors.
http://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/cruel-and-all-too-usual/
In the 1980s and ‘90s, the United States was gripped by panic over the specter of the teenage “super-predator,” and the controversial Princeton professor John DiIulio warned darkly of “the youngest, biggest and baddest generation any society has ever known.” These claims would turn out to be wildly overblown, but during this period many states introduced laws making it easier for children to be prosecuted as adults. Between 1985 and 1995, the number of youth incarcerated in prisons and jails roughly doubled. As of 2013, almost 6,000 kids were held in adult facilities across the country.
Compared to kids who do their time in juvenile detention, those in the adult system attempt suicide more often. One study, reviewed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, tracked what happened to minors in custody for similar crimes. After they were released, those who had served in the adult system were 77 percent more likely to be arrested for a violent felony than those who were sent to juvenile institutions.
There is an increasing body of scientific research showing that when adolescents suffer from extreme stress and trauma, it can inflict permanent damage on their bodies and brains. A study led by the CDC found that children who experienced multiple forms of trauma, such as physical and sexual abuse, had a life expectancy 20 years shorter than their counterparts.
-
WARNING: The Following Video, Obtained By The Huffington Post, Show The Rough Treatment Of A Minor By Correctional Officers & May bE Disturbing To Some Viewers.
If You are In A public Place Headphones Are Advisable:
-
http://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/cruel-and-all-too-usual/
-
>Cruel & All Too Usual A Terrifying Glimce Into The Life In Prison As A Kid By Dana Liebelson.
When the video above was filmed, the girl on the bed was 17 years old. For the purposes of this story, I’ll call her Jamie. There was a time when she liked acting in goofy comedy skits at her Detroit church or crawling into bed with her grandmother to watch TV. She loved to sing—her favorite artist was Chris Brown—but she was too shy to perform in front of other people.
Jamie, whose mother was addicted to crack cocaine, was adopted when she was 3. At high school, she fell in with a wayward crowd and started drinking and smoking weed. Since she didn't always get along with her adoptive mom, she lived with a close family friend from her church whom she referred to as her sister. One fall day in 2011, they got into a bad fight over their living arrangements. The friend told police that Jamie threw a brick at her, hitting her in the chest, and then banged the brick so hard on the front door that she broke the glass mail chute. Jamie denies the assault—and the police report notes that the brick may not have hit her friend—but she admitted to officers that she was “mad” and “trying to get back in the house.” The Wayne County court gave her two concurrent six-month sentences, for assault and destruction of a building.
In a wealthier Michigan county, kids convicted of minor offenses are almost always sentenced to community service, like helping out at the local science center. Doug Mullkoff, a criminal defense attorney in Ann Arbor, told me that prison in such circumstances is "virtually unheard of." But Jamie is from Detroit, and in January 2012, she was sent to the Women’s Huron Valley Correctional Facility, a prison that holds inmates convicted of crimes like first-degree homicide. From this point onward, her world was largely governed by codes and practices and assumptions designed for adult criminals.
Jamie is 20 now, but her soft brown eyes make her seem younger. When she first came to prison, women old enough to be her mother told her she was cute and promised to take care of her. “They rub on you and stuff, I can’t stand it,” she said. In the seven months before her 18th birthday, prison records show that Jamie was housed with at least three adult cellmates, including one in her 50s who had a history of cocaine possession. Jamie said she was also around adults in the showers and the yard. She had a bunkmate who did drugs she had never been around before, “something you snort.”
In this environment, Jamie found it hard to stay out of trouble. And when trouble came, she didn’t know how to explain herself to the guards. According to Chris Gautz, a spokesman for the Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC), Jamie “failed in every instance” to meet good-behavior standards that under Michigan law allow certain inmates to have their records scrubbed clean after they serve their sentences. In June 2012, Jamie’s special status was revoked and she was resentenced to up to five years in prison for her original crime. In May, Michigan Republican Governor Rick Snyder signed a law that limits the circumstances under which kids with Jamie’s status can be sent to prison. However, he stressed that youth can still be placed in prison to “protect public safety.”
When this news sank in, Jamie snapped. On June 15, 2012, she started yelling so loud and for so long that a correctional officer complained in the logbook that the noise was giving her a headache. Then she climbed on her sink and threatened to kill herself. A group of officers in gas masks hauled her out of her cell as she begged them to put her down. Chemical gas that had been used to subdue another inmate lingered in the hallway, Jamie later recalled, and she started to cough. The officers pressed a spit guard on her face and fastened straps on her arms and legs and chest, a practice known as five-point restraint. Jamie became more and more distressed, but at no point did the officers attempt to calm her or even explain what they were doing. “[There was] snot coming out of my nose. I’m trying to sit up,” she said. “I’m coughing and crying at the same time, and basically the officer said I spit on her and they still tied me down.” She recalled pleading with the guards, “I’m like only 17, you can’t do this to me.”
A page from a guard’s observation log on June 15, obtained through a FOIA request.
After Jamie had been restrained, the logbook shows that she was left tied to a bed for nearly 24 hours. No therapist appears to have visited her during this time. Jamie said that on another occasion, she was restrained for days and urinated on herself. “I’ve had dreams about being held down; nobody can hear me or nothing. It’s terrifying,” she said. The MDOC declined to comment on detailed questions related to her treatment because they concerned “pending litigation” and “personal medical information.”
Jamie had never attempted suicide until she went to prison and her fellow inmates taught her how to cut herself. Over the course of several weeks in June, according to the prison log, she tried to hang herself with socks tied around her neck, to cut herself with wall scrapings and rocks and a comb, to eat paint chips off her door, and to scratch a wound on her arm with empty mayonnaise packets. She told a staff member she wanted her arm to get infected, amputated, and sent to her parents.
A checklist from the June 15, 2012 incident report when Jamie was placed in restraints.The cause of the incident is marked as "none apparent."
The treatment of kids in adult lockups recently received a rare burst of attention with the suicide of Kalief Browder on June 8 of this year. Browder was sent to the jail on Rikers Island at the age of 16 after being accused of stealing a backpack. During the three years he spent there before the charges were thrown out, he was brutally assaulted by both inmates and guards and spent about two years in solitary confinement. His case has drawn attention to what the Justice Department called a “dangerous place for adolescents” with a “pervasive climate of fear.” But the problem runs far deeper than one jail gone rogue.
In the course of reporting on a lawsuit against the Michigan prison system, I obtained a series of videos depicting the treatment of underage inmates in adult facilities, as well as hundreds of prison documents through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests and other sources. (Jamie is a plaintiff in the lawsuit.) These materials show under-18-year-olds being restrained, held in solitary confinement, forcibly extracted from their cells, tasered, and allegedly sexually assaulted. Some of these incidents would not violate any official rulebook, but are simply accepted practices inside adult correctional institutions.
In 1822, when prison reformers in New York proposed the nation’s first juvenile institution, they saw the need to keep children separate from adults as “too obvious to require any argument.” The juvenile justice system was founded on the idea that young people are capable of change, and so society has a responsibility to help them overcome early mistakes in life. More recent science has only confirmed this principle. Because adolescents’ brains are still developing, their patterns of behavior not yet fixed, they have a far better chance of being rehabilitated than adults. And yet this potential is lost in prisons and jails, which barely recognize any distinction between adults and minors.
http://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/cruel-and-all-too-usual/
In the 1980s and ‘90s, the United States was gripped by panic over the specter of the teenage “super-predator,” and the controversial Princeton professor John DiIulio warned darkly of “the youngest, biggest and baddest generation any society has ever known.” These claims would turn out to be wildly overblown, but during this period many states introduced laws making it easier for children to be prosecuted as adults. Between 1985 and 1995, the number of youth incarcerated in prisons and jails roughly doubled. As of 2013, almost 6,000 kids were held in adult facilities across the country.
Compared to kids who do their time in juvenile detention, those in the adult system attempt suicide more often. One study, reviewed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, tracked what happened to minors in custody for similar crimes. After they were released, those who had served in the adult system were 77 percent more likely to be arrested for a violent felony than those who were sent to juvenile institutions.
There is an increasing body of scientific research showing that when adolescents suffer from extreme stress and trauma, it can inflict permanent damage on their bodies and brains. A study led by the CDC found that children who experienced multiple forms of trauma, such as physical and sexual abuse, had a life expectancy 20 years shorter than their counterparts.
Tuesday, June 30, 2015
~Not eligible to practice law
http://www.avvo.com/attorneys/92408-ca-byron-congdon-307492.html (June 30 2015)
Byron Congdon San Bernardino Attorney:
Not To Be Practicing Law!!
State CA.
Status Acquired (1986)
Updated~(5/20/2015)
CA ~Not eligible to practice law (Not Entitled) Professional Misconduct
This lawyer was disciplined by a state licensing authority.
3rd Discipline:-- Discipline with actual suspension
issued in CA, 2014 - updated on Mar 18, 2014
This sanction means the attorney lost his or her license to practice law for a period of time.
Discipline with actual suspension
issued in CA, 2012 ---- updated on Mar 4, 2013
Client Reviews out of 1 total
Review Byron Congdon
Posted by a Wrongful Death client
on Sep 11, 2013
Beware of this Attorney
Mr. Byron E Congdon is a bad bad Attorney. He never answers calls. He pushes court dates for years, he does
not study his cases before trial. He got my son locked up for 25 yrs. to life. Because he did not care. My son is
innocent of what he was accused of. If this Attorney would have done his job, my son would be home. This so
called Attorney needs to sell his law books and go fishing. Thanks for everything Mr Congdon, you have ruined
our entire lives.
Less
Practice Areas -Wrongful Death: 100%
Attorney Endorsements 0 total Byron Is Not Endorseed By Any Other Attorneys:
Byron E Congdon, Attorney at Law, APC
1918 Business Center Dr Ste 106
San Bernardino, CA, 92408-3451
Office (909) 383-7789- CA
1986- 05/20/2015 ~Not Able To Practice Law.
Professional Misconduct
This lawyer was disciplined by a state licensing authority.
Discipline with actual suspension ; issued in CA, 2014
updated on Mar 18, 2014
This sanction means the attorney lost his or her license to practice law for a period of time. The attorney
typically returns to practicing law when the suspension expires.
Discipline with actual suspension / issued in CA, 2012 -updated on Mar 4, 2013
This sanction means the attorney lost his or her license to practice law for a period of time. The attorney
typically returns to practicing law when the suspension expires.
Public reproval with/duties / issued in CA, 2006 - updated on Nov 13, 2011
This sanction means the attorney did something wrong but may still practice law. The Bar placed conditions on
the lawyer's activities to try to prevent a recurrence of the wrongful act.
Byron Congdon San Bernardino Attorney:
Not To Be Practicing Law!!
State CA.
Status Acquired (1986)
Updated~(5/20/2015)
CA ~Not eligible to practice law (Not Entitled) Professional Misconduct
This lawyer was disciplined by a state licensing authority.
3rd Discipline:-- Discipline with actual suspension
issued in CA, 2014 - updated on Mar 18, 2014
This sanction means the attorney lost his or her license to practice law for a period of time.
Discipline with actual suspension
issued in CA, 2012 ---- updated on Mar 4, 2013
Client Reviews out of 1 total
Review Byron Congdon
Posted by a Wrongful Death client
on Sep 11, 2013
Beware of this Attorney
Mr. Byron E Congdon is a bad bad Attorney. He never answers calls. He pushes court dates for years, he does
not study his cases before trial. He got my son locked up for 25 yrs. to life. Because he did not care. My son is
innocent of what he was accused of. If this Attorney would have done his job, my son would be home. This so
called Attorney needs to sell his law books and go fishing. Thanks for everything Mr Congdon, you have ruined
our entire lives.
Less
Practice Areas -Wrongful Death: 100%
Attorney Endorsements 0 total Byron Is Not Endorseed By Any Other Attorneys:
Byron E Congdon, Attorney at Law, APC
1918 Business Center Dr Ste 106
San Bernardino, CA, 92408-3451
Office (909) 383-7789- CA
1986- 05/20/2015 ~Not Able To Practice Law.
Professional Misconduct
This lawyer was disciplined by a state licensing authority.
Discipline with actual suspension ; issued in CA, 2014
updated on Mar 18, 2014
This sanction means the attorney lost his or her license to practice law for a period of time. The attorney
typically returns to practicing law when the suspension expires.
Discipline with actual suspension / issued in CA, 2012 -updated on Mar 4, 2013
This sanction means the attorney lost his or her license to practice law for a period of time. The attorney
typically returns to practicing law when the suspension expires.
Public reproval with/duties / issued in CA, 2006 - updated on Nov 13, 2011
This sanction means the attorney did something wrong but may still practice law. The Bar placed conditions on
the lawyer's activities to try to prevent a recurrence of the wrongful act.
Wednesday, June 17, 2015
Teen Kills Himself After Lock Up In Solitary
Teen kills himself after lock up in solitary confinement on Rikers.
Kalif Brower Killed himself last week after spending 3 years in solitary. being in Solitary in Rikers prison in New York.
He was 16 years old waiting to go to trial.
Commentators have dubbed last week's suicide of Kalief Browder – who, at sixteen, was arrested and incarcerated on Rikers Island for three years while awaiting trial – a "tragedy." "Tragedy" suggests an unavoidable calamity. Kalief's heartbreaking death was the direct result of irrational criminal and juvenile justice policies compounded by deliberate acts of cruelty and indifference by those charged with ensuring his safety during his 1,000 days in jail. That the loss of this young man, so full of promise, was utterly preventable makes it all the more horrifying.
According to the New Yorker, Browder was charged with robbery of a backpack in 2010. From the start, many questions arose regarding his involvement in the crime; the complaining witness, for example, provided conflicting details about the incident, including the date on which it occurred. At the time, Browder was a high school sophomore who teachers described as "smart" and "fun." The court set bail at $3,000, which his mother could not afford to post. So, he sat in jail.
Over the next three years, Browder was brutalized numerous times by correctional officers and other inmates. He was held in solitary confinement and deprived of any meaningful human interaction for a total of almost two years. His physical and mental health deteriorated; for the first time, he began to contemplate suicide and attempted at least once to hang himself. Despite this trauma, he rejected numerous, increasingly lenient plea offers, insisting on his innocence and his right to a trial. Ultimately, the case against him was dismissed and he was released in May 2013. After returning home, he continued to suffer the psychological aftershocks of his ordeal. His life, as he saw it, had been derailed. He was only 22 when he took his own life.
First, although he was just 16 at the time of his arrest, he was charged as an adult and held in an adult jail. Every state, including New Jersey, has mechanisms for prosecuting children in the adult system, under the guise of public safety. Yet study after study has established that young people prosecuted as adults reoffend more frequently and more seriously than those who remain in the juvenile justice system. Like Browder, they are more likely to be physically and sexually assaulted while in custody, more likely to attempt or commit suicide and less likely to receive essential educational services and mental health treatment.
Second, though Browder was never convicted of the robbery, he sat in jail for three years. He wasn't detained because he was dangerous or likely to skip town: he was jailed because he didn't have $3,000. Throughout the country, including in New Jersey, jails are filled with people who are in jail simply because they are poor. And Browder, like so many people in our state, didn't wait weeks or months for his day in court, he waited years. Courts in New Jersey have failed to enforce the right to a speedy trial even in cases where it took more than four years to bring a defendant to trial.
Finally, Browder, like so many incarcerated people, suffered long periods of solitary confinement, and he attributed his ongoing depression and anxiety to the trauma of that isolation. This is consistent with a substantial body of research establishing that even a short stint in solitary can lead to profound psychological distress, including chronic and overwhelming depression, paranoia, hallucinations and feelings of rage and violence. Solitary is even more dangerous for children, whose brains are still developing and are more acutely affected by the denial of human contact.
http://www.nj.com/opinion/index.ssf/2015/06/nj_should_learn_from_kalief_browders_death_how_to.html
Kalif Brower Killed himself last week after spending 3 years in solitary. being in Solitary in Rikers prison in New York.
He was 16 years old waiting to go to trial.
Commentators have dubbed last week's suicide of Kalief Browder – who, at sixteen, was arrested and incarcerated on Rikers Island for three years while awaiting trial – a "tragedy." "Tragedy" suggests an unavoidable calamity. Kalief's heartbreaking death was the direct result of irrational criminal and juvenile justice policies compounded by deliberate acts of cruelty and indifference by those charged with ensuring his safety during his 1,000 days in jail. That the loss of this young man, so full of promise, was utterly preventable makes it all the more horrifying.
According to the New Yorker, Browder was charged with robbery of a backpack in 2010. From the start, many questions arose regarding his involvement in the crime; the complaining witness, for example, provided conflicting details about the incident, including the date on which it occurred. At the time, Browder was a high school sophomore who teachers described as "smart" and "fun." The court set bail at $3,000, which his mother could not afford to post. So, he sat in jail.
Over the next three years, Browder was brutalized numerous times by correctional officers and other inmates. He was held in solitary confinement and deprived of any meaningful human interaction for a total of almost two years. His physical and mental health deteriorated; for the first time, he began to contemplate suicide and attempted at least once to hang himself. Despite this trauma, he rejected numerous, increasingly lenient plea offers, insisting on his innocence and his right to a trial. Ultimately, the case against him was dismissed and he was released in May 2013. After returning home, he continued to suffer the psychological aftershocks of his ordeal. His life, as he saw it, had been derailed. He was only 22 when he took his own life.
First, although he was just 16 at the time of his arrest, he was charged as an adult and held in an adult jail. Every state, including New Jersey, has mechanisms for prosecuting children in the adult system, under the guise of public safety. Yet study after study has established that young people prosecuted as adults reoffend more frequently and more seriously than those who remain in the juvenile justice system. Like Browder, they are more likely to be physically and sexually assaulted while in custody, more likely to attempt or commit suicide and less likely to receive essential educational services and mental health treatment.
Second, though Browder was never convicted of the robbery, he sat in jail for three years. He wasn't detained because he was dangerous or likely to skip town: he was jailed because he didn't have $3,000. Throughout the country, including in New Jersey, jails are filled with people who are in jail simply because they are poor. And Browder, like so many people in our state, didn't wait weeks or months for his day in court, he waited years. Courts in New Jersey have failed to enforce the right to a speedy trial even in cases where it took more than four years to bring a defendant to trial.
Finally, Browder, like so many incarcerated people, suffered long periods of solitary confinement, and he attributed his ongoing depression and anxiety to the trauma of that isolation. This is consistent with a substantial body of research establishing that even a short stint in solitary can lead to profound psychological distress, including chronic and overwhelming depression, paranoia, hallucinations and feelings of rage and violence. Solitary is even more dangerous for children, whose brains are still developing and are more acutely affected by the denial of human contact.
http://www.nj.com/opinion/index.ssf/2015/06/nj_should_learn_from_kalief_browders_death_how_to.html
Wednesday, April 1, 2015
California has long led the world in juvenile injustice
California Rightly Revisits Its Tough-on-Youth-Crime Stance''
California has long led the world in juvenile injustice. Just five years ago, when there were only seven people outside the U.S. serving life prison terms with no possibility of parole for crimes they had committed before they became adults, California had more than 200.
They were locked up with no hope for eventual release largely because of cruel and costly laws adopted in a frenzy of anti-crime sentiment in the 1980s and 1990s. Rising gang crime fueled fears that juveniles had somehow become inhuman and deranged a belief likely bolstered by the fact that California voters were disproportionately older and white, while the youths being charged with violent crimes were disproportionately Latino and African American. The cultural gap may have made it easier for voters to see juvenile offenders and their families as alien to society rather than an integral part of it.
A 1990 anti-crime ballot measure made life-without-parole sentences the norm for killers, and many other offenders, under 18. Teenagers who committed crimes could be written off and imprisoned as forever beyond redemption.
The tough-on-youth-crime stance ignored a growing body of scientific research demonstrating that teenagers simply don’t have brains that are sufficiently developed to provide the kinds of judgment and impulse controls expected of adults.
Gradually, leaders and lawmakers here came to realize that it was unjust to lock up people for crimes committed in their youth without leaving even the slightest chance for parole, regardless of their underdeveloped mental and emotional state at the time of the crime, regardless of any reckoning or responsibility gained over the course of their imprisonment.
Finally, in 2012, the law changed. The prison doors were not thrown open; on the contrary, the new law merely allowed such inmates who had already served at least 15 years to ask judges to change their sentences to allow parole hearings. If the judge agrees, parole can still be denied, and even if it is granted the governor can overturn the decision. But youthful offenders, aging in prison, gained at least a chance at freedom.
On Wednesday, Edel Gonzalez, now in his 30s, became the first person released from a California prison under the new law. An Orange County judge, the parole board and the governor were convinced that the person who committed a senseless killing at 16 had grown to understand the immorality of his act, had been punished, had been rehabilitated and was no danger to society.
It would be all the more cruel and unusual to deny a parole hearing to people merely because their horrendous juvenile mistakes were committed in the distant past.
The successful process shows that California, too, has grown beyond senselessness in its sentencing laws although it was not ahead of the national curve. Over the last decade, the U.S. Supreme Court has demonstrated an evolving understanding of the essential differences between adolescents and adults.
In 2005, the justices ruled that it was unconstitutional for a state to put a person to death for a murder committed as a minor. Just as juveniles cannot be entrusted with the rights and responsibilities of adults, given that they lack an adult’s judgment and maturity, they cannot be held to answer for their crimes to the same degree that an adult can, the court reasoned. They could be imprisoned, but not executed.
The same reasoning applied in 2010, when the court struck down sentences of life without even the possibility of parole for crimes — other than murder — that perpetrators committed while still juveniles. The justices ruled that such offenders should be able to at least have a chance to request parole, sometime in their adult years, after demonstrating remorse and working to make amends.
In 2012, the court ruled again, this time applying their previous reasoning to most murder convictions. If the basis for the earlier rulings was that juveniles lack an adult’s capacity to reason and to act responsibly, the fact that the crime was especially egregious doesn’t change that. Not every life without parole sentence for a killing committed in the perpetrator’s youth is now necessarily deemed cruel and unusual, but courts must consider the mitigating circumstances, including age.
And how about juveniles sentenced before the 2012 ruling? In December, the court agreed to consider whether its ruling should apply to states retroactively. But the case became moot in January, when the inmate in the case the justices were considering was released from a Louisiana prison. On Monday, though, they took another case that calls on them to answer the same question.
On the merits, the answer should be easy: If a life-without-parole sentence for a crime committed while the perpetrator was a juvenile is cruel and unusual punishment for anyone sentenced after the 2012 decision, it’s just as much a constitutional violation for anyone who has been serving such a sentence for years or even decades.
The court’s decision hinges in part on procedural rules defining when states can make such decisions for themselves. As the justices work through those rules, though, they should keep the substance of the constitutional question foremost in their minds. It would be all the more cruel and unusual to deny a parole hearing to people merely because their horrendous juvenile mistakes were committed in the distant past instead of recently.
California, meanwhile, is still no leader in more enlightened approaches to the sentencing of juvenile offenders. Despite the state law allowing them to seek resentencing, the state now has more than 300 inmates serving life without parole for offenses they committed before adulthood. California courts and lawmakers are waiting for the high court to decide whether a practice deemed cruel and unusual nevertheless remains permissible when applied to people locked up before 2012
California has long led the world in juvenile injustice. Just five years ago, when there were only seven people outside the U.S. serving life prison terms with no possibility of parole for crimes they had committed before they became adults, California had more than 200.
They were locked up with no hope for eventual release largely because of cruel and costly laws adopted in a frenzy of anti-crime sentiment in the 1980s and 1990s. Rising gang crime fueled fears that juveniles had somehow become inhuman and deranged a belief likely bolstered by the fact that California voters were disproportionately older and white, while the youths being charged with violent crimes were disproportionately Latino and African American. The cultural gap may have made it easier for voters to see juvenile offenders and their families as alien to society rather than an integral part of it.
A 1990 anti-crime ballot measure made life-without-parole sentences the norm for killers, and many other offenders, under 18. Teenagers who committed crimes could be written off and imprisoned as forever beyond redemption.
The tough-on-youth-crime stance ignored a growing body of scientific research demonstrating that teenagers simply don’t have brains that are sufficiently developed to provide the kinds of judgment and impulse controls expected of adults.
Gradually, leaders and lawmakers here came to realize that it was unjust to lock up people for crimes committed in their youth without leaving even the slightest chance for parole, regardless of their underdeveloped mental and emotional state at the time of the crime, regardless of any reckoning or responsibility gained over the course of their imprisonment.
Finally, in 2012, the law changed. The prison doors were not thrown open; on the contrary, the new law merely allowed such inmates who had already served at least 15 years to ask judges to change their sentences to allow parole hearings. If the judge agrees, parole can still be denied, and even if it is granted the governor can overturn the decision. But youthful offenders, aging in prison, gained at least a chance at freedom.
On Wednesday, Edel Gonzalez, now in his 30s, became the first person released from a California prison under the new law. An Orange County judge, the parole board and the governor were convinced that the person who committed a senseless killing at 16 had grown to understand the immorality of his act, had been punished, had been rehabilitated and was no danger to society.
It would be all the more cruel and unusual to deny a parole hearing to people merely because their horrendous juvenile mistakes were committed in the distant past.
The successful process shows that California, too, has grown beyond senselessness in its sentencing laws although it was not ahead of the national curve. Over the last decade, the U.S. Supreme Court has demonstrated an evolving understanding of the essential differences between adolescents and adults.
In 2005, the justices ruled that it was unconstitutional for a state to put a person to death for a murder committed as a minor. Just as juveniles cannot be entrusted with the rights and responsibilities of adults, given that they lack an adult’s judgment and maturity, they cannot be held to answer for their crimes to the same degree that an adult can, the court reasoned. They could be imprisoned, but not executed.
The same reasoning applied in 2010, when the court struck down sentences of life without even the possibility of parole for crimes — other than murder — that perpetrators committed while still juveniles. The justices ruled that such offenders should be able to at least have a chance to request parole, sometime in their adult years, after demonstrating remorse and working to make amends.
In 2012, the court ruled again, this time applying their previous reasoning to most murder convictions. If the basis for the earlier rulings was that juveniles lack an adult’s capacity to reason and to act responsibly, the fact that the crime was especially egregious doesn’t change that. Not every life without parole sentence for a killing committed in the perpetrator’s youth is now necessarily deemed cruel and unusual, but courts must consider the mitigating circumstances, including age.
And how about juveniles sentenced before the 2012 ruling? In December, the court agreed to consider whether its ruling should apply to states retroactively. But the case became moot in January, when the inmate in the case the justices were considering was released from a Louisiana prison. On Monday, though, they took another case that calls on them to answer the same question.
On the merits, the answer should be easy: If a life-without-parole sentence for a crime committed while the perpetrator was a juvenile is cruel and unusual punishment for anyone sentenced after the 2012 decision, it’s just as much a constitutional violation for anyone who has been serving such a sentence for years or even decades.
The court’s decision hinges in part on procedural rules defining when states can make such decisions for themselves. As the justices work through those rules, though, they should keep the substance of the constitutional question foremost in their minds. It would be all the more cruel and unusual to deny a parole hearing to people merely because their horrendous juvenile mistakes were committed in the distant past instead of recently.
California, meanwhile, is still no leader in more enlightened approaches to the sentencing of juvenile offenders. Despite the state law allowing them to seek resentencing, the state now has more than 300 inmates serving life without parole for offenses they committed before adulthood. California courts and lawmakers are waiting for the high court to decide whether a practice deemed cruel and unusual nevertheless remains permissible when applied to people locked up before 2012
Tuesday, September 16, 2014
Dear Fair Sentencing for Youth Supporters
Dear Fair Sentencing for Youth Supporters:
I'm writing to ask for your help in urging Governor Brown to sign AB 1276. Please take a few minutes to write, call, or email the Governor.
Young adults are especially vulnerable in prison to rape, assault, and the persuasions of prison gangs. Under current law, young people entering prison are usually housed on the most dangerous units, with the fewest programs and education. AB 1276 would change this.
This legislation recognizes both the vulnerability and potential of young adults entering prison. If passed into law AB 1276 would require prisons to more carefully consider where people under the age of 22 should be housed, and make it possible for young adults to be placed on units that are safer and provide more access to programming.
Your help is needed. The California legislature just passed AB 1276 and it now sits on the Governor's desk, awaiting his signature to become law. We cannot take the governor's support for granted. He needs to know that Californians believe this is important.
If he does sign it, young people entering prison will be treated differently. Do you have 10 minutes to help? Please urge Governor Brown to sign this bill into law. Here are easy-to-use sample letters, or you can email or call. Learn more about the bill here: AB 1276. Read Human Rights Watch's letter of support here.
Thank you, Elizabeth
Senior Advocate, Children's Rights Division
Human Rights Watch
11500 W. Olympic Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90064
O: 310.477.5540
ANNOUNCEMENTSHouse meetings?!
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Youth Offender / SB 260 Parole Guide
For families and people on the inside. Click here to get yours. The compete guide in Spanish is now available!
SB 260 Guía de información para los internos, sus familia, y amigos
Audiencia de libertad condicional para juveniles. Aqui en español
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Compassion acrosstraditional divides Imagine a setting where the family of murder victims and the family of youth sentenced to adult prison terms sit and listen to each other with compassion and care. That is what our group "Healing Dialogue and Action" does. Think you might be interested? Learn more here: Healing Dialogue
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