THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, December 6, 1995 TAG: 9512060004
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A12 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Opinion
SOURCE: By JERRAULD C. JONES
LENGTH: Medium: 86 lines
We are all keenly aware of the increase in violent crime by young people. Hardly a day passes without some media account of a violent act committed by a teenager.
These crimes not only leave victims in their turbulent wake but also fill our schools and communities with a sense of powerlessness, despair and anger at the perceived ineffectiveness of the juvenile-justice system. Indeed, the pain is real, the sense of powerlessness valid and the frustration readily understandable.
However, as juvenile-justice reform has slowly been transformed from a public-safety-policy issue into a centerpiece of a political debate, I am constrained to correct many of the factual inaccuracies and exaggerations which have appeared on your news and editorial pages, some of which are emanating from the Governors' Commission on Juvenile Justice Reform. How we as a society respond to this serious problem is too important to become swept up in campaign rhetoric and sound bytes. Some recurring misperceptions:
Virginia is in the middle of a violent youth crime wave. Actually, Virginia ranks below the national average of youth crime with less than 3 percent of all juvenile arrests being for violent crime. Less than 0.2 of 1 percent of Virginia's young people were involved in any form of criminal activity. While we must respond firmly and decisively to the violent youth among us, we must keep our perspective and realize that our young people today as a whole are not out terrorizing their communities.
Virginia's juvenile-justice system does no more than slap young people on the wrist. The fact is that in 1994, more than 1,300 juveniles were securely detained in one of the 17 secure detention homes awaiting trial. These detention homes, including those in Norfolk and Newport News, much like their adult jail counterparts, are chronically overcrowded. On any given day in Virginia, more than 900 juveniles are incarcerated in juvenile correctional centers. One a per-capita basis, Virginia locks up more young people than almost any other state in the union.
The need for more secure bed space prompted the Allen administration to expand the Bon Air facility by 180 beds. In reality, most juveniles who appear before court do not return for second offenses.
Juveniles who commit violent crimes serve only one year in confinement. Since 1994, Virginia law allows the transfer and trial in Circuit Court of any juvenile 14 years of age or older who commits any felony. For juveniles charged with violent felonies such as murder and rape, the judge need only find that probable cause exists to believe that the offense has been committed, and that the juvenile is competent to stand trial prior to transferring those cases to the adult court.
I challenge any Virginia prosecutor to name a case of a juvenile charged with a violent crime in which he was unable to try the case in adult court under the present law. In addition, as a result of our bipartisan legislative initiative on juvenile crime in 1994, the law now allows juvenile-court judges to sentence juveniles for up to seven years in juvenile facilities. Since the change in the law, more than 150 juveniles charged with a variety of crimes have been sentenced and are serving their time in secure confinement.
We all know that some violent juveniles are truly beyond salvation. However, these violent offenders constitute a very small percentage of our youth, the majority of whom can be turned around with the provision of community-based services.
The community holds them accountable for their actions and, thereby, in the words of the Governor's Commission, ``are afforded genuine opportunity to reform.'' As the chairman of the Virginia Commission on Youth and its juvenile-justice task force, I have worked on a variety of juvenile-justice issues during the past four years. I am saddened by the tendency to characterize all juveniles as predators in waiting. Scripted public ``debate'' and the misrepresentation of statistics do not move us closer to thoughtful and well-reasoned responses to public challenges.
As I have stated to groups across the state on numerous occasions, true reform is provided when young people are safe in their homes, schools become havens of learning, and communities are places where opportunities for work and productive citizenship are realities.
It is time to put the inflammatory statements away. We must work together to hold parents accountable for their children's behavior; further, we must devote our best efforts toward the first-time offender. We must show first-time offenders a different way of life and make good on our promise of genuine opportunity. To do less is to be a poor steward of our children's future. MEMO: Delegate Jones of Norfolk is chairman of the General Assembly's
Commission on Youth.
by CNB