Systematic Problems Result in Closure of Florida Juvenile Facilities

by David M. Reutter

The systematic lack of training, supervision, and oversight at two Florida juvenile detention centers caused unconstitutional conditions of confinement, a report by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) concludes. While the two facilities the DOJ reviewed have since closed, the “problems may well persist without detection or correction in other juvenile facilities under the same policies and procedures and subject to the same oversight process that allowed the failures ... to persist until a budgetary crisis forced” the closure of those two facilities.

Although DOJ closed its investigation due to the closures, it issued the report to put Florida “on notice as to its responsibilities,” for its findings “remain relevant to the conditions of confinement for the youth confined in Florida’s remaining juvenile justice facilities.” The two facilities the DOJ investigated sit on 159 acres in the rural part of Florida’s panhandle.

The 110-year old Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys (Dozier) has a notorious reputation for abuse, which was recognized by the state in the dedication of a monument memorializing boys who were killed by guards while confined at Dozier. On the same grounds was the Jackson Juvenile Offender Center (JJOC). Dozier held “high risk” juveniles while JJOC held maximum risk boys.

The report found that Florida failed to adequately protect youth confined to Dozier and JJOC from harm and threat of harm by staff, other youth, and self-harm. Excessive use of force was the first area the report addressed.

Despite policies requiring that force be used as a last resort, DOJ learned staff subjected youth to force as a first resort. Training by Florida’s Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) trains staff to use the three level “Protective Action Response” (PAR) to address youth behavior. Level 1 consists of verbal intervention; level 2 includes touch and countermove techniques as well as takedown methods; and level 3 involves the use of mechanical restraints.

At Dozier, staff used force as first resort against youth engaged in non-violent and non-threatening behavior. DOJ learned staff took youth to the ground using the dangerous face down prone restraint technique, engaged in impermissible uses of force such as a choking, and used force when a youth was already subdued, including use of mechanical restraints. These practices occurred even more frequently at JJOC.      

The report cited several instances of these types of force use, including several instances of staff provoking youth to respond in a way that allowed them to use force. It also found staff “unlawfully used mechanical restraints as a first response to youth who did not respond to verbal commands.” DJJ policies allow mechanical restraints when youth are engage in “aggravated resistance,” but the youth at Dozier and JJOC “were subjected to a pattern or practice of unconstitutional uses of force” in “circumstances that required only verbal intervention.”

Dangerous off-camera assaults were also an issue. “Youth at Dozier were often subjected to staff violence in facility regions outside of the viewing range of surveillance cameras,” states the report. “Many of the youth complained that [staff] often directed them to off-camera areas.”     

The DOJ also found the pattern or practice of excessive force was “obfuscated by its poor documentation and data collection efforts.” Of the 138 Dozier use of force reports it viewed from April 2010, if found that reports were so poorly written that it was difficult to determine what behaviors were being reported, reports lacked details to establish the appropriateness of the use of force, and there was underreporting of problematic responses to youth behavior. JJOC had similar documentation problems. “Inadequate documentation and recording of use of force incidents leads us to question whether uses of force at Dozier and JJOC were even higher than the data suggests,” states the report.  

The report then turns to the use of isolation, finding Florida “subjected youth to unconstitutional disciplinary confinement by (1) failing to provide youth placed in confinement with adequate due process, (2) confining youth for undue and excessively long periods of time, (3) confining youth as a form of punishment for minor infractions, and (4) depriving youth of necessary rehabilitative services.”

DOJ found 39 instances of youth receiving extended periods of confinement, up to 120 days, at the facilities as a disciplinary sanction. “The measures were in contravention of youths’ right to due process and access to juvenile court,” DOJ said. “The extension policy was ostensibly applied only to youth deemed aggressors in fights.” Yet, DOJ found instances of extensions beyond a youth’s release date in instances where the youth was defending himself.

The measures were problematic for several reasons. First, there were no safeguards in place to ensure fairness. Moreover, under Florida law, juvenile courts retain jurisdiction over the youth and must authorize transfer between higher and lower facilities, and a child cannot be subjected to extended confinement for punitive reasons. No consideration was given to the youth’s safety in lengthening the sentence. “Finally, these punitive measures were counterproductive to the rehabilitation of Dozier youth.”

Once their confinement was extended, youth were sent to DOJJ. “The extensions and transfers, while ostensibly serving as a deterrent to fighting, were ... an exaggerated response to youth who acted out and, instead, contributed to the youths’ aggressive behavior,” concludes the report. “In this respect, the extensions and transfers contributed to feelings of hopelessness, anger and aggression.”

Dozier youths were subjected to frisk searches more than 10 times per day, purportedly for recovery of contraband. The DOJ found those searches were “unduly intrusive” and violative of the Fourth Amendment.

While to DOJ’s knowledge, no youths at the facilities had committed suicide, “the lack of death does not minimize the serious risk for youth or the unlawful state of mental health care at the facilities.” DOJ found a “laissez faire attitude toward suicidal youth” and found the facilities’ isolation cells were replete with heightened dangers to suicidal youth. Medical and mental health care were found totally lacking, as were the rehabilitative services offered. DOJ found youth at the two facilities “spent a significant among of time being idle.” Finally, it found the conditions at Dozier to be unsanitary and unsafe.

“The deficiencies identified in the Report not only breach the state of Florida’s obligation to serve confined youth, but impact public safety as well. These conditions return youth to the community no better, and likely less, equipped to succeed than when they were first incarcerated,” wrote Assistant Attorney General Thomas G. Perez in a December 1, 2011 letter to Governor Rick Scott. “The described conditions erode public confidence in the juvenile justice system and interfere with the state’s efforts to reduce crime.”

Florida was advised to clean up its act at other juvenile facilities or face the prospect of another investigation. The DOJ’s report, “Investigation of the Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys and the Jackson Juvenile Offender Center, Marianna, Florida,” is available on PLN’s website.

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