Girls and Juvenile Justice Subject of House Hearing

On October 20, the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security held a hearing, “Girls in the Juvenile Justice System: Strategies to Help Girls Achieve Their Full Potential.”

“From 1995 through 2005, delinquency caseloads for girls in juvenile justice courts nationwide increased 15 percent while boys’ caseloads decreased by 12 percent,” said Ranking Member Louie Gohmert (R-TX). “Also, from 1995 through 2005, the number of girls’ cases nationwide involving detention increased 49 percent, compared to a seven percent increase for boys. This trend in juvenile delinquency has not gone unnoticed by federal, state, and local policymakers. As the number of female juvenile offenders increased, state juvenile justice officials have noted that juvenile female offenders generally had more serious and wide-ranging service needs than their male counterparts. Many of these needs include treatment for substance abuse and mental health conditions. To address these needs, the Department of Justice tells us that over the last 10 to 15 years, at least 25 states have developed new programming for girls in the juvenile justice system.”

Eileen Larence, director of Homeland Security and Justice Issues at the Government Accountability Office (GAO), said, “The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) is the Department of Justice (DOJ) office charged with providing national leadership, coordination, and resources to prevent and respond to juvenile delinquency and victimization. OJJDP supports states and communities in their efforts to develop and implement effective programs to, among other things, prevent delinquency and intervene after a juvenile has offended. For example, from fiscal years 2007 through 2009, Congress provided OJJDP almost $1.1 billion to use for grants to states, localities, and organizations for a variety of juvenile justice programs, including programs for girls.” Ms. Larence noted, “OJJDP established the Girls Study Group in 2004 under a $2.6 million multi-year cooperative agreement with a research institute. OJJDP’s objectives…included identifying effective or promising programs, program elements, and implementation principles (i.e., guidelines for developing programs). Objectives also included developing program models to help inform communities of what works in preventing or reducing girls’ delinquency, identifying gaps in girls’ delinquency research, and developing recommendations for future research, and disseminating findings to the girls’ delinquency field about effective or promising programs.” In short, the GAO reported that “The Study Group found that few girls’ delinquency programs had been studied and that the available studies lacked conclusive evidence of effective programs; as a result, OJJDP plans to provide technical assistance to help programs be better prepared for evaluations of their effectiveness. However, OJJDP could better address its girls’ delinquency goals by more fully developing plans for supporting such evaluation.”

Lawanda Ravoira, director of the National Council on Crime and Delinquency’s Center for Girls and Young Women, provided a profile of the girls in the criminal justice system, saying, “There is an overrepresentation of girls of color in the justice system. Based on the race/ethnic proportion of the general population of youth ages 12-17, overrepresentation is an equity issue affecting both girls and boys…Girls of color are overrepresented among youth in residential placement. Compared to white girls: African American girls are placed over three times as often; Native American girls are placed over four times as often; Hispanic girls are placed at higher rates; [and] Asian Pacific Islanders are underrepresented.” She continued, “Disparity exists regardless of offense type. Compared to white girls: African American girls are detained almost six times as often and committed over four times as often for violent crimes; Native Americans are detained five times as often for public order and nine times as often for status offenses, and committed over five times as often for violent and status offenses; Hispanic girls are detained almost twice as often for violent, public order, and technical violations. Girls of color are placed in adult prisons at far higher rates. Compared to white girls: African American girls are sent to adult prison over five times as often and Native American girls three times as often.”

“I was born in a women’s prison,” said Nadiyah Shereff, of California. “When I was two days old, I was taken from my mother and placed with my grandmother in San Francisco…I never knew my father and my mother was incarcerated my entire life.” She continued, “At 13, I got arrested for the first time and was charged with assault. I was taken to San Francisco’s juvenile hall and began a cycle of going in and out of detention. I was locked up 10 different times within a two-year period. Inside “juvie,” I met other girls like myself [who] were there for prostitution, assault, theft, and truancy. We were not violent girls. We were girls who were hurting…It was inside the walls of juvenile hall that I was introduced to the Center for Young Women’s Development, also known as CYWD. Members of their organization came monthly to meet with all the young women in lock-up. When it was my turn to meet with them, Marlene Sanchez, who is now the executive director, talked to me in a way that showed me she felt like I had the potential to do something with my life.” Ms. Shereff added, “Once out, I applied for the Sister’s Rising nine-month Employment Training Program, and was hired in spite of having just gotten out of lock-up. I spent the next nine months taking part in health circles, one-on-one counseling and building sisterhood with other young women who shared similar experiences…CYWD instilled in me a sense of purpose and hope and it was there that my world changed and I began to find myself. CYWD helped me begin the process of healing from all the things that occurred in my life and after graduating from Sister’s Rising, I felt like a truly transformed person.”

C. Jackie Jackson, executive director of Girls Inc. of the Greater Peninsula, Hampton, Virginia, discussed the importance of prevention programs, saying, “[Q]uality prevention does not mean just a place to ‘store’ children and teens with a ping-pong table and a television set. Girls at Girls Inc. participate in research-based programs that stimulate and nurture and maximize their healthy intellectual and emotional development. In addition to homework help, we provide positive life skills, and social skills that help children adopt positive peer groups and succeed in school, which promotes engagement, and, in turn, reduces truancy and other negative outcomes.” Dr. Jackson continued, “And we know prevention programs work. Scientific evaluations of youth programs have shown reductions in vandalism, assaults, drug activity, and juvenile arrests when compared to a control group. For Girls Inc., a 2001 experimental-design evaluation of Friendly PEERsuasion, our substance abuse prevention program, found that girls who participated were more likely than other nonparticipants to avoid situations where peers were smoking, drinking, or using drugs. And, one month after completion of the program, only 22 percent of girls, ages 11 to 12, reported involvement with abusive substances, compared with 40 percent of girls who did not participate in the program.” She added, “In addition to bettering the lives of children, prevention programs save money. In my own community, according to the Hampton Court Services Unit, the average yearly cost to house a child in one of their facilities is $51,000. Nationwide estimates for secure detention range from $32,000-$65,000 per year. In contrast, one year of comprehensive after-school and summer programming at Girls Inc. costs less than $2,000. Even considering the average stay in a detention center for a Hampton Roads youth of 30 days, that cost is still more than twice the cost of a full year of programming at Girls Inc.”

Thomas Strickrath, director of the Ohio Department of Youth Services, discussed his state’s efforts to address the growing population of girls in the juvenile justice system. “Although the DYS [Department of Youth Services] female population has been historically much smaller than our male population, we recognize that meeting the unique needs of this group is drastically different than the approach needed for boys. DYS has taken to heart the research and the lessons learned from working with the female population. When I took the position of director five years ago, the girls’ facility was a different place. Allegations of abuse, lack of mental health treatment, and scarce education plagued the facility. Over the past five years, we have worked tirelessly to change the milieu of the girls’ facility into one that is less penal, more structured, and better prepared to effectively care for the particular challenges this population presents. Employees in contact with girls, from the security staff to the cafeteria workers, participate in a two-day, research-based training developed by sociologists from the Girls Institute of Ohio. This training, called ‘Working Effectively with Girls,’ provides facility staff with the basic demographics of the female population, the key elements of effective girls programming, and strategies to enhance the services provided to girls…Not only do the employees working with our female population learn about trauma, the girls do as well. In the program titled ‘Girls Trauma Recovery and Empowerment Model,’ or G-TREM, girls learn how current behaviors are linked to past abuses, as well as basic skills in boundary maintenance and communication. We have increased the staffing of our female facility in key areas, including social workers and mental health staff. Staffing for female offenders reflects a clinician for every 15 female offenders diagnosed with mental health needs. All of the female units have comfort, or sensory, rooms. These therapeutic spaces are designed to serve as a quiet, safe, and respectful place of retreat to help a youth calm down and avert crisis. Sensory rooms are used for crisis de-escalation and also crisis prevention as youth learn safer and healthier ways to regain self-control.”

Tiffany Rivera, a young woman formerly detained in the juvenile justice system, also testified.