Lawsuit Alleges County Detained Teens Illegally

Los Angeles County has repeatedly violated court orders to release teenagers as young as 13 from juvenile hall for days, even weeks, after they were supposed to be freed, according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday.

The class-action lawsuit, although filed on behalf of 19 named minors, contends that many other youths have “suffered” wrongful imprisonment and violation of their civil rights by design or oversight of both the Department of Children and Family Services and the Probation Department.

“When a judge says that you get out of custody, you are supposed to get out,” said Manhattan Beach attorney Sanford Jossen, who filed the case. “But that is not happening.”

Instead, the suit alleges, at minimum a “lack of coordination and cooperation” between the Children and Family Services Department and probation officials has allowed children to remain in custody for more than two weeks after a judge ordered them returned to foster parents or to other non-jail settings. In other cases, according to the lawsuit, children’s department employees unilaterally decided to hold teenagers despite court orders that they be released back to foster care.

Officials with both departments referred calls to Roger Granbo, principal deputy county counsel, who said he had not seen the lawsuit. Granbo said he would not comment on pending litigation in any case.

The allegedly illegal detentions, according to the lawsuit, occurred at numerous county detention facilities for juveniles. And in virtually every case, the lawsuit alleges, the teenagers were not only held when they should not have been but were never contacted by Children and Family Services caseworkers about why they would remain in custody.

In one case, the lawsuit says, a children’s department employee allegedly told an attorney representing 14-year-old Mairon A. that the teenager should remain at Eastlake Juvenile Hall rather than the dependency facility MacLaren Hall because “MacLaren does not have enough structure for Mairon.” In that case, the lawsuit says, the teenager spent seven days in custody at the juvenile hall despite a judge’s order that he be immediately released from custody.

The lawsuit alleges that 16-year-old Cassie A. was placed in Sylmar Juvenile Hall on Aug. 3 after being arrested for driving her foster mother’s car without permission.

For the following eight days, the lawsuit says, Cassie remained in custody without any charges filed.

And during most of her incarceration, which continued for 11 days, the teenager was strip-searched two to three times a day, the lawsuit says.

And in one of several cases alleging more than a simple oversight by the Department of Children and Family Services, the lawsuit claims that Shawana J., 16, was illegally held at Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall for five days after a judge ordered her release.

Not only did department employees fail to call the teenager’s social worker, the lawsuit alleges, but they also “decided that ... [Shawana] should remain incarcerated in Los Padrinos” despite a judge’s order that she be sent to foster care or a group home within 48 hours. Shawana originally was taken into custody, according to the lawsuit, for breaking into her foster mother’s home and taking a computer game.

“DCFS is supposed to act as a parent for these dependent children,” Jossen said. “But what parent would not pick up their child when a judge has ordered their release?”