Parents angered as kids are held hours away
Federal probe looms over youth detention center reopening in Kentucky
Juanisha Saunders recalls the frantic phone calls she made as she attempted to ensure that her son – sitting in a cell over a hundred miles away – was safe.
Saunders said she was not properly informed that her child, DaQuan Bell Jr., then 15, had been transported to the Adair Regional Juvenile Detention Center days before a riot broke out in the facility in November 2022.
“I was upset,” said Saunders, who was unable to directly speak with her son for weeks. “Just because he’s charged with a crime, that doesn’t mean you don’t tell his mother, like, ‘Hey, I got your child. I’m taking him so many hours away.’ ”
Two years later, many parents in Louisville face the same struggles with distance and communication as their children are detained far away. Louisville metro’s youth detention center closed in 2019. State lawmakers have dedicated nearly $39 million to reopening it under state control, but the project is years from completion.
Louisville Metro Youth Transitional Services processes 38 juveniles per month on average, with nearly 73% detained and assigned to a facility. The local juvenile facility can take around 10 low-level male offenders. If it is full, youth are sent elsewhere – often hours away. Of the 61 juveniles who were arrested in Jefferson County and in state custody as of late July, more than half were housed in the Adair center in south central Kentucky.
“There’s no reason why the biggest city in the state does not have a facility,” said state Rep. Keturah Herron. “We know what that does when kids can’t have access to their family members. Really, what we’re doing is a lose-lose situation, not only for the kids but also for the families and for the staff.”
State Rep. Kevin Bratcher championed the law to reopen the Louisville Metro Youth Detention Center under state oversight. He said it is vital “to reach these young folks” before they are exposed to adult prisons. “If we don’t have a facility in Louisville, there’s no way to reach them,” Bratcher said.
Renovation plans are underway for the old detention center. The state estimates construction will take about two years, said Morgan Hall, Kentucky Justice and Public Safety Cabinet communications director.
Adding to the complexity is a federal investigation into Kentucky’s operation of youth detention centers that’s raised new concerns for stakeholders. Some are calling for better collaboration with community leaders and a deeper look at how Louisville’s facility can be improved – potentially turning it into a model for the rest of the state.
Bell, a Louisville native who was convicted of first-degree robbery, spent several months at the Adair facility when he was 15. “I really don’t try to think about it,” he said.
Bell said he and others were kept in their cells for days with three inches of standing water after a flood. Access to books and TV was extremely limited, he said, and residents’ treatment depended on whether staff liked them.
In May, the U.S. Department of Justice announced it had opened an investigation into conditions at eight youth detention centers and one youth development center run by the Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice. It followed a report from Kentucky’s auditor that described unfit living conditions and mistreatment of youth.
According to the report, isolation of juvenile residents was used too often and deployed as a punitive measure rather than to keep staff and other children safe. The report also criticized staff members’ use of force, such as deploying pepper spray at a high rate.
Officials with the state’s justice cabinet took issue with the findings. Gov. Andy Beshear defended equipping officers with pepper spray, saying it was “absolutely necessary.”