ACLU: More than 30 juveniles transferred to troubled Cuyahoga County Jail is a ‘grave concern’

Cuyahoga County Juvenile Justice Center

The ACLU of Ohio criticized Cuyahoga County Juvenile judges sending too many juvenile inmates to be housed at the Cuyahoga County Jail.

CLEVELAND, Ohio — More than 30 juveniles charged with crimes in Cuyahoga County have been transferred this year to the Cuyahoga County Jail where mistreatment of inmates have become the subject of federal and state investigations, according to the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio.

The ACLU said the issue is of “grave concern” considering that eight inmates died in the jail in 2018, another died in May. Eight current or former guards have been charged with a variety of crimes that include accusations of beating inmates, ignoring a dying inmate and selling drugs in the jail.

Thirty-four juvenile inmates have been transferred from the Juvenile Detention Center to the adult jail in the first six months of 2019, the ACLU said in a letter to Cuyahoga County Juvenile Court Administrative Judge Kristin Sweeney.

“The information we received from our public records request is shocking and disturbing,” ACLU Advocacy Director Jocelyn Rosnick said in a statement. “Every week there are new reports about the horrors at the Cuyahoga Jail, and now we’ve learned that not only are juveniles being sent there at alarming rates, but that the Juvenile Court has no written policy of how, when, and why youth are transferred.

The ACLU said Sweeney did not respond to their letter.

Sweeney said in an interview with cleveland.com that judges carefully consider each case before sending children to the county jail. She criticized the ACLU’s stance, saying that keeping juvenile inmates accused of violent crimes makes the juvenile detention center less safe.

“What the ACLU is saying they want makes our facility less safe because the [county] jail isn’t safe,” Sweeney said. “My response is to make the county jail safe.”

She said the judges take into account a variety of factors when deciding to send juveniles to the county jail, including the nature of the criminal charges against the inmate, how they are performing in school, their mental health, their age, the number of juvenile detention center inmates and the number of detention center guards.

Judges support transferring inmates who are 18 or older, Sweeney said. She said they currently have about 23 inmates that are adults.

“It’s not logical for middle school and college age students to be locked up in the same facility,” Sweeney said.

She said juvenile inmates who are sent to the adult jail are appointed a defense attorney and guardian ad litem who advocate on the juvenile’s behalf. She said judges then determine what’s best for the juvenile.

She said the juvenile detention center can hold up to 180 inmates, but that because of understaffing can only hold about 110. Sweeney said there are 114 juveniles housed in the detention center as of Tuesday.

“These aren’t decisions that are taken lightly,” Sweeney said.

The Cuyahoga County Jail has 29 cells designed to hold juvenile inmates whose cases are transferred to adult court.

Both the Juvenile Detention Center and Cuyahoga County Jail have struggled recently with mistreatment of inmates and dysfunction in leadership.

A September 2018 report by the Washington D.C.-based Center for Children’s Law and Poverty found inmates at the Juvenile Detention Center did not get legally required education services, that supervisors showed “a significant and dangerous dependence” on confining inmates alone in their cells for long periods of time and that food was inadequate.

A Nov. 21 U.S. Marshals Service report on the Cuyahoga County Jail found that inmates were subjected to “inhumane” conditions and that inmates are held in the same areas as adult inmates, in violation of federal jail standards, that juvenile inmates didn’t receive extra nutrition or exercise and don’t received programs that are educational or aimed at brain development.

They are also subjected to the forced lockdowns at the downtown jail, known as red-zoning. Red-zoning happens when the jail is understaffed for a particular shift and inmates are locked in their cells for hours at a time.

Cuyahoga County officials previously said they changed the diet for juvenile inmates and no longer house juvenile inmates with adults.

The ACLU, however, said they are more comfortable with the changes that have since been made at the Juvenile Detention Center, but not with the adult facility.

Researches have reported that housing juvenile inmates with adults causes juveniles to be more likely to commit suicide, be victims of sexual assault and re-offend after their release from incarceration.

The ACLU also criticized the reasons Cuyahoga County Juvenile Court judges gave ordering young inmates transferred to the adult jail. Among judges gave include:

  • Inmates being transferred for refusing to attend or being disruptive during school classes at the Juvenile Detention Center
  • Vandalism
  • Failures at the Juvenile Detention Center
  • Speculation about whether or not a juvenile inmate would be able to earn a high school diploma

Juvenile Court judges should give the inmates age-appropriate punishments for those issues and “should not send them to a dangerous adult facility in which many have recently died or suffered abuse at the hands of guards charged with their protection,” ACLU Advocacy Counsel Chevier and Advocacy Director Jocelyn Rosnik wrote.

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