By Mark Mix
Home day care providers would be forced into unions
The D.C. agency charged with rehabilitating youth offenders has squandered and underutilized resources intended for youth services during a period in which dozens of managers have left or been forced out of the agency, according to legislative oversight documents obtained through a public-records request.
Takisha Brown had barely gotten her feet wet as elected chairwoman of the Fraternal Order of Police union representing 200 youth-corrections officers when she sensed trouble.
A D.C. Council member is raising questions about the frequency of assaults at the city's juvenile detention facilities after two recent attacks on officers by youths.
The District's juvenile justice agency needs to provide more substance-abuse treatment options for its troubled wards and drastically improve its communication with parents of young people housed as far as Utah, a D.C. Council committee says.
One of the three people involved in Sunday's fatal police chase was a ward of the District's Department of Youth Rehabilitative Services (DYRS), officials said.
The family of a Catholic University student who was fatally shot while bicycling through the Petworth area in 2010 has dropped the District and its juvenile justice agency from a lawsuit that had accused the city of failing to supervise the 16-year-old murder suspect committed to its custody.
Like so many other D.C. youths, Alexis Mattocks grew up before her time.
The District's juvenile justice agency agreed to pay about $130,000 to a disgruntled former employee who sued the city after he was passed over for the top job at a D.C. facility in Laurel that houses young offenders, according to papers from the D.C. Office of the Attorney General.
The family of a Catholic University student who was fatally shot while bicycling through Petworth last year has filed a $20 million lawsuit against the D.C. Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services, accusing the agency of failing to supervise the 16-year-old murder suspect committed to its custody.
The D.C. Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services (DYRS) continued to demonstrate this week a lack of control over wards of the city committed to its custody, with dire consequences in at least one case.
A 20-year-old arrested Sunday in the fatal shooting of a Maryland taxicab driver was under the care and custody of the D.C. Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services (DYRS), The Washington Times has learned.
The former superintendent of the Laurel facility that houses wards of the D.C. juvenile justice agency has settled a lawsuit in which he claimed he was passed over in his bid to become the permanent boss and terminated for criticizing the selection process.
The District's juvenile-justice agency fired its human resources manager last week in the wake of unresolved questions around the hiring of a superintendent to oversee the city's youth-detention facility, D.C. human resources officials said.
Mayor Vincent C. Gray's pick to lead the District's juvenile justice agency will likely be confirmed this week by running out the clock on any objections to his nomination.
The agency also put out a request for proposal to establish an in-patient substance abuse program — a key area of concern for Mr. Graham — within 100 miles of the District, Mr. Stanley said.
"I think DYRS must know where every, single young person is at all times," Mr. Stanley told the committee.
