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Maryland is among the worst states in the nation when it comes to the number of prison inmates who began their time behind bars for crimes they committed as children, according to a report set to be released Wednesday.
With 6% of its overall prison population incarcerated for crimes they committed as minors, Maryland trailed only Louisiana, Wisconsin and South Carolina, according to the report, “Disposable Children: The Prevalence of Child Abuse and Trauma Among Children Prosecuted and Incarcerated as Adults in Maryland.”
The report, by Human Rights for Kids, said Maryland also fared poorly in terms of the number of children per capita who are charged as adults, trailing only Alabama. Minority inmates make up more than 90% of those who were charged as youth in Maryland and remain incarcerated as adults, according to the report.
“Maryland is faced with a simple choice. On the one hand the state can look the other way, continuing to incarcerate children who act out behaviorally due to abuse, neglect, and community violence, or it can seek to address the root of the problem by showing these children something many of them have never had before — love,” the report said.
The document is based on the nonprofit organization’s first statewide survey of Maryland inmates on Adverse Childhood Experiences, or ACEs, they were subjected to as youth. The survey was mailed to 882 people currently in Maryland adult prisons who have been incarcerated since childhood. About 124 people, or 14%, completed the surveys.
The report offers several policy and procedure recommendations, including a prohibition on solitary confinement of children in all facilities. Nearly 98% of respondents to the Maryland survey said they had been placed in solitary confinement, and about 80% of them said that happened while they were children.
Del. Sandy Bartlett (D-Anne Arundel), the vice chair of the House Judiciary Committee, sponsored unsuccessful legislation in this year’s session to restrict solitary confinement, or restrictive housing, for youth that is done “solely on the purposes of discipline, punishment, administrative convenience, retaliation, or staffing shortages.”
Bartlett said in a text message Tuesday that she’s working with the state Department of Juvenile Services (DJS) on a version of that bill for the 2025 legislative session.
“My goal is to get kids out of adult pretrial facilities,” she said.
Sen. Mary Beth Carozza (R-Lower Shore), who serves on the Senate Education, Energy, and the Environment Committee, said the legislature “made some strides” with passage of the juvenile justice law that went into effect Nov. 1. She declined to comment on the report without seeing it first, but said more juvenile reform needs to be done that incorporates not only rehabilitation, but also accountability.
In the legislative session that begins Jan. 8, Carozza said she plans to again sponsor, or at least support, legislation she introduced in the last session that would let a law enforcement officer question a youth if an alleged crime involved the use of a gun or crime of violence. The Child Protection Custody Act passed in 2022 does not allow an officer to interrogate a child until an attorney has been retained by a parent or Office of the Public Defender.
“I realize the whole issue of the questioning of juveniles has been a prohibition at this point, but I still think we should … take another look at this very narrow approach,” Carozza said. “If anything, it still opens up other conversations of what you can do with juvenile accountability.”
Policy, procedure recommendations
One bipartisan measure Human Rights for Kids endorsed was legislation sponsored by Sen. William G. Folden (R-Frederick) and Del. Karen Simpson (D-Frederick) in the last session. Their bills, which did not make it out of committee, sought to transfer cases from adult court to juvenile court for child victims of sex crimes and trafficking who commit crimes against their abusers, but who were convicted as adults.
Some other proposals in the report include:
- Prohibiting the housing of children in adult jails and prisons;
- Allowing formerly incarcerated children to be discharged from parole no more than five years after their release;
- and starting all cases involving children in juvenile court.
The report also suggests the legislature implement training on adverse childhood experiences. More specifically, it said ACEs training should be required for judges, prosecutors, defense attorneys and other staff who engage with youth with “extensive trauma histories.”
The law in Virginia, where Jamel Freeman was raised, requires courts to consider a youth’s childhood experiences and trauma history.
“The courts need to know that,” said Freeman, now 46, a member of the Maryland Equitable Justice Collaborative that was formed to eliminate mass incarceration in the state.
He said it’s important to remember that children respond differently than adults.
“When a child has an adverse experience that the body has and releases hormones that leave the brain at a heightened state of fear and stress, the shift in their cognitive, emotional and functioning behavioral actions start to reduce,” said Freeman, a graduate student at the University of Maryland-Baltimore School of Social Work. “Then their [children’s] once-normal, day-to-day life skills are replaced with the skills needed to survive.”
