A county judge of Los Angeles made a major step on Friday towards the closure of Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall in Downey, months after a state surveillance body found it “unsuitable” at the youth house.
J. Miguel Espinoza rendered a provisional decision that it was “illegal” to allow the Los Angeles County Probation Service to house the miners of the establishment.
Espinoza did not immediately ordered the closure of the room, but told the probation service to submit a plan by the start in May detailing how it will move around 270 minors – mainly between 15 and 18 years old – in other secure places. The parties must have returned to court next month.
The decision degenerates a one -month legal battle. The Council of State of State and Community corrections ordered Los Padrinos to close in December 2024, the observation of the ministry did not have enough personnel to operate in complete safety.
But probation officials ignored order with the support of the Comté de la. The office of the Public Defender of the County of Los Angeles immediately made a legal challenge on behalf of one of his clients, which put the question in front of Espinoza.
“The chaos of the probation department creates dangerous training effects on the security of our young people. On the overview, in the report after report, we have seen negligence, mismanagement and abuse, while emphasizing change,” said Luis Rodriguez, head of the public defender’s office division, in a press release. “The court order is today a step in the right direction.”
The president of the Correctional Services of the Council of State and the Community, Linda Penner, also celebrated the decision of Espinoza.
“We believe that today’s order is an important and significant step in ensuring the security and well-being of young people in the custody of the County of Los Angeles,” she said.
The head of the probation department, Guillermo Viera Rosa, was present for the hearing on Friday and refused to comment outside the East audience hall. In the light of the Order, the department “will quickly move to implement a depopulation plan for Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall which aligns with our wider strategy of installations and prioritizes public security” communications from the probation department.
About three -quarters of young people accommodated in Los Padrinos are waiting for hearings of the courts linked to violent offenses, including murder, attempted murder, assault, theft, kidnapping and gang crimes, according to Waters.
Viera Rosa went to Sacramento last week to call on the decision of the Council of Correctional and Community Services, arguing that the ministry had satisfied the minimum endowment requirements.
But the Council rejected the appeal, noting that the “staff shortages” always led to situations where young people did not receive appropriate medical care, lacked school time and sat unattended after being struck by a chemical spray which is sometimes used to stifle the disturbances.
“We continue to have concerns with the ability of the ministry to develop a long -term sustainable solution to deal with the gaps with the staffing of staff,” said the last report of the Board of Directors. “The documentation of the staff of the establishment continues to indicate that the staff deployed is used to reimburse the supervision staff of young people, an indication that the ministry continues to rely on a solution which was intended to be a short -term solution from 2022.”
During the months following the probation that ignored the order of the correctional services of the State and the Community, the news of misconduct and injuries to young people of Los Padrinos continued to accumulate.
The California’s prosecutor’s office accused 30 police officers last month for allegedly authorized, or in some cases, having “gladiator fights” between young people for months inside Los Padrinos. A surveillance video published for the first time by the Times in April 2024 showed a group of standing officers while eight young people in turn attacking a teenager, who suffered a broken nose and other injuries. Some officers could be seen by laughing and shaking hands with the attackers.
Last week, at least three teenagers underwent drug overdoses in Los Padrinos. In March, a teenager was stabbed in the eyes during school hours, according to several sources with direct knowledge of the incident that spoke under the cover of anonymity to discuss an in progress in progress. A spokesperson for the probation department said that the victim had only suffered “non-fatal injuries”.
A 19 -year -old also said last month that he had been sexually abused by an employee of the 29 -year -old ministry of mental health for almost a year in Los Padrinos, according to the judicial archives. His lawyer, Jamal Tooson, said that the abuses were only discovered when probation agents found explicit photos sent by the employee during a search in the teenager’s room.
Republic and mental health services have refused to comment on this incident. It was not clear if a criminal investigation had been opened on alleged abuses.
Los Padrinos was closed in 2019 due to a decrease in the number of young people imprisoned in the County of Los Angeles and excessive allegations against the police concerning their use of the lawn. The installation was reopened in July 2023, after the Council of State and the community corrections closed the other two juvenile rooms of the county of the.
In one month, a chaotic incident occurred in which seven young people broke a table and used the parts as weapons, attacking the staff and trying to separate in the surrounding district.
California Daily Newspapers
