[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 31 (Wednesday, March 12, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2164-S2166]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           JUVENILE VIOLENCE

  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I have been asked to chair the 
subcommittee of the Judiciary Committee on juvenile violence. It is an 
issue and a problem that I have dealt with for many years. I have been 
a Federal and State prosecutor for 17 years. I know juvenile judges, I 
know sheriffs, I know police chiefs, I know juvenile probation officers 
and those who work with them. I have been involved in organizations 
that have dealt with youth crime for many, many years. I think it is a 
rare opportunity to have the possibility of contributing to an issue as 
important as this one.
  I am particularly pleased that we have a bipartisan interest in real 
reform of juvenile justice in America. Not long ago, the Republican 
conference of this body listed juvenile violence as one of its top 10 
priorities. The President has made it so in his remarks and in his 
recent address to the Nation. Just a few weeks ago, the majority 
leader, Trent Lott, met with the President, and they agreed to work to 
pass a good and effective juvenile reform bill. Senator Lott had the 
occasion to talk with me about that, and his instructions to me were: 
``Jeff, we want the best crime bill that we can get, something that 
will effectively reduce juvenile violence in America.''
  Mr. President, let me discuss with you what our problems are. 
Understanding the situation we are in is important. The incidence of 
adult crime in America, since the early 1980's, has essentially been 
flat. During that time, we have doubled, tripled, and in some areas of 
the country, quadrupled the prison capacity for adult offenders in 
America. Many States have quadrupled their capacity. We have 
effectively targeted these repeat and dangerous offenders. Those 
offenders are not now out on the street, committing additional crimes, 
and we have, at great cost and at great pain, and I regret to say great 
loss of productivity, incarcerated people who needed to be 
incarcerated. But we have maintained more safety on our streets than 
would have been the case.
  During this same period of time we have observed that juvenile 
violence has increased rapidly. We have not dealt with that in any 
effective way. Since 1982, violent crime committed by juveniles in 
America has doubled. Murder rates have increased 128 percent since 
1982. This violent crime rate has been projected by the Department of 
Justice to double again by the year 2010. Indeed, by the year 2000 we 
will have 500,000 more crime-prone males, age 14 to 17. Many experts 
predict that these numbers alone will drive the juvenile violence rate 
even higher.
  I think we must systematically and deliberately confront this 
problem, find real solutions to it, and deal with what I consider to be 
the real problem, which is a juvenile justice system that is simply not 
working. Those who have seen it, who have worked in it, who have been a 
part of it, know that. We care about it. We want to improve it. But we 
have to be honest: It is simply not working.
  Let me tell you what is happening in America today. Recently, in 
Montgomery, AL, a night watchman was killed. I had one of my staff 
check to see about the three juveniles who had been arrested for that 
offense. One had 8 prior arrests, another had 8 prior arrests, and the 
third had 15 prior arrests. That is the kind of thing that is happening 
all over America. We do not effectively deal with juvenile violence and 
serious juvenile crime. We act as if it is the same kind of crime that 
existed 30 or 40 years ago when juvenile crime primarily involved 
vandalism or petty theft.

  Can we do anything about it? Can we, as a nation, effectively deal 
with these instances of ever increasing violence by young offenders, 
and make the system work better? As somebody who has been in it, I 
believe sincerely that we can. It strikes me that we have a system 
which is so badly constituted that we have great opportunities to make 
it more productive and work better.
  Mr. President, let me give you an outline of some of the proposals 
that will be in our bill and I think will be supported by the 
Department of Justice and the President. Senator Joseph Biden, the 
ranking Democratic member on our subcommittee, and others should be in 
general agreement with the proposals I am going to make. I certainly 
hope they will be.
  First, we do have to make the Federal system work better. It is as a 
practical matter impossible at this time to effectively prosecute a 
juvenile offense in Federal court. The prosecutor must certify that the 
offender cannot be prosecuted in State court. Then the prosecutor must 
certify the offender as an adult. Then the offender has a right, at 
that point, to appeal the certification, to the U.S. Circuit Court of 
Appeals, which delays the trial as much as a year while the public 
waits on the results of that appeal. That is not necessary.
  We believe that our bill, with the support of the President, and the 
Department of Justice, can eliminate those problems and allow the 
Federal prosecutors to effectively be engaged in prosecuting 
appropriate violent juvenile cases. But we have to be honest with 
ourselves: 99.9 percent of juvenile crime cases--99.99 percent--are 
being tried in State court. Overwhelmingly, those cases ought to 
continue to be in State court. We do not need to have the Federal 
bureaucracy, here in Washington, DC, taking over the prosecution of 
juvenile crime in the States.
  What we need to do in this Nation, and what this Senate needs to do, 
and what our Federal Government needs to do, is develop ways to assist 
the juvenile systems throughout America to be more productive in 
prosecuting cases within their own counties, cities and localities. 
This is the most important thing. First, we need to fix the Federal 
system, but we do not need to ever think for one moment that that is 
going to be a serious detriment to the overall growth and threat of 
violence in our young offenders.
  How do we improve the States' systems? We have to deal with it 
systemically, addressing the day-to-day things that are happening 
there. I would like to share with you some proposals that will be 
included in our bill, and share with you some of the problems that we 
face. First, let me tell you what is happening today all over this 
country, when young offenders are arrested.
  Let us take this example. A young offender in a stolen car is 
arrested at 2 a.m. by a local deputy sheriff, caught flat-footed. What 
typically happens is, if there is not a juvenile facility nearby--and 
normally there are only a few approved juvenile facilities within the 
State--that offender cannot be kept overnight in a separate part of a 
local or city jail. Those offenders cannot be kept at the local jail 
because Federal mandates say they cannot be housed in any institution 
in which adults are housed. They cannot even be in an institution that 
shares the same dining facility. So they either have to be released 
that night, or they have to be taken to a juvenile facility that may be 
in a distant locality and may be at full capacity. So, routinely what 
happens is that young offender, caught flat-footed in a stolen 
automobile, is released that night to his parents. He is back on the 
street that night.
  It is not just bad for him, that he receives a horrible message, but 
it is also bad for his younger brothers, perhaps, or his running 
buddies, his would-be criminal associates, because they know Billy got 
caught. They know the police caught him in a stolen car. They see him 
back on the street that very night or the next morning. They see him 
laughing about it. They do not respect the system, and that procedure 
undermines the moral authority of the police and the legal system in 
America. It encourages crime and it does not deter crime, and we have 
to deal with that fundamental problem. We can do so, and I have some 
ideas I would like to share with you.

  As a matter of fact, as I traveled the State of Alabama as attorney 
general, talking to local police, that is the single most frustrating 
situation for local police officers throughout Alabama, and I think the 
Nation, in juvenile crime, because these officers say to me over and 
over, ``Jeff, they are laughing at us. They don't think we can do 
anything to them, and we can't.'' This creates crime by sending a clear 
message to all involved that these young offenders are getting away 
with their crimes.

[[Page S2165]]

  How do we deal with that? We need to end these irrational Federal 
mandates that require total separation. We do not need to have young 
offenders in the same cell with hardened criminals. Nobody proposes 
that. But on separate floors, in separate wings, separate parts of 
jails can be carved out where young offenders can be kept, at least for 
short periods of time, totally apart from adult offenders. That can and 
should be done, and it is the only sane and logical thing to do. I 
believe there is a growing consensus in America to do that, and our 
bill will do that. I think we can have bipartisan support to end these 
regulations. This will free up, at little or no cost, significant 
amounts of bed space for juvenile offenders.

  In addition, we need to put some money into juvenile facilities. 
Adult facilities, as I have said, have doubled and tripled and 
quadrupled in America, but facilities for young offenders have not 
increased. In fact, in some States, their jail space for juveniles has 
decreased. Florida, after decreasing juvenile jails for a number of 
years, has now recognized the need to increase their available space. 
Our bill will provide financial support to State and local governments 
who need to undertake to expand their existing facilities, such as by 
putting on a separate wing for juvenile offenders. That way, at a 
reasonable cost, we can add jail capacity.
  A sheriff in Alabama told me just a few weeks ago that he was 
arresting and incarcerating people under a new Alabama law that our 
Attorney General's office helped get passed, but he did not realize he 
was also in violation of Federal mandates and he was called on the 
carpet by Federal officials who forced him to stop. His policy was to 
hold young offenders for several days when the charges were serious, 
taking them promptly to court, and having prompt hearings. As a result 
of that tough approach, his juvenile crime rate dropped significantly. 
He was just furious that he could no longer carry out that policy, 
because he was absolutely convinced that if he was given the capacity 
to identify the serious offenders, take them to court, and detain them, 
then he could make progress in reducing crime. That is what we want. We 
want to deter criminal conduct. We want to have a system that does, in 
fact, cause juveniles to think about the consequences of their actions 
before they are tempted to commit a crime. I am convinced that our plan 
will do that.
  Some of these matters I will be talking about on the floor in the 
future in more detail, but I want to mention several other parts of 
this program that I think will have bipartisan support and which will 
be effective in thousands of everyday criminal cases in juvenile court, 
so that we can deter these young offenders from going further along. We 
need to make that first brush with the law their last.
  Drug testing. I have always thought it was virtually irrational or 
insane for us to arrest offenders, when we know statistically as high 
as 60 and 70 percent of serious offenders test positive for an illegal 
substance in their body at the time of their arrest, and not drug test 
them to determine whether or not they have a drug problem. They will 
say they do not. Routinely, they will deny it, but through regular drug 
testing, we can identify those young offenders who are using drugs. We 
can identify those who can, through their own willpower and the 
discipline of the court get off drugs, and those who are seriously 
addicted and need treatment. We can involve their families, if they 
have families, in that process. We can give the judge the kind of 
information he needs to know. When he is crafting an appropriate 
sentence, he needs to know whether or not this person standing before 
him, the one he is about to sentence, has a serious drug problem, and 
the sure way to do that is drug testing. It is relatively inexpensive.
  So we will be proposing legislation that will provide money for State 
and local juvenile courts to test young offenders. If they test 
positive, they can put them on a very intensive drug-testing program, 
and if they continue to flunk, they will either go to jail or some 
serious treatment facility. We need to stay on them. We do not do them 
a favor to act as if their drug problem does not exist and allow them 
to continue life as usual. We need to work on that very hard.
  Another matter that is extremely important is recordkeeping. For 
years, we have had in the National Crime Information Center the 
capacity to put every adult person's criminal history in our national 
computer system, so when they are arrested, a law officer can call up 
the National Crime Information Center from any police department in 
America, and, indeed, many police officers have today in their vehicles 
the capacity to tap into that system to find out if the person they 
just stopped out on the highway is a fugitive from justice for a 
serious offense. It is one of the most worthwhile, productive criminal 
justice innovations this Nation has ever implemented. It is not being 
done for juveniles.

  The greatest predictor of adult violence is a history of violence and 
crime as a youngster. We know that. That makes common sense. Yet, with 
regard to the young people who are being arrested, because of the 
secrecy laws around the country and an aversion for putting these 
records in the NCIC, the judges may not know about a history of 
violence and crime. They may know it if the offender committed a crime 
in their local community, but they will not know it if they committed 
it in another community.
  Additionally, in the case of a 24-year-old, for example, who the 
judge is about to sentence, that judge would need to know, in crafting 
an appropriate sentence, whether that offender standing before him had 
committed two armed robberies as a juvenile in a distant city. We have 
made a serious mistake over the years in not putting those records in 
the National Crime Information Center, and our bill will end that 
policy. I think it is something long overdue.
  I think it is appropriate for the Federal Government to provide 
training for State and local officials. It would be good to provide a 
national center, that no one State could afford to put together, to 
train probation officers who will be working with young offenders, to 
train sheriff deputies and police officers who will be working with 
young offenders, to train prosecutors who will be working with young 
offenders and, yes, provide the latest and finest training for juvenile 
judges so that they can be effective. I would love to see us establish 
training centers and scholarship programs so that virtually every young 
prosecutor, every new probation officer for juvenile offenders could 
have 1 week or 2 or 3 weeks in intensive training on what it means to 
have their job and how to best conduct themselves in it.
  We also need, and it is appropriate for the Federal Government who 
has all 50 States under its jurisdiction, to provide a research center 
to study what programs work and what programs don't work, to give 
authoritative data to local officials as they struggle to decide what 
to do about juvenile violence in their community.
  I sense, as I travel Alabama--and I know this is true nationally--
that people in local communities are very concerned about juvenile 
crime, and they want to develop programs to do something. They are 
willing to invest money in that. They are just not certain what to do.
  For example, a number of years ago, Congress developed a boot camp 
program in America. We had one of those in my hometown of Mobile. I was 
involved in helping to get it established. We had great expectations 
for it. The U.S. Department of Justice did an intensive study of the 
boot camps around and the studies produced, unfortunately, mixed 
results. The studies concluded that whereas many young offenders appear 
to be quite changed when they finish their short-term incarceration and 
intensive military-like discipline and really seem to be better, once 
they were released and went back into the community from which they 
came, they developed the same friends and same associates and the 
recidivist rates, the rearrest rates, did not change very much.
  So since then, boot camps, because of that study and others, have 
adopted an aftercare program where the graduates have to come back to 
the training center with their parents or parent and go through a 
counseling and intense monitoring program. This has helped expand the 
productivity of the boot camp system and has helped keep more of these 
people from going back into a life of crime.

[[Page S2166]]

  That is the kind of thing that is difficult for a State to do on its 
own. It is appropriate for the Federal Government to do that. That is 
not a Federal takeover of juvenile justice, but a Federal helping hand 
to give States the information that they need.
  So, Mr. President, I would just say that we are dealing with an issue 
of great national importance. I cannot tell you how delighted I am that 
the President, that the Department of Justice, that the Democratic 
leadership of this body and the Republican leadership of this body are 
united in being committed to developing a workable plan that will 
actually and realistically improve our ability to deal with this 
juvenile crime problem, because if we don't, it will get worse. And I 
am excited about our prospects.

  This proposal that I have outlined for you today will provide more 
jail space so that when young offenders violate their probation, so 
that when they commit crimes, they can be immediately incarcerated and 
disciplined by their judge. If the judge has no capacity to do that, 
then that judge is losing control of his courtroom; and the police 
officers who went out and made the arrest, their moral authority is 
undermined.
  We need drug testing to find out which ones of these young people are 
addicted to dangerous drugs which may be the accelerant to their 
criminal activity.
  We need better recordkeeping to identify serious dangerous offenders 
throughout this Nation as they move throughout this Nation.
  We need a training center to train local and State law enforcement.
  And we need a research center to identify the greatest and best ways 
to fight juvenile crime so that we can assist Federal and State 
activity in improving that effort.
  Mr. President, I am excited about the potential for doing something 
good for America, for making our streets safer. I must point out that 
in some areas of this country almost the leading, if not the leading, 
cause of death of young people is murder. That is a horrible thing to 
say, because it is not just the young people who are committing crimes, 
they are also the victims of young criminals. It is something we have 
to put an end to if we care about our country.
  It is a core function of government that we make our streets safe. 
This bill will help take us a long way toward that goal. I thank you, 
Mr. President.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Hutchinson). The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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