Judge orders state to take custody of 26 Philly teens held in the city’s dangerously overcrowded juvenile jail

A Commonwealth Court judge has ordered Pennsylvania officials to take custody of 26 young people living at Philadelphia’s juvenile jail to alleviate what the city has described as dangerously overcrowded conditions — but one youth advocacy group called the judge’s instructions a “disappointment” that will only “stop the bleeding” temporarily.

The 26 young people are among 75 currently housed at the Juvenile Justice Services Center in West Philadelphia who’d been adjudicated delinquent — the juvenile equivalent of being convicted — but were awaiting placement at a state Youth Development Center to serve out their sentences. Some children have been at the city facility for months awaiting placement, and because they don’t get credit for that time served, the delays can sometimes double their time incarcerated.

The order, issued Friday afternoon by Judge Ellen Ceisler, requires the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services to find placement for 26 children within 30 days. After that, if the city’s juvenile jail remains over its 184-youth capacity, the state must “accept as many youths as possible into its treatment facilities” within another 30 days until the city’s facility is at capacity.

» READ MORE: Philly’s juvenile jail ‘is in crisis,’ city says, and conditions will cause ‘serious harm’ to kids if unaddressed

Ceisler also “strongly” urged the state to reevaluate how it managed the wait-list for youth awaiting placement “and to further evaluate every possible measure” to obtain temporary emergency staffing and security personnel to alleviate overcrowding or understaffing.

She also directed the city to work with local stakeholders — like judges and law enforcement officials — to resolve cases or change sentences to reduce the population.

In a statement, the city said it was grateful for the order, which it said would “ensure that the Commonwealth will provide prompt treatment, supervision, and rehabilitation to these youth and will also lead to the safety and well-being of the youth and staff.”

Ali Fogarty, spokesperson for Pennsylvania DHS, said officials were reviewing the order, and that they are committed to providing treatment to youth “while maintaining safe staff-to-youth ratios at our facilities,” which it is working to expand.

Fogarty said a shortage of beds and a growing population of young people “being referred to DHS for periods of time far exceeding the traditional timeframe for treatment” are stretching resources thin. She said the state plans to open a new “secure care treatment program” in November 2023 and is working to alleviate overcrowded centers in the meantime.

“We are committed to working with Philadelphia leadership ... to address the drivers that are straining the capacity of Philadelphia’s Juvenile Justice Services Center,” she said.

Friday’s order marks the second time since November that the courts have intervened to alleviate the increasingly fraught conditions inside Philadelphia’s juvenile jail. The facility is licensed to hold 184 young people ages 10 to 17 who are awaiting trial or state placement. But the population recently ballooned to more than 246 youths — a new high, the city said.

Children were sleeping on mattresses on the floor in the gym and hallways, getting into more fights, and building makeshift weapons. Young people were often forced to stay in their units, some of which are windowless, for the majority of the day, often without schooling, and nonemergency medical care has not been available, officials said. These conditions, the city said, would cause “serious harm” if unaddressed.

The city sued the state in October over the center’s conditions, and in November, Ceisler ordered the state to take custody of 15 youths. But the intervention brought little help long-term, as the conditions worsened, the city said. Last month, the city filed another petition asking the courts to intervene and require the state to prioritize placements for young people from Philadelphia’s facility, increase the staff-to-youth ratio at state facilities so more young people could be moved there, and direct the state to take custody of two Philadelphia children per day.

During a hearing on Wednesday, Ceisler heard hours of testimony from both sides and appeared desperate to find open beds for Philadelphia children to be moved to.

But the hearing ultimately showed that city and state officials remain at the same impasse: Neither party appeared willing to take necessary steps to improve conditions without the court’s intervention. The state’s witnesses described a statewide juvenile justice system in crisis and said other counties similarly had young people waiting for placement. The city argued residents and staff were living in unacceptable conditions because of state inaction.

Marsha Levick, chief legal officer of Juvenile Law Center, said the order to move some children was “welcome news.”

But, she said, “this barely qualifies as a Band-Aid.”

“Even when implemented, it merely stops the bleeding,” she said. “We owe it to these children to reduce confinement and pursue more creative solutions to holding children responsible and keeping communities safe.”

State DHS officials have said the issue is multifaceted and complex, and could be solved locally if city departments and offices worked to resolve outstanding cases or change sentences. And there is a staffing shortage across Pennsylvania, with few open beds at its three Youth Development Centers. Moving Philly kids to those facilities, they argued, would overcrowd those spaces, which are also at or near capacity, and cause “cascading harm” to more children.

The state’s Bureau of Juvenile Justice Services director Kevin Seabrook had said changing the staffing ratio would hurt the quality of programming and essentially turn facilities into detention centers with little to no rehabilitation.

Gary Williams, a deputy commissioner at Philadelphia’s Department of Human Services, said the center’s processing area had been converted into an overflow space where up to 13 youths squeezed into 15-by-15-foot rooms where the lights can’t be dimmed. He said young people often eat meals on their mattresses because of the overcrowding.

The state has said the city could use more private facilities, but that comes with other challenges. For example, the city entered an emergency contract with Rite of Passage, based in Texas, and 10 Philadelphia youths were accepted. But the city and District Attorney’s Office have opposed six of those placements, citing the facility’s disciplinary tactics and distance from the city, so only four young people have been sent there.

Philadelphia Department of Human Services Commissioner Kimberly Ali said the nonprofit Adelphoi has a contract with the city as well, but Adelphoi has rejected some of the young people referred there.

And plans to open a 28-bed juvenile wing in Northeast Philly’s Riverside Correctional Facility have been put on hold after city lawyers discovered that armed corrections officers would inevitably be interacting with young people. Weapons such as batons or pepper spray can’t be used to restrain juveniles.

Laval Miller-Wilson, deputy secretary for the Pennsylvania Office of Children, Youth, and Families, asked for more time to get stakeholders together. He worried young people’s trauma would go untreated if they were simply shuffled around for the sake of relieving Philly’s overcrowded center.

Cesiler scheduled another hearing for Sept. 8 to check the status of the transfers and conditions inside the facilities.