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Juvenile Detention Reform

An alarmingly high number of children accused of crimes are jailed before trial.
On an average day, an estimated 27,000 youths reside in locked pretrial detention centers. This number has grown by 72 percent since the early 1990s despite a steady decline in crimes committed by juveniles.1 Each year, more than 600,000 children and teens cycle through secure detention facilities in the United States.2
The statutory purpose of pretrial detention—to hold only youths who are a danger to the community or at risk of flight—is largely ignored.
Far too often, locked detention is used as an easy place to “park” bothersome and troubled young people who have been accused—but not convicted—of offenses.3
Most youths in pretrial detention centers are nonviolent, relatively minor offenders.
Nearly 70 percent of youths in pretrial detention are held for nonviolent offenses. More than half are aged 15 or younger, and a third are aged 14 or younger.4 And fully one-third of juveniles in detention are status offenders—their offenses would not be considered as crimes if committed by adults.5 In almost half of status cases, the most serious offense is running away from home.6
Current detention practices disproportionately affect young people of color.
Between 1983 and 1997, juvenile detention rates for minorities grew 76 percent, while rates for whites actually declined. Throughout this period, four of every five newly-detained youths were minorities.7
Confinement worsens outcomes for most young offenders.
Pretrial detention is appropriate for those who present a danger to others or who are unlikely to report for trial. But for most youths, detention makes their situation worse. Putting young, nonviolent children in close contact with more hardened offenders provides a higher education in criminal behavior for some and a physical danger for others. Experts have found that detention increases long-term recidivism rates.8 Detention also increases the likelihood that children will be placed out of their homes in the future—even when controlling for offense, prior history, and other factors.9 And detention leads to more suicide attempts, stress-related illnesses and psychiatric problems.10
Detention reform cuts recidivism rates.
Communities across the country have found that keeping juveniles out of secure detention helps both young people and their communities.11 For example, a San Francisco study of 1,500 high-risk youths who completed an alternative-to-detention program found that the program participants were 26 percent less likely to be rearrested than similar youths released from secure detention facilities.12 Youths in alternative pretrial programs benefit from better mental health assessments and treatment as well as stronger connections with family, school, religious and community supports—all factors that contribute to lower recidivism.
Detention reform redirects tax dollars to more cost-effective home- and community-based programs.
Detention is very expensive. One detention bed costs between $1.25 and $1.5 million dollars over 20 years.13 Detention alternatives have been proven to save money. In Cook County, Illinois, for example, a combination of accelerated case processing, use of a model objective risk assessment instrument, and a network of community-run reporting centers has saved millions of dollars.14
States are adopting detention reform.
In 2005, Mississippi enacted sweeping juvenile justice reforms that include new controls on juvenile detention facilities. New Mexico now prohibits juvenile detention unless an objective assessment demonstrates substantial risk of harm to self or others, or a youth is likely to leave the court’s jurisdiction.15 North Dakota developed a system of short-term community holding sites throughout the state where youths receive one-on-one attention from trained adult advocates, including social workers, teachers, clergy and volunteers. The results of such detention reforms have been positive—community safety is preserved, youths are held in the least restrictive setting for the shortest period of time in facilities as close to home as possible, and valuable resources are freed up.

This policy summary relies in large part on information from the Coalition for Juvenile Justice.

Endnotes
  1. Coalition for Juvenile Justice, “Unlocking the Future: Detention Reform in the Juvenile Justice System,” January 2004.
  2. Rina Shore, “Kids Count Indicator Brief: Reducing the Number of Disconnected Youth,” Annie E. Casey Foundation, July 2005.
  3. “Unlocking the Future: Detention Reform in the Juvenile Justice System.”
  4. Howard Snyder and Melissa Sickmund, “Juvenile Offenders and Victims, 1999 Report,” National Center for Juvenile Justice, 1999.
  5. Deborah Busch, “By the Numbers: the role of data and information in detention reform,” Annie E. Casey Foundation, Pathways to Juvenile Justice Reform series, 1999.
  6. “Juvenile Offenders and Victims, 1999 Report.”
  7. Annie E. Casey Foundation, “The JDAI Story: Reducing Racial Disparities in Juvenile Detention,” Pathways to Juvenile Detention Reform, 2002.
  8. “Unlocking the Future: Detention Reform in the Juvenile Justice System.”
  9. Annie E. Casey Foundation, “Juvenile Jailhouse Rocked: Reforming Detention in Chicago, Portland and Sacramento,” AdvoCasey: Documenting Programs that Work for Kids and Families, Fall/Winter 1999.
  10. National Juvenile Detention Association and Youth Law Center, “Crowding in Juvenile Detention Facilities: A Problem-Solving Manual,” 1998.
  11. Beneficial results of detention reform have been reported in such diverse jurisdictions as Bernalillo County/Albuquerque (NM), Tarrant County (TX), and Santa Cruz (CA), and the states of Illinois (starting with Chicago/Cook County) and North Dakota. See “Unlocking the Future: Detention Reform in the Juvenile Justice System.”
  12. Center on Juvenile Crime and Criminal Justice, “Detention Diversion Advocacy Project Evaluation,” September 1999.
  13. American Youth Policy Forum, “Less Cost, More Safety,” 2001.
  14. Richard Mendel, “And the Walls Keep Tumbling Down: A Demonstration Project has Come and Gone but Detention Reform Continues to Gather Steam,” Annie E. Casey Foundation, Spring 2003.
  15. New Mexico Children’s Code, Revised, §32A: 2.1 et seq., effective July 2003.
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