Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

InflationOk300 OP t1_iwnfynv wrote

BATON ROUGE - The Louisiana Office of Juvenile Justice is pleading with the state's judges to allow some young inmates out of jail, saying the agency does not have enough beds to sustain any more teen offenders.

The letter penned last week by William Sommers, the head of OJJ, says long stays for some of those inmates and a riot that "completely destroyed" a dorm at one facility in Monroe has pushed the agency to its limit when it comes to housing those troubled juveniles. 

OJJ says it plans to start filing motions requesting releases for some inmates whom the agency believes can be "safely reintegrated" back into the community. 

"We are asking your consideration to grant these motions as there is no other way to remove youth from the local detention centers pending placement unless we first safely release those youth who qualify for community based rehabilitation services," the letter read. 

The head of the agency added that OJJ should be able to better meet current needs once the state repairs the destroyed 36-bed dormitory at Swanson Monroe and opens its new 72-bed unit at that same facility. 

WBRZ has reached out to OJJ for more information on the request.

The plea comes as Louisiana has struggled for more than a year to safely operate its juvenile detention centers. The problem had gotten so bad that the state announced earlier this year a plan to temporarily move some teens from one facility plagued by riots and frequent breakouts to a newly constructed juvenile-only wing at the Angola state prison, a controversial decision met with pushback from some activist groups.

As of November, no juvenile offenders have been moved to Angola.  

54

TheNewGirl_ t1_iwnol8u wrote

> OJJ says it plans to start filing motions requesting releases for some inmates whom the agency believes can be "safely reintegrated" back into the community.

why are a bunch of kids they, the people responsible for punishing them, believe are capable of being safely reintegrated not already out of prison ...

why does any prison have any significant population of CHILDREN deemed safe to be reintegrated by the same people whose job it is to make sure thats the case

73

ArrogantAragorn t1_iwo74dt wrote

I don’t think the people running the prison decide sentences for the offenders

24

Bubble_of_ocean t1_iwrv2ql wrote

Wellllllllll… google “cash for kids.”

Directly bribing judges to convict more children is actually the smaller problem. The bigger problem is the sickening amount of money the prison industry pours into politics. Gotta keep people scared and “tough on crime,” can’t let the putting-humans-in-cages business dry up!

6

datbech t1_iwq0k5z wrote

To play devils advocate, I live in Baton Rouge and go to New Orleans frequently. There has been an alarming number of violent crimes committed by minors in the last 6 months. Tons of normal people in “safe” areas that are getting robbed, car jacked, and murdered at random. The NOLA DA has been in hot water for releasing many of these minors, with a laundry list of previous violent crimes, because of “insufficient evidence.” There was a random LSU student killed a few weeks ago, a lady killed filling her gas at Costco, and an old woman who had her arm ripped off and bled out in front of her neighbors from teenagers car jacking her.

Locking people up blindly and indefinitely is wrong, but releasing people has not made any progress of since COVID.

https://www.wwltv.com/amp/article/news/crime/man-who-carjacked-ran-over-woman-at-costco-arrested/289-1a157509-4a24-4859-ae21-d1976c4488c6

https://www.wwltv.com/amp/article/news/crime/elderly-woman-dragged-death-new-orleans-carjacking/289-763a761c-95c8-46a9-ad30-3ef151ec419f

https://abc13.com/amp/allie-rice-baton-rouge-lsu-student-killed-woman-found-dead-in-car-the-shed/12240380/

13

TheNewGirl_ t1_iwrdf88 wrote

That has nothing to do with the issue I brought up

Were talking about kids already in prison where the people in charge of reforming them have explicitly said - these kids are safe to be reintegrated back to society

If anything if the kids Im talking about werent in Jail, there would be like more room for the kids you're talking about in there lol

4

[deleted] t1_iwni51f wrote

[removed]

1