FLORIDA

Juvenile justice head making waves with reforms

As a public defender for Florida's young delinquents, Marie Osborne for years saw child offenders locked down in tiny rooms in warehouse-style facilities. Like adult prisoners, when they wanted to phone family, they had to pay extra and call collect. “For a while there, I was just waiting for them to have to start making license plates,” said Osborne, who, as head of the juvenile division of the Miami-Dade County Public Defender's Office, was dismayed by what she considered harsh conditions.
After deaths and allegations of abuse in detention centers, however, the state Department of Juvenile Justice is reforming how it deals with inmates — turning away from incarceration and punishment toward treatment and rehabilitation.

Agency head Anthony Schembri, confirmed unanimously last month by the state Senate, has led the shift, arguing that the department must take advantage of the proven ability of children to turn themselves around more easily than their adult peers.
“I don't care what they're charged with,” Schembri said of juveniles. “When they come to a detention center, they're not only in our custody, they're in our care.”

New leader, many changes
Observers say that's a remarkable shift for a department that a year ago was reeling from the death of a 17- year-old detainee and other allegations of abuse and neglect of inmates. Omar Paisley was denied treatment for three days after suffering a burst appendix in his cell.

Appointed in May 2004 in part to deal with that scandal, Schembri has drafted a children's “bill of rights” for the state's detention centers, hired someone to oversee medical care for young offenders and closed facilities that drew criticism.
It's been quite different from his tenure as head of New York City's jails, Schembri said.
“In New York, I had the inmates beating the heck out of the officers. Down here, we were doing just the opposite,” he said. “I've referred over 200 wrongful uses of force to prosecutors.”
Schembri also has established surprise inspections of detention centers and overseen the closure of programs that he believed were not working.
After learning that more than 60 percent of girls in the Florida system have experienced sexual abuse or other physical attacks, he shut down a boot camp-style program that he believed was leading to repeat offenses by further traumatizing the girls.

Doubts remain for some
Still, some who work with the children remain cautious, questioning whether the change in philosophy will be enough to reform a system contending with inertia and what they say are low salaries for those who work most closely with the youths.
“The policy direction I see coming from the secretary, I don't think has translated into the rank and file as of yet,” said Wansley Walters, director of the Miami Dade Juvenile Assessment Center, where workers evaluate young offenders and decide whether to detain them while they await trial.

“He is interested in innovation, and he is interested in doing things differently, but you have a lot of people who are very entrenched and interested in things not changing,” she said.
Still, she says, the department's moves toward individualizing the assessment process so treatment can be tailored to each child could one day make a huge difference.
Probation officers and the guards who care for the children daily are underpaid, critics argue. Also, Osborne says that visitation rules at many detention and residential centers make it nearly impossible for public defenders to investigate allegations of abuse without exposing the child to possible retaliation.

“My feeling is that it has become harder and harder to access children once they're in residential programs,” she said.
Agency spokesman Tom Denham said the secretary would look into the issue, adding that he believes “it is easier for youths to report abuse than ever before.”

Rehabilitation versus punishment
While some critics worry that the conditions at some high-security lockups may be too harsh, others are concerned that the department's shift in focus could leave potential criminals less worried about consequences.
“Our crime rate is at its lowest rate ever,” said Sen. Mike Haridopolos, R-Melbourne. “I think it's because we've been very tough on crime. I think we should always hesitate before we make it more lenient.”
Some studies have suggested that treatment and rehabilitation lowers the rate of recidivism. The National Mental Health Association says that child delinquents who receive treatment are up to 25 percent less likely to become repeat offenders than their untreated peers.

Schembri was police chief of Rye, N.Y., when he became the model for the ABC television series “The Commish.” He says he's proud of the changes he has made, although he bemoans a lack of state money for pilot programs that he believes could help the agency.
Schembri's penchant for turning an organization's politics on its head to spur people into action is not always tactful. He once moved the Rikers Island warden's office into a sewage-filled locker room to get the warden to fix the pipes.
On one Florida detention center visit, concerned by the meager-looking sandwiches children were receiving for lunch, he demanded that kitchen employees have their bags searched daily to make sure they weren't stealing food.

Praise from a former critic
His willingness to dive into touchy issues has won the secretary praise from former critics, including Sen. Frederica Wilson, D-Miami.
Months after joining other black lawmakers to criticize Schembri for showing a Chris Rock video lampooning racial profiling to Florida NAACP leaders, Wilson now applauds the secretary for taking what she calls a “political risk.” Schembri says he has used the video as part of a classroom discussion of racial stereotypes and crime.
“Most elected officials, they sort of shy away from the race issue. This gentleman is willing to put the race issue on the forefront,” Wilson said.

And that, she said, is “something that we should be happy about.”

Samantha Gross
19 June 2005

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