Conflict and confusion after state suspends intake for convicted juveniles

There is concern and confusion in King County courts after a surprising decision from the state to suspend intakes of juvenile offenders at two correctional facilities due to overcrowding. Instead, youths sentenced to long-term confinement will remain under county oversight until further notice, the state Department of Children, Youth & Families (DCYF) told county officials Friday.

Green Hill School in Chehalis, the state’s highest-security juvenile correctional facility, is meant to house 196 young people, but currently houses 240, the state said, leading to dangerous overcrowding and understaffing. The state also stopped intakes at Echo Glen Children’s Center in Snoqualmie.

“We were astonished to get a letter like that, in the manner we received it, without any warning,” said Ketu Shah, presiding judge of King County Superior Court. By statute, counties are only responsible for juvenile criminal cases until youth are sentenced, Shah said.

“Once we sentence someone, it is DCYF’s responsibility to find a place for that youth that meets the statutory goals, which are accountability, rehabilitation, and intervention," Shah said. "How DCYF does that is their choice, but they are responsible for that.”

This now puts the county on the hook to figure out where to place youth who would otherwise be sent to the two state facilities.

Allison Krutsinger, public affairs director at the Department of Children, Youth & Families, acknowledged the stress on counties but said it was the only way the state could improve conditions at Green Hill.

“Currently, we have living units that were designed for 16 that are having 25 or 30 young people in them,” Krutsinger said. “Violence has exacerbated violence amongst residents, and violence towards staff. We needed to intervene to stabilize the campus.”

The halt on state correctional intakes comes as juvenile crime rates soar statewide. In King County, there were 50 youths per day in detention on average by the end of June, the highest rate since 2018 and a 47% increase in the past two years. That increase is despite years of effort by the county to reduce — and even eliminate — youth detention.

Jason Smith, who heads the King County Juvenile Detention Guild, said he worries that those numbers will only grow as the state refuses to take youths once they’re sentenced. Smith said the facility is already severely understaffed, with high turnover.

“We have to lock the youth in their room away from programming and away from schooling several times a day, on average,” Smith said.

When confined, youths get frustrated and agitated, he said.

“We're seeing a drastic increase in youth assaults and staff assaults,” Smith said.

That violence, in turn, increases staff turnover, he added.

In the past year, 51 young people in King County were sentenced to state juvenile correctional facilities, said Noah Haglund, spokesperson for the county Department of Adult and Juvenile Detention. While the state intake suspension is in effect, not all young people waiting to serve sentences at the state will remain in juvenile detention, Haglund said — those who turn 18 will be transferred to the county’s adult jail. Others may be placed on electronic home monitoring awaiting their sentence, he said.

Anita Khandelwal, King County Public Defender, welcomed the state’s decision to suspend intakes at its juvenile facilities. She petitioned the state appeals court this spring for the release of several young clients incarcerated at Green Hill, alleging inhumane conditions including long stretches of young people locked in their rooms, sometimes as collective punishment.

Bathroom access during lockups was allegedly so limited that youths were forced to relieve themselves in plastic bottles, and some soiled themselves, according to the petition.

“We are relieved that DCYF is, belatedly, doing the right thing — recognizing that they are not rehabilitating young people and that the conditions the young people are facing there will make us all less safe,” Khandelwal said by email. “We remain very concerned for the young people who are currently incarcerated in these facilities that are not safe, therapeutic, or functional.”

While the state facilities are closed to newly sentenced youths, however, Khandelwal said that keeping them in county detention is unacceptable.

“The court and county cannot legally warehouse youth who have been sentenced to [state Juvenile Rehabilitation],” Khandelwal said, pointing to a King County audit from April that showed that, although the county’s detention facility was designed for stays of 30 days or less, a growing number of youths are now there far longer awaiting trial.

The facility lacks the programming and therapies state correctional centers are meant to provide for long stays, the audit found, including mental health care and substance abuse treatment many youths critically need .

“Young people must be released until [the state] can take them. In the interim, we need to find supports to help keep these young people, and our community, safe,” Khandelwal said.

The state told counties that the juvenile corrections intake hiatus may last months. The population surge at Green Hill follows the state’s 2022 closure of a third large youth facility, Naselle Youth Camp in southwest Washington, which had fallen into disrepair and at the time housed only 30 young people, far under capacity.

The population in juvenile correctional facilities quickly rebounded after the height of the pandemic, however, due also to a 2018 law that allows youths with long sentences to stay in juvenile facilities until they are 25, rather than the previous cutoff when they turned 21. Today, one-fifth of Green Hill inmates are 21 or older, Krutsinger said.

Judge Shah said it’s up to the state to find solutions for young people facing criminal sentences, and questioned why it had no contingency plans given the foreseeable spike in juvenile corrections populations beyond punting the problem back to counties.

“If we want long-term intervention to help change behavior and help kids make better decisions or different decisions, we need to provide that structure to do that," Shah said. "If we don't, then all we are doing is expecting no change in behavior, and that will lead to tragic results in the future.”