A lack of urgency in pursuing complaints of problems and wrongdoing at state juvenile detention facilities has led to the demotion of five top officials in the department’s investigative unit and policy changes to avoid the current backlog of hundreds of cases open months beyond their 45-day deadline for closure.
On Monday 19 Department of Juvenile Justice investigators and supervisors, suspended with pay for more than a month, will return to work but some have been demoted and some have been reassigned. The state investigation found the unit had about 700 open cases, some dating back to Jan. 1, 2012.
The investigation was a result of a state follow up to a federal report early last month on inappropriate sexual conduct inside the juvenile detention centers that listed Georgia as one of the nation’s four worst. The anonymous survey found 15.8 percent of the Georgia juvenile offenders questioned reported having sexual contact with each other or staff while the national rate was 9.5 percent. The Paulding Regional Youth Detention Center led the nation with 32.1 percent of the offenders surveyed reporting having some kind of sexual contact there. Three other Georgia lockups also were among the 13 juvenile detention facilities nationwide with a high rate of “sexual victimization by youth or staff.”
DJJ, skeptical of the findings, asked the Georgia Department of Corrections and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to verify the findings of the survey, which is required by the federal Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003. It was during that review that the state officials counted 700 open cases, ranging from reports of juveniles having contraband to fighting to staff and youth engaging in sex.
On Friday, the 19 were called in to DJJ offices to be told their status and that they were to report to work Monday. There were a total of 20 suspensions with pay but one of the investigators retired soon after the leaves were imposed.
When the suspensions were announced, DJJ Commissioner Avery Niles said it was because of the discovery of 20 open investigations of allegations of inappropriate sexual conduct between juveniles and staff.
“Youth safety is at stake and we have pledged to maintain a sexually safe environment for all our residents,” Niles said in a written statement released Sunday along with the findings of the DOC-GBI reviews. “That means taking immediate corrective actions to ensure all reports of sexual abuse and harassment are quickly and thoroughly investigated according to DJJ Policy and state and federal law. DJJ will uphold its pledge to enforce zero tolerance for sex abuse and guarantee that Georgia’s secure facilities are secure inside the fence too.”
The top five investigations officials, the chief of investigations and four regional principal investigators, were demoted and some were moved out of the Office of Investigations. A staff investigator was also demoted.
The former director of investigations, who at the time of the suspensions had already been given another assignment for reasons unrelated to the federal survey, was demoted from his new job.
The remaining investigators were either counseled or had letters about agency policies placed in their personnel files, emphasizing the need to expedite these investigations, something that had not previously been a priority, according to some who were affected.
Consequently DJJ has adopted several changes, including realigning staff and adding positions, additional training, a system for tracking cases and scheduled case reviews and audits.
Last month Niles said he was unaware of the investigative unit’s overwhelming caseload but later conceded it had been discussed at meetings at least twice in May and that administrators had met with each investigator to review individual caseloads.
According to DJJ, out of its 700 cases, 275 of those reports involved an allegation of sexual contact, and 141 met the federal definition of sexual abuse or sexual harassment. Most of those — 102 cases — involved juveniles having sexual contact with each other while the remaining 39 were reports that juveniles and institution employees or staff at community-based programs had contact of a sexual nature, DJJ said.
DJJ said 19 reports of sexual contact with DJJ staff were not substantiated. But three were confirmed, and consequently three employees were fired. DJJ referred two of those cases to local prosecutors to determine if they would bring felony charges.
Meanwhile, 12 cases of alleged sexual contact remain open and under investigation, DJJ said in Sunday’s statement.
The five remaining reports came from community-based programs, of which two were unsubstantiated and three remain under investigation.
Out of 1,800 juveniles in 27 short- and long-term state lock ups, 497 at 17 facilities participated in the survey.
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