All Ellas: Girls locked up

Feminist Studies

Volumn 30, Issue 2, 2004, Pages 302-324

  Dohrn, Bernardine ^a,b  

^a Department of Law ^*

^b Children and Family Justice Center   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 7644242083     PISSN: 00463663     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/20458965     Document Type: Review

References (84)

1. See www.dc.state.fl.us/ActiveInmates/inmatesearch.asp. Jessica was also on the cover of the New York Times Magazine in an article by Margaret Talbot, "The Maximum Security Adolescent," sec. 6, 10 Sept. 2000.
2. See www.dc.state.fl.us/ActiveInmates/inmatesearch.asp. Jessica was also on the cover of the New York Times Magazine in an article by Margaret Talbot, "The Maximum Security Adolescent," sec. 6, 10 Sept. 2000.
3. Paolo G. Annino, "Children in Florida Adult Prisons: A Call for a Moratorium," Florida State University Law Review 28 (Winter 2001): 477-80.
4. "Girls" with be used to include young women between the ages of ten and eighteen years, although the variation in state delinquency law is vast. In Illinois, for example, juvenile court has jurisdiction over girls under seventeen; a seventeen-year-old who is arrested will be tried and incarcerated as an adult. For the majority of states, eighteen remains the age of adulthood for purposes of criminal responsibility, with substantial exceptions for waiver or transfer to adult court.
5. Beth E. Richie, "Challenges Incarcerated Women Face as They Return to Their Communities: Findings from Life History Interviews," Crime and Delinquency 47, no. 3 (2001): 369; Susan M. George and Robert J. Laonde, "Incarcerated Mothers: The Chicago Project on Female Prisoners and Their Children" (comments to the Congressional Black Caucus, 14 Sept. 2002); see also www.harrisschool.uchicago.edu/research/chpp/research.html.
6. Beth E. Richie, "Challenges Incarcerated Women Face as They Return to Their Communities: Findings from Life History Interviews," Crime and Delinquency 47, no. 3 (2001): 369; Susan M. George and Robert J. Laonde, "Incarcerated Mothers: The Chicago Project on Female Prisoners and Their Children" (comments to the Congressional Black Caucus, 14 Sept. 2002); see also www.harrisschool.uchicago.edu/research/chpp/research.html.
7. Beth E. Richie, "Challenges Incarcerated Women Face as They Return to Their Communities: Findings from Life History Interviews," Crime and Delinquency 47, no. 3 (2001): 369; Susan M. George and Robert J. Laonde, "Incarcerated Mothers: The Chicago Project on Female Prisoners and Their Children" (comments to the Congressional Black Caucus, 14 Sept. 2002); see also www.harrisschool.uchicago.edu/research/chpp/research.html.
8. The continuing body of work by Meda Chesney-Lind is pioneering. See, for example, Meda Chesney-Lind and Randall G. Shelton, Girls, Delinquency, and Juvenile Justice, 2nd ed. (Belmont, Calif.: West/Wadsworth, 1998); and Meda Chesney-Lind, The Female Offender: Girls, Women, and Crime (Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage Publications, 1997).
9. The continuing body of work by Meda Chesney-Lind is pioneering. See, for example, Meda Chesney-Lind and Randall G. Shelton, Girls, Delinquency, and Juvenile Justice, 2nd ed. (Belmont, Calif.: West/Wadsworth, 1998); and Meda Chesney-Lind, The Female Offender: Girls, Women, and Crime (Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage Publications, 1997).
10. Lateefah Simon, executive director of the Center for Young Women's Development in San Francisco, exemplifies this determination to develop a powerful force composed of those young women who have been arrested and incarcerated. See also the Chicago organizations GirlTalk, directed by the remarkable Wenona Thompson, and Sisters Organizing for United Leadership (SOUL); Friends of the Island Academy and Youth Force in New York City; the Ella Baker Center in Boston; and the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights in San Francisco, whose young women initiated the brilliant Books Not Bars campaign.
11. This article will use the word "prison" to include all forms of incarceration for delinquent and criminal girls: reformatories, training schools, juvenile correctional facilities, cottages, boot camps, "homes," private hospitals, treatment programs, and secure institutions (both public and private). Within criminal justice, however, prison generally refers to an adult facility.
12. Heather Szerlag, "Teen's Death Probed at YSI Iowa Center," Youth Today, February 1996, 42, 48, cited in Chesney-Lind, 86. YSI was created by the millionaire who began Jiffy Lube.
13. Heather Szerlag, "Teen's Death Probed at YSI Iowa Center," Youth Today, February 1996, 42, 48, cited in Chesney-Lind, 86. YSI was created by the millionaire who began Jiffy Lube.
14. Annie E. Casey Foundation, JDAI Project (1995), cited in American Bar Association and National Bar Association, Justice by Gender: The Lack of Appropriate Prevention, Diversion, and Treatment Alternatives for Girls in the Justice System (2001), 17-18.
15. Annie E. Casey Foundation, JDAI Project (1995), cited in American Bar Association and National Bar Association, Justice by Gender: The Lack of Appropriate Prevention, Diversion, and Treatment Alternatives for Girls in the Justice System (2001), 17-18.
16. Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners in 1994 (Washington, D.C: Department of Justice, 1995), cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 165.
17. Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners in 1994 (Washington, D.C: Department of Justice, 1995), cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 165.
18. Meghan C. Scahill, Female Delinquency Cases, 1997 (Washington, D.C.: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 2000), cited in Barbara Fedders, "More Young Women in the Juvenile Justice System: Girls in Trouble," Guild Practitioner, "America's War on Its Children" 58 (2001): 104.
19. Meghan C. Scahill, Female Delinquency Cases, 1997 (Washington, D.C.: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 2000), cited in Barbara Fedders, "More Young Women in the Juvenile Justice System: Girls in Trouble," Guild Practitioner, "America's War on Its Children" 58 (2001): 104.
20. Margaret Talbot, 46; Ronnie Greene and Geoff Dougherty, "Kids in Prison," Miami Herald, 18 Mar. 2001.
21. Margaret Talbot, 46; Ronnie Greene and Geoff Dougherty, "Kids in Prison," Miami Herald, 18 Mar. 2001.
22. Patti Puritz and M.A. Scali, Beyond the Walls: Improving Conditions of Confinement for Youth in Custody (Washington, D.C.: American Bar Association Juvenile Justice Center, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 1998).
23. See Fox Butterfield, "U.S. and Georgia Deal to Improve Juvenile Prison," New York Times, sec. 1, 22 Mar. 1998; Butterfield, "Profits at Juvenile Prisons Earned at a Chilling Cost," New York Times, sec. A, 15 July 1998; Human Rights Watch, No Minor Matter: Children in Maryland's Jails (New York: Human Rights Watch, Children's Rights Division, 1999).
24. See Fox Butterfield, "U.S. and Georgia Deal to Improve Juvenile Prison," New York Times, sec. 1, 22 Mar. 1998; Butterfield, "Profits at Juvenile Prisons Earned at a Chilling Cost," New York Times, sec. A, 15 July 1998; Human Rights Watch, No Minor Matter: Children in Maryland's Jails (New York: Human Rights Watch, Children's Rights Division, 1999).
25. See Fox Butterfield, "U.S. and Georgia Deal to Improve Juvenile Prison," New York Times, sec. 1, 22 Mar. 1998; Butterfield, "Profits at Juvenile Prisons Earned at a Chilling Cost," New York Times, sec. A, 15 July 1998; Human Rights Watch, No Minor Matter: Children in Maryland's Jails (New York: Human Rights Watch, Children's Rights Division, 1999).
26. D. G. Parent et al., Conditions of Confinement: Juvenile Detention and Correctional Facilities (Washington, D.C.: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 1994), cited in Mark Soler, "Examining 'Justice' in the Juvenile System," in Building Violence: How America's Rush to Incarcerate Creates More Violence, ed. John P. May and Khalid R. Pitts (Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications, 2000), 58.
27. D. G. Parent et al., Conditions of Confinement: Juvenile Detention and Correctional Facilities (Washington, D.C.: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 1994), cited in Mark Soler, "Examining 'Justice' in the Juvenile System," in Building Violence: How America's Rush to Incarcerate Creates More Violence, ed. John P. May and Khalid R. Pitts (Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications, 2000), 58.
28. Laurie Schaffner, "Violence and Female Delinquency: Gender Transgressions and Gender Invisibility," Berkeley Women's Law Journal 14 (Spring 1999): 53.
29. Leslie Acoca and K. Dedel, No Place to Hide: Understanding and Meeting the Needs of Girls in the California Juvenile Justice System (San Francisco: National Council on Crime and Delinquency, 1998).
30. American Correctional Association, The Female Offender: What Does the Future Hold? (1990), cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 170.
31. American Correctional Association, The Female Offender: What Does the Future Hold? (1990), cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 170.
32. Acoca and Dedel.
33. Elizabeth Cauffman et al., "Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder among Female Juvenile Offenders," Journal of the American Academy of Childhood and Adolescent Psychiatry 37 (November 1998): 11, cited in Kim Brooks et al., The Special Needs of Youth in the Juvenile Justice System: Implications for Effective Practice (Covington, Ky.: Children's Law Center, 2001), 39.
34. Elizabeth Cauffman et al., "Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder among Female Juvenile Offenders," Journal of the American Academy of Childhood and Adolescent Psychiatry 37 (November 1998): 11, cited in Kim Brooks et al., The Special Needs of Youth in the Juvenile Justice System: Implications for Effective Practice (Covington, Ky.: Children's Law Center, 2001), 39.
35. Mark-David Janus et al., "Physical Abuse in Canadian Runaway Adolescents," Child Abuse and Neglect 19, no. 4 (1995): 433-47, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 37.
36. Mark-David Janus et al., "Physical Abuse in Canadian Runaway Adolescents," Child Abuse and Neglect 19, no. 4 (1995): 433-47, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 37.
37. Linda Teplin et al., "Psychiatric Disorders in Youth in Juvenile Detention," Archives of General Psychiatry 59 (December 2002): 1133-43.
38. See Marty Beyers, "Delinquent Girls: A Developmental Perspective," Kentucky Children's Rights Journal 17 (Spring 2001): 20-21, for a thoughtful analysis of girls' development response to violent victimization.
39. M.L. Armstrong, Adolescent Pathways: Exploring the Intersections between Child Welfare and Juvenile Justice, PINS, and Mental Health (New York: Vera Institute of Justice, 1998), 18.
40. Kenneth J. Keller, "Juvenile Female Offenders in Cook County: Trends and Outcomes" (paper presented at the American Society of Criminology Annual Meeting, Chicago, 14 Nov. 2002). Seen the other way, delinquent girls are 44 percent more likely than males to have had a child protection petition filed on their behalf. Note that it is unclear to what extent the risk is increased by the underlying abuse or neglect, or from the vicissitudes of the child welfare system.
41. Human Rights Watch, Violence in the Hallways (New York: Human Rights Watch, Children's Rights Division, 2001).
42. Beyers; Acoca and Dedel.
43. I. R. Bergsmann, "The Forgotten Few: Juvenile Female Offenders," Federal Probation 53 (March 1989):73-78, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 87.
44. I. R. Bergsmann, "The Forgotten Few: Juvenile Female Offenders," Federal Probation 53 (March 1989):73-78, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 87.
45. Scahill, cited in Fedders, 104.
46. Justice by Gender, 21.
47. Howard N. Snyder and Melissa Sickmund, Juvenile Offenders and Victims: 1999 National Report (Pittsburgh: National Center for Juvenile Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 1999), 52.
48. Fedders, 104.
49. Federal Bureau of Investigation, Crime in the United States - 1993 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, 1994), 222, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 12-13.
50. Federal Bureau of Investigation, Crime in the United States - 1993 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, 1994), 222, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 12-13.
51. See Anne Meis Kupfner, Reform and Resistance: Gender, Delinquency, and America's First Juvenile Court (New York: Routledge, 2001).
52. Girls Incorporated, Prevention and Parity: Girls in Juvenile Justice (Indianapolis: Girls Incorporated National Resource Center, 1996), 7, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 80-81.
53. Girls Incorporated, Prevention and Parity: Girls in Juvenile Justice (Indianapolis: Girls Incorporated National Resource Center, 1996), 7, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 80-81.
54. Paul Lerman, "Twentieth Century Developments in America's Institutional Systems for Youth in Trouble," in A Century of Juvenile Justice, ed. Margaret K. Rosenheim et al. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002), 86.
55. Ira M. Schwartz, Martha Steketee, and Victoria W. Schneider, "Federal Juvenile Justice Policy and the Incarceration of Girls," Crime and Delinquency 36, no. 4 (1990): 503-20, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 83.
56. Ira M. Schwartz, Martha Steketee, and Victoria W. Schneider, "Federal Juvenile Justice Policy and the Incarceration of Girls," Crime and Delinquency 36, no. 4 (1990): 503-20, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 83.
57. The U.S. House of Representatives, Hearings on the Reauthorization of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974, Hearings before the Subcommittee on Human Resources of the Committee on Education and Labor, 102nd Congress, 1992, Serial No. 102-125, Washington, D.C., 4983, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 142-44.
58. The U.S. House of Representatives, Hearings on the Reauthorization of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974, Hearings before the Subcommittee on Human Resources of the Committee on Education and Labor, 102nd Congress, 1992, Serial No. 102-125, Washington, D.C., 4983, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 142-44.
59. Eileen Poe-Yamagata and Jeffrey A. Butts, Female Offenders in the Juvenile Justice System (Pittsburgh: National Center for Juvenile Justice, June 1995), cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 82; F. Sherman, "Probation and the Delinquent Girl," Women, Girls, and Criminal Justice Newsletter 1 (August/September 2000): 5.
60. Eileen Poe-Yamagata and Jeffrey A. Butts, Female Offenders in the Juvenile Justice System (Pittsburgh: National Center for Juvenile Justice, June 1995), cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 82; F. Sherman, "Probation and the Delinquent Girl," Women, Girls, and Criminal Justice Newsletter 1 (August/September 2000): 5.
61. Eileen Poe-Yamagata and Jeffrey A. Butts, Female Offenders in the Juvenile Justice System (Pittsburgh: National Center for Juvenile Justice, June 1995), cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 82; F. Sherman, "Probation and the Delinquent Girl," Women, Girls, and Criminal Justice Newsletter 1 (August/September 2000): 5.
62. Bart Lubow, Juvenile Jailhouse Rocked: Reforming Detention in Chicago, Portland, and Sacramento (Baltimore: AdvoCasey, Annie E. Casey Foundation, Fall/Winter 1999).
63. See, for example, Kirsten Lindberg, Girls in Gangs: The Girls behind the Boys (Chicago: Illinois Crime Commission, 1999); note the subsequent conference on "Girls and Gangs: Princess or Predator: We Are Not Who YOU Say We Are!" Children and Family Justice Center, Northwestern University School of Law, Chicago, 22 May 2000.
64. See, for example, Kirsten Lindberg, Girls in Gangs: The Girls behind the Boys (Chicago: Illinois Crime Commission, 1999); note the subsequent conference on "Girls and Gangs: Princess or Predator: We Are Not Who YOU Say We Are!" Children and Family Justice Center, Northwestern University School of Law, Chicago, 22 May 2000.
65. Keller, 10.
66. See, for example, Justice by Gender, 17; Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 11; Schaffner, 19, 53; Franklin K. Zimring, American Youth Violence (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998).
67. See, for example, Justice by Gender, 17; Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 11; Schaffner, 19, 53; Franklin K. Zimring, American Youth Violence (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998).
68. See, for example, Justice by Gender, 17; Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 11; Schaffner, 19, 53; Franklin K. Zimring, American Youth Violence (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998).
69. See, for example, Justice by Gender, 17; Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 11; Schaffner, 19, 53; Franklin K. Zimring, American Youth Violence (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998).
70. Lerman, 91.
71. Ibid.; Snyder and Sickmund, 199.
72. Ibid.; Snyder and Sickmund, 199.
73. Laurie Schaffner provided this insight, conversation with author, September 2002.
74. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, Juveniles Taken into Custody: Fiscal Year 1992 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, 1992), 31, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 166.
75. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, Juveniles Taken into Custody: Fiscal Year 1992 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, 1992), 31, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 166.
76. Lois A. Weithorn, "Mental Hospitalization of Troublesome Youth: An Analysis of Skyrocketing Admission Rates," Stanford Law Review 40 (1988): 773-838, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 85.
77. Lois A. Weithorn, "Mental Hospitalization of Troublesome Youth: An Analysis of Skyrocketing Admission Rates," Stanford Law Review 40 (1988): 773-838, cited in Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 85.
78. Lerman, 97.
79. Ibid., 89.
80. Chesney-Lind and Shelton, 186.
81. Keller, 23. In Chicago, more than one-fifth of the girls on probation (21.7 percent) are parenting, pregnant, or both.
82. Leslie D. Leve and Patricia Chamberlain, Delinquency in Girls: Defining and Early Onset Pathway (Eugene: Oregon Learning Center, 2001).
83. Marian Daniel, cited in John A. MacDonald and Meda Chesney-Lind, "Gender Bias and Juvenile Justice Revisited," Crime and Delinquency 47 (April 2001): 190.
84. These suggestions are my summaries of the written wisdom of Beyers, Chesney-Lind, Simon, Schaffner, Richard Wright, Fedders, Thompson, Lubow, and the JDAI work, and the whole Justice by Gender team.