A young inmate at the Juvenile Detention Center in Nampa, Idaho. |
“The Court, in its infinite wisdom, has committed your
child, based on risk and needs.”
From the
introductory video “Your Child Has Been Committed to The Juvenile Corrections
System”
For reasons
beyond his control, it had taken Donny* three attempts to complete his senior
year in high school. On his twentieth birthday, Donny was three days from
finishing the classwork necessary to graduate from the Rebound School of Opportunity in Meridian, Idaho. All he had left was to make an oral presentation of his senior
report. He had already been offered a post-graduation job at Valley Truss, a local
construction service and supply store.
At home, Donny’s
father and mother, David and Norma, had prepared a party in honor of their
oldest son’s birthday and his anticipated graduation. When they got home from school, Donny’s
siblings, Larry and Sally*, were eager to celebrate with their older brother. But
Donny didn’t come home from school that day. Just before classes ended, he was
dragged away in handcuffs by his probation officer, John Youngkin and taken
to the Ada County Jail, where he will remain until April 28.
Over the past six
years, Donny has been incarcerated in a variety of institutions, from
“treatment centers” in both Idaho and Utah to the Idaho Department Juvenile
Corrections Center in Nampa. The juvenile facility in Nampa has become
notorious for corruption and sexual exploitation of inmates by guards and other
staff members.
In 2008, Donny
pleaded guilty to charges of indecent exposure and battery as a result of an
incident with his younger brother and sister that did not involve physical contact.
“Norma and I went
to Papa Murphy's to pick up some pizzas for dinner,” David recounted to Pro
Libertate. “We were gone just a few minutes – not even a half hour – and we
left Donny here in charge of the younger kids. He was 14 at the time, and he
seemed able to handle things. Besides, it was just down the block.”
At the time,
Sally was six years of age, and Larry was ten. When Dave and Norma returned,
Sally told them that Donny had “asked us to take our clothes off.”
“We were upset
and worried, of course, and we tried to find out immediately what had
happened,” Dave related. “As far as we could tell, it wasn't as if he had
abused the kids, or even touched them. It was a `You show me yours, and I'll
show you mine' kind of thing, which is bad, and wrong, but it was not anywhere
near as bad as we were afraid it might be.”
Still, out of an
abundance of caution, and acting as conscientious parents, Dave and Norma
decided to have their daughter examined.
“We took Sally to
the hospital right away, and she was fine,” Dave reports. However, the hospital
visit resulted in a mandatory report to social workers and police, and Donny
was in custody before his parents returned.
An examination of
Donny conducted on behalf of the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare
concluded that the teenager displayed “Mild Mental Retardation to Borderline
Intellectual Functioning.” He was on a variety of prescription medications and
severely depressed by the prospect of being separated from his family. His
parents, who were hardly people of means, were predictably desperate to find an
alternative to juvenile prison. They didn’t understand that the juvenile
“justice” system is designed to prolong needless and unproductive suffering.
“The original
evaluation called for outpatient therapy through SANE Solutions,” David points out. “However, at the
hearing [counselor] Larry Overholser discouraged us from seeking outpatient
treatment, insisting that what he called an`in-patient' approach would be
better.”
Dave and Norma
took that advice, without being told explicitly what it would entail. They soon
regretted their decision.
“We asked the
judge for Donny to receive in-patient treatment. He agreed – and the bailiffs
took him into custody immediately. That happened six years ago. He has been a
prisoner ever since.”
From the orientation video for parents of juvenile inmates. |
Donny’s six-year
ordeal has included two month-long stints in the Juvenile Corrections Center (JCC)
in Nampa. During those visits, Dave recalls, “We saw staff members who were
covered in prison tattoos, and a few who were wearing [GPS] ankle bracelets”
because of criminal convictions.
Seeing their son
confined in a facility where he was surrounded by violent offenders – both
among fellow inmates and the staff – led his parents to wonder “if we should
sue the County for child endangerment,” David observes. They wouldn’t be the
first to file a lawsuit of that kind against the JCC.
In June 2012, seven Idaho Department of Juvenile
Corrections employees filed a whistleblower lawsuit alleging that their supervisors had
permitted female staffers to engage in sexual misconduct with male detainees.
According to the lawsuit, the facility’s “cronyist, incompetent, corrupt, and
unresponsive administration” had abetted widespread “fraud and waste of public
resources”; bestowed promotions on unqualified personnel, who were insulated from
accountability; and retaliated against employees who expressed concerns to
supervisors.
One former
employee described how some staffers would sexually exploit prisoners and were
“grooming” others to replace them as resident predators.
“One staff member
was [sexually] involved with a juvenile,” Shane Penrod told the Boise Weekly. “That juvenile became a staff member
and now they are involved with another juvenile.”
The allegations
didn’t reflect the isolated views of a few embittered dissidents: A total of 47
current and former employees eventually lodged complaints against the agency.
The lawsuit claimed that the Nampa Police Department was made aware of the widespread
problems – including sexual misconduct – at the jail, but did nothing about it.
The IDJC filed an
official response denying all of the allegations. Sharon Harrigfeld, director of the Idaho Department of Juvenile Corrections, issued a statement reassuring the public “that our facilities are safe” and
thanking “all staff for the public service provided each day to community
safety.”
That statement
was issued on July 31, 2012. At that time, the facility’s staff, whose indivisible
probity had earned Harrigfeld’s unqualified endorsement, included 31-year-old employee
Julie McCormick, who was arrested several months later
and charged with sexual assault on a 15-year-old boy.
McCormick, who has entered a guilty plea, faces a sentencing hearing on March 17. The sexual offenses she committed are outlined, in infuriating detail, in a $1.2 million tort claim filed on behalf of her 15-year-old victim in November 2012.
While confined in the Juvenile Corrections Center's mental health unit, the young boy "was a victim of statutory rape" by McCormick, who had been designated as "Safety and Security Supervisor" despite having "little or no qualifications for security, management, or care and treatment of juveniles or mental health patients...." That position gave McCormick the opportunity to groom the teenager, who was on psychiatric medications, "in a manner commonly used by child molesters" -- lavishing attention on him, laundering his clothes and bedding at home, giving the boy "love notes" and taking his "letters and photos of his girlfriend out of his cell, isolating him from other persons."
The sexual exploitation began on July 4, 2012 and continued for several months. Staff and management were aware of what was happening, but no action was taken.
McCormick, who has entered a guilty plea, faces a sentencing hearing on March 17. The sexual offenses she committed are outlined, in infuriating detail, in a $1.2 million tort claim filed on behalf of her 15-year-old victim in November 2012.
While confined in the Juvenile Corrections Center's mental health unit, the young boy "was a victim of statutory rape" by McCormick, who had been designated as "Safety and Security Supervisor" despite having "little or no qualifications for security, management, or care and treatment of juveniles or mental health patients...." That position gave McCormick the opportunity to groom the teenager, who was on psychiatric medications, "in a manner commonly used by child molesters" -- lavishing attention on him, laundering his clothes and bedding at home, giving the boy "love notes" and taking his "letters and photos of his girlfriend out of his cell, isolating him from other persons."
The sexual exploitation began on July 4, 2012 and continued for several months. Staff and management were aware of what was happening, but no action was taken.
JCC Whistleblowers with their attorney (Boise Weekly photo). |
On February 5 of this year, notice of an impending lawsuit was filed against the Department
Juvenile Corrections on behalf of a former inmate who claims he was “threatened
with bodily harm” by the staff if he were to “talk about crimes committed in
the facility.” The plaintiff was committed to the JCC in June 2008 and released
in February 2010 –a time frame that includes the two months Donny served there. He claims that the Idaho
Department of Juvenile Corrections has allowed “sexual predators to have
continued access to inmates” at the JCC.
According to the plaintiff, he was the victim of repeated sexual
assaults, including one that took place “while [he] was shackled and recovering
from being anesthetized from surgical dental procedures in October 2008.” One
staffer “locked him in a room … and had sexual intercourse” with the boy, who
had been sexually abused before arriving at the JCC. The predator would seek to
“pay” the victim for sexual favors – and then threaten “to turn him in for having
cash in the facility.” The guard also “threatened she would tell Plaintiff’s
friends and family of his sex acts if he spoke to anyone” about what had been
done to him.
Some of the
female staffers “watched Plaintiff and other male inmates shower for their own
prurient interests,” according to the tort claim. Others “arranged for physical
fights involving juvenile and young adult inmates at the facility, off camera,
in a large closet room.” After he filed a complaint about his mistreatment, the
staff “retaliated against him with extended incarceration and false accusations
of behavior.”
The victim’s
criminal record, and the possibility of being sent incarcerated again after his
parole, left him vulnerable to blackmail following his release: His chief
tormentor “continued to threaten and intimidate [him] through 2013.”
Rather than
carrying out a thorough lustration of the facility in Nampa, the IDOJC filed a motion to seal the
documents connected to the whistleblower lawsuit. This was to be expected, given that
covering up sexual misconduct by “corrections” personnel is standard operating procedure.
In 2007, Timothy
Ray Gilligan, who was employed as a prison guard at the Idaho
Maximum Security Institution in 2007,
admitted that he had repeatedly had sexual relations with a female inmate. In
September 2009, Gilligan was arraigned on a charge of felonious sexual misconduct.
Thanks to an all but inexplicable act
of leniency by the Ada County prosecutor, and the uncharacteristic generosity
of the Idaho Sex Offender Classification Board, Gilligan did not have to register
as a sex offender. He wasn’t even prosecuted on the sex charge. As a result, he served only a few months of a
three-year sentence.
The Ada County
Prosecutor's office, in collaboration with 4th
District Judge Ronald Wilper, arranged an agreement in which Gilligan
was permitted to plead guilty to a charge of burglary -- despite the fact that
the only thing the offender may have taken by force was a captive woman's
self-respect.
The Sex Offender Classification Board helped out by relieving Gilligan of the prospect of being a registered sex offender, or even a violent sexual predator (VSP). This decision was supposedly made on account of the results of a "psycho-sexual evaluation" carried out by SANE Solutions, a quasi-private psychological counseling service that provides such evaluations and supervises treatment of convicted sex offenders.
The Sex Offender Classification Board helped out by relieving Gilligan of the prospect of being a registered sex offender, or even a violent sexual predator (VSP). This decision was supposedly made on account of the results of a "psycho-sexual evaluation" carried out by SANE Solutions, a quasi-private psychological counseling service that provides such evaluations and supervises treatment of convicted sex offenders.
A quick reminder:
If Donny and his parents had agreed to an “out-patient” treatment program, it
would have been conducted through SANE Solutions.
Gilligan, who worked as a "psychiatric technician" in the prison system subsequent to his admitted offenses, may have known how to game that system. Then again, it's obvious that Gilligan's erstwhile colleagues in the criminal "justice" system extended every conceivable professional courtesy in the effort to avoid ruining his life by forcing him to register as a sex offender.
Gilligan, who worked as a "psychiatric technician" in the prison system subsequent to his admitted offenses, may have known how to game that system. Then again, it's obvious that Gilligan's erstwhile colleagues in the criminal "justice" system extended every conceivable professional courtesy in the effort to avoid ruining his life by forcing him to register as a sex offender.
As Donny and his parents can testify, in sexual
misconduct cases not involving employees of the state criminal
"justice" system, the Ada County prosecutor's office is not inclined
toward such generosity.
The stated reason
for Donny’s final arrest was an alleged probation violation. Specifically, he
had not subjected himself to a required polygraph examination. Donny’s parents
insist that they had received approval for an alternative treatment program as
a substitute for a polygraph examination.
The polygraph ranks just below the witching rod as a
reliable scientific instrument.
It was invented by the same man who created
the comic book character “Wonder Woman,” an Amazonian princess who wielded a magic lasso that could
compel truthful disclosures from those whom it encompassed. Polygraph findings
are generally not admissible as evidence in court, but the device is routinely
used during interrogations as a way to intimidate suspects into confessing. It
is also widely used to “re-offend” people on probation.
Several years
ago, Donny “failed” a polygraph question about being alone with his siblings in
violation of the terms of his probation. His father David insists that this was
not only untrue, but impossible.
“We were appalled
by that result,” he declares. “Donny was never left alone. He was under 24/7
supervision.”
Donny requested a
second polygraph examination, which meant another $150 fee had to be paid by
the family. An appointment was made with
an approved polygraph technician, and Donny, along with his father and his
attorney, went to the appointed location – only to be told that the technician
had selected a different location several miles away.
“Somehow we made
it there on time, probably breaking several traffic laws doing so,” David
recalls. This sudden change of plans resulted in the creation of an unnecessary
high-stress situation, just as the harried young man was going to undergo a
scientifically dubious examination that measures, among other things, his
stress levels.
The second polygraph
examination resulted in Donny being sent back to confinement to be treated for
what were described as “thinking errors.”
“What on earth is
a `thinking error'?” David asked, his voice burdened with incredulity. One of
the doctors who examined Donny asked the same question: “He told us that he had
no idea what was meant by the expression `thinking error,' or how it could be
treated.”
This meant
another prolonged separation from the family as Donny made the circuit of
treatment facilities in Idaho and Utah. Despite the anxiety, depression, and
other difficulties he faced, Donny excelled in his independent study program,
earning top grades in academic subjects and finding a place on the Honor Roll. Yet
with metronomic regularity, some new problem would arise to extend his period
of confinement and prevent him from graduating.
After Donny
enrolled in the Rebound School, David recalls, “We went to a counselor ... to try arranging an alternative to a polygraph. The proposal was that
he would undergo six additional counseling sessions, and do some special
assignments, in place of the polygraph examination.” David says that this alternative
course was approved, leaving the family hopeful that the ordeal was, at last,
winding down. He was once again living at home, flourishing in his studies, and
doing volunteer work, along with his mother, every Thursday night at a food
pantry run by a church in Kuna.
Every evaluation
attested that Donny was not a danger to “re-offend.” If the object had been
rehabilitation, that goal had clearly been achieved. But the probation and
parole system is run by people who have the power to prolong the suffering of
harmless people, and the whimsical cruelty necessary to do so on the thinnest
pretext.
“We were half-way
through the supplemental therapy sessions when the probation officer showed up
and arrested him at school” last November 18, David recalls. “He had called the
Principal at the Rebound Academy and found out that Donny had two weeks left to
finish his work for graduation.” In what could reasonably be construed as an
act of deliberate sadism, the probation officer waited until Donny's birthday
to drag him away from school in handcuffs.
“Our family had
prepared a birthday party for Donny,” Dave points out. “The kids came home from
school eager to see their brother, expecting to have a party. Instead we find
out that he was arrested.”
According to the
State of Idaho, the “kids” who were so eager to see Donny were his victims, and
they needed to be protected from him. The terms dictated to the family made it
impossible for David, who is on disability, to find a job: While Donny was at
home, one of his parents had to be present to supervise him, especially when
the younger children were at home.
“It’s been six
years, and our family simply cannot take it anymore,” David told the judge
during the January 14 hearing in which it was decided that the state
Corrections system would steal another 168 days of Donny’s life.
“Idaho has to be
number one in something – and it’s number one in dropout rate,” Norma pointed
out in her statement to the judge. “I don’t want my kid to be a statistic.”
Donny wasn’t merely
a statistic: He was in many ways typical
of thousands of troubled but essentially harmless people who are devoured by
the tax-fueled engine of misery called the Idaho Criminal Justice System.
Despite its
reputation for being commendably hostile toward government, the state ranks
second in the country in terms of the prison population’s growth rate.
Those
convicted of non-violent offenses in Idaho compose 62 percent of the inmate
population, and they typically
serve sentences twice as long as the national average.
Over the next five
years, barring dramatic changes in the system, Idaho tax victims will pay
roughly $300 million in prison construction and operating costs. The "corrections" system is an immensely lucrative racket, sustaining not only those directly employed to operate prisons and jails but also the profiteers who populate an ever-expanding network of "private" organizations affiliated with the probation and parole system.
Among the changes
being considered by the Idaho legislature is a proposal to hire more probation
and parole officers and authorize
them “to impose immediate sanctions for violators.” As the ordeal of Donny and
his family illustrates, such “reforms” would not be an improvement. Non-violent
“offenders” sentenced to probation are handed a Sisyphean stone
and assigned an overseer who can extend their suffering at his discretion.
__
*The names of the children have been changed for the purposes of this story.
*The names of the children have been changed for the purposes of this story.
Thanks to everyone who has donated so generously to keep Pro Libertate up and running. We still need your help -- and we greatly appreciate it. God bless!
Dum spiro, pugno!
10 comments:
This makes me sick to my stomach. Human evil seems to be boundless. Do we normal, sane, gentle people have to become killers, and wipe these vermin off the face of the earth, to ever put a stop to this kind of viciousness? How else will it ever end? Don't quote Jesus to me. Turning the other cheek, and doing good to these hyenas, will not work. They have no conscience and no compassion. Do we have to become worse than them to make it stop? Or do we just have to mutely suffer for ever and ever and ever more at the hands of these scum? Anybody have a realistic remedy, other than killing them, as one would a pack of rabid dogs?
I will quote the Bible even though I'm a pagan. Matthew 18:6
But whoever shall offend one of these little ones who believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.
Anybody have a realistic remedy, other than killing them, as one would a pack of rabid dogs?
It's not the people attracted to unjustified power that we need to kill, but the obscene, corrupt institution that gives them that power. Though, if the institution (government) will not yield to citizens demanding to be left alone to run their own lives, and to raise their own children without endless meddling, then all bets are off.
I don't think you're too far off, Lamuel. The "rabid dogs" have created jobs for themselves and their fellow travellers and will continue to perpetuate the gravy train until they are some how stopped. They know that they are otherwise unemployable and so does the state that sanctions this devilish corruption.
“We asked the judge for Donny to receive in-patient treatment. He agreed – and the bailiffs took him into custody immediately. That happened six years ago. He has been a prisoner ever since.”
six years??!! your description of the juvenile system as a 'gulag' is absolutely on target.
my reading of these events indicates the system described is in the BUSINESS of creating future criminals - job security, if you will.
the other impression i got is that the system described is run by those infinitely worse than those who are incarcerated.
it saddens me beyond description when i read of what those troubled youths must endure at the hands of 'enforcement', as it is obvious that those in that system will come out much worse than when they entered. the specter of society paying crime incubators, hidden behind the moniker 'juvenile detention', to increase the criminal load among us goes to the heart of our authoritarian society. everything is a crime and everyone is a perp.
there is a biblical warning about the treatment of children, millstones and the sea.
Thus saith the LORD; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the LORD.
Jeremiah 17:9
The great lie of our time: mankind is basically good. The Founding Fathers knew better, and framed the Constitution accordingly.
How high off the ground does a bar have to be to hang yourself from it? Apparently, not as high as we thought. James Floyd Stewart has managed, while in detention, to hang himself from a bar 3 feet off the ground, using his trousers:
http://www.codyenterprise.com/news/local/article_dbc472c6-9da3-11e3-96ce-0019bb2963f4.html
This is Fairy Hitchcock of Hitchcock Family Advocates...You forgot to mention that Timothy Gilligan, mentioned in this article, was allowed to make a video which is now used for training other new Staff for IDOC/IDJC and he is an honored presenter to & for the Idaho Prison Business. The last time I attended an Idaho Criminal Justice Commission meeting the Agenda included his video...as I sat there, fully known for speaking out about this breach of ethics for years, they cancelled the Video and Presentation. His "kind" prosecutor said they could not find his victim when the Judge asked why there was no victim present or a statement at Gilligan's Sentencing. I was there and spoke with the woman who was on Parole in Pocatello and had wanted to come to Boise but was refused permission and transportation costs or information on more than that he had admitted guilt and would be "taken care of".
Fairy -- PLEASE contact me. We need to talk.
Another great article! The state truly is evil - how could anyone who reads this argue otherwise?
Post a Comment