The Florida House on Friday unanimously passed a bill protecting teens from abuse by staff in lock-ups run by the Department of Juvenile Justice, but for many advocates, the Legislature should be putting more protections in place.
The Dream Defenders, a youth group focused on juvenile justice issues, this week called for protection from arrests at school for minor incidents. The group also called for an end to pepper spray and solitary confinement in jails run by Florida counties and to stop putting teens in the juvenile justice system for misdemeanor first offenses.
Florida incarcerates more youths per capita than any of the 10 most populous states. Last year, more than 58,000 were arrested — a rate 40 percent higher than the national average.
Members of the Dream Defenders staged a sit-in last week at Gov. Rick Scott's office and called on the Legislature to give their bills a hearing, but the measure that passed Friday wasn't on their radar.
The department had asked Rep. Gayle Harrell (R-Stuart) to sponsor the bill, HB 353, after the death of Eric Perez of a cerebral hemorrhage at the Palm Beach Regional Detention Center in 2011. A 2012 inspector general's report found that agency employees didn't call for help because they thought Perez was faking his illness.
A grand-jury report was scathing, but found criminal charges couldn't be filed against staff because there was no basis in state law. So HB 353 expands the definition of child abuse to include youths in department detention facilities.
Department Secretary Wansley Walters said the bill was necessary but the incident itself was "an outlier – and it was swiftly dealt with. And that certainly sends a message."
Since Perez' death, the department has developed a yearly audit to review its employees for compliance with policies and procedures, and a tool to screen potential employees for their ability to work with detained youths. The Palm Beach lock-up's telephones were reconfigured so teens could make free calls to lawyers, probation officers and the state abuse hotline.
She pointed to the Milton Girls Juvenile Residential Facility, which was closed last winter after a former guard was charged with child abuse for her treatment of a 15-year-old inmate.
"I think there was a culture there that was really being kept secret and being hidden from our department," Walters said. "But it has emerged, and fortunately law enforcement has gotten involved and people are being held accountable – after the fact, because within a few months of that incident, that program was closed. And that will be our approach throughout our system."
Perhaps the biggest issue for advocates, though, is what the Southern Poverty Law Center's David Utter calls "state-sanctioned child abuse down in Polk County."
That would be the center's top legislative priority, SB 506 by Sen. Arthenia Joyner (D-Tampa) which would repeal a 2011 law, SB 2112, that allows Florida counties to run their own juvenile justice facilities.
Three counties now do so — Polk, Seminole and Marion — but only Polk uses pepper spray on juveniles.
The center has brought a federal lawsuit against Polk County and Sheriff Grady Judd for the practice, which Judd strongly defends.
He said pepper spray quickly wears off, whereas many advocates say it shouldn't be used on juveniles because their brains aren't fully developed.
"The overwhelming view in Florida and the rest of the nation regarding the use of pepper spray in juvenile settings is at odds with Sheriff's Judd's practice," wrote Magistrate Judge Mark A. Pizzo last month. "He would be wise to develop a plan for reducing the juvenile-on-juvenile violence and limiting the use of pepper spray."
Seminole County also operates its own juvenile detention center, and Major Scott Ballou told an audience at the panel discussion "Kids are Different: Youth in the Justice System" last month at St. Petersburg College that the cost was indeed a factor.
Seminole County has cut the daily average number of incarcerated youths from between 40 and 50 to 15, he said.
"That's why we wanted to do it. It wasn't to abuse children by any stretch of the imagination," Ballou said. "Because of local control, we have a lot of options on detention avoidance."
Joyner's bill repealing SB 2112 hasn't been heard, nor has its House companion by Rep. Mia Jones (D-Jacksonville).