I was sent to a youth facility by former Judge Mark Ciavarella in the ‘Kids for Cash’ scandal

In the winter of 2007, when I was 15 years old, a police officer called my home in White Haven, Pa., to inform me I was being arrested for creating a MySpace parody of my vice principal. The officer told my mother he would charge me with abuse of the internet and internet stalking — both federal charges — unless she agreed not to involve attorneys. Later, I attended an intake meeting with juvenile probation, where I was asked deeply personal questions regarding my sexuality, whether I’d tried drugs, and my relationship with my parents.

On the day of juvenile court, I was accosted by a receptionist who expressed annoyance when my mother asked questions regarding a document we were told to sign. Not knowing I was waiving my right to counsel, we signed. We were naive enough to believe our willingness to comply would count for something.

In the courtroom, Judge Mark Ciavarella lazily flipped through my case file. I admitted guilt without hesitation.

“Based on her admission, adjudicate her delinquent,” Ciavarella told the court. Then he demanded, “What makes you think you can do this kind of crap?”

My answer was irrelevant. The judge knew his ruling long before any admission of guilt. I had seen him at my high school, where he appeared at annual countywide assemblies to warn children about the dangers of misbehavior. “If you come before me, I’ll send you away,” he announced. I remember thinking that this would never happen to me. I was a “good kid.”

In court, Ciavarella asked several more questions for which he would chastise my response. Then he announced, “Send her away.”

Unbeknownst to me, I’d just been sentenced to a youth forestry camp in Wind Gap, Pa., for a minimum of three months with a mandatory six-month probation after my release. A bailiff pulled my hands behind my back in a small anteroom of the court. My mother’s hysterical wailing was all that I could hear aside from the light clinking of cuffs.

“Look what you did to your mother,” the bailiff said as the cuffs clicked into place. I was unable to wipe away my tears.

Unlike many of my peers, my story has a happy ending. Because of the perseverance of my mother and the efforts of Juvenile Law Center — a children’s advocacy group based in Philadelphia — I was released early from my sentence. I only served three weeks, and because of the support I received from friends and family, I overcame the social stigma of being labeled a “juvenile delinquent.” I ventured off to college after high school at 18 years old, despite being directly told by a counselor that I was not intelligent enough to attend.

Even after Ciavarella and another Luzerne County judge, Michael Conahan, were found guilty of orchestrating a scheme to send children to for-profit jails in exchange for kickbacks, I spent years believing that the way children were treated in Luzerne County was somehow special or unique. The media reinforced this belief by dubbing the scandal “Kids for Cash.”

Last week, Ciavarella and Conahan were ordered to pay more than $200 million to hundreds of victims like me. Though I am not one of the victims involved in the civil suit, their stories strongly resemble mine. While I am overjoyed for the recipients, I remain concerned that people will ignore the remaining work still necessary to protect the rights of juveniles.

People are so shocked by the dollar amounts involved that they neglect the awkward truth: Ciavarella’s court practices were unethical long before he began accepting money. It is much easier for many people to accept that the judges who took advantage of a vulnerable population were unique exceptions instead of questioning the system that allowed for them to thrive. This willful ignorance is an unfortunate reflection of the attitudes our nation has toward the rights of children.

It is hard not to be disillusioned as juvenile justice scandals continue to plague Pennsylvania in particular. Horrifying tales of abuse at institutions like Lima Detention Center and Glen Mills Schools are grim reminders of the dangers of becoming complacent.

For years, children and their parents spoke out against Ciavarella’s unscrupulous behavior in his courtroom. He was cruel and dismissive, often mocking families before involuntarily separating them. However, voices of concerned citizens were dismissed by others in the community who were grateful Ciavarella was dealing with the problematic or deviant kids plaguing Luzerne County. Years later, the vilification of adolescence is still evident in the underutilization of diversion, despite evidence showing overly harsh sentencing is ineffective and only serves to traumatize youth.

In 2020, a task force was commissioned in response to the ongoing abuses of juvenile rights at Glen Mills Schools and Lima Detention Center. The task force released a “Report & Recommendations” in June 2021, and several of its suggestions have become the basis of proposed legislation, but this represents only the bare minimum that must be done to protect the rights of children in our state.

It is imperative we begin to steer children who have been found guilty of offenses to diversionary programs and reserve the use of out-of-home placements for only the most serious convictions. Although the use of placement is already encouraged as a last resort, specific criteria must be established for sentencing to limit its use. The task force found nearly 62% of youth sent to placement had never been charged with a felony, and 73% of youth in placement were sent on their first conviction. Why are so many kids being incarcerated for low-level crimes with no previous history? Even worse: Black kids are more than four times as likely as white kids to experience incarceration nationwide.

Diversionary programs not only protect Black and Latino youth from harsher sentencing, but they also have an 80% success rate. Kids connected to community-based programs are more resilient and more likely to succeed within their communities. When placement costs the state as much as nearly $193,000 per year per child, diversionary programs not only address racial disparities in the system and positively affect recidivism rates, but they also reduce state spending by nearly 50 times.

Pennsylvania juvenile courts’ jurisdiction over children as young as 10 years old is also an unconscionable practice that remains long after Ciavarella. No 10-year-old kid has the cognitive ability to appropriately weigh the outcomes and consequences for their actions. Additionally, this population is more likely to suffer the trauma of out-of-home placement. Young children should never be referred to juvenile court. They should always be treated by holistic programs that serve their emotional and developmental needs.

Finally, Pennsylvania’s use of direct file, the ability to directly charge children in adult court, robs children of the opportunity to be treated as children and ignores obvious developmental differences between children and adults. Further, racial disparities exist in who is charged and convicted as adults; Black boys ages 10 to 17 make up about 7% of Pennsylvania’s youth population but 56% of the young people who are prosecuted as adults. Continuing to support a system that ignores developmental science and evidence-based practices is counterproductive to the goals of the juvenile justice system. We are not rehabilitating youth. We are creating scenarios in which they are further impeded and ostracized within their communities.

As a teacher and first-time mom of a young child, my role in the development and success of our communities’ children has never been more apparent to me. We need to stop further traumatizing youth by ignoring developmental differences, demonizing adolescent mistakes, and applying overly harsh sentences — especially for youth of color. We must connect youth with community resources to help them succeed.

Most important, we need to listen to kids currently affected by the juvenile justice system. We need to trust their perspectives and not dismiss them when they share their concerns about how they were not served by the system. Just because children lack the cognitive ability to emotionally regulate as effectively as adults does not mean they are unable to recognize their own experiences.

It is my sincerest hope that this brief renewal in interest in the draconian practices of Ciavarella’s court will shine a light on those children who continue to be harmed by a system that still needs drastic reforms.

We must elevate the voices of all kids, especially youth of color, who are disproportionately harmed by the system, to prevent any more damage to our communities. We must advocate for forward-thinking programs that seek to support youth — like Care Not Control, a campaign seeking to end youth incarceration in Pennsylvania. We cannot lend our compassion to a community like Luzerne County without also acknowledging injustices that continue to occur. We must remain vigilant in our concern for our communities’ children and enact appropriate protections to prevent another scandal like Kids for Cash from occurring.

There’s no question that $200 million is a substantial win for the plaintiffs listed on the civil case as well as a compelling deterrent for those who might also think to abuse their positions of power for financial gain. However, I encourage the public not to be distracted by the money. We must divert our attention away from the “cash” in kids for cash to focus on what really matters: kids.

Hillary Transue was sentenced by former Judge Mark Ciavarella in April 2007 and continues to use her experience as a platform to advocate for juvenile rights. She is an adjunct English instructor at Widener University in Chester. She is also a wife, mother, and aspiring author.