Judges Call for Juvenile Crime System Overhaul to Ease Crowding

Overcrowding in Ventura County’s juvenile justice system has become so severe that judges are imposing more lenient sentences than they feel appropriate and are unable to provide proper rehabilitation options for offenders.

Two Ventura judges say that with fewer than 300 available beds for the county’s most serious juvenile criminals it’s time to overhaul the county juvenile justice system.

One urgent need, they say, is to provide a dramatic increase in beds to house those who require incarceration. Another is to add community intervention services preventing young people from getting into trouble in the first place.

With waiting lists at all the county’s facilities, youthful offenders often know they can get away with some crimes, said Ventura Superior Court Judge Melinda Johnson.

“If I know the hall doesn’t have any more space, I will look much harder at who I am going to put in for a weekend,” Johnson said. “Kids know exactly how far they can push everything. They know when they will just get a slap on the wrist.”

She added: “I have to look like I decided this is my punishment, not here’s your punishment, but I can’t do it.”

The lack of space in the juvenile facilities has a trickle-down effect on the average county resident, Superior Court Judge Steven Z. Perren said.

Because there is so little space, judges are forced to place juveniles on probation in many cases when they more appropriately should either be locked up or enrolled in an alcohol or drug rehabilitation program, Perren said.

“What necessarily occurs is an increased need for probation in the community,” Perren said. “That dilutes the ability of probation to deal with kids. Our community, in effect, becomes a prison without walls.”

But even more broadly, both judges say, Ventura County lacks services that would keep kids from getting into trouble.

“Budget cuts have made it so difficult to provide any of the services that really help,” Johnson said. “Incarceration is a short-term fix. Without mental health counseling and other services, we can’t accomplish rehabilitation.”

The judges worry that if nothing is done, the system, already strained to the breaking point, could suffer some kind of a melt-down.

“We are lucky no crisis has occurred yet,” Perren said. “Unfortunately the system responds to awful things--if an awful gang incident occurred the community would be galvanized. I hope it doesn’t come to that.”

While millions of dollars have been spent on adult detention facilities statewide, little has been spent on detention facilities for young people, whom the judges feel can still be redeemed.

But in a dramatic turnaround, the state Legislature this summer budgeted $100 million for juvenile facilities across California, probation agency chief Cal Remington said. Over the next 12 months, Ventura County will vie for a chunk of that.

Still, the judges say, more money will need to be set aside locally for the system to be adequately improved.

“If the purpose of the juvenile justice system is to nip crime in the bud . . . then it is absolutely foolish from society’s perspective not to invest money to prevent gang and other types of criminal activity among young people,” Johnson said. “We know that we are at least five years away from a new facility. This is something we need today. We needed it yesterday.”

While the population of the county has almost quadrupled since 1960, juvenile facilities structured in the early 1970s have remained virtually unchanged since then, Johnson said.

Perren estimated that a broad increase of 50% capacity to county youth facilities would address current needs. But that does not take into account population growth predicted for the county in coming decades.

The problem has not gone unnoticed.

The county has commissioned a $34,000 in-depth study of the future needs of local juvenile institutions. Johnson called the report, which is due out this month, the most comprehensive look at the juvenile justice system since she began working in the county 16 years ago.

Currently, four facilities house juvenile offenders. The Juvenile Restitution Project--which resembles adult work furlough programs--has room for 24 and is typically full with one or two people on a waiting list.

The Tri-County Boot Camp has 40 beds, with 20 allotted to Ventura County. Those beds are always full, with a waiting list of three to 10 teens, said Remington of the county probation agency.

Juvenile Hall has a rated capacity of 84, but authorities have crammed in as many as 140 people, Remington said. Usually, however, the number of occupants hovers closer to 112. That facility is so cramped it would not pass today’s standards for juvenile facilities, but remains open only because it was built before current standards were set, he said.

The Colston Youth Center has 45 beds that are always full, with a waiting list of seven to eight teenagers.

Judges handling juvenile cases also have the option of placing youths in group homes around the county and the state. Although there are plenty of beds, it takes time to place offenders. Such homes always have a waiting list of four to five, Remington said.

But Perren says even those numbers are artificially deflated.

“If you take a photo of the current system, that is a doctored photo,” Perren says. “We are making decisions to conform with the resources we have.”

The judges said it is important to think of young offenders differently from their older counterparts.

“Why?” Perren asks. “First, because we have a good chance of succeeding [in rehabilitation]. Second, because we can prevent the physical victimization of both people and property and thereby save huge amounts of money down the road. And third, we can save a kid.”

With space maxed out at every available local facility, the county has agreed to spend about $1.2 million to add 40 beds at a center at Camarillo Airport. Remington said it should be ready by spring.

But that is a far cry from what is needed, the judges said.

“This is all just the tiniest of Band-Aids on a system that is hemorrhaging,” Johnson said.