By State Representative Kimberly Fiorello
After negotiations broke down with no bipartisan agreement to address failings in the state’s juvenile justice system, Republican lawmakers are taking our case directly to the people of the state of Connecticut —youthful offenders and their victims both deserve more accountability, not the partisanship and empty rhetoric offered by Democratic elected leaders in this state.
“Arrest, release, repeat”: that’s the cycle law enforcement leaders, including the Connecticut Police Chiefs Association, see repeated daily as they watch at-risk juveniles fall into a life of crime. When juvenile offenders are never truly held accountable for their actions, that cycle continues to repeat until many of those juveniles age out of juvenile jurisdiction.
Or worse, they are arrested for even more serious crimes — like the 14-year-old and 16-year-old defendants now facing trial for murder in Stamford.
Meanwhile, neighborhood watch-style Facebook groups — created by concerned residents, and often monitored by the local police — continue to capture this cycle in action, doorbell cameras showing groups of teenaged thieves casing driveways and residential streets in towns across Connecticut, looking for vehicles to steal.
The system intended to both protect victims of juvenile crime and rehabilitate the offenders themselves is clearly failing — but we can fix it.
First and foremost, Republican legislative proposals aim to give local police and judges more discretion over pursuing cases in their jurisdiction, enabling them to seek a detainment order or upgrading the charges available for repeat offenders who repeatedly fail to correct their behavior.
The state also needs to close the loopholes that allow youthful offenders to evade accountability — any juvenile arrested for stealing a car should have their fingerprints taken, and mandatory remote monitoring should be required for those juveniles re-arrested while awaiting their court date. When I met with the sergeant of Greenwich’s Special Victims Unit, he shared that expanded monitoring could be a useful tool for preventing recidivism, especially for the most at-risk youths in the juvenile court system.
Lawmakers could extend more support to troubled teens by giving youth specialists in the Judicial Branch and at the Department of Children and Families permission to conduct supervision and provide them treatment earlier on in their development, preferably before their first arrest.
When then-Gov. Malloy ordered the closure of the Juvenile Training School in Middletown in 2018, he failed to free up additional capacity in the system. That, unfortunately, meant placing many juvenile arrestees in group homes meant for younger children with behavioral issues, a systemic failure which placed many more at-risk kids in harm’s way.
The Republican plan would explore restoring that capacity, as well as the staffing levels necessary to ensure pre-trial diversionary programs work as intended.
This detailed plan, as well as opportunities for residents of Connecticut’s 169 towns and cities to weigh in on the proposals, can be found at www.stopcarthefts.com.
My colleagues and I are looking to change the narrative and offer common-sense solutions — I encourage all to approach them with an open mind and with the safety of our residents at the forefront.
State Representative Kimberly Fiorello serves the 149th House District of Greenwich and Stamford.
The Greenwich Sentinel received this as an Ope-Ed. The Greenwich Sentinel news department was not involved in the creation of this content.
