A Clinical‐Corrections Approach: The Failure of a Residential Juvenile Delinquency Treatment Center

• Date: 01 February 1994
• Author: Edmund M. Kearney
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-6988.1994.tb00933.x
• Published date: 01 February 1994

A Clinical-Corrections Approach: The Failure

of

a Residential Juvenile Delinquency

Treatment Center

By

Edmund

M.

Kearney,

Ph.D.

Abstract

With the incidence of violentjuvenile

crime

and the increasingly limitedfinds for residen-

tial treatment of the adolescent offender; one

court jurisdiction

(I

6th Judicial Circuit, Kane

County, Illinois) attempted

to

develop and ad-

minister its own residential treatment facility

within the walls

of

its detention facility. This

article documents the problems encountered in

this endeavor and provides recommendations

for other jurisdictions which might be tempted

to

try

to

balance the jiscal and rehabilitative

demands of this gmwingpopulation by admin-

istering their own residential treatment facili-

ties. The problems addressed in this article

pertain

to

the following areas of diflculty:

developing a therapeutic milieu; attracting,

training, and evaluating

a

competent child

care stag and implementing a consistent phi-

losophy

of

change designed

to

drive all deci-

sion-making within the centel:

Introduction

With juvenile crime, and particularly vio-

lent crime, clearly on the rise

(U.S.

Department

of Justice, 1992), juvenile dispositions follow-

ing delinquency proceedings assume increas-

ing importance from both a societal and indi-

vidual case perspective. Court, county and

state systems are simultaneously strapped for

funds

in

general. Moreover, increasingly

lim-

ited funds are earmarked for treatment or resi-

dential placement

of

delinquent minors. Some

counties, within the state of Illinois for ex-

ample, set no specific funds aside for place-

ment of minors, and rely solely on the state’s

department of corrections to rehabilitate and

care for delinquent minors. Other more fortu-

nate counties find their once sufficient place-

ment budgets depleted by the onslaught of sex

offenders, gang members, and other young

perpetrators of violent crime. These offenders

have often traditionally been placed

in

private

residential treatment facilities at a cost of sev-

eral hundred dollars per day.

One attempt to balance the fiscal and reha-

bilitative demands of this growing population

has been to develop residential treatment fa-

cilities directly under the auspices of the local

juvenile court, administered by the director of

court services. By using existing facilities (a

part

of

the local youth detention center)

and

existing stafT(staffdrawn from the local deten-

tion facility), such

an

attempt theoretically pro-

vides intensive psychological and rehabilita-

tive services to juveniles at a lower per diem

than

encountered

in

private placements.

One such attempt took place

in

Kane

County, Illinois under the direction ofthe

Court

Edmund

M.

Kearney, Ph.D. received

his

doctorate

in

clinical psychology from Loyola

University of Chicago. This article was written while the author was a staff psychologist at the

Kane County Diagnostic Center of the 16th Judicial Circuit

in

the state of Illinois.

Dr.

Kearney

is currently a staff psychologist at Maryville Academy and a member of the teaching faculty at

The Chicago School

of

Professional Psychology.

1994

I

Juvenile

and

Family

Court Journal

33