Smart Justice
Smart Justice covers the pursuit of better outcomes on justice system issues, including incarceration, foster care, and juvenile justice. The podcast is produced by Restore Hope.
Website: http://smartjustice.org
Support: https://smartjustice.supercast.com
Smart Justice
The Young & Armed: Violence Risk in Teens
What happens when a community decides to reimagine juvenile justice? Across Arkansas, dedicated professionals are discovering that evidence-based interventions not only reduce crime but transform lives and strengthen communities.
Meet Amber Govan, who at just eight years old learned sign language to facilitate her father's drug deals. Her path seemed predetermined—drug dealing, homelessness, and violence marked her early years. But when a high school teacher took interest in her success, everything changed. Today, Amber leads Carter's Crew, a nonprofit helping at-risk teens break cycles of crime and poverty.
Arkansas Supreme Court Justice Rhonda Wood shares how the state has changed its approach to juvenile justice through SAVRY (Structured Assessment of Violence Risk and Youth) evaluations. This research-backed tool helps courts identify which interventions will truly help each young person while avoiding unnecessary detentions that can do more harm than good. As Judge Tom Smith notes, "You can turn low-risk kids into high-risk just by how you treat them."
In Pine Bluff, once known as "Crime Bluff" and America's fastest-shrinking city, an innovative approach called Group Violence Intervention (GVI) is yielding remarkable results. By directly engaging with high-risk youth groups, they deliver a powerful message: "We'll help you if you let us. We'll stop you if you make us." The result? Over 400 days without a juvenile homicide in a city previously devastated by youth gun violence.
These success stories emerge despite significant challenges—post-pandemic increases in juvenile gun crimes, substance abuse, and educational disruptions. Yet they prove that with evidence-based approaches, community collaboration, and a focus on early intervention, we can create juvenile justice systems that truly rehabilitate rather than simply punish.
How might your community reimagine its approach to troubled youth? Join us to explore solutions that work, not just for today, but for generations to come. Subscribe now for more insights into strategies that create safer communities and brighter futures for our youth.
Smart Justice is a production of Restore Hope. Executive Director is Paul Chapman. Associate Directors are Karen Phillips and Sarah Littleton.
Executive producer of the podcast is Karen Tricot Steward. Videography and production by Ti King.
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we start seeing an uptick in juvenile gun crime, and it's just continued to pick up.
Speaker 2:The worst thing we can do is treat them like a high-risk kid that's going to be in court the rest of their life.
Speaker 3:We'll help you if you let us. We'll stop you if you make us.
Speaker 4:Crime and punishment are hot topics, but are there solutions? We're hearing about the best we can do. What if there's a smarter way to approach justice, one that delivers better return on investment? To approach justice, one that delivers better return on investment, I look at it like about every nine beds occupied for a year, that's around a million dollars. Strengthens, law enforcement and courts.
Speaker 3:I get fired up about that. I'm excited about the potential that we have to really do something that's going to change generations to come.
Speaker 4:And connects families in crisis with the resources they need to end cycles of crime.
Speaker 5:Having that support in place. I wouldn't be here without it.
Speaker 4:This isn't just a theory. We're covering real, evidence-based solutions that are improving our communities. Welcome to Smart Justice. This is Season 4, juvenile Justice.
Speaker 6:My dad had a person who came and bought drugs and he was deaf.
Speaker 4:When Amber Govan was eight years old, she learned sign language, but not for the typical reasons children might learn a second language. It was to help her father complete a drug deal.
Speaker 6:So when he was trying to tell my dad what he needed, he would sign the alphabet to me. Amber took on a role no child should ever have to assume she was in survival mode when the choice is do I eat tonight or do I sell drugs and maybe go to jail, most people are going to pick. I want to eat tonight. I was the oldest. I had younger siblings and I felt like as the oldest I had to make sure that they were okay.
Speaker 4:She became a drug dealer and a drug trafficker, and she developed substance abuse issues herself, often relying on substances like Xanax to get her through the day.
Speaker 6:I ended up being homeless. I've been a victim of domestic violence and gun violence twice. I've also been a perpetrator of crime.
Speaker 4:The path towards destruction started to change when Amber was in high school. She signed up for a yearbook class because she thought it would be an easy way to earn a school credit. But yearbook would become more than just a class. When the teacher showed interest in helping Amber and her family succeed, it became a place where she would see that every story matters, including her own.
Speaker 6:She is the person who was the first community intervention for us. I think people get an idea that a community intervention has to be a program, but it's anybody or anything that steps in and switches the trajectory of where your life is going From. Ms Guthrie, stepping in other people in the community started to step in Pastors, the counselor at the school, different people who tag-teamed our family and brought services or things that we didn't know about to help my family, change the dynamics of our lives.
Speaker 4:Today, Amber has come a long way. She is the executive director of a youth organization called Carter's Crew, based in Little Rock.
Speaker 6:I'm putting my heart back out to the community that I caused destruction in for so many years. Carter's Crew is named after my son, who is my heart and the most valuable thing that I have in this world. He has a name tag and he calls himself the boss man and everybody treats him as such.
Speaker 4:Carter's crew works with at-risk teens who have been in the justice system or live in areas of high crime. The nonprofit aims to support youth and their families by addressing educational and poverty related needs, breaking cycles of crime and substance abuse.
Speaker 6:A lot of families have issues with paying bills or even getting food on the table every night consistently. We also see a lot of kids who are repeating what they have seen from their parents. So their parents are drug dealers or their parents have been in prison and they are repeating the cycle of what they see in the environment that they are a part of. A lot of our families read on a third grade level, so parents might be on the same level as far as reading comprehension as their 16, 17-year-olds, and so the first piece is addressing their comprehension of the things that are being told to them by the governmental agencies that they are interacting with Government agencies often require parents or their children to comply with guidelines, complete paperwork and participate in programs, but parents with limited reading skills may struggle to understand critical documents like court orders or case plans.
Speaker 4:This can lead to misinterpretation or non-compliance. Improving literacy helps parents who are part of the justice system create a more stable environment for their children.
Speaker 6:I've always felt like if people had the supports that they needed whether that's people, education supplies then they're more likely to be successful in the goals that they have for their families and so we intentionally set up the environment of Carter's crew to feel like a family.
Speaker 4:I'm Paul Chapman, dedicated people like Amber are on a mission to show young people that, while they may have been born into tough circumstances, there can be a way out. They want to reach young people with the message that the future can be bright despite the drugs and the crime that they see all around them.
Speaker 6:They have access to those things because that's what they're around in their community, and so that's why it's important for us that we show the kids that the world is so much bigger than just their neighborhoods.
Speaker 4:On this episode of Smart Justice. We'll talk to judges and a Supreme Court justice about how decisions are made about the future of juveniles who end up in court. We'll also travel to Pine Bluff, arkansas, a city that has long occupied a spot on the list of most dangerous cities in America. Leaders in that community are determined to curb youth violence, and they're using a method that's been shown to be successful.
Speaker 7:Support for Smart Justice is provided by Restore Hope. Have you ever wondered why some communities aren't seeing the outcomes they seek when trying to support at-risk families, even those that seem to have all the right assets? Restore Hope is a software and services organization dedicated to empowering communities by offering the coordination and tools needed to support the vulnerable, like those involved in the justice and child welfare systems. Learn how you can bring these tools to your community at RestoreHopeio. Restore Hope is a nonprofit aiming to reduce incarceration and the need for foster care through a community-driven approach.
Speaker 4:A lot of decisions are made about how to handle troubled youth based on the risk of future violence. But how do we measure that risk as accurately as possible? Should we treat a young person who has just started skipping school the same as a juvenile who's been found carrying a gun? Juvenile Judge Tom Smith, who serves northwest Arkansas, says that that used to be the approach.
Speaker 2:I mean, if we're locking up kids right and left. We're not going to school. That was a response that was expected from the schools.
Speaker 4:That was a response that was expected by the judges, but that's changed over the years, in large part due to efforts of the Arkansas Supreme Court's Commission on Children, Youth and Families. The chair of the commission is Supreme Court Justice Rhonda Wood, who has played a key role in juvenile justice in Arkansas as both a lawyer and a judge.
Speaker 5:I don't know if I picked it or it picked me.
Speaker 4:Honestly, that may be how a lot of people feel that work in juvenile she was in her first year practicing law when she was asked to defend parents in a child welfare case. It involved terminating parental rights.
Speaker 5:And that was my first experience and it was actually pretty horrific.
Speaker 4:When she became a trial judge, she had juvenile delinquency cases on her docket.
Speaker 5:Even when I left that area and went to the Supreme Court. Once it's in your heart, you never leave.
Speaker 4:She has been the leader of the Supreme Court Commission on Children, youth and Families for 10 years now. The commission works to ensure the well-being of young people and families involved in Arkansas courts. Justice Wood says if we want a juvenile justice system that's as fair as possible, we should look to research and data to inform us. She says if we do, we can have a better understanding of how judges are making these decisions about the future of young people.
Speaker 5:And what we never want is them to make that call based on what they look like or what they're wearing. I am a big believer in sort of making sure what we're doing is evidence-based and having a plan right, Not just sort of ad hoc guessing and saying we're going to do this and just throwing out ideas.
Speaker 4:With that mindset in place, the commission adopted a strategic approach to evaluating the potential risk of violence in teens, using research on adolescent behavior and development. The assessment tool is called SAVERY, which stands for Structured Assessment of Violence Risk and Youth.
Speaker 5:Even just to get it to complete statewide rollout was six years.
Speaker 4:Every juvenile officer in the state had to be retrained, which had its challenges, but the effort paid off, helping strike a critical balance between giving youth a real chance at rehabilitation and ensuring public safety. Justice Wood highlights that the SAVERY assessment serves not only to identify the most suitable intervention for each individual, but it also provides valuable insights into the effectiveness of treatment services on a broader scale effectiveness of treatment services on a broader scale and if the government is going to basically the state give money out to say these are the services we need across Arkansas.
Speaker 5:we want to know what the data says we really need.
Speaker 4:Another project the commission has been working on involves guiding law enforcement officers on how to make decisions when they come into contact with the youth.
Speaker 5:So if they pick a juvenile up and they make that decision, am I going to cite that juvenile for a curfew violation or take that person, try to take them into a detention facility versus release and just say, hey, we're just going to take you home and like or call a local pastor or, you know, reach out to the community. How do they make that call? There is not a validated tool in the country for that.
Speaker 4:The goal, she says, is to ensure fairness and consistency in the juvenile justice system In Benton County. Judge Tom Smith, who oversees juvenile cases, shares his perspective. He cautions that treating low-risk juveniles like high-risk offenders can do more harm than good.
Speaker 2:If they're low-risk kids, the worst thing we can do is treat them like a high-risk kid that's going to be in court the rest of their life. One decision can ruin a child's life if it's the wrong decision. You can actually turn low-risk kids into high-risk by just how you treat them. We try to divert them and keep them out of the full system as much as we can.
Speaker 4:Judge Smith works very closely with Chief Juvenile Probation Officer Drew Shover, who also chairs the data committee for the Supreme Court's Commission on Children, youth and Families. Officer Shover says assessments play a vital role in determining the appropriate level of intervention. We want to be able to work things out informally first.
Speaker 8:You know less is more. However, you have to know when to do less and you have to be able to work things out informally first. You know less is more. However, you have to know when to do less and you have to know when to do more.
Speaker 2:They don't reoffend and they stay out of court over 90% of the time and sometimes it's way up in the 90s. So I think, with all that hard work of getting the kids out as quickly as possible with some other means, it allows us to spend time on those juveniles that do come back and have more crimes, more serious crimes, and are basically at risk to go straight from the juvenile system into the adult system.
Speaker 4:Benton County did something pretty unique a few years ago. It opened a shelter for teenage boys on the grounds of the Juvenile Detention Center. That allows the county to provide services to teens without arresting them.
Speaker 2:I wanted a program where I could get kids out of the home where the problems are, but not necessarily have to lock them up, because that was the old way. Well, they can't go home, they're fighting like crazy. Well, what you learn over the time is half the time it could be a parent problem, not the kid problem. So you have the kid getting locked up because of the alcohol, the drugs, whatever's going on with the parents. We've added that shelter. We still haven't reached the capacity of where I'd like to be with it for those instances, especially with domestic abuse, but we're working towards it because really I think everybody would realize an officer has to be concerned when they're being called out and you have a whole lot of arguing and fighting going on between parents and kids, it's hard to just leave them in that home. So you have to start looking at all your alternatives that you can come up with and that's one reason why we have that shelter.
Speaker 4:Justice Wood emphasizes the critical need to identify appropriate interventions for juveniles. The balance, she says, lies in providing the necessary treatment without isolating young people for too long. She explains that the extended periods of separation that occur when juveniles are detained can impede their reintegration into the community, leaving them ill-equipped to handle their environment upon release.
Speaker 5:You know sometimes to think about don't pull them out of the environment, to give them the tools. Give them the tools in that environment rather than sort of making them do it in isolation and then throwing them back in. So it's almost like let's walk in ours with them. If you have a good sort of probation team and community providers, you can do that without ever having them having to do that incarceration piece. It just takes a lot of support. The whole community has to be willing to accept and always say like there's no bad kids, I mean there's kids that make bad mistakes. It may have had some unfortunate decisions and maybe didn't have sort of the support system that we had.
Speaker 4:For adults who've been incarcerated, the common advice is to change their people, places and things, meaning the people that they associate with, the places they go and the things that they engage in. But for young people, most times that just isn't feasible. They often return to the same home and neighborhood with little control over their circumstances or their environment.
Speaker 5:It's remarkable. So you could see this broken, shattered teenager who had done some pretty terrible things, you know, and they would come back and be a changed person in front of me. They've turned their life around ready to go, and then I'd see them, like three weeks later and they're like beaten down and it's like they just you know whether the world just wasn't accepting to them or they're right back in the same home and neighborhood and it'd just be so, so heartbreaking, because they really just thought they could do it and they had the tools. But it was like that last sort of piece.
Speaker 4:And all of these solutions tie back to that SAVERY assessment, which serves as a guide for knowing what a juvenile needs in order to make progress. Justice Wood says many young people in the system have likely experienced trauma and no one wants to do more damage by locking them up if it's not needed.
Speaker 5:If they come out and they are not making improvements. We've incarcerated them for no purpose and, odds are, we've like, dramatically harmed them.
Speaker 4:The the COVID-19 pandemic caused a major drop in school enrollment in the US. While some kids moved to private schools or homeschooling, a large number didn't return to any formal education. This has sparked serious concerns about the long-term effects on their education and social development. We talk about the long-term effects on their education and social development.
Speaker 5:We talk about the CASPer students, the students that just went missing after COVID, so we don't even know really how to find them. The real fear, from a child welfare standpoint, of what has happened to those juveniles and if they're okay.
Speaker 4:She says it's also becoming more common for adults to manipulate children into committing crimes, taking advantage of a young person's impressionability.
Speaker 5:Adults are targeting juveniles and asking them to sort of carry the burden of committing the heavier crimes, in the sense that they know that if a juvenile actually does the shooting, they'll say well, you're going to get out when you're 21, or you get out at this age, versus if I do the shooting, you know I'm life.
Speaker 4:One issue that has grown urgent in the aftermath of the pandemic is teen drug abuse. It's not a new issue, but the stakes are higher than ever. The risk of overdose and serious health consequences have increased dramatically. Serious health consequences have increased dramatically. Right now, there's a significant gap in comprehensive, accessible treatment options that are specifically tailored to young people struggling with substance abuse. Justice Wood underscores the need for more age-appropriate supports, saying that sending young people to adult groups often exposes them to negative influences more ways to get drugs rather than providing the intended support.
Speaker 5:They were making better contacts, and that was not what we needed. Part of the other thing that we need, that we don't have enough of, are alcohol anonymous and narcotics anonymous that are for juveniles. We would find someone that didn't need inpatient, that needed to go through that process, and the only thing that I would have to send them to was an adult one. And some of these groups are great faith-based groups. So a faith-based group that would be willing to say I'm going to lead one that is just going to be juvenile focused and we don't have. Definitely we need beds that are inpatient for when a juvenile is at that critical need stage Typically juveniles even if they're getting treatment and getting that point, you usually are getting them out within 30 to 60 days. Juveniles do not need long-term substance abuse treatment.
Speaker 4:She is passionate about the potential impact of conflict resolution programs in schools. By teaching students how to resolve disagreements peacefully at an early age, these programs can help prevent minor disputes from turning into serious issues.
Speaker 5:There are some programs that do peer-to-peer mediation, conflict resolution. I think that would be incredible to do with schools, because you think about, there are some of these that it starts sort of lower level but if they have never seen how to resolve conflicts in their home and they sort of just always experience that you resolve conflict with violence and then that escalates as they get older and then when they are in a situation then that's their resolution is they're going to resolve with violence. And sometimes they're brought into the system because they just get these little disorderly conducts at school, because they get in a fight at school and it goes too far.
Speaker 4:In Benton County. Judge Smith says schools are one of the biggest partners in juvenile justice. He says they're playing a significant role in helping identify at-risk youth and intervening at an early stage. They know it's a warning sign when students aren't showing up or if they're acting out.
Speaker 2:Schools are one of our biggest partners. I mean, most of the cases that we deal with on the juvenile court side come from school, and so we work with the schools to try to get the kids back in school and find out what plan we need for their education. So, yeah, we work very hard. In fact, every summer, before school starts, we'll put on a meeting with all of our schools and see where the courts are going, what the schools are doing. Over our time we've seen schools really. You know they have a lot of social service programs, they have social workers, they have alternative programs. They've established their own way of handling a lot of these things.
Speaker 4:Officer Shover says the schools in the county have become more and more thorough in assessing a student's situation, decreasing the amount of time spent on investigating a case and allowing for more swift intervention.
Speaker 8:Schools are generally between 75-85% referrals to about 15-25% from parents. Parents can come up here if they're having difficulties with their kids in school or drugs or mental health reasons, and then schools are sending us referrals on kids that are absent without justification from school, and we also send out a global report to the schools every two weeks so they know where the referrals are standing at that point in time and they can communicate with us directly. You're also hearing about other type of programs that they're putting in place teen court or different types of approaches that they're taking, and if it comes to us, we know it's the last resort.
Speaker 4:Teen court is a program for young people who have committed minor offenses. Instead of going through the formal juvenile system, the teen appears before a court made up of their peers. The goal of teen court is to hold juveniles accountable while promoting restorative justice. Sentences often include community service writing essays, counseling apologies or educational workshops.
Speaker 2:We see, like most areas probably, marijuana in school. There's just too much easy access to these marijuana vapes and other type of marijuana. It's like they can get it whenever they want to, and I have a real issue with that, because the speech we have to give every day is you know, the brain's not developed until it's 25. It's messing them up and it's hurting their future. And when they have nothing when they're 40, well, it all started back when they were doing these things as teenagers.
Speaker 8:You'll find a lot of school-related arrests. Kids are leaving home, bringing their stuff to school too, but one place they have the best chance of having a fair shake in life. They're putting that in jeopardy because of substances. We are limited resources and it just seems mental health and substance abuse services that area is really suffering right now. Substance abuse services that area is really suffering right now and trying to get youth and families in services expeditiously is an extreme challenge.
Speaker 4:Shover says they are continuing to work on developing programs that make a difference.
Speaker 8:Equine therapy, art therapy, doing the physical activities like CrossFit, looking at skateboarding programs. You know you have to do things that kids enjoy and that is really what fills the void there to kids that go off and venture and do things they shouldn't be doing is getting them active. I do remember sitting in a CrossFit session and one kid just said I don't get in trouble anymore, I'm too tired, you know, and he goes. I sleep at night. You know we all got a big kick on it. But it's true. I mean, kids need those type of outlets to occupy their time, for one have structure and discipline.
Speaker 4:Shover says, one trend they're monitoring closely is the potential for more violent group crime, especially as the population in his part of the state continues to grow. Group crime encompasses any social network whose members commit violent crimes together. The concept of group crime has been studied for decades, but the way it's understood and addressed has evolved over time, as we'll learn later in this episode.
Speaker 2:Arrest for kids with guns. It's not just in Benton County, but it's everywhere, and you hate to see that. Because you start shooting at people and you kill people or you hurt people, you're going to be charged as an adult and you're going to find yourself locked up in prison. We've had plenty, like anywhere else, and it's always that type of violent crime it's guns. Really, it's important to understand how important it is to not let kids have access to guns.
Speaker 2:You know, I wish there was a way that we could tell every person, not just in Bend County but in the state lock your car every time you get out of your car and never leave a gun in your car. If you could do that, you could get a lot of guns out. But that's not being done and kids find ways to get guns. We spend a lot of time dealing with juveniles that have guns in their possession simply because somebody left their car unlocked and left a gun in a car. Young people, at least in our area, don't go around smashing windows, but if it's unlocked they're going to pop it and they're going to take what's inside.
Speaker 8:Kids are impulsive, there's many reasons why they're trying to go into a car. A lot of times you'll hear I was just looking for spare change, or I was looking for money or something of value to pawn, and then there's a weapon in there underneath the seat of one of the cars and next thing you know, you have a youth that's now armed one of the cars. And next thing you know, you have a youth that's now armed. And so you have to be really careful how you process those offenses as well, because are you dealing with an impulsive youth or are you dealing with someone who is actually violent and dangerous?
Speaker 2:There's lots of young people in our county, just like across the state. They don't have a stable environment, they don't have parents not doing drugs or alcohol themselves. They don't have parents not committing crimes themselves and when they're here we have to be aware of it, to give them the opportunity to make good choices and be successful and being aware of what you see matters.
Speaker 4:There is a profound and sometimes tragic connection between early life experiences and adult outcomes. Juvenile delinquency is often not an isolated phase but part of a continuum that, if not interrupted with support and rehabilitation, may escalate into more severe offenses. Justice Wood says early intervention is critical and can change lives. It can prevent poor and even severe outcomes for individuals in society down the road.
Speaker 5:We sat on the execution cases in 2017 up here at the Supreme Court Some of the hardest decisions I ever made. Wouldn't you sit on those cases when they come up at that stage? So they've been in the system. You know 20, 30 years and those you know typically men are in death row. We go back and we look at everything in their file for 30 years. You see their childhood, you know and everything about them and they are the juveniles that you see in Juventus. All of them were in juvenile court and so it's sort of looking at them it's like, well, they all had truancy issues, they all were in some kind of delinquency case. I think all at one was in foster care. You know, at some point they all had educational deficiencies Not saying that everybody in juvenile court is going to, you know, end up down that road but it's sort of every one of them had contact with somebody that we can really make a difference. So you never know.
Speaker 4:Coming up. We'll take a look at a city determined to curb violence among its young people. They say they're ready to reach violent youth and step in as early as possible.
Speaker 10:Support for this podcast is provided by the non-profit Restore Hope and the 100 Families Initiative, moving families from crisis to career through innovative case management software, Communities can develop strategies to best support those in need in their area and track outcome data in real time to see what's working. Learn more at RestoreHopeio and by the Arkansas Department of Human Services, which aims to improve the quality of life for all of the state's residents by protecting the vulnerable, fostering independence and promoting better health.
Speaker 4:The city of Pine Bluff, arkansas, is on the list of most dangerous cities in America. It has long struggled with its reputation, earning the unfortunate nickname Crime Bluff. Over the years, many people have left the area, leaving buildings and homes abandoned, but city officials are working to turn that around, which includes addressing a dramatic spike in juvenile gun crime over recent years. Judge Ernest Brown presides over the juvenile division in Pine Bluff. When young people come to his court, he literally points in two directions that he does not want them to go.
Speaker 3:Straight ahead. That's the adult jail across the street. So I say I don't want you to be there. To my right of my building there's a coroner's office. So I'm saying I don't want you to be locked up over there and I don't want you to die. There's such a proliferation of guns Like everybody feels like they, especially a young person, need to have a weapon In 2023, half of the city's homicide victims were 18 or under.
Speaker 4:Pine Bluff has implemented a strategy called Group Violence Intervention or GVI. The term group refers to any social network whose members commit violent crimes together. This includes both organized gangs and loose neighborhood groups. Gvi is an evidence-based violent prevention model that has already proven successful in other high crime cities around the country, including York, pennsylvania, boston, massachusetts and Stockholm, california. Judge Brown has high hopes for the initiative. York Pennsylvania is a city he says serves as a shining example of what's possible. It started its GVI effort in 2016. And in 2023, group-related gun violence had dropped by 80%.
Speaker 3:I don't know if Pine Bluff can get to 80%, but I'll tell you right now. I'd take 30%, 40%. Right now I would take any level of reduction to show that we're moving in the right direction and then people will gravitate to it. I get fired up about that. I'm excited about the potential that we have to really do something that's going to change Pine Bluff for generations to come.
Speaker 4:Around the country. It's been shown that a small number of individuals and identifiable street groups are responsible for a large portion of the violent crime in their communities. The GVI initiative targets these high-risk groups. Law enforcement and community partners working together can identify them. Then the GVI team directly engages with them, either by going out to their homes or identify them. Then the GVI team directly engages with them, either by going out to their homes or calling them.
Speaker 3:They deliver a moral message against violence, emphasize the consequences of future violence and make a genuine offer of help through providing services and you'll have somebody from law enforcement, somebody from the community whether that is pastors, parents of murdered children, social services agency like housing, community-based providers and that team will come and say okay, John, we know you're involved in this, we want to offer you help. We don't want you to be a victim, we don't want you to hurt anybody. But if you decide you don't want to do that and you want to continue to do that, then we're going to be on you and your group all the time. We'll help you if you let us. We'll stop you if you make us.
Speaker 4:In many criminal cases, the same individual show up repeatedly and in different roles. Someone might be a victim of crime today, but it's very likely that they'll be a suspect, a witness or a family member tomorrow. Connecting those dots allows law enforcement to identify young people in trouble, their friends and their network. Assistant Chief Juvenile Officer Eric Walden works with Judge Brown in the implementation of GVI. He has an understanding of group violence. He was in a gang during his teens while living in Nevada and in Kansas. He also has a special appreciation for Pine.
Speaker 1:Bluff. I moved to Pine Bluff when I was 18 to get out of trouble. I was gang involved, I was in and out of juvenile court system, myself faced adult charges as a juvenile, and when I moved here it was a chance for me to redefine myself and give myself an opportunity.
Speaker 4:Today, he uses his troubled past to connect with at-risk youth and show them that there's a better path to follow. He says that the job has gotten harder and harder as the nature of youth crime changes.
Speaker 1:It was so dramatic the increase of kids we were seeing coming in with gun charges, coming in with automatic weapons, coming in for murder cases and shootings.
Speaker 1:When I first started here, we had a large string of residential murder. Commercial murder was like the number one crime we'd see in court. Kids were breaking into businesses, breaking into houses, stealing things, and then we kind of got a tackle on that and things started shifting to seeing more and more gun crime. Five, six years ago or so, it was just about students or kids having guns in their possession guns at school, guns in the community. We really didn't have a lot of kids coming into our court system for shootings or committing homicides or things of that nature. But then around 2020, right after COVID we start seeing an uptick in juvenile gun crime shootings, homicides, aggravated robberies and things like that and it's just continued to pick up. And it's just continued to pick up. We've had several juveniles in our court system that have gone on to face adult charges because either they've committed a homicide or they shot at someone, and we've had a lot of kids that we've lost as well to the youth gun violence.
Speaker 4:Walden says he's noticed kids' attitudes changing over the years.
Speaker 1:I say it all the time I would give anything to work with the kids that we worked with 10 years ago or so, around the time, you know, when I first started this, because those kids even though some of them were bad or they would get in trouble or they committed serious offenses the regard for life and the respect was a lot different. I could have a young man that I worked with yes, maybe he was on probation for dealing drugs. Yes, maybe he was on probation for fighting or even having a gun, but he was still respectful, he was mannerable to some degree. But some of the kids that we deal with now they don't care if you're a teacher. They don't care if you're law enforcement. They don't care if you're an adult or anything.
Speaker 1:They're going to say what they want to say. They're going to do what they want to do. They have no regard whatsoever. We've noticed that over the years how the kids have changed and how they deal with people. These kids are just out doing whatever they want to do. You get into it on social media and they feel like they want to come and shoot. That's what they're going to do. They're going to come by and shoot and the access to guns is crazy right now, and so it's so easy for them to get a hold of them.
Speaker 4:Judge Brown says, with so many guns on the street, youth are embracing a gun culture that gives them a sense of confidence and pride in owning a firearm.
Speaker 3:It's a certain status to doing it, so that's something we have to break.
Speaker 4:He says conflicts among youth seem to escalate into gun violence quickly. He notes that a significant number of juveniles coming to court for gun charges have never been there for a lesser offense.
Speaker 3:Most of those cases I see now about half of them they weren't even in the juvenile court system before they did it. And how they got involved with this particular group. What made them want to get in this group? What made them so mad at this other group. It's a lot of questions that happen with those particular situations.
Speaker 1:Before, where we would see like juveniles in gangs and their rival gang members. Now it's like in-house conflict we were seeing more of. We make gang profiles and things like that and we're seeing the kids on the profile together and then one week they're cool and then the next week they're committing crimes against each other. It was like trying to figure out what is going on, like it was very alarming.
Speaker 4:Walden says going to school has become more difficult for students in the city. Everyone suffers because they don't know what might happen on any given day and what conflicts will be brought into the classroom.
Speaker 1:It's very hard at school because of all the stuff that goes on. And then the other thing with that is going to school with somebody that you've seen, maybe last week, but now they're gone because they've been lost to gun violence or the other person is locked up for committing an act of gun violence. That's something very difficult too. That weighs on them.
Speaker 4:A lot is at stake for Pine Bluff. The most recent US census, taken in 2020, noted that Pine Bluff is America's fastest shrinking city, having lost 12 percent of its population in a decade. Judge Brown says reducing violence will also improve the school environment and revitalize neighborhoods.
Speaker 3:Making sure that dilapidated houses are torn down, that the communities are clean. That's the whole movement that comes with that, because as you reduce violence, you improve your communities.
Speaker 4:Walden says that, while Pine Bluff may have some unique struggles, juvenile crime is on the rise in cities across Arkansas.
Speaker 1:So I serve on the Arkansas Juvenile Officer Association Board and we have representatives on our board from Conway, from Little Rock, stuttgart, and a lot of us share kids because our kids are traveling all over the state committing crime.
Speaker 3:Some of the ones I've seen, they've come in as a gun from Ark of Death or a gun from different places. So when I mention that we're interrelated, we can't just say, oh, this is happening in Little Rock, I ain't worried about it, it's happening, I'm not worried about it. The likelihood that people move around and things move around means that we need to be concerned about one another. We need to collaborate with each other. We ought to do better. We should not become just insulated to reading about somebody being shot and killed. We ought to be doing what we can.
Speaker 4:But here's some great news. Pine Bluff has seen some pretty remarkable results with its GVI initiative.
Speaker 3:They're celebrating more than 400 days without a juvenile homicide. I am very motivated to make sure we get it right so we can share what we did, the successes and some of the failures, because we've been on this journey since 2020. And I'm hoping that, as others embark on it, that they can learn some of the failures, because we've been on this journey since 2020. And I'm hoping that, as others embark on it, that they can learn some of the things that worked well for us and some of the things that did not work well.
Speaker 4:Walden says, improving juvenile justice ultimately means improving access to services for juveniles and for their families.
Speaker 1:No matter what we order or what we do, like if things don't change in the home, for some of this kid like it's not going to matter, like we have to get. We need the parents on board too in order to curb some of this behavior and curb some of what's going on. Like they've got to be, they've got to have buy-in, because if they don't and the kid notices that the parent doesn't have buy-in, they're not going to either.
Speaker 4:Judge Brown notes that the community already has several services available to help at-risk families, but that they will be working on getting more resources out to families in a more efficient and effective manner. But he adds that there's still a long way to go in order to get more services to his community, and especially those that would help kids with drug addictions.
Speaker 3:It is tough when there's somebody that needs drug treatment and there's no place to send them. Some of those things need to be treated in a residential fashion and not just with intensive outpatient. I mean, what am I to do? Detention is not going to get them that treatment. We have some real limitations right now.
Speaker 1:I think, now more than ever, we need our community to wrap around our young folks. In order for us to reduce this issue of gun violence, in order for us to fix it, we have to be really engaged with our young people and show them that we care, helping in any which way we can. And then the other thing I would say is engaging kids at a younger level. We've seen issues as young as elementary, not necessarily with gun violence, but where there's gang mentioned or where there's certain words exchanged and so being involved in kids at the elementary level, teasing the importance of gun safety, staying away from groups and gangs and having activities for them to keep them engaged so that they don't look for those things when they get older, to help curb that. Because we really have a mindset and a culture we have to change. We have a very challenging road ahead and we need all hands on deck.
Speaker 4:Coming up on the next episode of Smart Justice. In the US, homicide isa, leading cause of death among black males under 44. We'll meet a former football coach who is tackling the epidemic.
Speaker 3:We won't say what's wrong with them. No, that's the wrong question.
Speaker 1:The question is what happened?
Speaker 8:to them.
Speaker 4:We'll also talk to the director of an alternative education academy, designed to meet the needs of students who may not do well in a traditional school setting.
Speaker 3:What we learn about every kid is that they can learn, though, and in the right setting, they will learn.
Speaker 4:And we'll examine how the role of juvenile prosecutors, who decide which kids should be charged with crimes, is shifting from solely reacting to crime to actively engaging in strategies to prevent it.
Speaker 9:Starting before the crime to me starts. I mean at the point where these babies are born. That's on the next Smart Justice, thank you. Our coverage is solutions-oriented, focusing on the innovative ways in which communities are solving issues and the lessons being learned as a result of successes and challenges. That's smartjusticeorg. There you can also sign up for the Smart Justice newsletter so you never miss the latest headlines. And please support us by leaving a rating and review you.
