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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsLouisiana's Infamous Angola Prison Will Now Lock Up Children
In the coming days, Louisiana officials will incarcerate about two dozen children inside the old death row of Louisiana State Penitentiary, also called Angola, a massive maximum security prison for adult men that was once notorious for its violence.
Children as young as 10 with a history of assault may be transferred from their current juvenile correctional facilities to the former death row, where they will sleep in windowless cells with floor-to-ceiling metal bars that lock them in. The conditions are more punitive than those at the states high-security juvenile facilities, where kids normally sleep in dorms. The Office of Juvenile Justice will house the children at Angola temporarily while finishing construction on another place to detain them.
Several Louisiana law clinics and the ACLU sued to try to stop the transfers, arguing that keeping children at the adult prisoneven temporarilywas unconstitutional and psychologically harmful, and that it might increase their risk of suicide. Though the kids will be housed separately from the adult men, the facility is going to scream prison to them, Vincent Schiraldi, a juvenile justice expert for the plaintiffs and the former commissioner of the New York City Department of Correction, told the court.
But on Friday, Chief District Judge Shelly Dick reluctantly signed off on the plan, stating that incarcerating kids at Angola would potentially be traumatizing for them, but that government officials had nowhere better to keep the kids, who pose security risks. The prospect of putting a teenager to bed at night in a locked cell behind razor wire surrounded by swamps at Angola is disturbing, the judge wrote. But the threat of harm these youngsters present to themselves, and others, is intolerable.
https://www.motherjones.com/crime-justice/2022/09/louisianas-infamous-angola-prison-will-now-lock-up-children/
Lousyanna. That is all.
live love laugh
(13,081 posts)And I have to ask: whats the racial/ethnic composition of the children? Its a rhetorical question that I am sure I know the answer to.
Make it make sense.
jimfields33
(15,703 posts)Since its 24 people, Im sure they are the most dangerous.
Archae
(46,301 posts)Four boys who had a kidnapping plot against a classmate and her Father, it fell apart and all four are now in jail cells.
https://abcnews.go.com/US/hero-father-thwarted-alleged-kidnapping-attempt-prays-peace/story?id=51127499
These are not "children."
They are thugs who deserve to be in Angola.
jimfields33
(15,703 posts)This is not a kid stealing a candy bar. These are dangerous criminals who probably have a chance to do it again if allowed.
WhiskeyGrinder
(22,309 posts)jimfields33
(15,703 posts)Have they not had the trial yet?
WhiskeyGrinder
(22,309 posts)Archae
(46,301 posts)They've hit school bus companies twice now, and replacing just ONE costs $1200.
And these punks are stealing DOZENS from school buses.
jimfields33
(15,703 posts)This is happening all over the country with cars and other modes of transportation.
WhiskeyGrinder
(22,309 posts)why you're bringing this random article into it, besides satisfying your inclination to proclaim certain people "thugs" and deny their humanity or, for that matter, childhood.
questionseverything
(9,645 posts)Not bring criminal charges?
I understand this not a good situation but, the article says, the other children are afraid to sleep at night because these kids jump them
There have also been bones broken
WhiskeyGrinder
(22,309 posts)time, the should not be in an adult facility, let alone what used to be fucking death row.
questionseverything
(9,645 posts)WhiskeyGrinder
(22,309 posts)they are adjudicated in juvenile court. When you hear "tried as an adult," that means they're adjudicated in "regular" criminal court. Juvenile offenders are held in juvenile facilities, not adult ones, which Angola is.
Elessar Zappa
(13,911 posts)All our prison system does is produce more criminals. Plus, imost prisoners are minorities. Do you think minorities are inherently more criminal? No, its pure racism. Angola should be razed to the ground.