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Young people also shared their report Broken Promises: Futures Denied, which details the harms of the Commonwealth’s juvenile detention system

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Ian Manuel, sentenced to life in prison in 1991 for attempted murder in a downtown Tampa botched robbery at 14 years old, is now sharing his story as an adult. Manuel is advocating against solitary confinement, where he says he spent 18 years within the Florida Department of Corrections (FDC).

And it’s turning over geolocation data to law enforcement, no warrant required. Kids in Philly call it being “on the band.” In recent years, the city’s juvenile justice system has rapidly expanded its use of GPS-equipped ankle monitors to enforce curfews and house arrest.

Google “disparities in the juvenile system” and you’re likely to land on the federal Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) website with the note: “No information is available for this page.” Earlier this year, the site provided robust data demonstrating that, despite years of reforms, the juvenile legal system reflects deep inequality. 

During the month of May, advocates turn their attention to those with experience in the foster care/family regulation system. What is the impact on youth mental health after surviving these systems? What approaches allow for trauma-informed collaboration to center youth mental health needs? Juvenile Law Center’s Youth Advocacy Program has developed two new tools to help advocacy organizations incorporate a trauma-informed lens into their advocacy efforts.

The child welfare system purports to protect children but it inflicts physical, emotional, and mental pain on families caught in its web.  In 2020, 215,000 children were removed from their homes and placed in foster care.  Twenty-five percent of those children were Black, yet Black children only account for approximately 14% of the youth population in the United States. 

How far should society go in punishing young criminals? Recent cases have reignited the discussion over treating juveniles as adults and giving them harsher penalties for serious crimes. For decades, juvenile justice reform has been a pendulum.

Over and over again, the juvenile legal, criminal legal, and family regulation/child welfare systems pull children out of school and then deny them a quality education. Since its founding in 1975, Juvenile Law Center has fought against these harmful practices.

During this Second Chance Month, even as new threats to our rights and freedoms emerge almost daily and the fear of losing hard-earned legal protections from discrimination has become all too real for far too many of us, it is worth taking a moment to consider our system impacted community members for whom discrimination, both public and private, has long been, and continues to be, the norm.

John Lewis taught us that "Freedom is not a state; it is an act. It is not some enchanted garden perched high on a distant plateau where we can finally sit down and rest. Freedom is the continuous action we all must take.” For youth justice advocates, what does acting for freedom look like right now?