Recent news

The California Supreme Court recently made it clear that statutes cannot have a presumption in favor of life without parole for juvenile offenders.

In the wake of the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Miller v. Alabama in June 2012, banning mandatory juvenile life without parole sentences (JLWOP), Juvenile Law Center has argued in cases across the country on behalf of inmates who were sentenced to mandatory JLWOP before Miller was decided.

As kids, these inmates were sentenced to spend the rest of their lives in prison, without any consideration of their age, personal history, or other influences. There was no consideration as to whether they were truly unable to be rehabilitated and to ever rejoin society—all factors that Miller says courts must now consider before sentencing a kid to JLWOP.

On May 13, 2014, the Stoneleigh Foundation held the symposium “What About the Girls?” to address these unique risk factors. Panelists included Malika Saada Saar, executive director of the Human Rights Project for Girls; Leslie Acoca, president of the National Girls Health and Justice Institute; Gwendolyn Bailey, executive director of Youth Service, Inc.; and Larbriah (Briah) Morgan, a Juvenile Law Center Youth Advocate.

Juvenile Law Center intern Claire Glass sat down with Briah after the symposium (and her final exams). They discussed the realities she’ll face when she turns 21 and “ages out” of the system in early June, and how she thinks the system could be improved to help more foster youth both make it to and succeed in college and find stable housing.

Following a successful nationwide theatrical run, the acclaimed documentary Kids for Cash will be released across all leading Video On Demand and digital platforms today!

While National Foster Care Month reminds us of the unique situation of youth who are removed from their families and placed in foster care, it is also important to think about how strongly youth in foster care just want to be treated like “average” kids. 

Far too often, the foster care system creates barriers to youth having the “normal” experiences of adolescence. Most people don’t realize that in many states, foster youth cannot date, go to sleepovers, work, or participate in extracurricular activities.

The Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) was signed into law in 2003 to protect our country’s bloated prison and jail population from sexual abuse, and in particular, to address the widespread sexual assault and rape of youth housed in adult facilities. More than a decade later, however, youth are still being raped, waiting for the protection they deserve in facilities nationwide.

The movie Kids for Cash chronicles the devastating effects the juvenile justice system can have on youth. Many people who see the film—from parents to experts—invariably ask one question: “If this film is meant to depict the devastation done to children in the justice system, why are there no kids of color represented in the film?”

Unaccompanied homeless youth and youth from foster care encounter many barriers to higher education. These vulnerable young people contend with histories of abuse, neglect, trauma, and frequent educational disruption caused by mobility. They struggle without parental care or other adult support, and frequently lack the basics that most of us take for granted, like shelter and food. Higher education is their best hope for a better life.

The Luzerne County "kids-for-cash" case has been called the “most egregious judicial scandal in U.S. history.” But not for the reasons most people think. The judges accepted $2.8 million in "finder’s fees” from the builder of the new for-profit detention center, and most Americans found that fact both shocking and repugnant. Yet something far worse was exposed in the shadows of the kids-for-cash story: America’s love affair with incarceration.

Our nation’s first juvenile court was established in Illinois in 1899. The court process at the time was informal, often nothing more than a conversation between the youth and the judge. Youth did not have lawyers—a child’s constitutional right to counsel in delinquency proceedings was not recognized. This right did not come until 1967, when the U.S. Supreme Court issued its landmark ruling in In re Gault that children were entitled to many of the same rights as adults who committed crimes.

For virtually all young adults, making the transition from adolescence to independent adulthood is challenging. Luckily, most of us have parents to help guide us through the transition. Most foster youth aren’t so lucky.