Three States Lead the Way for Juvenile Justice Reforms; News Roundup

Juvenile Justice Reform

• Teen Is Used to Being Behind Bars, Imagines Future There (JJIE)
  Ruben Rodriguez, a teen from the Bronx, is on Rikers Island, waiting to stand trial for homicide. By the time he returned to the Box (punitive segregation) in late September, City of New York Correction Department Commissioner Joseph Ponte publicly promised to end punitive segregation for Rikers’ roughly 300 juvenile inmates by 2015.

• Three States Lead the Way for Juvenile Justice Reforms (PewTrusts.org)
  State leaders from Georgia, Hawaii, and Kentucky discuss the shifting landscape in juvenile justice and how they enacted data-driven and fiscally sound policies that protect public safety, improve outcomes for youths, and contain correctional costs.

• Transferring Juveniles to Adult Justice System Detrimental (Indian Express)
  The provision of transferring juveniles between 16 and 18 years of age, accused of serious crimes, to the adult justice system was widely discussed and was found to be detrimental rather than effective at a national-level consultation between officials and experts — in the field of juvenile justice and child reforms — on the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) campus Saturday.

• CT Supreme Court Examining Long, Mandatory Sentences For Juveniles (Hartford Courant)
  Before Ackeem Riley was sentenced to at least 85 years in jail for his involvement in a 2006 gang-related, drive-by shooting in the North End of Hartford, the prosecutor said the teen "should never, ever be on the streets again." That was before the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a trio of cases that a child's age and maturity should be considered before courts impose harsh sentences, and that state laws that strip judges of discretion when sentencing juvenile offenders constitute cruel and unusual punishment.
  

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Adolescent Substance Abuse Treatment and Mental Health

• Sugar Can Worsen Teens' Depression And Anxiety And Change How They React To Stress (Medical Daily)
  “It is alarming that the teen stress experience is so similar to that of adults. It is even more concerning that they seem to underestimate the potential impact that stress has on their physical and mental health,” APA CEO and Executive Vice President Norman B. Anderson said in a press release. “In order to break this cycle of stress and unhealthy behaviors as a nation, we need to provide teens with better support and health education at school and home, at the community level and in their interactions with health care professionals.”

• Rogers to Expand with New Clinics in Chicago and Nashville (Milwaukee BizTimes)
  The Utah Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice unanimously approved a series of proposed reforms Wednesday intended to reduce prison population growth, including making drug possession a misdemeanor.

• What Brain Studies Reveal About the Risk of Adolescent Alcohol Use and Abuse (Medical Press)
  Neuroscientists at Georgetown University Medical Center (GUMC) are zeroing in on brain factors and behaviors that put teens at risk of alcohol use and abuse even before they start drinking.