GROUPS CONDEMN SHACKLING OF JUVENILE DEFENDANTS IN RACINE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 19, 2005

Contact: Larry Dupuis, ACLU-Wisconsin Foundation, (414) 272-4032, ext. 12
Beverly Hicks, Racine Branch of NAACP, (262) 632-1151
Wendy Paget, Wisconsin Council on Children & Families, (608) 284-0580
Mark Soler, Youth Law Center, (202) 637-0377 ext. 114

Four organizations joined today in condemning juvenile justice authorities in Racine for making all incarcerated children in the courtroom at the Juvenile Detention Center wear shackles and chains on their ankles during their court hearings, regardless of their age or the seriousness of the charges they face. The Racine Branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin, the Wisconsin Council on Children and Families and the Youth Law Center say that the practice is demeaning, humiliating and painful to the children and their families, and violates the law.

“The children in court at the Racine detention facility are forced to wear leg irons, regardless of their age, regardless of the charges against them, and regardless of whether they present a risk of violence or escape,” said Wendy Paget, a policy analyst with the Wisconsin Council on Children & Families who spent a day observing hearings in the Racine courtroom. “A twelve-year-old accused of shoplifting should not have to endure this treatment in front of his or her family in a court of law.”

“The unnecessary use of restraints in the courtroom demeans and humiliates individual defendants and their families,” said Beverly Hicks, President of the Racine Branch of the NAACP. “The image of children in chains may be particularly offensive – even traumatizing – to African-American families, because of the association of shackling with slavery. This practice also undermines the confidence of families and the public that these children are truly presumed to be innocent until proven guilty.”

“The indiscriminate shackling of children in Racine is illegal and should be stopped immediately,” said Mark Soler, president of the Youth Law Center, a national public interest law firm working on juvenile justice reform. “The appellate courts have consistently held that leg irons and other restraints should only be used in courtrooms when necessary to prevent escape or violence. Judges must make individual determinations of the need for such restraints based on the facts of each case, and they should only be used in extraordinary circumstances. The juvenile justice system is supposed to be based on rehabilitation: it should not indiscriminately subject children to such degrading treatment.”

In June, the ACLU sent a letter to the Chief Judge of the Racine County Circuit Court, the judges presiding in juvenile court and the superintendent of the Juvenile Detention Facility asking that the practice be halted. The letter pointed to state, federal and even international law, as well as psychological studies, in urging the authorities in Racine to stop chaining juveniles without individualized assessment of the need for restraints. The authorities have thus far refused to revisit their policy, claiming that only future security enhancements at the detention center, which depend on the availability of funds, would allow them to one day remove the chains.

“The chains should come off now,” said Christopher Ahmuty, Executive Director of the ACLU of Wisconsin. “The rights of these children to dignified treatment should not be held hostage to tight budgets. Putting children in chains unnecessarily sends a message to them that they are dangerous outcasts, not young people with the potential for good. If they internalize those messages, the juvenile justice system has pushed them farther down the path to delinquency and crime, rather than steering them back on the course of law-abiding behavior.”