How locking kids in solitary confinement became normal

I remember the first time I ever saw a child locked up in a men's prison. I was walking down the corridor of a maximum-security prison, visiting a prisoner who had been transferred there from the prison where I was working at the time. (That's a sad story for another day.)

Suddenly, I saw the face of a boy, staring out at me bleakly from a cell window. The incongruity of the boy's presence in a men's prison made me do a double-take. I stared back for a long moment into his haunted eyes. When I asked about him later, I was told that, as the only minor at the prison, he had to be locked down 24/7 for his own protection.

I remember thinking at the time that even if a minor was tried and sentenced as an adult, there should be a provision to keep him in a juvenile lockup until he turned 18, so that he would be with others his age, have access to educational programming, and not be such a target for victimization.

Fast forward to 2014, and such a sight is no longer unusual. Thousands of minors across the United States are locked up in adult prisons and county jails, and many of them are kept in solitary. Manhattan's Rikers Island, the second-largest jail in the United States, houses hundreds of minors, and roughly one-fourth are in punitive segregation at any given moment. What makes this especially appalling is that most of these minors are pretrial detainees, not yet convicted of any crime. 

Spotlight on Rikers island

Ismael "Izzy" Nazario has recently become the public face of the problem. Now 25 and a case manager for juveniles coming out of Rikers, he estimates that as a juvenile he spent about 300 days altogether in "The Box," a dreaded 6x8 cage; his longest single stay was four months. After a while, he said in a video (which has since been removed from YouTube), you start to go crazy. You pace back and forth and talk to yourself; your eyes start playing tricks on you. "Your mind becomes your own worst enemy."

Ismael "Izzy" Nazario

Nazario's experience is not unusual. According to a state report, teens in solitary at Rikers are more likely than other detained juveniles to try to harm themselves. Nationwide, more than half of detained juveniles who commit suicide do so while locked in solitary confinement.

This is not surprising. As noted by developmental psychiatrist Bruce Perry in an interview with the Center for Investigative Reporting, solitary confinement is bad for anyone -- but it is especially bad for children. And as we forensic professionals know, incarcerated children are not just any children; they are children who have already experienced major losses and traumas in their young lives. Traumas that make them more vulnerable to the deleterious effects of isolation:

"They end up getting these very intense doses of dissociative experience, and they get it in an unpredictable way. They’ll get three days in isolation. Then they’ll come back on the unit and get two days in isolation. They’ll come back out and then get one day. They end up with a pattern of activating this dissociative coping mechanism. The result is that when they’re confronted with a stressor later on, they will have this extreme disengagement where they’ll be kind of robotic, overly compliant, but they’re not really present. I’ve seen that a lot with these kids. They’ll come out, and they’re little zombies. The interpretation by the staff is that they’ve been pacified. 'We’ve broken him.' But basically what you’ve done is you’ve traumatized this person in a way that if this kid was in somebody’s home, you would charge that person with child abuse."

Being a feifdom, Rikers has steadfastly refused to allow journalistic access. But  New York City Councilman Daniel Dromm, one of the few outsiders to witness conditions in The Box, pulled no punches in labeling what he saw "torture." Dromm is campaigning for more transparency. At minimum, he wants Rikers administrators to report the number of minors locked in punitive segregation, their ages, and their infractions. “We need to unveil the secrecy," he said.

Rikers Island in the 1930s, Lucien Aigner

The international community agrees with his categorization. The United Nation classifies solitary confinement as a form of torture, prohibited for children under international law.

The correctional officers' union disagrees with this prohibition. A spokesman said outsiders just don't understand the need for force -- including punitive segregation -- to keep testosterone-fueled young men in line in "the belly of the beast."

I found that turn of phrase more than a little intriguing, coming from a correctional officer. Although the origins and meaning of the phrase are a bit murky, since the publication of Jack Abbott's prison memoir by that the title in 1981, in reference to the American prison system it is generally used to invoke a brutal and unjust system, which one opposes even from within.

But the phrase is apropros, because beastly the system is.It takes already marginalized youth and bestows the ultimate lesson in disempowerment and dehumanization. As Bruce Perry puts it, it announces to disenfranchised minors that, as a society, "we don’t care for you."

That's a harsh message, and one that these young people will have fully internalized by the time they are set back loose into society, broken or vengeful as the case may be.

The silver lining is that Rikers Island conditions are gaining traction as a symbol of the plight of children in adult correctional institutions nationwide. PBS Newshour recently highlighted the issue. And the Center for Investigative Reporting features a series of reports on the online media platform Medium.

Long-burning embers of 1990s superpredator wildfire 

But how did we ever get to the point that children are being tried and incarcerated as adults in the first place, not to mention locked in solitary confinement in adult institutions?

Not all of us are even old enough to keenly recall the 1990s hysteria surrounding juvenile "superpredators," marauding Black and Brown youth who were predicted to engulf society within a few short years if nothing was done to stop them.

This week, the New York Times produced a superb "retro report" video, documenting the history of the superpredator panic. Archived news clips bring us back to the moment when it all began, with incendiary predictions of two academics -- prominent political scientist John J. Dilulio Jr. and criminologist James Fox.

It was Dilulio who coined the term "superpredator," which invokes an animal menace in hordes of "Godless" young Black males, "a ticking time bomb" waiting to erupt; Fox added his own inflammatory rhetoric about the “bloodbath” that was just around the corner.

"And like a match to a flame, the word caught on.... Life in the 1990s [became] dominated by a sense that youth violence was out of control. The future looked bleak. To explain why, one word said it all – superpredators.... A growing wave of kids who were going to ravage the country…. The prediction was terrifying, and lawmakers cracked down on juvenile offenders."

Conservative politicians seized the moment. Aided by fears over changing racial demographics, they were able to pass harsh laws in nearly every U.S. state to allow for juveniles to be tried as adults and to exponentially increase their punishments.

Ironically, at the very moment these laws were being enacted, juvenile crime rates began their unprecedented plummet, the exact opposite of what Dilulio and Fox had predicted. The two men now admit that they were flat-out wrong. In 2012, they both went so far as to sign an amicus brief arguing against life imprisonment for children convicted of murder.

But it was too late. The punitive social climate they had ignited was like a wildfire that burned far out of control. And it's still burning across the United States, from Rikers Island to Los Angeles County and everywhere in between, consuming untold thousands of teenagers from the most vulnerable classes of society.

Hat tip: Kathleen

* * * * *

For those interested in the topic of juveniles sentenced as adults, I recommend the award-winning film Juvies.

(c) Copyright Karen Franklin 2014 - All rights reserved

California conference to highlight juvenile treatment

Michael Caldwell, co-founder of the Mendota Juvenile Treatment Center in Wisconsin, will share his Center’s innovative approach to treating hard-core juvenile offenders at this year’s Forensic Mental Health Association of California (FMHAC) conference.

Caldwell, whose research on juvenile risk assessment has been highlighted on this blog, says the Mendota approach has been proven to reduce violent offense among the extreme end of intractable juvenile delinquents who absorb such a disproportionate amount of rehabilitation resources and account for a large proportion of violent crimes.

His two workshops are part of a special juvenile track that will also feature a session on introducing the practice of mindfulness to incarcerated juveniles.

The juvenile track is one of five special tracks at this year’s FMHAC conference, coming up March 19 in beautiful Monterey, California. The other tracks are clinical/assessment, legal, psychiatric and, of course, the omnipresent sex offender track.

More details and registration information can be found HERE.The FMHAC's website is HERE.

School violence and criminology: Free article access

This month only, Routledge (publisher of multiple academic journals) is offering free access to a series of articles on school violence relevant to forensic psychology. Click on any of the articles below to access the content:

• “The Road to Hell Is Paved With Good Intentions”: A Historical, Theoretical, and Legal Analysis of Zero-Tolerance Weapons Policies in American Schools (In: Preventing School Failure: Alternative Education for Children and Youth)

• The Practice of Campus-Based Threat Assessment: An Overview (In: Journal of College Student Psychotherapy)

• The Prevalence of Stalking Among College Students: The Disparity Between Researcher- and Self-identified Victimization (In: Journal of American College Health)

• Releasing Their Stories: A Qualitative Study of Juvenile Justice-Involved Youth with Histories of Mental Health Issues and Violence (In: Journal of Forensic Social Work)

• Effects of “Safe School” Programs and Policies on the Social Climate for Sexual-Minority Youth: A Review of the Literature (In: Journal of LGBT Youth)

• Providing Anchors - Reclaiming Our Troubled Youth: Lessons for Leaders from a Study of 15 Targeted School Shooters (In: The Educational Forum)

•  The Relevance of the School Class as Social Unit for the Prevalence of Bullying and Victimization (In: European Journal of Developmental Psychology)

• Urban African American Youth Exposed to Community Violence: A School-Based Anxiety Preventive Intervention Efficacy Study (In: Journal of Prevention & Intervention in the Community)

• Young Offenders’ Perceptions of School: An Ecological Analysis (In: Psychiatry, Psychology and Law)

• The Impact of Bullying and Coping Strategies on the Psychological Distress of Young Offenders (In: Psychology, Crime & Law)

• ‘Stop It, That’s Enough’: Bystander Intervention and Its Relationship to School Connectedness and Shame Management (In: Vulnerable Children and Youth Studies)

The above is just a sampling. For a complete list of the articles, in the form of an interactive online PDF, click HERE.

Justice Quarterly virtual special issues

Wait, there's more!

In honor of its 30th anniversary, Justice Quarterly has put together a set of four virtual special issues, featuring highly cited scholarship from the archives:

• Thoughts on Seminal Theoretical Criminology 

• The Growth and Development of Correctional Research 

• A Generation of Policing Research

• 30 Years of Research on Court Processing

With all of this free content, hopefully there is something here for everyone.

Forensnips aplenty, forensnips galore

Everybody knows that the war is over
Everybody knows the good guys lost
Everybody knows the fight was fixed
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich
That's how it goes, Everybody knows

I can't seem to get Leonard Cohen’s haunting Everybody Knows out of my mind.

Perhaps it's because I was just down in Alabama, the belly of the beast, working on a tragic case. With the highest per capita rate of executions in the United States, the Heart of Dixie State kills people for crimes that other nations punish with probation. No exaggeration. It was jarring to drive around  Montomery and see the close proximity of historic mansions to abandoned homes and decaying housing projects. The juxtaposition is fitting, as Montgomery claims the dual distinctions of being the "cradle of the Confederacy" and the "birthplace of the Civil Rights Movement."  

Montgomery, Alabama (c) Karen Franklin 2013

Or maybe it's a flashback to Elysium, in which the one percenters have left Earth’s teeming masses to rot away while they luxuriate on an idyllic orbiting satellite. The scene in the parole office, with a robot parole agent delivering a quick risk assessment and then pushing meds, is worth the price of admission, although the film is marred by interminable hand-to-hand combat scenes and a ridiculous Hollywood ending.

David Miranda, held hostage
by British security forces

Or, it could be because I’m still riled up over the British government's abuse of David Miranda. He is the Brazilian partner of journalist Glenn Greenwald (think Edward Snowden). In what can only be called an outrageous effort to intimidate journalists, the Brits detained Miranda at Heathrow Airport for nine solid hours -- the maximum allowed under the British Terrorism Act -- before finally releasing him sans his laptop, cell phone and camera. Under the Terrorism Act, he was not entitled to counsel, nor to decline to cooperate. I sure hope it backfires and incenses journalists; it certainly fired up USA Today columnist Rem Rieder (whose column I highly recommend).

* * * * *

I feel bad about the dearth of posts recently. It's been a hectic period. I'll try to make up for my lapse by packing this post with lots of links to forensic psychology and criminology news and views from the past few weeks:

Evidence-based justice: Corrupted memory

Nature magazine's profile of Elizabeth Loftus and her decades-long crusade to expose flaws in eyewitness testimony is worth a gander.

Psychopathic criminals have empathy switch

New research published in the journal Brain indicates that psychopaths do not lack empathy, as is often claimed. Rather, they can switch it on and off at will. The study, out of the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience, is freely available online. BBC also has coverage.  

The demographics of sexting

Sexting is becoming increasingly commonplace. But practices and meanings differ by gender, relationship and sexual identity, according to a new article, also available online, in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking.

Brainwashed video discussion

New York Times columnist David Brooks just interviewed psychiatrist Sally Satel and psychologist Scott Lilenfield about their new book, Brainwashed, which is getting quite a bit of media buzz. The book is a workmanlike, if a bit superficial, exploration of the allure of "mindless neuroscience." If you’ve got 65 minutes, I recommend watching the video discussion.

Prison news: Hunger strike, juveniles, the elderly, women

On the prison front, a lot has been going on. California prisoners are into Day 50 or so of their hunger strike over solitary housing (a condition that the Department of Corrections denies, despite many men being kept in segregation units for years and even decades) and other cruel conditions. With prisoners' health deteriorating, a court order has been issued allowing force feeding if necessary to forestall deaths. Mainstream media reporting has been minimal, but at least Al Jazeera's got you covered.  

Even more local to me, a lawsuit has been filed over solitary confinement of juveniles in Contra Costa County. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court, accuses county officials of flouting state laws mandating that juvenile detention facilities be supportive environments designed for rehabilitation.

Meanwhile, NBC news is sounding an alarm over the increasing number of elderly people in U.S. prisons. NBC sounds mostly worried about the cost to taxpayers of prisons teeming with upwards of 400,000 elderly prisoners by the year 2030. Read ithttp://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/06/29/.UeV62HppQL8.twitter, and weep. 

Piper Kerman, author of the memoir Orange Is the New Black that's become a trendy Netflix series, is also sounding an alarm. In a New York Times op-ed, she writes about a federal plan to ease overcrowding in men's prisons by shipping about 1,000 women from Connecticut down to Alabama and points beyond, where they will be even more estranged from their families. As Kerman notes: "For many families these new locations might as well be the moon." I recommend her thoughtful essay on alternatives for low-risk women prisoners. 

In a more promising development, the U.S. Justice Department has announced efforts to curtail the stiff drug sentences that have caused much of this overcrowding in the first place. The U.S. prison system is so bloated, so costly, and so irrational, that even conservatives are calling for reform. Better late than never, I suppose.

By the way, Florida has executed John Errol Ferguson, the prisoner whose controversial case I blogged about earlier this year, whose competency was contested in part because of his insistence that he was the "Prince of God." The American Bar Association had filed an amicus brief asking the U.S. Supreme Court to clarify the standard for competency for execution being applied in the case. 

Sex offender news

In yet another in a series of registry-facilitated vigilante attacks, a South Carolina man has been arrested for killing a sex offender and his wife in the mistaken belief that the man was a child molester. At the same time, there are signs that overzealous laws that contribute to such stigmatization are being scrutinized more closely. For example, a federal judge has struck down a Colorado city's ordinance restricting where registered sex offenders can live, ruling that it conflicts with a state law requiring parolees to be reintegrated into society. An appellate panel in North Carolina has also struck down a law that banned registered sex offenders from using social media sites. The state Court of Appeals agreed with the challenger that the law violated his Constitutional rights to free speech and freedom of association. 

Dispute over expert witness credentials

Finally, there's a big brouhaha in South Dakota over the credentials of a psychologist who frequently testifies as an expert witness in child custody cases. The credentials of the widely respected psychologist, Thomas Price, became an issue during a child custody dispute. It was ascertained that he had earned his PhD in behavioral medicine from an online degree mill called Greenwich University on Norfolk Island, Australia, that was subsequently shuttered by the Australian government. According to an expert on diploma mills quoted by the Sioux Falls Argus Leader, degree mills often adopt the names of respected English universities. Price's resumé says he earned a Ph.D. in behavioral medicine from Greenwich University, without noting the Norfolk Island location. "Typically," notes the article, "people don’t get caught using an unaccredited degree until they assume a high-profile position ... or they do something that causes another person to research their backgrounds…. If you stay under the radar, you can get by."

Science blogger

Finally (this time I really mean it), for those of you who are into offbeat science, I've just added a new blog, Mike the Mad Biologist, to my blog roll (which can be found a little ways down the right column of my blog site). Mike is prolific and wide-ranging in his news links, with a creative spin. 

Hat tips to Jane, Terry, Kirk and others

Attorney-client privilege trumps child abuse reporting law, court rules

Elijah W. ruling clarifies thorny issue in California

Forensic psychologists are split as to whether we must breach confidentiality when a criminal defendant divulges child abuse or threatens physical harm to others.

On the one hand, here in California a psychologist can be criminally prosecuted under the Child Abuse and Neglect Reporting Act (CANRA) for failure to report suspected child abuse. On the other hand, a psychologist hired as a defense consultant assumes a legal duty to maintain attorney-client confidentiality.

But a welcome appellate ruling this week at least partially resolves this vexing dilemma. A psychologist hired by a criminal defense attorney is bound by the same rules as the attorney, and must uphold the client's Constitutional right to confidentiality rather than report child abuse, the court held.

"In the absence of clear legislative guidance, we decline to read into CANRA [the Child Abuse and Neglect Reporting Act] a reporting requirement that contravenes established law on confidentiality and privilege governing defense experts and potentially jeopardizes a criminal defendant’s right to a fair trial," ruled the Second Appellate District.

The question of whether, or how, to report threatened violence (as mandated under Tarasoff and related case law) remains a bit vaguer; in some cases, warning the retaining attorney might discharge the duty to protect, but in other cases it might not. 

The appellate ruling also does not clarify the reporting requirements of psychologists retained by litigants in child custody or civil cases. However, an attorney colleague said it likely extends to any situation in which the psychologist is hired to consult on a privileged matter, such as in civil or child custody cases. The colleague's opinion was based in part on the fact that the court specifically declined to decide the issue on Constitutional grounds, basing its decision instead on California laws regarding attorney-client privilege. In contrast, under California's Evidence Code (Section 1017), there is no privilege if the expert is appointed by the court as a neutral expert. Also, if the psychologist shifts from the consultant role to become a testifying expert, once-privileged information is no longer protected.

The ruling is good news for forensic practitioners in that it reduces the ethical tension between protecting the privacy rights of the accused and protecting our own skins. Psychologists who fail to report suspected child abuse may be subject to criminal and civil penalties and are often treated very harshly by licensing boards.

The ruling puts California in the lead among U.S. states in clarifying psychologists' duties in navigating a confusing mishmash of reporting laws. Maryland is an exception to the general vagueness; that state's Attorney General issued an opinion that defense-retained psychiatrists in criminal cases are exempt from mandated reporting.

Judge had nixed child's request for independent expert

The case involved Elijah W., a 10-year-old Los Angeles boy arrested on an arson charge. When the defense team requested an expert to help prepare the fourth-grader's defense, the juvenile judge limited them to a member of the local juvenile competency to stand trial (JCST) panel. However, panel members had told Elijah's attorneys that they would report to authorities any information that Elijah revealed about suspected child abuse or neglect.

In contrast, a member of the local superior court's regular panel of psychiatrists and psychologists, Dr. Catherine Scarf, had assured the defense team she would respect attorney-client privilege and only report threats or child abuse to Elijah's counsel. The judge refused to appoint Dr. Scarf, scoffing at the defense team's concerns as "merely academic" because the judge could not recall any juvenile disclosing reportable information during a competency evaluation. 

Los Angeles created the juvenile panel in response to a recent California law mandating that juvenile competency evaluators have special training and experience in child development and juvenile forensic issues. The Los Angeles court's juvenile protocol allows a minor's defense counsel to obtain an assessment and not disclose it unless a doubt is declared as to the minor's competency. 

Elijah's attorney argued that appointment of a defense expert who would not defer to lawyer-client privilege violated Elijah's Constitutional right to effective assistance of counsel.

The appellate court agreed, noting that child abuse reporting requirements might interfere with full and open communication between a minor and his defense team.

"It is certainly plausible, for example, that a young child accused of setting fires is acting out following some form of traumatic experience, perhaps even child abuse…. Similarly, if the child is warned of the defense psychologist's intention to disclose information concerning child abuse or neglect prior to the assessment ... disclosures necessary for effective representation may be inhibited."

The appellate court also considered whether the attorney-client privilege trumps the so-called Tarasoff warning, or psychologists' duty to protect reasonably identifiable victims from threatened violence. The justices wrote favorably of Dr. Scarf's position that notifying the defense attorney would discharge the duty; in California, an attorney may reveal confidential information if necessary to prevent a criminal act likely to result in death or great bodily harm:

"We cannot evaluate in advance whether Dr. Scarf's intended notification of Elijah's attorney will insulate her from liability in any particular situation…. But her position is certainly reasonable, and her willingness to safeguard the confidentiality of Elijah's communications at the risk of personal liability should not have been discounted by the juvenile court."

Bottom line: The appellate court ordered that the juvenile court approve Dr. Scarf's appointment.

Practical implications

Forensic psychologists in California will want to carefully review this ruling for themselves, and tailor their consent forms based on the nature of the case and who the client is -- the court, the defense, or the prosecution. In preparing one's informed consent documents, consulting with an attorney knowledgeable in this tricky area is certainly not a bad idea.

Likewise, the case serves as a reminder for practitioners outside of California, who should determine the relevant statutes and case law in the jurisdictions in which they practice. In their book Evaluation for personal injury claims, Kane and Dvoskin opine that in jurisdictions in which attorneys are mandated to report child abuse, expert consultants likely must report as well. (The American Bar Association has an online chart listing state-by-state laws pertaining to attorneys' child-abuse reporting requirements.)

 * * * * *

The published case, Elijah J. versus Superior Court of Los Angeles County, can be found HERE. 

Related resources available online include: 

• Forensic evaluations and mandated reporting of child abuse, Kapoor and Zonana (2010), Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and Law

• Expert Opinion: Does mandatory reporting trump attorney-client opinion? Connell, Golding, Morgan and Niland (2004), American Psychology-Law Society News  

 
Hat tip: Adam Alban, PhD, JD

Risk screening worthless with juvenile sex offenders, study finds

Boys labeled as 'sexually violent predators' not more dangerous

Juveniles tagged for preventive detention due to their supposedly higher level of sexual violence risk are no more likely to sexually reoffend than adolescents who are not so branded, a new study has found.

Only about 12 percent of youths who were targeted for civil commitment as sexually violent predators (SVP's) but then freed went on to commit a new sex offense. That compares with about 17 percent of youths screened out as lower risk and tracked over the same five-year follow-up period.

Although the two groups had essentially similar rates of sexual and violent reoffending, overall criminal reoffending was almost twice as high among the youths who were NOT petitioned for civil commitment (66 percent versus 35 percent), further calling into question the judgment of the forensic evaluators.

Because of the youths' overall low rates of sexual recidivism, civil detention has no measurable impact on rates of sexual violence by youthful offenders, asserted study author Michael Caldwell, a psychology professor at the University of Wisconsin and an expert on juvenile sex offending.

The study, just published in the journal Sexual Abuse, is one in a growing corpus pointing to flaws in clinical prediction of risk.

It tracked about 200 juvenile delinquents eligible for civil commitment as Sexually Violent Persons (SVP's). The state where the study was conducted was not specified; at least eight of the 20 U.S. states with SVP laws permit civil detention of juveniles, and all allow commitment of adults based on offenses committed as a juvenile.

As they approached the end of their confinement period, the incarcerated juveniles underwent a two-stage screening process. In the first phase, one of a pool of psychologists at the institution evaluated them to determine whether they had a mental disorder that made them "likely" to commit a future act of sexual violence. Just over one in every four boys was found to meet this criterion, thereby triggering a prosecutorial petition for civil commitment.

After the initial probable cause hearing but before the final civil commitment hearing, an evaluator from a different pool of psychologists conducted a second risk assessment. These  psychologists were also employed by the institution but were independent of the treatment team. Astonishingly, the second set of psychologists disagreed with the first in more than nine out of ten cases, screening out 50 of the remaining 54 youths. (Only four youths were civilly committed, and a judge overturned one of these commitments, so ultimately all but three boys from the initial group of 198 could be tracked in the community to see whether or not they actually reoffended.)

Evaluators typically did not rely on actuarial risk scales to reach their opinions, Caldwell noted, and their methods remained something of a mystery. Youths were more likely to be tagged for civil detention at the first stage if they were white, had multiple male victims, and had engaged in multiple instances of sexual misconduct in custody, Caldwell found.

However, no matter what method they used or which factors they considered, the psychologists likely would have had little success in predicting which youths would reoffend. Even "the most carefully developed and thoroughly studied" methods for predicting juvenile recidivism have shown very limited accuracy, Caldwell pointed out. This is mainly due to a combination of youths' rapid social maturation and their very low base rates of recidivism; it is quite hard to successfully predict a rare event.

Indeed, a recent meta-analysis revealed that none of the six most well-known and best-researched instruments for appraising risk among juvenile sex offenders showed consistently accurate results. Studies that did find significant predictive validity for an instrument were typically conducted by that instrument's authors rather than independent researchers, raising questions about their objectivity.

"Juveniles are still developing their personality, cognitions, and moral judgment, processes that reflect considerable plasticity," noted lead author Inge Hempel, a psychology graduate student in the Netherlands, and her colleagues. "There are still many possible developmental pathways, and no one knows what causes persistent sexual offending."

Caldwell agrees with Hempel and her colleagues that experts' inability to accurately predict which juveniles will commit future sex crimes calls into question the ethics of civil commitment.

"From the perspective of public policy, these results raise questions about whether SVP commitment laws, as written, should apply to juveniles adjudicated for sexual offenses," he wrote. "If SVP laws could be reliably applied to high risk juvenile offenders, the benefit of preventing a lifetime of potential victims makes for a compelling case. However, the task of identifying the small subgroup of juveniles adjudicated for sexual offenses who are likely to persist in sexual violence into adulthood is at least extremely difficult, and may be technically infeasible."

* * * * *

The articles are:

Michael Caldwell: Accuracy of Sexually Violent Person Assessments of Juveniles Adjudicated for Sexual Offenses, Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment. Request it from the author HERE.

Inge Hempel, Nicole Buck, Maaike Cima and Hjalmar van Marle: Review of Risk Assessment Instruments for Juvenile Sex Offenders: What is Next? International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology. Request it from the first author HERE.

Evaluating juveniles: Grisso's classic updated for new era

In the 1990s a moral panic swept through the United States over juvenile "super-predators," ruthless youngsters devoid of empathy or morality who would terrorize the good citizenry -- raping, looting and murdering with abandon. Although the hysterical, racially coded predictions proved unfounded (the spike in violent crime was just a historical blip on the radar screen), politicians passed harsh new laws that set the U.S. apart from all other nations in the magnitude of penal warehousing of children.

At the pinnacle of this frenzied "get-tough era" in juvenile justice, the eminent forensic psychologist Tom Grisso authored Forensic Evaluation of Juveniles, a groundbreaking text that guided practitioners into the burgeoning niche of psychological evaluations in delinquency cases.

Now, in a major overhaul of that influential 1998 text, Grisso writes optimistically of a new trend in juvenile justice that he labels the "developmental era." Social science evidence about adolescent brain development and social maturation will contribute to greater judicial and societal recognition that much delinquency is time-limited, he believes. Although this new direction comes too late for the youths and families shattered by the get-tough policies of the past few decades, Grisso hopes that forensic psychology can help judges, probation officers and policy makers understand the potential of rehabilitation for today's wayward youth.

Photo from Richard Ross's Juvenile In Justice photography project

I'm a little less sanguine about a newer, gentler era. Yes, the U.S. Supreme Court has outlawed the death penalty for juveniles, life without parole for crimes other than murder, and mandatory sentences of life without parole for murder.* But such reversals are a drop in the bucket so long as the punitive architecture remains in place that allows, for example, prosecutorial "direct-files" of juvenile cases to adult courts. We are living in an increasingly repressive culture. About 70,000 young people -- disproportionately poor and non-white -- are currently incarcerated in the U.S., many serving ridiculously long sentences that give them no chance of ever leading productive lives. 

Grisso's practical guide strikes a humanistic tone, refreshing in a field increasingly infiltrated by a gloomy, pathologizing, technocratic worldview. The award-winning director of the Law-Psychiatry Program at the University of Massachusetts Medical School for example cautions evaluators to avoid simple tallies of actuarial risk factors in informing the court of a youth's risk. Rather, evaluators should understand and incorporate the two broad, and complementary, theories of delinquency: The biological and personality-oriented theories of psychology, and the social-environmental theories of criminology, such as the notion of "drift" into delinquency. Evaluators should also understand the individual child's context, and the factors that contribute not only to pathology but also to resilience in the face of adversity.

Perhaps the most radical departure from the first edition is a newfound emphasis on understanding racial, ethnic and cultural factors, historically a major blind spot in forensic psychology. With non-white children comprising the overwhelming majority of those incarcerated in America, this principle cannot be overstated. Grisso addresses the barriers to even basic communication that will become all the more challenging as young immigrants arrive from far-flung lands, many carrying inside them the weight of untold traumas. Although he proffers no facile solutions, he preaches greater awareness of cultural blinders and of the inherent limitations of forensic tools that were not normed on diverse populations.

Disappointingly, given this humanistic tenor and discussion of racial and cultural issues, Grisso soft-pedals criticism of the growing practice of labeling juveniles as psychopaths. He describes evidence for the validity of the psychopathy construct in juveniles as "mixed," yet omits mention of the calamitous -- and often self-fulfilling -- consequences to youths when the psychopathy label is introduced in court.

Like the first edition, this is a practical manual that provides a clearly written historical overview of the field for novice practitioners, and useful review material for more seasoned juvenile evaluators. Chapters address specific types of evaluations, including competency to stand trial, waiver of Miranda rights, risk assessment, waiver to adult court, and rehabilitation and treatment recommendations. New statutes, case law, scientific findings and assessment methods are interwoven throughout, making this an indispensable addition to the juvenile evaluator's bookshelf.

If you found this review helpful, I would appreciate your taking a moment click to visit my Amazon review (HERE) and click on the "YES" button at the bottom ("this review was helpful"). This helps boost the review's ranking. Thanks in advance. 

*The cases are Roper v. Simmons (2005), Graham v. Florida (2010), and Miller v. Alabama (2012), respectively.

Report: 2,500 serving life for crimes committed as children

United States far out of step with global community

Photo credit: Richard Ross, Juvenile in Justice

"Life without possibility of parole for a 13-year-old?!" a European colleague exclaimed, clearly disbelieving my story.

With the Land of the Free far out of step with the rest of the world, wonderment over our criminal justice policies is not uncommon internationally, but nowhere moreso than regarding our treatment of juveniles. We are the only country in the world who condemns juveniles to spend their entire life behind bars for crimes committed as children.

(We're also way out of step in our overall incarceration rates and in our penchant for solitary confinement, too, but that's another story -- see today's New York Times for more on that.)

Now, the first-ever national survey documents numbers far higher than even I imagined: Not just a handful, but more than 2,500 Americans are serving life without parole for crimes committed before the age of 18.

The oldest prisoner in the survey, now 67, has served half a century in prison so far. Just stop for a moment and ponder the implications of that.

The Sentencing Project's report, The Lives of Juvenile Lifers, comes just weeks before the U.S. Supreme Court hears oral arguments in the cases of two 14-year olds, Miller v. Alabama and Jackson v. Hobbs, which will address questions about the constitutionality of sentencing teens to life without the possibility of parole.

The national survey draws a portrait of severe disadvantage experienced by those serving life sentences without parole: Juvenile lifers were exposed to high levels of violence in their homes and their communities. Among the 45 girls serving life, three-fourths experienced sexual abuse before their crimes.

"Most juveniles serving life without parole sentences experienced trauma and neglect long before they engaged in their crimes," stated Ashley Nellis, research analyst of The Sentencing Project and author of the report. "The findings from this survey do not excuse the crimes committed but they help explain them. With time, rehabilitation and maturity, some of these youth could one day safely re-enter society and contribute positively to their families and their communities."

It will come as no surprise to most of you that race has much to do with who gets this draconian sentence. African Americans, who make up only 12 percent of the U.S. population, represented 60 percent of these children -- five times their proportion of the population, They are especially likely to be serving life without parole if they killed a white person.

From a fiscal standpoint alone, the report notes, the costs to states of incarcerating someone from their teens into their twilight years, when health costs rise steeply, is at least $2 million per prisoner.

The report advocates spending more money on prevention programs, instead of warehousing:

Instead of spending scarce resources on warehousing lives that could be transformed, we could be spending money more wisely, helping victims, and improving public safety. The nonpartisan American Law Institute recommends a “second look” after 10 years of imprisonment for life-sentenced youth. Notwithstanding the probability that most prisoners would not be granted release after only 10 years, if even one eligible inmate was determined to be ready for release upon this “second look,” this could save a typical state $1.8 million in needless incarceration. The money saved could instead be directed at prevention and intervention programs that have a strong evidence-base in lowering crime: preschool programs, parenting skills development, multi-systemic therapy, vocational training, substance abuse treatment, and a host of other effective interventions that would reduce crime and repair families and communities from damage associated with violence.

The full report, which I highly recommend, can be read or downloaded HERE.

Of related interest:

Another Bite at the Graham Cracker: The Supreme Court's Surprise Revisiting of Juvenile Life Without Parole in Miller v. Alabama and Jackson v. Hobbs, by by Scott Hechinger, Georgetown Law Journal

Life, with dementia (New York Times article about the growing problem of dementia behind bars)
 

Hat tip: BRUCE

Thanksgiving roundup

Brandon McInerney

Gay panic defendant gets 21 years

The gay panic case of Brandon McInerney that we’ve been tracking here since 2008 is finally over. The defendant, who was 14 when he shot and killed classmate Larry King, agreed to a 21-year prison term after a jury deadlocked in his murder trial two months ago.

"The missing militant" pleads no contest

Ronald Bridgeforth

Ronald Bridgeforth, the man I blogged about a couple of weeks ago who spent 43 years underground before deciding to turn himself in, pleaded no contest yesterday to a 1968 charge of assault on a police officer. His sentencing is set for February. For those of you who are interested in his fascinating life, I recommend a profile (HERE) by Laura Rena Murray in Tuesday's San Francisco Chronicle. As Bridgeforth put it, "Not being in jail is not the same as being free."

From Australia: Prolonged detention and mental health

An investigative journalism program in Australia has aired a remarkable documentary on the psychiatric effects of lengthy detention of asylum seekers. ABC’s Four Corners obtained rare footage of conditions in facilities that are typically kept out of sight and out of mind. The show portrays rampant self-mutilation, suicide and psychotic decompensation among Australia's 4,000 incarcerated asylum seekers. "I have only seen darkness in life and a dark future ahead," explains a young Iranian man who has just tried to hang himself after the third rejection of his immigration petition. In a secretly filmed interview, a psychiatric nurse states that suicide attempts and grotesque self-mutilations are daily occurrences, with as many as 30 detainees at a time on one-to-one suicide watch at her facility alone. Psychiatric staff are shown responding to the overwhelming despair by overprescribing sedating medications. Dr. Suresh Sundram of the Mental Health Research Institute describes the detention sites as factories for producing mental illness, especially for detainees who are held for lengthy periods and those who have undergone torture and other traumas before fleeing their homelands. Click below to watch the 45-minute video, which is relevant not only in Australia but other countries around the world with similar immigration issues.

Juveniles: Lifelong benefits of multisystemic therapy 

In a study that's getting a bit of buzz around the Web, a researcher has found that Multisystemic Therapy's positive effects on juvenile delinquents extend for decades. An average of 22 years later, youths who were randomly selected for MST treatment had significantly fewer arrests and family problems than those who got traditional individual therapy. MST, developed by study co-author Charles Borduin of the University of Missouri, has become one of the most widely used evidence-based treatments in the world. It owes its success to the fact that it involves the offender's entire family and community, whereas traditional therapy targets only the offender without modifying his problematic environment. The new study is published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology. The Abstract is HERE; a press release summarizing the findings is HERE.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Photo (c) Karen Franklin 2011

And finally, if you're reading this in the comfort of your warm and cozy home or office, you can be thankful you're not at the bottom of the 99 percent, living in a plywood shack being torn down just in time for the rainy season. That's the plight of the folks in one of the many homeless encampments near where I walk.

I wish all of you readers and subscribers a nice holiday.