Immigration and Human Rights Law Review
The Blog
Immigration and Human Rights Law Review
The Blog
Human Rights Immigration Law

The Detention of Minors Is Not Proper Child Care: The Unnecessary Detainment of Dual System and Migrant Youth

by |Published

Abstract:

Children’s unique human rights hold global value and recognition; however, the United States’ juvenile detention practices continue to violate these rights. American detention centers hold children without need and biases and prejudices. Legal professionals have pushed for and continue calling on the United States to ratify the Convention on the Rights of the Child (“CRC”). Populations that experience the systemic displacement of parental figures and familial stability fall vulnerable to unnecessary detention. Dual system youth as well as migrant children endure detention at higher rates than the general population and experience other various hardships related to their statuses. True alternatives to detention in conjunction with the United States ratifying the CRC must be satisfied to address the issue of unnecessary childhood detention. This paper will address the evolving outlooks on the juvenile justice system and the practice of detaining minors, as well as an examination of the experiences of dual system and migrant youths in child detention. Solutions will also be proposed for limiting the detainment of children in the United States using true alternatives to detention. After the dissolution or separation of a family, the children’s care must not fall on detention centers.

The Detention of Minors Is Not Proper Child Care: The Unnecessary Detainment of Dual System and Migrant Youth

Gianna Valentic, Associate Member, Immigration and Human Rights Law Review

Introduction

Imprisoning and detaining children unnecessarily is a human rights violation. Unnecessary detention of a minor, in any capacity, strays from the goals of ensuring they attend their court hearing and protecting the public from harm the child would cause.[1] Incarcerated or detained children often do not receive proper education or health services and face a greater risk of abuse and maltreatment.[2] Researchers have studied and recorded the negative impacts of youth detention for at least forty years.[3] Moreover, America is the only United Nations member that has not ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child (“CRC”).[4] Article 37 of the CRC states that “[n]o child shall be subjected to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. Neither capital punishment nor life imprisonment without possibility of release shall be imposed for offences committed by persons below eighteen years of age.”[5] Because America also remains the only country that imposes sentences of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole on minors, this country’s treatment of children’s rights evidently goes against international standards.[6]

Children can become detained through the juvenile justice system or through the immigration control system.[7] The paths into and the circumstances around these two forms of detention vary greatly. Removal or separation of parental units by American systems–such as child welfare and immigration control systems–results in the care of the child or children needing to fall elsewhere.[8] Detaining children either in immigration or juvenile justice system detention centers does not constitute an adequate childcare solution.

Systemic interference on parental authority and family support can have long-lasting negative impacts on individuals even into their adulthood.[9] For children, a lack of family structure and stability may lead to juvenile delinquency.[10] While many find “delinquency” difficult to define, professionals generally understand it to describe juveniles’ acts, such as assault, theft, or truancy, that could trigger juvenile court action.[11] Studies reveal that children coming from disrupted or separated homes are more likely to exhibit delinquent behavior.[12] Thus, children with family structures weakened or destroyed by other American systems experience a heightened risk of entering the juvenile justice system.[13]

Additionally, parental deportation or detention produce detrimental effects on children’s well-being.[14] Strong familial and community-based roots hold essential spaces in the growth of children in society.[15] When systems remove these roots, detention should not be the solution to issues surrounding otherwise manageable behavior problems or general childcare and welfare.

This paper will address the evolving outlooks on juvenile justice as a whole and the practice of detaining minors. Additionally, this article will examine the experiences of the dual system and migrant youths in child detention to cast light on two populations often subject to unnecessary detention. Lastly, solutions will be proposed for limiting the detainment of children in the United States using true alternatives to detention.

Background

  1. Recognition of Children’s Unique Rights in the Juvenile Justice System

Throughout its history, the American juvenile justice system has transformed into a near replication of the adult criminal legal system riddled with mass incarceration practices and disproportionately affecting the lower class and people of color.[16] When the juvenile justice system first began to take shape in the nineteenth century, rehabilitation was the primary focus.[17] However, as the nation’s “tough on crime” perspective started to change the criminal legal system’s landscape, the juvenile justice system changed with it.[18] When this “tough on crime” philosophy began taking shape, lawmakers introduced mandatory incarceration laws and reintroduced capital punishment.[19] These actions rapidly increased the incarcerated population leading to worsened prison conditions and limited resources.[20] In more recent years, advocacy groups and state legislators often continue to debate whether the criminal legal system, including and especially the juvenile system, should maintain its focus on punishment and deterrence, or circle back to its original intention–to be rehabilitative and individualized.[21]

Case law heading in the direction of recognizing the unique rights of children has increased within the last nearly twenty years.[22] In 2005, the Supreme Court held in Roper v. Simmons that sentencing a person to death for a crime committed while they were under the age of eighteen years old is unconstitutional.[23] The defendant, Roper, was convicted of a murder that he committed at seventeen years of age and was then sentenced to death at eighteen years old.[24] In deciding this case, the Court relied on a national consensus against sentencing children to death in its analysis of whether the practice violates the Eighth Amendment.[25] The Eighth Amendment protects people from cruel and unusual punishments.[26] The Court in Roper noted the differences in sense of responsibility, character development, and impulsivity in children and adults as reasons for supporting their conclusion that state execution of children violates the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments of the Constitution.[27] Although this ruling transferred the sentences of over seventy individuals from death row to life imprisonment, some people doubt the rationality of a bright-line cut-off at eighteen years old.[28] Thus, this case has led to discourse surrounding the abolition of the death penalty altogether and has evolved the analysis of Eighth Amendment jurisprudence.[29]

Five years later in 2010, the United States Supreme Court in Graham v. Florida held that children not convicted of homicide must not receive the sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.[30] Graham, however, contains an exception for minors convicted of murder that still allows for some children to endure imprisonment for the remainder of their lives.[31] The Court in Graham again used an “objective indica of national consensus” and identified the CRC as guidance in its decision.[32] Factors contributing to this consensus included the barring of this sentence for non-homicidal crimes in six jurisdictions, the actual sentencing practices of jurisdictions that did permit the sentence, and international principles and standards.[33]

Using the same “evolving standards for decency” analysis that the Court used in Roper and Graham, legal child rights advocates argue that life in prison without the possibility of parole imposed against juveniles violates the Eighth Amendment, regardless of the crime of which they are convicted.[34] Legal scholars have argued that the lower level of culpability for children, which was the reasoning used to rule against the constitutionality of life without parole sentences for children charged with non-homicidal offenses, should apply equally for charges of homicide.[35] Individuals have also used the cruel and unusual punishment clause of the Eighth Amendment to push for the abolition of immigrant family detention and the solitary confinement of minors.[36] Legal scholars and court actors may use this analysis used by the Court to someday eliminate the unnecessary use of detention on minors.

2. Use of Detention Centers

Despite the recognition of children’s unique rights, American systems still use detention centers to detain minors at alarmingly high rates.[37] Article 37(b) of the CRC states that the deprivation of a child’s liberty by detention should only come as a “last resort.”[38] Alternatives to detention that judicial actors should explore prior to making the ultimate decision to detain a child may include counseling programs, educational or vocational institutions, probation, or other forms of judicial supervision.[39] Detention centers across America seem to disregard this internationally accepted idea that the practice of detaining children should only occur in the most necessary of circumstances.[40] Every day, juvenile justice system detention centers hold over 26,000 children, with roughly seventy percent being locked up for nonviolent offenses.[41] Residential placements vary greatly in their purposes, goals, and structures, but they all typically separate children from their families and homes to achieve desired outcomes.[42] Nearly a third of children detained in residential placements endure pre-adjudication detention, and many have not committed a crime at all.[43] Further, because the constitutionally guaranteed right of possible release on bail does not extend to children in juvenile court delinquency proceedings, bail may not exist as an option for many minors.[44]

Additionally, detention centers at the United States borders hold tens of thousands of migrant children every year.[45] Pediatric professionals have deemed the conditions of these detention centers as unfit for addressing children’s basic needs including medical care and access to proper food and water.[46] Migrant children experience detention in these conditions for over a month on average.[47] These practices of child detention are unnecessary and violate the human rights of these harmed youths.

The practice of holding minors in detention centers while they await adjudication is generally thought to reduce recidivism as states or counties keep children in custody until a hearing takes place.[48] This understanding of detention, however, far deviates from reality.[49] Creating physical and emotional distance between a child and their families and communities to congregate them with other delinquent youths produces a recipe for recidivism and aggravation.[50] In fact, studies have shown that a child’s prior detention or incarceration was a much greater predictor of recidivism than gang membership or having and carrying a weapon.[51] Studies have shown that community and family-based interventions, such as day or evening reporting centers or group homes, successfully rehabilitate children and decrease recidivism rates in minors.[52] Community and family involvement, especially when working in tandem, has shown to reduce delinquency.[53]

Systems, such as the immigration and child welfare systems, with power over parental authority and familial stability place children at heightened risks for negative outcomes.[54] Children whose family structures have suffered disruption at the hands of the child welfare system or immigration enforcement often experience mental health challenges, decreased quality of education, consequences to their social networks, and other harms to their wellbeing.[55] Immigration enforcement branches destroy family systems by deporting or detaining parents of dependent, U.S.-citizen children as well as keeping migrant children apart from their parents.[56] The child welfare system removes children from their families in an often racist, classist manner that may sometimes do more harm to the child’s overall well-being than good.[57] Both of these groups of children often do not receive adequate resources and education after being separated from their parental units.[58] These youths deserve the attention of legal professionals, as well as other individuals and systems working with children, to address the issues that arise due to family separation.

Discussion

  1. Dual System Youth

While childhood detention creates broadly negative effects on youths, some populations experience multiple system interactions that elicit additional barriers.[59] In recent years, experts have revealed distinct challenges of a unique population of children referred to as “dual system youth.”[60] Dual system youth constitute children who have come in contact with the child welfare system and the juvenile justice system.[61] Dual system youth also often belong to a broad group of children known as “crossover youth,” described as children who have experienced childhood maltreatment and engage in delinquent acts.[62] Studies have shown that half or more than half of children in the juvenile justice system may also have had, or will have, experience with the child welfare system.[63] Dual system youth also experience unique challenges within each system including a lack of access to proper health and social services and instability in housing or custody.[64]

Children end up in a dual system situation in a variety of different ways.[65] Most dual system youth first become involved with the welfare system before later getting swept into the juvenile justice system.[66] Because maltreatment and trauma may predicate delinquency, children who have had experiences of abuse or neglect prior to or because of the child welfare system may be more likely to commit delinquent acts and end up in the juvenile justice system.[67] This trajectory becomes important to consider when exploring the roles of each system on dual system youth.[68] Overall, dual system youth experience a major lack of resources and services due to their involvement in systems that rarely collaborate.[69]

Many children in the child welfare system enter the juvenile justice system not from committing violent crimes, but from committing status offenses.[70] Status offenses constitute a particular type of offense that may detain children experiencing familial instability.[71] Otherwise noncriminal acts, status offenses only violate the law because of the offender’s age being under eighteen years old.[72] This includes acts such as curfew violations, truancy, and drinking alcohol.[73] Various circumstances in the home involving lack of permanency or parental absence may help explain behavior such as skipping school or running away.[74] Children and teenagers in the child welfare system run away from their foster or group home placements at high rates.[75] Some children recounted running away to spend time with friends or to “feel normal.”[76] Additionally, abuse or maltreatment can often lead youths to run away from their homes or environments.[77]

The National Standards for the Care of Youth Charged with Status Offenses (“Standards”) provides recommendations for avoiding and limiting the courts’ involvement with these matters in any capacity.[78] Of these suggestions, solutions addressing the status offenders’ unmet needs and tackling domestic issues within the family should take priority.[79] Importantly, the Standards highlight the ineffective and dangerous nature of detention for youth status offenders.[80]

Regardless of the reason behind a child’s involvement in the juvenile justice system, a disconnect exists between juvenile court actors and individuals working directly with the children in the child welfare system.[81] Many jurisdictions rely on self-reporting from youths or families to flag child welfare system involvement.[82] This practice often results in incomplete or unreliable narratives of the children’s reality.[83] Additionally, judicial actors may not know the identity of children’s legal guardian or their current living arrangements, possibly leading to the use of prolonged detention.[84] Judges lack of knowledge of these children’s situations results in orders and outcomes not suitable for the children’s overall wellbeing.[85] The lack of collaboration between actors in both systems leads directly to a waste of resources, duplicated case management efforts, and increased detention of minors.[86]

In addition to a general disconnect between systems, juvenile court actors may not understand developmentally appropriate punishment or surveillance tactics for children in child welfare custody. For example, the court in In re Darren H. held that a child welfare agency did not do enough to keep a juvenile from running away from his placement.[87] The court validated a court order which expressed “appropriate” measures to keep a child from running away from their placement, including physically restraining them, locking them into rooms, or hiring security guards.[88] The court also condemned the agency for not following this order.[89] In its reasoning for upholding the court order, the court in this case held that the agency failed to abide by the court order, as the above-mentioned steps were reasonable to stop the juvenile from leaving the premises of his group home placement.[90] In addition to the discussion on the court order itself, the court in this case discussed the “acting-out behavior” and suicidal ideation of the juvenile as cause for such harsh restrictions on his whereabouts.[91]

Traumatic experiences similar to those described in In re Darren H. often lead to children in the child welfare system to have higher rates of mental health and behavioral issues.[92] Moreover, children involved in public mental health programs are more likely to undergo referrals to the juvenile justice system for minor charges, and with harsher punishments, than the general population.[93] Children detained in the juvenile justice system employ more violent means of suicide attempts than means used by nonincarcerated juveniles.[94] Further, in a U.S. House of Representatives lead report, fifty-four percent of responding juvenile detention facilities reported that its staff received poor, very poor, or no mental health training at all.[95] Potentially as a partial result of the inadequacy of detention centers’ mental health services, the suicide rate for incarcerated youths exceeds the overall youth’s suicide rate by over four times.[96] Further, many detention facilities admitted to holding children who only required mental health treatment and not detainment, due to a reported lack of another option.[97] The inadequacy of mental health services within the juvenile justice system and lack of collaboration with outside services leads to a disturbingly large number of unnecessary detentions.

Regardless of their mental health status, children in the child welfare system tend to experience juvenile justice detention more often and for longer periods of time than children not involved with the child welfare system.[98] In some counties, the detention rate of dual system youth prior to adjudication in the juvenile justice system is nearly double that of children not involved in the child welfare system.[99] Additionally, children involved with both systems are more likely to receive correctional or residential placements than in-home probation from the juvenile justice system.[100] Residential placements involve removing children from their homes to relocate them to either publicly or privately operated facilities.[101] These more restrictive sanctions for child offenders reduce recidivism and address mental health and safety issues much less effectively than probation or community programs.[102] Judges have actually admitted to perceiving children in foster care as less stable and requiring detention over those children who attend court with a parent willing and able to support their efforts to avoid recidivism.[103]

The lack of traditional familial structure for children in the child welfare system could lead juvenile judges to choose detention centers over probation sanctions for these children.[104] Despite this, juvenile courts should maintain programs that do not default to detaining youth.[105] Alternative strategies to detention include the juvenile courts working closely with families and varied professionals to ensure a productive home environment when available or working to build various community programs to reduce recidivism while maintaining children’s support systems.[106] Combining funding and service delivery among courts, medical and mental health providers, and child welfare services has proven to be effective in several jurisdictions across the country.[107]

Jurisdictions across the country have implemented a collaborative solution produced by experts and professionals in 2010 to address dual system youth.[108] Created out of Georgetown University’s Center for Juvenile Justice Reform, the Crossover Youth Practice Model (CYPM) aims to reduce the overall number of dual system youth, the use of congregate and out-of-home care, and disproportionalities for children of color in both the child welfare and juvenile justice systems through a collaborative approach.[109] This practice model emphasizes the need for system collaboration to better the outcomes for dual system youth.[110]

The CYPM encourages juvenile court judges and attorneys to work as active team members alongside child welfare workers, educators, mental health professionals, and law enforcement personnel to create individualized plans for services and placements that focus on family engagement.[111] While the CYPM presents an ambitious and heavily involved solution, it has proved to reduce recidivism in dual system youth.[112] Dual system youth who participated in the CYPM treatment services experienced adjudication for additional, subsequent crimes at lower rates than dual system youths not involved in the CYPM.[113] Either a lower number of reoffending youth or an increase in social service referrals rather than juvenile justice system involvement could contribute to reduced recidivism after the implementation of the CYPM.[114] The collaborative strategies of the CYPM provide a starting point for all solutions involving dual system youth.[115] Because juvenile judges and attorneys often only interact with the children on their docket for short amounts of time and within the courthouse, collaboration with their social workers and case managers would promote a more holistic intervention.[116]

Instability often riddles children’s lives within the child welfare system.[117] Their environments typically do not aid in their ability to thrive.[118] Even still, when introduced to the juvenile justice system, children in the child welfare system often experience bias and barriers stacked against them.[119] To lessen and avoid the overrepresentation of dual system youth in detention centers, juvenile courts and attorneys should collaborate with the child welfare system and other services to better serve these children who walk through the courtroom doors with the programs and interventions that would truly work to lower recidivism.

2. Immigration

In addition to dual system youth, migrant children face detention in unique and harmful capacities.[120] The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (“UNHCR”) declares that children should not endure detention under any circumstances relating to their migration status.[121] The UNHCR based this position on research and evidence showing the harms that children experience from any amount of detention, no matter the conditions.[122] Additionally, this position directly aligns with international standards as described in the CRC.[123] Any detention of children based on their immigration status ignores the UNHCR’s position, yet the United States engages in this practice at alarming and deplorable rates.[124]

Migrant children and children born to immigrant parents face unique and severe challenges with and within the American legal system.[125] Interactions with the juvenile justice system pose serious dangers for children who themselves are undocumented or have one or more parents or family members who are undocumented.[126] Undocumented children and families run the all too real risk of deportation due to any encounters with the legal system.[127] Legal professionals and those involved in the juvenile justice system must examine the experiences of migrant children and children born to immigrant parents to ensure better outcomes for these youths.

The process of migrant youth detention typically involves several different systems and facilities.[128] Agency officials from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (“CBP”) typically apprehend and detain migrant children upon their crossing the U.S. border.[129] The children do not experience detainment on suspicion of committing a crime but rather for simply trying to obtain safety.[130] Accompanied and unaccompanied minors may be eligible for asylum, but these proceedings require a proper application and interview for consideration.[131] Following apprehension at the border, migrant children face temporary detention in CBP facilities while waiting to find out if they qualify as unaccompanied children.[132] Immigration systems define unaccompanied minors as migrant youths without lawful status in the United States, under eighteen years of age, who do not have a parent or guardian present.[133] If not immediately deported or transferred to a parent or guardian, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) will send children to the Office of Refugee Resettlement (“ORR”), an agency under the Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”).[134] The HHS holds the responsibility for the placement and care of migrant children while they wait for judges to hear their cases.[135] The ORR can detain children in circumstances qualifying an “emergency,” including a general influx of individuals migrating to the U.S., despite being required by a national settlement to place migrant children in the least restrictive environment as soon as possible.[136]

Following the detention of a minor, the Code of Federal Regulations (“CFR”) lists, in order of preference, three options for immigrant children to be released: to a parent, a legal guardian, or an adult family member barring that the caretaker is not also detained.[137] In the event that the child’s caretakers are also detained or not in the United States, judicial and immigration service actors may make arrangements on a discretionary basis to simultaneously release the parent or guardian and the child. Alternatively, the child may be released to an out-of-country caretaker if they ensure the child’s attendance in court.[138] However, this CFR Section includes no mention of alternative care options.[139] When a child does not have any of these listed options available to them, ORR must arrange the least restrictive, developmentally appropriate placement option for them.[140]

While the majority of immigrant youths experience detention due to their immigration status, racial profiling leads to disproportionate detainment of immigrant children as well.[141] Law enforcement officials too often profile and stereotype youths of color broadly but specifically immigrant children.[142] In a New York county, law enforcement and ICE created Operation Matador in 2017 to tackle an over-emphasized gang issue.[143] The operation uses allegations of gang activity to target and arrest immigrant youths.[144] These allegations could consist of minute pieces of evidence including drawings, articles of clothing, or tattoos.[145] School staff were among the people who brought forth these allegations, extending this operation beyond police and ICE.[146] Even once law enforcement proves the allegations of gang involvement false, a brief detention stay introduces minors to the American legal system and the harms that come with it.[147]

In addition to detention based on immigration status or profiling, actors in the juvenile justice system have revealed that the intersection between delinquency and immigration status presents itself often.[148] In one study, around ninety-five percent of juvenile justice system attorneys and judges reported experiencing at least one case where a party’s immigration status was pertinent to their proceedings.[149] The intersection between the juvenile justice system and immigration status presents differently in each generation.[150] First-generation immigrants have a lower rate of delinquent behaviors than their native-born peers.[151] However, the children and grandchildren of immigrants are much more likely than their first-generation immigrant relatives to engage in delinquent behaviors.[152] Strong family and parental control may generate the lower rate of delinquency among immigrants across generations.[153] Knowing this, the removal of second-generation immigrants’ parents through deportation or detention puts their children at a greater risk for engaging in delinquent behavior, leaving them vulnerable to becoming involved with the juvenile justice system.[154]

Beyond general concerns with child detention and the juvenile justice system as a whole, immigrant children who come in contact with the criminal system through delinquency face unique danger.[155] For children seeking legal status, encounters with the juvenile justice system can hinder their abilities to obtain that status.[156] A real risk for deportation exists for undocumented children who enter the juvenile justice system.[157] As of 2017, law enforcement personnel are expected to act in the expansion of immigration control.[158] Thus, any experience with the juvenile justice system may expose immigrant minors to being reported to ICE.[159] Once ICE becomes aware of an undocumented child within the juvenile justice system, the child becomes vulnerable to detention in ICE’s custody with potential for deportation.[160] Many jurisdictions have enacted laws that protect these children’s confidentiality and status.[161] Similar laws should exist everywhere to eliminate any reporting to ICE and the subsequent consequences that undocumented children may face.[162]

In light of the issues surrounding immigrant youths in the juvenile justice system, some undocumented children qualify for the protection of the juvenile justice system via acquiring Special Immigrant Juvenile Status (“SIJS”).[163] This status allows children who suffered abuse or neglect by a parent or both parents to apply for legal permanent residence in the United States.[164] To be eligible for SIJS, a court must find that a child returning to their country of origin would likely result in further abuse or neglect.[165] While this status provides protection to those who are eligible, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) must review and rule on the requirements involved in SIJS.[166] This process may take months or even years to complete as the USCIS does not have mandated timeliness requirements for adjusting statuses.[167] The SIJS proceedings do not end minors’ involvement with immigration proceedings but rather start their involvement in a different way.[168] The federal statute’s lack of clarity on what constitutes abuse or neglect produces jurisdictional variability which leads to inconsistent results for similarly situated children.[169] The SIJS provides protection for qualified immigrant children, but the proceedings’ timely and narrow requirements are flawed and should be clarified and broadened to protect more vulnerable children.[170]

Apart from legal protections, additional regulations exist to protect immigrant youths in American immigration systems. The Supreme Court’s ruling in Flores v. Reno and the subsequent Flores Agreement became a step in the right direction for the rights and liberty of migrant children.[171] The 1992 case Reno v. Flores involved a class action lawsuit brought by minors detained by the Immigration and Naturalization System (“INS”) against the then Attorney General, Janet Reno.[172] The class action lawsuit challenged the INS’s practices and conditions in which migrant minors were detained.[173] Although INS’s overall practices of detaining children were upheld by the Court, a Settlement Agreement full of mandatory policies resulted.[174]

Article IV of the Flores Settlement Agreement states that children detained by the INS must receive the least restrictive, developmentally appropriate placement, “provided that such setting is consistent with its interests to ensure the minor’s timely appearance before the INS and the immigration courts and to protect the minor’s well-being and that of others.”[175] The Agreement also directs INS to release detained minors “without unnecessary delay,” which courts in recent years determined to mean less than twenty days.[176] Under Flores, INS must release detained children in less than three weeks; however, this same standard does not apply to adults.[177] Thus, children are being released while their parents and adult relatives remain in detention.[178]

The Flores Agreement establishes a productive start to limiting migrant child detention, but the United States can and should do much more to completely eradicate the practice of detaining innocent minors. Despite the requirements and obligations set out in the Agreement, the INS continues to engage in detention practices that violate the Agreement.[179] Children have suffered abuse, irreparable harm, and lost their lives in the “care” of ICE and CBP.[180] The immigration enforcement systems have proven their lack of care and consideration of children’s rights in the deplorable manner in which they treat the minors under their supervision, despite the Flores Agreement in effect.[181] Because the Flores Agreement as it stands no longer protects children at the United States border, the United States Congress should codify the Agreement. Making the Agreement law would eliminate the judicial variance in the interpretation of the Agreement and better secure the rights of migrant children and families.[182]

In its own attempt to lessen child detention, ICE attempted its version of an alternative to detention for immigrant families.[183] In 2016, ICE, along with the primary implementing contractor GEO Care, implemented the Family Case Management Program (“FCMP”).[184] The FCMP used case management, rather than detention or harsh surveillance, to achieve the objective of migrant detention: ensure compliance with immigration proceedings.[185] The case management strategy focused on a hierarchy of basic needs using community resources and support to ensure that the children and families involved returned to court when their cases were being heard.[186] While ICE contracted this program for five years, it abruptly terminated it after only a year and a half for reasons not explained to the public.[187] However, during the short time the FCMP was implemented, the model successfully supported families in finding stability in their communities while ensuring compliance with their immigration requirements.[188]

3. Proposed solutions

Certain populations of children, such as dual system and migrant youth, endure more vulnerability to excessive and inappropriate detention practices in America.[189] When considering the possible solutions to ending the unnecessary detainment of children, a “one size fits all” approach does not necessarily exist. As laid out in this article, the ways that children become detained vary, and the systems responsible for their detention differ.[190] With these differences in mind, some overlapping and overarching solutions can be explored.

Many families’ situations across the country involve both the child welfare system and immigration enforcement.[191] The unique population of children affected by this intersection face two systems that destroy their family units and leave them extremely vulnerable to detention and the juvenile justice system.[192] In cases where child welfare services remove a child from a home due to domestic violence, they will often become the responsibility of the child welfare system.[193] However, if the parent or parents subsequently become involved with immigration enforcement systems or get deported, the child welfare and immigration systems’ typical goal of reunification often becomes obsolete.[194] Instead, children of immigrant parents often lose their native language, suffer separation from their parents and other relatives, and remain in the child welfare system.[195] As previous discussion revealed, being a child in this system with little to no familial relations or resources leaves these children in a uniquely disadvantaged place in terms of their ability to remain grounded and supported.[196] The child welfare systems should develop more inclusive standards to protect immigrant children and have specialized departments to directly address these children’s unique situations.[197] The unique position of immigrant children in the child welfare system deserves the attention of all the systems that come into contact with them.

Ratification of the CRC would help to hold America to the same standards as the rest of the world in regard to how this country treats children as well as show general support to the unique rights of all children.[198] The United States has not ratified the CRC on the basis that the Convention would challenge its sovereignty.[199] Congress’s opinions of the CRC have remained varied, but its reservations continue to prevail and hinder movement toward United States ratification.[200] However, more positive consideration regarding the CRC may exist if an emphasis is made on the Reservations, Understandings, and Declarations (RUDs) that can be made to modify the country’s obligations to the treaty.[201] Attached to international treaties, RUDs allow for a ratifying state to limit, clarify, or modify treaty provisions.[202] This avenue of implementing RUDs to the ratification of the CRC would allow the United States to address Congress’s concerns while still acknowledging children’s rights and holding itself to these international standards.[203]

Further, senators and government officials have argued that the CRC would undermine the parental authority in American families.[204] How does this come into play when another system has already undermined or completely removed parental authority over a child? As seen in the examples examined in this article, systems, such as the child welfare system and immigration enforcement, remove and separate children from their parents, too often leading them to become children of the State.[205] The United States deprives children of their fundamental right to liberty by being detained against experts’ guidance of child well-being.[206] When American systems rip child’s parental figures from them, additional legislation and protocols are necessary to protect them. The United States must ratify the CRC and comply with its standards to protect the unique liberties of children.

Ratifying the CRC may start a chain of changes that the United States government can make to ensure the protection of the rights of children. However, its actions must not stop there. Children must not experience unnecessary detention, for any amount of time, and detention as a default to childcare requires abolition. After the dissolution or separation of a family, the children’s care must not fall on detention centers. System collaboration and an increase in funding to the child welfare system would help to guarantee the best interest of children. The unique population of children whose families and supports have been torn from them by various American systems deserve more than falling into another system that will fail them.

Juvenile detention pre-adjudication should only occur as a means of last resort.[207] This means that juvenile justice personnel have considered all other possible options, and no other setting is available.[208] A child’s parental home often stands as the most favorable placement for a child awaiting adjudication.[209] This then becomes an issue for children who do not have a parental home to which they can return. As described in this article, children in both the child welfare system and the juvenile justice system typically receive more restrictive and less rehabilitative placements than their peers not involved in the child welfare system.[210]

Similarly, migrant children and children of immigrant parents often encounter detention, rather than developmentally appropriate housing awaiting adjudication in their immigration proceedings.[211] To avoid detention pre-adjudication within the juvenile justice and immigration enforcement systems, the child welfare system and INS must make less restrictive options available for children needing housing while awaiting their court hearings.[212] Better equipping the child welfare system with resources and funding would help ensure that options remain available to children in this situation.[213] Providing for stronger connections to services and an overall increase in housing options would decrease the number of children being held in detention centers before adjudication.[214]

True alternatives to detention remain the most effective way to eliminate or reduce the use of juvenile detention.[215] Because the route to child detention differs through different systems, alternatives may differ. For children in the juvenile justice system, these alternatives include probation, community programs, or less restrictive facilities that allow overnight stays in their homes.[216] For migrant children, an alternative to detention includes community-centered housing that allows for interaction with others and fosters community support.[217] These alternatives should ensure that children continue receiving proper education and have access to ample resources.[218]

Conclusion

The punitive nature of the juvenile justice system and the general practice of unnecessarily detaining children constitute human rights violations. The vulnerable position of children requires special attention and unique rights outlined by the CRC.[219] Children deserve opportunities to thrive in society and become upstanding members of it. Instead, however, the systems in place to protect children’s liberty resort to detention far too often.[220] Those children with parental and familial support systems seized from them by an American system, the supports thought of as the backbone of a minor’s life, deserve broad systemic support to succeed.

Protecting children’s liberty requires a multi-system, collaboration initiative.[221] The United States must first ratify the CRC to hold itself more accountable for respecting the rights of children. After ratification, the United States government must rigorously enforce and implement the standards set out by the CRC. Additionally, the systems and departments responsible for the well-being of children under their respective demographics should proactively implement program models proven to benefit children and keep them from detention. Finally, in order to properly implement the programs described above, these systems need to receive better funding and resources to serve children more wholly and adequately. Children deserve the opportunity to thrive without the threat of unnecessary detention hindering their freedom.

  1. Bart Lubow & Joseph B. Tulman, The Unnecessary Detention of Children in the District of Columbia, 3 D.C. L. Rev. [xi], [xi] (1995). ↑
  2. Barry Holman & Jason Ziedenberg, Just. Pol’y Inst., The Dangers of Detention: The Impact of Incarcerating Youth in Detention and Other Secure Facilities 2 (2006). ↑
  3. A. Leigh Lucart, Juvenile Detention: An Inquiry Into Its Personal Dimensions (1983) (Ph.D. dissertation, Saybrook University) (on file with author). ↑
  4. UN Treaty Body Database, https://tbinternet.ohchr.org/_layouts/15/TreatyBodyExternal/Treaty.aspx?Treaty=CRC&Lang=en (last visited Nov. 5, 2022). ↑
  5. Convention on the Rights of the Child art. 37, Nov. 20, 1989. ↑
  6. Ashley Nellis, The Sent’g Project, Life Goes On: The Historic Rise in Life Sentences in America 11 (2013). ↑
  7. Sherwood Norman, Detention Intake, 1952 Y.B. 140, 140 (1952); Emily Ryo & Reed Humphrey, Children in Custody: A Study of Detained Migrant Children in the United States, 68 UCLA L. Rev. 136, 145 (2021). ↑
  8. Kalina M. Brabeck, et al., The Psychosocial Impact of Detention and Deportation on U.S. Migrant Children and Families, 84 Am. J. of Orthopsychiatry 496, 501 (2014). ↑
  9. Timothy J. Biblarz & Adrian E. Raftery, The Effects of Family Disruption on Social Mobility, 58 Am. Socio. Rev. 97, 107 (1993). ↑
  10. Crystal L. Murry et al., Juvenile Delinquency and Family Structure: Links to Severity and Frequency of Offending, The Univ. of Ala. McNair J. 87, 87 (2006). ↑
  11. Arnold binder, et al., Juvenile Delinquency: Historical, Cultural & Legal Perspectives 3 (3d ed. 2001). ↑
  12. Eugene M. Bushong, Family Estrangement and Juvenile Delinquency, 5 Soc. F. 79, 81 (1926). ↑
  13. Murry, supra note 10. ↑
  14. Lisseth Rojas-Flores et al., Trauma and Psychological Distress in Latino Citizen Children Following Parental Detention and Deportation, 9 Psych. Trauma: Theory, Rsch., Prac., and Pol’y 352, 358 (2017). ↑
  15. Kristin Anderson Moore et al., What Are Good Child Outcomes? 28 (Jan. 14, 1998). ↑
  16. Lori Guevara et al., Race, Legal Representation, and Juvenile Justice: Issues and Concerns, 50 Crime & Delinq. 344, 348-349 (2004). ↑
  17. National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, Juvenile Crime, Juvenile Justice 154-155 (Joan McCord, et al. eds., 2001). ↑
  18. Id. ↑
  19. Frances T. Cullen, et al., Explaining the Get Tough Movement: Can the Public be Blamed, 49 Fed. Probation 16, 16 (1985). ↑
  20. Id. ↑
  21. National Research Council and Institute of Medicine ↑
  22. Peter J. Benekos & Alida V. Merlo, A Decade of Change: Roper v. Simmons, Defending Childhood, and Juvenile Justice Policy, 30 Crim. Just. Pol’y Rev. 102, 104 (2016). ↑
  23. 543 U.S. 551, 575 (2005). ↑
  24. Id. at 556. ↑
  25. Id. at 567. ↑
  26. Michael Barbee, Juveniles are Different: Juvenile Life without Parole after Graham v. Florida, 81 Miss. L. J. 299, 302 (2011). ↑
  27. Id. at 575. ↑
  28. Janine D. Garlitz, Abolition of the Juvenile Death Penalty in Roper v. Simmons, 30 Nova L. Rev. 473, 505 (2006). ↑
  29. Id. at 478, 505. ↑
  30. Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48, 79 (2010). ↑
  31. Id. at 69. ↑
  32. Id. at 62. ↑
  33. Id. at 62, 80. ↑
  34. Barbee, supra note 26 at 313. ↑
  35. Id. ↑
  36. Daniel Hatoum, Abolition of Immigrant Family Detention: Tracing an Evolving Standard of Decency from Separation through Imprisonment, 47 Hofstra L. Rev. 1229, 1231 (2019); Brittany A. Puckett, Solitary Confinement of Juveniles and Our Evolving Standards of Decency: A Look at Recent Action Taken by the Court, Congress, the President, and the States, 38 U. La Verne L. Rev. 63, 79 (2016). ↑
  37. Michael Bochenek, Children Behind Bars: The Global Overuse of Detention of Children, in Human Rights Watch, World Report 2016 (2016). ↑
  38. Convention, supra note 5. ↑
  39. Israel de Jesus Butler, The Right of the Child in the Case Law of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights: Recent Cases, 5 Human Rts. L. Rev. 151, 151 (2005). ↑
  40. Bochenek, supra note 37. ↑
  41. Holman & Ziedenberg, supra note 2, at 2. ↑
  42. Dev. Services Grp., Inc., Juvenile Residential Programs 5 (2019). ↑
  43. Anthony Petrosino et al., Alternatives to Youth Incarceration, in Handbook of Issues in Criminal Justice Reform in the United States 685, 687 (Elizabeth Jeglic & Cynthia Calkins eds., 2022). ↑
  44. Lylian Pagan, Delinquency: The Case for the Right to Juvenile Bail in the United States, The Diplomatic Envoy (January 1, 2022) https://perma.cc/4SZ4-TCU9. ↑
  45. Amelia Cheatham & Diana Roy, U.S. Detention of Child Migrants, Council on Foreign Relations: Backgrounder (Dec. 2, 2021) https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/us-detention-child-migrants. ↑
  46. Brendan Lokka, Trump’s Torture Legacy: Isolating, Incarcerating, and Inflicting Harm upon Migrant Children, 35 Am. U. Int’l. L. Rev. 169 (2019). ↑
  47. Cheatham & Roy, supra note 45. ↑
  48. Holman & Ziedenberg, supra note 2, at 2. ↑
  49. Id. at 4-5. ↑
  50. Id. ↑
  51. Id. at 4. ↑
  52. Id. at 6; Petrosino, supra note 43, at 692-94. ↑
  53. Kimberly Flash, Treatment Strategies for Juvenile Delinquency: Alternative Solutions, 20 Child & Adolescent Soc. Work J. 509, 522 (2003). ↑
  54. Rita Manning, Punishing the Innocent: Children of Incarcerated and Detained Parents, 30 Crim. Just. Ethics 267, 273 (2011). ↑
  55. Luis H. Zayas, et al., The Distress of Citizen-Children with Detained and Deported Parents, 24 J. of Child and Fam. Stud. 3213, 3214-15 (2015). ↑
  56. Id. at 3214. ↑
  57. Beth A. Mandel, The White Fist of the Child Welfare System: Racism, Patriarchy, and the Presumptive Removal of Children from Victims of Domestic Violence in Nicholson v. Williams, 73 U. Cin. L. Rev. 1131, 1149 (2005). ↑
  58. Susan Stone et al., Educational Services for Children in Foster Care, 1 J. of Public Child Welfare 53, 63 (2006); S. Megan Berthold & Kathryn Libal, Migrant Children’s Rights to Health and Rehabilitation: A Primer for US Social Workers, 1 J. Hum. Rights Soc. Work 85, 88 (2016). ↑
  59. Lauren Ashley Morgan, “Dual Jurisdiction? It Doesn’t Work Like That.” Practitioner Decision-Making at the Juvenile Justice and Child Welfare Nexus, 143 Child. & Youth Services Rev. 1, 1 (2022). ↑
  60. Barbara Tatem Kelley & Paul A. Haskins, Dual System Youth: At the Intersection of Child Maltreatment and Delinquency 2 (2021). ↑
  61. Id. ↑
  62. Id. ↑
  63. Morgan, supra note 59. ↑
  64. Id. at 3. ↑
  65. Kelley & Haskins, supra note 60 at 6. ↑
  66. Id. at 6-7. ↑
  67. Denise C. Herz, et al., An Empirical Test of Dual System Pathways, 0 Youth Violence and Juvenile Just. 1, 17. ↑
  68. Id. ↑
  69. Morgan, supra note 59, at 7. ↑
  70. John H. Lemmon, The Effects of Maltreatment Recurrence and Child Welfare Services on Dimensions of Delinquency, 31 Crim. Just. Rev. 5, 9 (2006). ↑
  71. Coalition for Juvenile Justice, Status Offenses and Family Engagement 1 (n.d.). ↑
  72. William Hickey, Status Offenses and the Juvenile Court, 34 J. Mo. B. 277, 277 (1978). ↑
  73. Id. ↑
  74. Id. ↑
  75. Brenda M. Morton, Barriers to Academic Achievement for Foster Youth: The Story Behind the Statistics, 29 J. of Rsch. in Childhood Educ. 476, 478 (2013). ↑
  76. Id. at 485. ↑
  77. Jeanne G. Kaufman & Cathy Spatz Widom, Childhood Victimization, Running Away, and Delinquency, 36 J. of Rsch. In Crime & Delinq. 347, 349-50 (1999). ↑
  78. Coalition for Juvenile Justice, National Standards for the Care of Youth Charged with Status Offenses 51 (2013). ↑
  79. Id. at 53. ↑
  80. Id. at 12. ↑
  81. Morgan, supra note 59, at 2. ↑
  82. Gene Siegel & Rachael Lord, When Systems Collide: Improving Court Practices and Programs in Dual Jurisdiction Cases, 56 Juv. & Fam. Ct. J. 39, 41 (2005). ↑
  83. Id. ↑
  84. Id. ↑
  85. Id. ↑
  86. Id. at 39. ↑
  87. 179 Misc. 2d 130, 684 N.Y.S.2d 126 (Fam. Ct. 1998). ↑
  88. Id. ↑
  89. Id. ↑
  90. Id. at 147. ↑
  91. Id. at 133-34. ↑
  92. Barbara J. Burns et al., Mental Health Need and Access to Mental Health Services by Youths Involved With Child Welfare: A National Survey, 43 J. of the Am. Acad. of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry 960, 963 (2004). ↑
  93. Ann Vander Stoep et al., Risk of Juvenile Justice System Referral Among Children in a Public Mental Health System, 24 The J. of Mental Health Admin. 428, 436 (1997). ↑
  94. Mana Golzari et al., The Health Status of Youth in Juvenile Detention Facilities, 38 J. of Adolescent health 776, 779 (2006). ↑
  95. Id. at 778. ↑
  96. Id. ↑
  97. Id. ↑
  98. Denise C. Herz et al., Dual System Youth and their Pathways: A Comparison of Incidence, Characteristics and System Experiences using Linked Administrative Data, 48 J. of Youth and Adolescence 2432, 2441 (2019). ↑
  99. Id. ↑
  100. Joseph P. Ryan et al., Maltreatment and Delinquency: Investigation Child Welfare Bias in Juvenile Justice Processing, 29 Child. & Youth Services Rev. 1035, 1046 (2007). ↑
  101. Melissa Sickmund, Juveniles in Residential Placement, 1997-2008, in OJJDP Fact Sheet (2010). ↑
  102. Id. ↑
  103. Sara Munson & Madelyn Freundlich, Double Jeopardy: Youth in Foster Care Who Commit Delinquent Acts, 25 Child. Legal Rts. J. 9 (2005).12 ↑
  104. Ryan, supra note 100, at 1038. ↑
  105. Stephanie Bontrager Ryon et al., Juvenile Justice Interventions: System Escalation and Effective Alternatives to Residential Placement, 52 J. of Offender Rehab. 358, 359 (2013). ↑
  106. Munson & Freundlich, supra note 103, at 13. ↑
  107. Id. at 12-13. ↑
  108. Lorrie Lutz & Macon Stewart, Ctr. for Juv. Just. Reform, The Crossover Youth Practice Model 30 (Shay Bilchik, ed., 2015). ↑
  109. Id. ↑
  110. Id. at 8 ↑
  111. Id. at 9 ↑
  112. Herz, supra note 98. ↑
  113. Wendy Haight, et al., An Evaluation of the Crossover Youth Practice Model (CYPM): Recidivism Outcomes for Maltreated Youth Involved in the Juvenile Justice System, 65 Child. & Youth Services Rev. 78, 82 (2016). ↑
  114. Id. ↑
  115. Herz, supra note 98. ↑
  116. Lutz & Stewart, supra note 108, at 9. ↑
  117. Cyleste C. Collins, et al., Housing Instability and Child Welfare: Examining the Delivery of Innovative Services in the Context of a Randomized Controlled Trial, 108 Child. & Youth Services Rev 1, 1 (2020). ↑
  118. Id. ↑
  119. Munson & Freundlich, supra note 103. ↑
  120. CBP Enforcement Statistics Fiscal Year 2020 (Oct. 7, 2022), https://www.cbp.gov/sites/default/files/assets/documents/2021-Aug/U.S.%20Border%20Patrol%20Fiscal%20Year%202020%20Sector%20Profile%20%28508%29.pdf. ↑
  121. UNHCR’s Position Regarding the Detention of Refugee and Migrant Children in the Migration Context from the UNHCR Division of International Protection (Jan. 2017). ↑
  122. Id. ↑
  123. Id. ↑
  124. CBP Enforcement Statistics Fiscal Year 2020, supra note 120. ↑
  125. Alina Das, Inclusive Immigrant Justice: Racial Animus and the Origins of Crime-Based Deportation, 52 U.C. Davis L. Rev. 171, 173 (2018). ↑
  126. Caitlin Cavanagh & Elizabeth Cauffman, The Land of the Free: Undocumented Families in the Juvenile Justice System, 39 Law & Human Behavior 152, 157-58 (2015). ↑
  127. Id. ↑
  128. Cheatham & Roy, supra note 45. ↑
  129. Id. ↑
  130. Areti Georgopoulos, Beyond the Reach of Juvenile Justice: The Crisis of Unaccompanied Immigrant Children Detained by the United States, 23 L. & Ineq. 117, 118 (2005). ↑
  131. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Asylum Procedures for Minor Children, USCIS, https://www.uscis.gov/humanitarian/refugees-and-asylum/asylum/asylum-procedures-for-minor-children (Dec. 8, 2021) ↑
  132. Cheatham & Roy, supra note 45. ↑
  133. Id. ↑
  134. Id. ↑
  135. Id. ↑
  136. Id. ↑
  137. 8 C.F.R. § 1236.3. ↑
  138. Id. ↑
  139. Id. ↑
  140. Stipulation of Settlement Agreement at 7, Flores v. Reno, 507 U.S. 292, 292 (U.S.Cal.,1993) (No. CV 85-4544). ↑
  141. Laura Beckman & Nancy Rodriguez, Race, Ethnicity, and Official Perceptions in the Juvenile Justice System: Extending the Role of Negative Attributional Stereotypes, 48 Criminal Just. & Behavior 1536, 1539 (2021). ↑
  142. Id. ↑
  143. Victor M. Flores, Challenging Guilt by Association: Rethinking Youths’ First Amendment Right to Associate and Their Protection from Gang Databases, 107 Cornell L. Rev. 847, 865 (2022). ↑
  144. Nermeen Arastu et al., Swept Up in the Sweep: The Impact of Gang Allegations on Immigrant New Yorkers 7 (JP Perry, ed., 2018). ↑
  145. Id. at 9. ↑
  146. Flores, supra note 143 at 848. ↑
  147. Arastu, supra note 144 at 36. ↑
  148. Theo Liebmann, Adverse Consequences and Constructive Opportunities for Immigrant Youth in Delinquency Proceedings, 88 Temp. L. Rev. 869, 869 (2016). ↑
  149. Theo Liebmann & Lauris Wren, Special Issue Introduction: Immigrants and the Family Court, 50 Fam. Ct. Rev. 570, 570 (2012). ↑
  150. Hoan N. Bui, Parent – Child Conflicts, School Troubles, and Differences in Delinquency Across Immigration Generations, 55 Crime & Delinq. 412, 434 (2009). ↑
  151. Xin Jiang & Anthony A. Peguero, Immigrant Generations and Delinquency: Assessing the Relative Effects of Family, School, and Delinquent Friends, 7 Race & Just. 199, 200 (2017). ↑
  152. Bui, supra note 150. ↑
  153. Jiang supra note 151, at 216. ↑
  154. Id. ↑
  155. Angie Junck & Rachel Prandini, Protecting Immigrant Clients in the Juvenile Justice System, 34 GPSolo 37, 37 (2017). ↑
  156. Id. ↑
  157. Id. ↑
  158. Exec. Order. No. 13, 767, 82 Fed. Reg. 8793 (Jan. 25, 2017). ↑
  159. Junck & Prandini, supra note 155, at 38. ↑
  160. Id. ↑
  161. Id. ↑
  162. Id. ↑
  163. Brad Reynolds, Reforming and Clarifying Special Immigrant Juvenile Status, 47 J. Legis. 112, 112 (2021). ↑
  164. Id. at 113. ↑
  165. Id. at 112. ↑
  166. Id. at 112-13. ↑
  167. Id. at 114. ↑
  168. Id. ↑
  169. Id. at 116. ↑
  170. Id. at 117. ↑
  171. Matthew Sussis, Center for Immigration Studies, The History of the Flores Settlement 4 (2019). ↑
  172. 507 U.S. 292, 292 (U.S.Cal.1993). ↑
  173. Id. at 300-02. ↑
  174. Stipulattion of Settlement Agreement, supra note 140. ↑
  175. Id. ↑
  176. Sussis, supra note 171. ↑
  177. Id. ↑
  178. Id. ↑
  179. Rebeca M. López, Codifying the Flores Settlement Agreement: Seeking to Protect Immigrant Children in U.S. Custody, 95 Marq. L. Rev. 1635, 1662 (2012). ↑
  180. Amanda V. Reis, Codifying Flores: A Call to Congress to Protect Migrant Families from Deterrent Border Policies, 27 Roger Williams U. L. Rev. 140, 140-41 (2022). ↑
  181. Id. at 141. ↑
  182. Id. at 150. ↑
  183. Katharina Obser, Women’s Refugee Comm’n, The Family Case Management Program: Why Case Management Can and Must Be Part of the U.S. Approach to Immigration 1 (Diana Quick, ed., 2019). ↑
  184. Id. ↑
  185. Id. at 4-7. ↑
  186. Id. at 4-5. ↑
  187. Id. at 1. ↑
  188. Id. at 14. ↑
  189. Siegel & Lord, supra note 82. ↑
  190. See supra p. 2. ↑
  191. Rosie Hidalgo, Crossroads: The Intersection of Immigrant Enforcement and the Child Welfare System, 64 Juv. & Fam. Ct. J. 35, 36 (2013). ↑
  192. Murry, supra note 10. ↑
  193. Hidalgo, supra note 191. ↑
  194. Id. at 38. ↑
  195. Id. ↑
  196. Moore, supra note 15. ↑
  197. UNICEF, UNICEF Working Paper: Alternatives to Immigration Detention of Children 6 (2019). ↑
  198. Lainie Rutkow & Joshua T. Lozman, Suffer the Children?: A Call for United States Ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, 19 Harvard Hum. Rts. J. 161, 189 (2006). ↑
  199. Luisa Blanchfield, Cong. Rsch. Serv., The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child 6 (2015). ↑
  200. Id. ↑
  201. Elena Tilovska-Kechedji and Darian Rakitovan, Will it Be or Will it Not (US Position on Ratifying the CRC) 2 Hum. Rts. Prot. 129, 140 (2019). ↑
  202. Eric Chung, The Judicial Enforceability and Legal Effects of Treaty Reservations, Understandings, and Declarations 126 The Yale Law J. 170, 172 (2016). ↑
  203. Elena Tilovska-Kechedji and Darian Rakitovan, supra note 201. ↑
  204. Barry Krisberg, Rediscovering the Juvenile Justice Ideal in the United States in Comparative Youth Justice 6, 16 (2006). ↑
  205. Cheatham & Roy, supra note 45. ↑
  206. Lokka, supra note 46. ↑
  207. Corrections Standard 8.2 7(a) (1973). ↑
  208. Id. ↑
  209. Id. ↑
  210. Ryan, supra note 100, at 1046. ↑
  211. Cheatham & Roy, supra note 45. ↑
  212. Stipulation of Settlement Agreement, supra note 140. ↑
  213. Ilan Katz & Rachael Hetherington, Co-Operating and Communicating: A European Perspective on Integration Services for Children, 15 Child Abuse Rev. 429, 437 (2006). ↑
  214. Munson & Freundlich, supra note 103, at 12-13. ↑
  215. Bochenek, supra note 37. ↑
  216. Id. ↑
  217. Id. ↑
  218. Id. ↑
  219. Convention, supra note 5. ↑
  220. Bochenek, supra note 37. ↑
  221. Katz, supra note 208. ↑

 

AUTHOR

Gianna Valentic
Associate Member, Immigration and Human Rights Law Review

You may also like