Juvenile (In)justice

Reveal

The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX

News

4.7 • 8K Ratings

🗓️ 7 August 2021

⏱️ 53 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Larissa Salazar grew up in Wyoming, and when she was in eighth grade, she got in a fight on a school bus. That snowballed into her spending 16 months in a state juvenile facility.

Reporter Tennessee Watson follows Larissa’s experience in the juvenile justice system in Wyoming, which locks up kids at one of the highest rates in the nation. Larissa’s mom says that instead of helping her daughter, the system made things worse.

Then Watson explores why Wyoming is clinging to its “get tough” approach to juvenile justice, even as many other states are moving away from punishing kids – especially for low-level or nonviolent offenses. Research shows that locking kids up doesn’t change their behavior and often creates a new set of problems.

We end with Watson visiting South Dakota, a state that in the past few years has changed how it deals with kids who get in trouble. South Dakota’s juvenile justice system recognizes that kids who are incarcerated are more likely to get in trouble again, whereas kids who are held accountable and receive support close to home are not.

This show originally aired March 20, 2021.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, it's Alan. I hope 2022 has been a good year for you. But to be honest, it's been a tough one for us.
0:08.0	This year, Reveal was struck by a financial crisis that jeopardized our very existence.
0:14.0	But we've rallied, and all the while that was happening, our staff forged ahead to produce ambitious investigations
0:22.0	that exposed corruption and abuses that the powerful interests did not want revealed.
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0:34.0	To support fearless investigative nonprofit journalism, please donate by December 31st.
0:41.0	Just visit revealnews.org slash 2023. Again, to donate to the show and to support our work into the future.
0:48.0	Please visit revealnews.org slash 2023. And from the bottom of my heart, thank you.
1:03.0	From the Center for Investigative Reporting in PRX, this is Reveal. I'm Alan Litzon.
1:10.0	Jennifer Salazar, Liz and Rock Springs, Wyoming. We're on a warm Saturday in October.
1:16.0	She meets up with her porter Tennessee Watson at a park on the edge of town.
1:20.0	I'm trying to see. I'm Jennifer. Nice to meet you.
1:23.0	Sorry, it's been so crazy.
1:25.0	Oh, they're at the park and not at her house.
1:28.0	Because Jennifer has something to share that her husband Andrew isn't ready to talk about. It's still hard for her too.
1:35.0	So I will tell you and I'll apologize now, but this is the month that my daughter passed away.
1:41.0	So if you notice I'm not wearing makeup and I brought clean-ups because it's going to be a little hard.
1:48.0	It's been three and a half years since Jennifer and Andrew's daughter Larissa died.
1:53.0	She just turned 16 when it happened. And it made Jennifer question, whether Wyoming was a safe place to raise her two younger kids.
2:02.0	It freaks me out to raise kids here and even though they say Wyoming is a good place to raise kids,
2:07.0	I tell my husband, like, I don't know. Like, is there a risk that we take raising them here?
2:12.0	That they make a wrong step and get into the system and the same thing happens? Like, I just, it freaks me out. Like it does.
	...

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