Reply #22: How do you resolve... [View All]

To some in Paris, sinister past is back
In Texas, a white teenager burns down her family's home and receives probation. A black one shoves
a hall monitor and gets 7 years in prison. The state NAACP calls it 'a signal to black folks.'
By Howard Witt
Tribune senior correspondent
Published March 12, 2007
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There was the 19-year-old white man, convicted last July of criminally negligent homicide for killing a 54-year-old black woman and her 3-year-old grandson with his truck, who was sentenced in Paris to probation and required to send an annual Christmas card to the victims' family.

There are the Paris public schools, which are under investigation by the U.S. Education Department after repeated complaints that administrators discipline black students more frequently, and more harshly, than white students.

And then there is the case that most troubles Cherry and leaders of the Texas NAACP, involving a 14-year-old black freshman, Shaquanda Cotton, who shoved a hall monitor at Paris High School in a dispute over entering the building before the school day had officially begun.The youth had no prior arrest record, and the hall monitor--a 58-year-old teacher's aide--was not seriously injured. But Shaquanda was tried in March 2006 in the town's juvenile court, convicted of "assault on a public servant" and sentenced by Lamar County Judge Chuck Superville to prison for up to 7 years, until she turns 21.
Just three months earlier, Superville sentenced a 14-year-old white girl, convicted of arson for burning down her family's house, to probation.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0703... -
newsnationworld-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true

By RALPH BLUMENTHAL
Published: February 28, 2007
Texan Calls for Takeover of State’s Juvenile Schools
AUSTIN, Tex., Feb. 27 — A long-simmering scandal over sexual abuse of juveniles at schools for youthful offenders broke into the open on Tuesday with an outraged state senator calling for a takeover of the troubled Texas Youth Commission.
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Senators questioned Mr. Nichols about the transfer in 2003 of one supervisor, Ray Brookins, to the West Texas State School from another school for juvenile offenders at San Saba, after pornography had been found on his computer. Mr. Brookins later became assistant superintendent at Pyote and was cited by the Texas Rangers for sexual contact with juveniles there, senators said.Another supervisor at Pyote, John Paul Hernandez, was also reported by the Texas Rangers to have engaged in sexual contact with students, senators said.
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Mr. Hernandez became principal at a charter school in Midland, the Richard Milburn
Academy, said Norman Hall, the school’s superintendent. The school did not know of Mr. Hernandez’s history when it hired him, Mr. Hall said, and put him on leave several weeks ago.
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The superintendent at Pyote, Chip Harrison, who knew of the accusations against Mr. Brookins and Mr. Hernandez and kept them on the staff, senators said, is now director of juvenile corrections for the commission, in charge of several schools.
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Mr. Nichols called him “one of our most experienced superintendents,” setting off a gasp from parents.
Stacie Semrad contributed reporting.

In 1985 one out of every 320 Americans were in jail.
Between1980 and 1994, the number of people in federal and state prisons increased 221%.
Today, 2 million Americans are in prison.
1.2 million are African-American men.

• In 2000, 1.5 million U.S. children had an incarcerated parent. Between 1990-2001, the number of women in prison increased by 106%.
• In 1995, 12% of children in foster care had not received routine health care. 90% had not received services to address developmental delays.
• Between 1992-2002, the number of infants and toddlers entering foster care increased by 110%.
• In 1993, more than 60% of the homeless population in NYC municipal shelters were former foster youth.
• According to a 1999 report, less than 50% of foster youth had graduated from high school, compared to 85% of the general population.
• In 2000, of 732 mid-western foster care youths, nearly 52% had lived in three or more foster homes and had moved schools.
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There are more than half a million children and youth in the U.S. foster care system, a 90% increase since 1987.Three of 10 of the nation’s homeless are former foster children.
A recent study has found that 12-18 months after leaving foster care:
27% of the males and 10% of the females had been incarcerated
33% were receiving public assistance
37% had not finished high school
50% were unemployed
Children in foster care are three to six times more likely than children not in care to have emotional, behavioral and developmental problems.

A study by the National Center for Mental Health and Juvenille Justice found 70% of these youth meet the criteria for at least one mental health disorder. What's worse is that 36% of the parents of these youth intentionaly involved the juvenille justice system to access mental health services...some 12,700 children were places in either child welfare, or the juvenilled justice systems to access mental health systems (U.S. GAO 2003) Of course, the U.S. DOJ in recent investigations into the conditions in these juvenille detention and correctional facilities, found inadequate access to treatment, inappropriate use of medications, and neglect of suicide attempts nationwide (U.S.DOJ 2005).
---80 percent of prison inmates have been through the foster care system.

* 872,000 children and youth were confirmed victims of abuse or neglect in the United States in 2004.

--According to the National Council on Crime and Delinquency, since 1990 the incarceration of youth in adult jails has increased 208%. On any given day, more than 7,000 young people are held in adult jails.

-- Increasing numbers of young people have been
placed in adult jails where they are at risk of assault, abuse, and death.
Currently, 40 states permit or require that youth charged as adults be placed pre-trial in an adult jail, and in some states they may be required to serve their entire sentence in an adult jail.
http://www.campaign4youthjustice.org/Downloads/NEWS/JPI014Consequences_Summary.pdf