THE DEATH of seven young women from the Armadale Juvenile Correctional Centre has once again exposed our neglect of some of the most vulnerable members of our society. So, now we are frantically searching for someone to blame. Accordingly, the Armadale Commission of Enquiry has started out as high drama. Unfortunately, it is rapidly degenerating into farce as a multitude of players posture and pose.

Former Public Defender Howard Hamilton has denounced the incompetence of the staff on duty at the institution at the time of the fire. The current public defender, Earl Witter, has asserted the right of his office to conduct its own investigation into the events at Armadale. We have been treated to the account of the officer who could not carry the keys for the doors to the dorms because her jeans were too tight and her pockets could not take a message, much less a bunch of keys. The deputy superintendent arrived at the enquiry armed with her documents (no repeat of the abuse of the previous day). The case manager bemoaned the lack of space and the lack of love, both of which she deemed necessary for the proper management of the girls at the facility.

No calls for an investigation

I would like to suggest that this is about more than whether the fire extinguishers were working, who had the keys, and where the superintendent was. The Armadale fire is only the latest in a series of events that have highlighted how badly we treat those whom we have classified as "bad behaving" or "needy". (Let us keep in mind the situation at the Port Antonio Infirmary. People seem to be more upset about Minister of State Robert Montague's outburst than about the reason for his outburst. There have been no calls for an investigation into conditions at the infirmary, only calls for the minister to apologise.)

How many of us have any idea what happens when a child is brought into the care or correctional systems? Do we know that in cases that do not involve the commission of an offence under the law, it is the judge who decides whether a young person goes to a correctional centre rather than a children's home? Do we know that it is largely precedent which creates a division of labour whereby the Correctional Services handle children 14-18 years, while the Child Development Agency (CDA) takes charge of the younger ones?

How many of us realise that out of a staff of more than 2,200 in the Correctional Services, there are only 160 probation officers? It is the probation officers, like the 60 or so children's officers at the CDA, who prepare the social enquiry reports for the courts, who are supposed to help the wards deal with the anger, confusion and hurt which helped to land them before the court, who are expected to educate the community so that on leaving the institution the young person can find a home and a job. Three thousand two hundred and ninety-three young persons came before the courts in 2008. This is a 46 per cent increase over the figure for 2005. In about a third of the cases, the young person is brought before the court because he or she is in need of care and protection.

A probation officer could do 70-80 visits in connection with case investigations each month. An investigation involves interviewing parents, child, teachers, friends, victim - if there is one - and preparing a written report for the court. A probation officer is only allowed to travel 500km per month, by the way, and he or she will spend two or three days each week in court awaiting the magistrate's pleasure.

'Bad pickney'

We have been regaled with stories of the Armadale girls throwing faeces and urine (known as 'tequila') at correctional officers. We have heard how uncontrollable they are and how regularly they attempt to escape. These are some of the same girls who caused a riot at the Fort Augusta Adult Correctional Centre (to use the politically correct name), and also at the Horizon Remand Centre. So 'dem mus be bad pickney!' But very few of these young persons have committed a serious offence, although the number of girls brought before the courts for minor offences has tripled between 2005 and 2008.

More than 30 years ago, Erna Brodber wrote a book called The Abandonment of Children in Jamaica. In it she documented how parents, custodial aunts or grandparents saw State institutions as the appropriate destination for children who had become uncontrollable at home. This was particularly the case when the child reached adolescence and began 'flexing', testing the limits of parental authority. At the time, there was a strong focus on the adolescent boys being 'abandoned', being handed over to the state. Teenage girls have now joined them - not in as great a number, but because it is not socially acceptable for girls to be seen to be acting out, their behaviour is perceived as more extreme.

In 2006, a Gleaner report drew attention to the dramatic increase in the number of young persons being housed in correctional facilities and to the fact that some had to be housed in adult facilities, such as the Horizon Remand Centre. This practice continues today. Last December, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights released its report and said that conditions in the facilities in which children were being held did not meet international standards.

At the end of 2008, there were 430 young persons in custodial care, 113 of them were girls, and more than half of them were housed at Armadale. The enquiry that is under way is showing us how they have been treated: twenty-three hours on lockdown for a disciplinary infraction; one hour per day to complete one's personal care; once-a-month release for physical education. I would like to know which of us would not be acting out and acting up under those conditions. A long time ago, a former commissioner of corrections said that the best he could offer was humane containment, not rehabilitation. Currently, we do not seem to be able to achieve even that goal.

Lack of training

On the other side of the coin, those responsible for the custody of these young women will have received little or no training in how to deal with them. They will have had six months of paramilitary training (drills, handling weapons, quelling disturbances), some elements of prison administration, and law. Persons assigned to work in the juvenile institutions, whether as custodians or 'case managers', will have been afforded little specialised education in how to work with disturbed youth. (Some persons may have acquired this knowledge if they were professionally trained as social workers, counsellors or clinical psychologists.) Even if they are highly skilled in methods of individual and group therapy and psycho-educational development, no one can deal single-handedly with more than 60 young women, some of whom may be seriously disturbed.

The fact of having so large a number confined together is in itself a recipe for disaster. But which of us wants a facility for disturbed children in our neighbourhood? And that's the rub. Except for a small group of dedicated individuals, most of us would prefer to have all this excitement die down as soon as possible. It certainly is not good for our reputation.

So there aren't enough people asking why it is that if the Cabinet of one administration approved the 'National Plan of Action for Child Justice' it has to be resubmitted to the current Cabinet for its approval? Why should this plan, which calls for the increased use of alternatives to custodial sentencing, have to re-join the queue of topics on an already overburdened executive agenda? Is this plan the same as the 'Plan of Action for Juvenile Justice' that was developed six years before in 2001? Forgive us if we are rather confused.

It is easy to understand how the documentation to secure the release of some of the surviving Armadale girls who are so badly burnt the state has acknowledged that it cannot care for them, seems to have been mislaid. The assent of the minister is required to secure their release, but the paperwork has been held up somewhere in the system. Let us hope that other young women do not die or become permanently disabled because of a lack of access to adequate care.

Interesting innovations

There have been some interesting innovations in the Correctional Services over the past few years. Radio FREE now broadcasts from the Tower Street facility, inmates at Tamarind Farm are learning hydroponics and other modern agricultural methods. Courthouses are being refurbished, and court proceedings are being modernised. Yet youth in custodial institutions, especially teenage women, are being left behind. Blaming is not enough.

Peta-Anne Baker is the coordinator of the social work programme at the University of the West Indies, Mona. She may be contacted at pab.ja2009@gmail.com.