CIVIL RIGHTS GROUPS URGE US DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION TO INVESTIGATE CHILDREN'S RIGHTS VIOLATIONS AT L
The Southern Poverty Law Center and other civil rights groups today urged the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) to investigate the state of Louisiana’s decision to move children to the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, the nation’s largest adult maximum-security prison, one with a longstanding record of human rights violations.
In a letter signed by lawyers for the SPLC, the Louisiana Center for Children’s Rights (LCCR), the ACLU National Prison Project, the ACLU of Louisiana, Loyola University New Orleans College of Law and Families and Friends of Louisiana’s Incarcerated Children, advocates described how the misguided and unprecedented move of children to Angola has dire implications for these children’s lives, including their educational opportunities.
In July 2022, Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards announced that children previously held at the Bridge City Center for Youth would be temporarily transferred to the former death row building at Angola, located about 1.5 miles from the adult facility, to address the severe failings of the Louisiana Office of Juvenile Justice (OJJ), the state agency responsible for the care of youth in the juvenile system.
In anticipation of the transfer last year, the SPLC, LCCR and Loyola University sent a letter to several of the state agencies charged with providing education and rehabilitative services to detained youth to request a detailed, written plan about how they will deliver education and rehabilitative services to children at Angola.
https://www.splcenter.org/news/2023/03/20/investigate-childrens-rights-violations-angola-prison