On Wednesday, members of the Illinois Senate did something unusual and remarkable. They corrected a mistake.
State law requires that youths who are caught committing drug offenses within 1,000 feet of a school or public housing be automatically tried as adults. The effect of that law is that each year hundreds of juveniles–overwhelmingly black and Hispanic–are reflexively shipped to adult court on drug charges. Many of them are first-time offenders.
Judges have no discretion to send them back to juvenile court, where most of the cases belong.
That means teens rarely get a second chance. They don’t get an opportunity to receive the kind of rehabilitative counseling and educational services provided in the juvenile system. Most of these teens would benefit far more from drug counseling, education and juvenile detention, rather than a permanent adult criminal record.
They get stuck with an adult conviction that permanently mars their employment prospects–often before they hold a first job.
And there is another unintended consequence: This inflexibility has created a dual system of justice: one for whites and one for everyone else. In 1999, there were 393 automatic transfers of Cook County youths to adult court. Three of them were white.
Rarely do suburban youths in Illinois who are arrested for drug crimes get automatically transferred to adult court. Not because they don’t use drugs, but because their travels fall outside the grasp of the automatic transfer law. There is automatic transfer for selling drugs within 1,000 feet of public housing, but not a $400,000 private home.
Often, when suburban kids get caught, they face nothing more than a “station adjustment,” or a stern talking to by cops. In 1999, Lake County transferred four youths to adult court. Kane County transferred three and DuPage and McHenry Counties transferred none.
Problems flank both extremes. Overuse of station adjustments robs cops and the courts of the opportunity to straighten out a minor offender before his criminal tendencies get worse. Overuse of automatic transfers to adult court and prison is like using a guillotine to slice a tomato. Again, the opportunity to straighten out a wayward kid before he gets worse can be lost.
The key is flexibility. The system has none.
It has taken nearly two decades for legislators to rectify the error, but they are about to complete the job. The Senate voted 43-11 to give criminal court judges the discretion to turn these cases back to the juvenile system. The bill, passed by the House, now goes to Gov. George Ryan. He should sign it.
It is sponsored by Democratic senators Barack Obama and Carol Ronen, both of Chicago.
Not so fast–this isn’t a sop to the bleeding-heart crowd. The bill still gives judges the option to keep serious drug cases in the adult courts. The bill is also sponsored by Republican Sen. Ed Petka of Plainfield, a former Will County state’s attorney known as one of the toughest law-and-order lawmakers in Springfield.
Kudos to all three for recognizing a stinker when they see one, and for expending the political capital needed to correct a mistake that has created its share of injustice.
