The Choice Channel

“Two years ago, a 15-year-old named Maria was arrested for bringing a small fingernail file to school. For eight weeks, she was held in a secure juvenile detention center awaiting trial. She was strip-searched upon entering the facility. She was housed with children who were drug-addicted, mentally ill, and charged with far more serious crimes than she was. The doors and windows of the facility were locked. And her ability to move around inside the facility was limited. Maria was not jailed because she was a flight risk, or because she was a danger to her community. She was jailed because, having been raped by a family member before her arrest, a Massachusetts Juvenile Court judge felt she could not live at home safely. And the Commonwealth had no other place to put her. There were no readily available placements in either the Commonwealth’s child welfare or mental health systems. Maria’s case is extreme, but she is hardly the only Massachusetts child to be jailed inappropriately while awaiting trial for a minor offense.” (05/12/08)