Recent news

The Pennsylvania Senate has designated October 21-25 as "Juvenile Detention Centers Week," providing an opportunity to reflect on the practie of placing juveniles in secure detention facilities—and how a promising national initiative is helping to transform that practice.

Juvenile Law Center has announced that a partial settlement with a second set of defendants has been reached in the Luzerne County juvenile-court civil litigation.

Over on The Huffington Post's blog, Juvenile Law Center Staff Attorney Emily Keller and Steve Drizin, Clinical Professor of Law, Northwestern University School of Law, explain why felony murder statutes and their accompanying harsh prison sentences should not apply to children and teens, given that scientific research shows they are less able than adults to understand and assess risks.

Thanks to a federal ruling yesterday, three Pennsylvania inmates, convicted of murder offenses they committed as juveniles and sentenced to life without parole, will be able to petition the federal district court to reconsider their sentences.

"Surrogate Parents and Special Education in Pennsylvania: An Overview" will explore the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act's surrogate parent requirements, targeting school district superintendents, principals, special education administrators, social workers, guidance counselors, special education teachers, IEP team coordinators, community partners (OCY caseworkers, mental health case managers), and parents. 

On April 17, 2012, a young black man was shot and killed in Southwest Philadelphia. What made this killing different from the 400+ shootings every year involving a young black man? Nothing and yet, everything.

Juvenile Law Center is seeking a student to join our team and assist with writing abstracts/summaries for publications in our Resource Index, an in-house online collection of essays, journal articles, reports and studies, selected from many publication sources and assigned to one or more of over sixty subject areas. 

Interested in joining one of Juvenile Law Center's youth engagement programs, Juveniles for Justice or Youth Fostering Change? Here's your chance!

On August 7, State Policy Advocacy and Reform Center (SPARC) and the Annie E. Casey Foundation, together with the Legal Center for Foster Care and Education (a collaboration of the American Bar Association, Juvenile Law Center, and Education Law Center-PA), hosted a webinar on state implementation of the Uninterrupted Scholars Act. If you missed it, you can view the recording here. 

In late June-early July, my husband, Philadelphia Public Defender Tom Innes, and I traveled to Okinawa and Tokyo, Japan to teach trial advocacy, and lecture on both the American juvenile justice system and the "kids-for-cash" scandal in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania.