17-year-olds need to be kept out of adult jails
For safety and financial reasons and to fight recidivism, it is the right thing for Texas to do.
As a veteran of Texas criminal justice policy and co-sponsor of many of the nationally recognized criminal justice reforms in Texas over the past decade, I do not want to see the same faces come into our jails time and time again. I also want to protect individuals from harm while they are in custody. This week, the Texas Legislature made great progress in both of these areas.
I was thrilled to see the House of Representatives pass a top legislative priority on Tuesday, when a measure to keep 17-yearolds out of adult jails was included in a larger bill (SB 1630) that would reorganize the Texas Juvenile Justice Department.
Currently in Texas, all 17-year-olds are handled in the adult criminal justice system. More than 90 percent of them are charged only with minor, nonviolent offenses.
A growing number of Texas voices, from sheriffs to judges to business leaders, have emphasized the pressing and immediate need to raise the age of criminal responsibility from 17 to 18 years, as the vast majority of states have already done. Sending 17-year-olds to adult jails, rather than holding them accountable in the juvenile system, puts them at risk and threatens public safety by turning nonviolent teenagers into hardened criminals.
The federal Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA), signed into law by President George W. Bush, requires jailers to separate by “sight and sound” all youth under the age of 18 from adult inmates. The law recognizes the extreme vulnerability of the youngest prisoners. Gov. Greg Abbott has recently announced that he intends for Texas to meet the requirements of this law, and our sheriffs are committed to complying. However, having the age of criminal responsibility set at 17 makes such compliance difficult to achieve, even when enormous sums are spent on it.
Smaller and medium-size jails are not designed to meet such requirements. Many jails will need to modify their facilities, at costs that have been estimated in the millions. Even in large counties, compliance has been costly. For example, Dallas County is spending almost $80,000 per week to separate 17-year-olds from adult offenders.
If a teenager is sexually assaulted in our jails and we are not in compliance with PREA, Texas taxpayers could be liable for multi-million dollar verdicts. Even defending against such lawsuits can cost tens of thousands of dollars. Needless to say, the moral liability would dwarf any financial settlement. Texas sheriffs do their best to keep youth safe while they are in their jails, but many that I’ve spoken to also know 17-year-olds do not belong there.
Sexual assault is one of many dangers faced by young people in adult jails and prisons. The suicide rate for people under 18 in adult facilities is eight times that of youth in juvenile facilities and 36 times that of adult inmates.
Current law puts young people in harm’s way for no good reason. Repeated studies have shown that minors prosecuted as adults are more likely to commit future crimes — and even more likely to escalate towards serious violent crimes — than those who remain in the juvenile system. The juvenile system mandates that youth attend school and participate in other programming designed to stop reoffending, such as substance abuse counseling. The adult system does far less to rehabilitate. Instead, kids get adult criminal mentors.
Public safety would be far better served by keeping 17-year-olds in the juvenile system, where rehabilitation is more likely to occur, while allowing younger teens accused of the most serious crimes to still be treated as adults. That would mean that many more of our 17-year-olds would have the opportunity to turn their lives around and contribute to our communities.
The House correctly recognized this by approving a measure that would raise the age of criminal responsibility starting Sept. 1, 2017. This gives the juvenile justice system time to prepare while demonstrating that the Legislature is taking action to keep kids safe and protect taxpayers from potential lawsuits. The Senate should concur with this legislation to save counties millions of dollars while decreasing crime in our communities.