What I'm reading: 'Raised by the Courts'

I finally sat down this week to read Judge Irene Sullivan's book "Raised by the Courts", an account of her experience with Florida's juvenile justice system.

Sullivan is a Circuit Court Judge in Florida's Unified Family Court, and she's tired of a system that doesn't seem to do much good. We put more young people in lockup than any other country in the world --1 million each year, at last count. Too many graduate out of the system only to go to prison as adults.

It's relevant here now that lawmakers must decide what to do about a state law that's in conflict with last year's U.S. Supreme Court ruling that life sentences for juveniles are cruel and unusual punishment in cases other than first-degree murder. Iowa law allows courts to lock juveniles up for life if they're convicted of other class A felonies, like kidnapping or rape.

They could tweak the law to limit life sentences to murder, but while they're at it, lawmakers would be well-served to look even farther up the chain. Sullivan's argument -- that we already know how to dramatically reduce juvenile crime -- is a compelling one. The answer is not to sentence juveniles to ever tougher, longer terms behind bars, she argues, but to get tough on the causes of juvenile crime -- child abuse, dysfunctional families, truancy and substance abuse. "We don't need to spend money developing and testing new solutions," she argues. "We need to support, adopt, and expand access to the many cost-effective programs that have proven to work." And then she highlights a few of the best.

Like The Reclaiming Futures Initiative substance abuse intervention program for youth, which reduced drug use and recidivism in 10 pilot communities by requiring fast-paced drug treatment to any offender who admitted drug use -- even if they weren't charged with a drug-related crime. Or a Washington State program that actually cut the juvenile crime rate while slashing costs -- just by focusing resources on evidence-based programs that had been proven to work.

In a particularly compelling chapter, Sullivan makes a case for gender-specific programs for juvenile offenders -- an idea that deserves serious thought, as girls increasingly become involved in the juvenile justice system nationwide. Throughout, she describes not only programs but explores real-life cases where they've helped -- the runaway, throwaway kids who were steered away from life sentences on the installment plan.