Amid abuse scandals at juvenile institutions and research documenting the harms of locking up kids, leaders nationwide have called for reforming and shrinking the juvenile justice system. Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner who campaigned on a promise to "treat kids as kids," announced a new era for juvenile justice in Philadelphia, outlining sweeping policies with an emphasis on rehabilitation. He celebrated immediate and sharp reductions in the number of kids jailed awaiting trial in the adult system and pledged to end what a “coercive” practice of requiring kids charged as adults to plead guilty in exchange for being transferred to the juvenile system. Along the way, city and state leaders’ most significant reform proposals have been shelved, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports.
Critics say some of the district attorney’s bold juvenile policies, though nominally still in place, have fallen by the wayside. The number of youth jailed awaiting trial as adults is significantly higher than when Krasner took office, while the negotiating tactic Krasner once derided as coercive is once again routine. Compared with 10 years ago, Philadelphia does incarcerate significantly fewer young people. And the DA’s office now diverts one in five juvenile cases. “We are no longer incarcerating youth as a first step,” Krasner said in 2019. Police recently launched an additional diversion program aimed at diverting low-level cases even earlier, at the point of arrest. Philadelphia remains an outlier both in Pennsylvania and among big cities nationwide in its rate of locking up kids. Even as the number of teens in the system declined, the total nights spent in secure detention have increased. The the city regularly sends youth who score as low-risk on state standardized assessments to high-security institutions.
Comments