delinquency

Effective today, the Minnesota Supreme Court has ruled that child welfare and juvenile justice cases will proceed apace, but will rely mostly on video and telephonic interaction. Chief Justice Lorie Gildea said that all cases of a “super high” or “high” priority will continue as normal.

California faces crucial choices. The state can continue scrambling to address burgeoning climate-change crises while it spends $316,000 per youth per year to watch Division of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) inmates languish idly and suffer staggering recidivism, plus $90,000 annually per California Department of Corrections (CDCR) inmate for prisoners offered little rehabilitation.

The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) recently issued a $10.4 million funding competition that on first blush shocked Youth Services Insider. It was a request for proposals (RFP) from nonprofits or local governments in states that are not participating in the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act (JJDPA), through which state juvenile justice agencies receive grants in exchange for complying with four standards in their treatment of youths.

Michigan, one of the last four states to consider all 17-year-olds to be adults in the eyes of the law, will soon raise its age of jurisdiction to 18. “Today I signed the bipartisan “Raise the Age” legislative package, which raises the age of who is considered an adult under the criminal justice system from 17 to 18 years old,” said Gov.

For the first time since 2002, the law governing national juvenile justice standards has been reauthorized by Congress. The bill will now head to President Trump’s desk, possibly ending a long string of disappointments for juvenile justice advocates who tried in vain to update the law during the administration of Barack Obama.

A final push to reauthorize the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act (JJDPA) before the midterm elections has passed through the House of Representatives and has now moved to the Senate for an attempt at unanimous consent this week.

The Trump Administration plans to cut thousands of Department of Justice positions, which may mean a 25 percent (or more) culling of the already tiny 60-person federal agency focused on juvenile justice, according to several sources at the department or with connections to the department.

In January, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) announced that the Wisconsin Department of Corrections would gradually shutter two juvenile facilities beleaguered by rampant use of solitary confinement and chemical restraints. Late last month, the state legislature made that official in law, and put a clock on the process to ensure that closing Lincoln Hills School for Boys and the Copper Lake School for Girls did not drag on.

Last week, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention published some findings about the persistence of mental health problems among juveniles who were detained at Cook County’s detention center (Chicago area).