A new audit examining the state’s juvenile justice department found that incidents in their juvenile facilities are going unreported, youth aren’t always disciplined the same way, and some are spending longer stretches of time in isolation.
The audit, which is a routine look at the department, was not intended as an investigation into the deaths of three teens in 2022, but documented problems which it said can impact DJJ’s ability to ensure a safe and secure environment for youth.
The audit followed a September report by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that three teenagers who were in state custody in 2022 had died within weeks of each other. All three were under the age of 18 and were in the care of separate facilities across the state. Their deaths were highly unusual for the juvenile justice department, which supervises and rehabilitates youth offenders. The last time a child died while in custody was in 2015, according to Department of Juvenile Justice Commissioner Tyrone Oliver.
The 65-page audit, conducted by the Georgia Department of Audits & Accounts, identified issues related to how problems inside the facilities were reported, isolation, discipline, and investigations. DJJ officials said they appreciated the audit, and will work to implement changes.
“The audit highlighted some areas where we need to make adjustments to optimize our performance further,” the agency said in a statement. “DJJ is dedicated to addressing the findings and will implement a comprehensive action plan and continue to regularly assess our performance to ensure sustained improvements.”
DJJ is responsible for an average daily population of just under 1,000 kids who stay in 25 facilities across Georgia, according to data from fiscal year 2022. In 2019, a yearlong investigation by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution found that juvenile justice in Georgia is at once too lenient and too harsh, barely holding many youths accountable even for repeated offenses before confining them in brutal, chaotic juvenile prisons when their crimes turn more menacing.
The audit found some good news: the number of “incidents,” inside juvenile facilities — defined as a range of problems including self-harm, child abuse and death — have decreased dramatically in recent years. From FY 2018 to FY 2022, the total number of incidents decreased by nearly 50%, from approximately 17,600 to 8,900. The most significant decrease in total incidents, or 33%, occurred between fiscal years 2020 and 2021, the audit found. This was most likely due to coronavirus restrictions limiting youth interaction.
The department is following many best practices, the audit found. For example, when a youth reports a problem they have multiple ways to do so, and cannot face retaliation for doing so.
The audit also found weaknesses in procedures. Notably, the department doesn’t set a limit on the length of time that a youth can be held in isolation, a practice that has been found to cause depression, anger, paranoia, and psychosis among some youth. DJJ defines “isolation” as placing a youth in a locked room for 15 minutes or more, excluding when he or she is asleep.
The audit found that over the past several years — since fiscal year 2018 — the amount of time youth have been held in isolation has increased. Among some of the key stats:
•Between fiscal years 2018 and 2022, the average time a teenager was placed in isolation increased from about a half-day to more than 1.5 days.
•In fiscal year 2022, approximately 17% or 580 of the 3,400 isolation periods were two or more consecutive days in length.
•In fiscal year 2022, five isolation periods were longer than 30 consecutive days.
In its formal response to the audit, DJJ disagreed with the characterization of the overuse of isolation, but also indicated its commitment to improving the practice.
The audit also found that DJJ incidents, which consist of both youth or staff infractions, are not always reported, and monitoring processes could be improved to address reoccurring problems. Surveys of DJJ staff also identified some key issues, including that nearly 40% of the 284 staff who responded to the survey indicated that incidents inside the juvenile facilities did not always result in a report. What’s more, 42% of those surveyed said that youth are disciplined in an inconsistent way.
Approximately 10% of staff who were surveyed said a supervisor had asked them not to report a problem, and several staff said that they kept quiet because a manager did not want their facility being investigated.
The audit also found that DJJ doesn’t always take action when staff fail to report an incident. The audit found seven staff members with substantiated allegations for failure to report an incident. There was no documented disciplinary action for two of the seven staff. In the other cases, two of the employees resigned, and the other three received written reprimands or letters of concern, including one with a performance improvement plan.
The story so far:
In September, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that three teenagers who were in custody of the Georgia juvenile detention system had died within the span of a few weeks in 2022, all at separate facilities. One involved a highly publicized case of a 17-year-old boy in a South Georgia detention facility who died after a “fight game” on Aug. 9, 2022. Another case involved a 16-year-old female juvenile who died after she became “unresponsive” after allegedly ingesting an illegal substance before entering the facility. Through a tip and subsequent public records request, the AJC found a third case of a child who died after an altercation inside a facility on Aug. 29, 2022. The child became unconscious after being struck by another incarcerated child.
