Leading the way on juvenile justice
Missouri’s handling of crisis serves as model for reform
Dirty, dangerous conditions at a youth prison in Missouri triggered public outrage and prompted juvenile court judges to vow they would not send any more teen offenders to the facility.
Fights between inmates. Long stints in solitary confinement. Injuries inflicted by guards. Life in the rural Missouri prison resembled that at Wisconsin’s Lincoln Hills School for Boys in recent years.
But Missouri faced its crisis 45 years ago and as a result radically changed the structure of its juvenile corrections system, providing what could be a blueprint for Wisconsin. And an indication of how much work lies ahead.
In Missouri, large institutions were replaced with small facilities, closer to offenders’ homes. Teens live in pods of 10 with two counselors. They wear their own clothes, sleep in dorm-style rooms and address the staff by first names.
The doors are locked for the high-risk offenders, but no matter the setting, the focus is on therapy instead of controlling the youth, said Mark Steward, one of the architects of the Missouri system. They are reporting a much higher success rate than Wisconsin.
“It is done with dignity and respect both for the youth and the staff and that makes all the difference in the world,” said Steward, who retired as head of Missouri’s Division of Youth Services. “It is how you deal with them rather than the kind of youth they are.”
The “Missouri Model,” and versions similar to it have cropped up across the country. A delegation from Wisconsin went to Missouri two decades ago and even drew up a plan, according to Steward. But it was never put in place.
Problems at Lincoln Hills may finally force that reform.
Part of the solution could be a Missouri-style facility in Milwaukee County. Discussions are underway for a 36-bed secure facility, possibly operated jointly by the county and the state.
Such a facility has several hurdles. It would have to be approved by the Legislature. No one has yet estimated what it would cost to build and it’s unclear who would pay for its operation, which is expected to exceed the roughly $300 a day it costs to house an inmate at Lincoln Hills.
If the new facility is built, it would be too small to accommodate all the Milwaukee County youth currently at Lincoln Hills. It could lead to more offenders staying in their homes under supervision, raising concerns about public safety.
Police, prosecutors and some elected officials stress there needs to
be enough room for the surge in violent teen offenders arrested in Milwaukee. In the first 10 months of this year, for instance, more than 80 teenagers were arrested for armed carjackings, according to Milwaukee police data. That is a sharp increase from previous years.
Jim Moeser, head of juvenile corrections under former Gov. Jim Doyle, hopes the crisis at Lincoln Hills will change how the state’s most serious offenders are treated but added that rushing the transition could cause problems, especially in Milwaukee.
“You can’t go from 120 to zero. You need secure options,” said Moeser, who is now deputy director of the Wisconsin Council on Children and Families.
“You can’t put them in the county, cross our fingers and hope it works out.”
‘Missouri Model’ started small
In the early 1970s, Steward was just out of college with a marketing degree and headed for a job at a bank. He heard about a chance to work with troubled teens and jumped at it.
The system was a wreck. Stories of abusive conditions at a boys’ prison in a rural part of the state drew outrage and calls for a different way of dealing with children who commit crimes.
“It was a hellhole. Youth spitting on guards and throwing excrement,” Steward said. “It was like a bad movie.”
Steward and others set out to create a setting with a focus on therapy, education and skills training.
In typical youth prisons, a psychologist came once a week, what Steward calls “a white coat drive-by.” The rest of the time the inmates were under the watch of guards.
“It was, move ’em, herd ’em, watch ’em, punish ’em,” said Steward, now head of Missouri Youth Services Institute, which consults with other states reforming their systems. “We were saying, ‘Let’s listen and talk to them and spend time with them.’ “
Under the therapeutic model, offenders live in small groups with a couple of youth counselors, working through their histories and learning how to make different decisions.
Scattered around Missouri, the facilities might have up to 40 youth, but they are grouped in pods of 10. Some are high security, locked and enclosed by a fence. But inside there is the feeling of a college dorm. There are no segregation wings. If someone acts up, a counselor may take that teen to a room to cool down but then the inmate comes back. But separating youth from the group is rare, Steward said.
The group itself typically keeps order. When a new offender arrives, they are surrounded by the others and “grouped in.” It shows that they belong but also that misconduct won’t be allowed, Steward said.
Hiring people with the right personality to be counselors and then training them properly is key. The theory used to be that counselors avoid personal relationships with offenders.
“Now, we believe they absolutely have to build relationships and have a positive influence on the youth. It is critical,” said Michael Dempsey, executive director of the Council of Juvenile Correctional Administrators.
The reform approach cost more on the front end, but Missouri
reports a higher success rate compared with Wisconsin. A 2015 report shows about 12% of juveniles released from Missouri’s correctional system are readmitted within a year; about 30% are back after three years.
The recidivism rate in Wisconsin is almost three times higher at one year out and twice as high after three years, according to the Department of Corrections.
“You kind of get what you pay for,” Steward said. “You put someone in a jail cell and expect by osmosis to make them better, it just doesn’t happen.”
Changes underway
Pointing to states like Missouri, Milwaukee County officials say this is an opportunity for reform and to build on changes underway over the past five years.
Officials said the county used to lock up too many offenders arrested for minor offenses like theft, and house them with youth facing serious weapons charges.
“Before it was based on gut or feelings and we were damaging these kids. We need to be very careful. We cannot treat these kids as adults. We need to take a rehabilitative approach,” said County Health and Human Services Director Héctor Colón.
Colón said the county is using a new tool that measures which offenders need to be locked up and which can be returned to their parents under supervision. The county also is using its juvenile detention center in Wauwatosa coupled with supervision and services to try to keep offenders closer to home.
The shift in Milwaukee is toward keeping offenders in the home and supervising them. Officials say they are getting encouraging results. Colón said officials plan to increase that practice, placing even offenders deemed to be a high-risk in their home, using electronic monitoring.
“Some of them do bad things, but we have to be careful not to defer the risk because it is going to get worse,” he said. “If they go to Lincoln Hills, they get worse.”
Despite a call by many to get Milwaukee teens out of Lincoln Hills and other secure state lockups, the number remains high. Milwaukee still has almost 120 teens in the three correctional facilities, only about 15 fewer than were there in April, state records show.
Mark Mertens, head of the county’s delinquency services, said the system must balance the need for rehabilitation with public safety but simply locking up offenders does not work.
“We are reacting and trying to do whatever we can to help rehab youth and at the same time protect the community,” he said. “We cannot incarcerate this city out of the carjacking problem. It’s not going to happen.”
Public safety concerns
Milwaukee Police Chief Edward Flynn said he is concerned the county’s approach of relying more on supervision has contributed to crimes and a move to use the strategy more could make things worse.
Flynn said his officers routinely arrest teenagers who are supposed to be under county supervision but who are not being watched.
Most concerning are carjackings — armed robberies where a car is stolen, he said. There were about 35 such arrests of teens in the first 10 months each of 2014 and 2015, according to police. This year, however, there were 84 carjacking arrests over the same 10month period. And a number of the teenagers were suspected of multiple carjackings.
Flynn said he is not in favor of locking up large numbers of teens, just the ones who need to be separated. He thinks a smaller local facility focused on treatment would be helpful. But it must be secure.
Probation workers must provide more consequences to young offenders early on in the system, he said. Otherwise, they are learning the lesson that they are not going to be held accountable.
“Let’s get these kids while they are young and impressionable. Sanctions and services have to go together,” Flynn said. “We have to draw the distinction between dangerous and immature and I am not comfortable we are doing that right now.”
Of the dozen teens who were sent to Lincoln Hills in recent months, a summary of their records shows they committed more crimes while they were under supervision of the county.
“The system is not credible right now,” Flynn said. “Why are we surprised that I’ve got a blizzard of stolen cars, burglaries and robberies committed by young adults and juveniles. That should be no surprise to anybody.”
Milwaukee District Attorney John Chisholm said offenders are only being sent to Lincoln Hills when they have flunked out of every local option.
“They are not getting there on a quick ticket,” Chisholm said.
State, county discuss new approach
Gov. Scott Walker recently said he would support state help to pay to build the 36-bed facility in Milwaukee, but the county would have to pay to run it.
In Wisconsin, the county and state share responsibility for juvenile justice.
The counties deal with offenders when they first enter the system, supervising them and arranging for treatment ordered by a judge. When a judge sentences a juvenile to a correctional facility, the state takes over custody of the offender.
Colón said the county wants to make sure the state does not abdicate its responsibility to pay for corrections.
In a meeting in Walker’s office last month, county officials made clear they want to stop sending juveniles to Lincoln Hills as soon as possible, according to a letter released by County Executive Chris Abele.
The letter calls for a memo of understanding that would allow the county to operate the facility in Milwaukee but require the state to pay for the facility, food and medical service, transportation, and maintenance.
The county’s proposed operation of the facility appears to match those used in Missouri and other states, using a low ratio of offenders-to-staff for intense treatment in a secure setting, according to the letter.
It also calls for a citizens’ advisory council to oversee policy and operations of the facility, another similarity to Missouri.
Acknowledging Lincoln Hills is not going to close soon, the county is calling for reforms to that facility immediately: an end of guards using pepper spray; better treatment programs; shorter stays; and better care after release.
Experts say a large facility can be used for a Missouri-type model but it takes a commitment, leadership and a change in mind-set.
“It has to be addressed every single day to change that culture,” said Dempsey, of the Council of Juvenile Correctional Administrators.
Chisholm said he was struck by Missouri’s dedication to their reforms. Wisconsin could learn from that, he said.
“The Missouri Model didn’t descend from heaven. They stuck with it over the decades,” he said. “At the end of the day, you have to balance public safety with the needs of these kids.”