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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 9, 2017)
Page 8A East Oregonian BEHIND THE REPORTING Why NORCOR was worth our time I t’s my belief that journalists, accustomed common practice for organizations intending to asking questions, need to get better at to give media time to read a report, ask answering them and explaining how and questions and do our own research before why we report the stories we do. publishing. We ask you to trust the information we We get reports and studies, news tips and publish, and it’s only fair to show how the press releases emailed to us nearly every day, work is done. and part of the job is deciding which With that in mind, the East merit the time, space and energy Oregonian is going to use space on to follow up on. This report was a semi-regular basis to deconstruct appealing for several reasons. a recently published article and First: The report’s creator has explain how we chose our sources, direct access that journalists do sifted through data, verifi ed facts, not. The jail was required to let an selected certain words and decided attorney enter the facility and talk when it was ready to publish. to the youth on multiple occasions. Daniel We will take nothing for granted. For privacy reasons and because the Wattenburger Decisions that seem obvious inmates are minors, a newspaper Editor are sometimes the most worth isn’t even able to access the names examining. And we encourage of most of the juveniles held there, further questions. The media is a tool some of whom come from Umatilla for looking critically at the powers that be, and Morrow counties. and we must be willing to put our work up to The organization also has a history of the same rigorous evaluation. credibility. In March it published a similar We’re starting with the article reported by report about the Multnomah County Jail Phil Wright and published Wednesday about that found similar methods for dealing with the Northern Oregon Regional Correctional inmates suffering from mental illness. Facility’s treatment of youth who are housed And most importantly, the fi ndings are at the jail. relevant for the public to understand. We The story began when we were apprised entrust a lot of funding and power to those of a report by Disability Rights Oregon, a who manage the criminal justice system — federally designated advocacy group, after especially those who oversea children — and representatives toured the facility on several have a responsibility to examine how they occasions and interviewed youth inmates. are doing their jobs. The report was released last week Once we decided the story was worth the time and attention, we got to work. but embargoed until Tuesday at 8 a.m., a Saturday, December 9, 2017 What to publish, what to cut D isability Rights Oregon in but the report remained under embargo. mid-November asked reporters That allowed me time to read all 37 pages if they were interested in a and compile information from the report forthcoming investigative report on into a news story. conditions at the juvenile jail in The Dalles. Radcliffe’s report has plenty of stats Northern Oregon Regional Correctional and numbers, and I selected some. I didn’t Facility operates that juvenile want to reproduce her report, after detention facility, and sometimes all, but give readers a sense of Umatilla and Morrow counties what was in it, of why she found send youth there for treatment, conditions there shocking. usually because they are defendants I also needed to get reactions facing serious criminal charges. So from someone who would be a I was interested. voice for NORCOR. That was its The lawyer who conducted the director, Bryan Brandenburg. He investigation, Sarah Radcliffe, was was not available until Tuesday Phil available for interviews before the at noon. I didn’t want to publish a Wright story without his side. report went public Dec. 5. She and Reporter I talked over the phone the morning And because we’re a local of Nov. 28. paper, I wanted to hear from public What she said, and how she said offi cials and others that have it, convinced me this report would be news. dealings with that juvenile jail. I didn’t Radcliffe described a jail — sure, the get to speak to every source I wanted to inmates are 12-18, but they still are in by deadline. Kara Davis, a local defense jail — that relied on Puritanical rules and attorney, was one. She has represented attitudes to make their young inmates clients who served time in the juvenile jail. behave. The kids there could get into I hope to work her words and insight into trouble for looking out of windows, for subsequent reports. keeping their hands above their waists, for Because this story is not over. I had the not looking forward. fi rst “follow” in Friday’s edition. Another They did not get the amount of educa- appeared Saturday. If Wasco County gets tion state law requires, they faced hours of its way, an independent investigation will isolation a day, and if they broke rules that look into NORCOR in light of DRO’s isolation could last weeks. fi ndings. If that happens, I’ll follow it. Disability Rights released the report to And if that investigation doesn’t happen, news organizations and others on Nov. 30, I’ll write about that, too. 1. We selected an isolation cell as the lead photo from nearly a dozen that accompa- nied the report. Prisons and jails will allow photojournalists behind the walls on some occasions, but because the jail is in The Dalles and we would likely not have been allowed the same kind of access, we opted to use a contributed photo. We also used another of the outside of the jail shared by The Dalles Chronicle to help set the scene. Photo contributed by Disability Rights Oregon Isolation is a common experience for youth at the Northern Oregon Regional Correctional Facility, The Dalles, according to t a new report from Disability Rights Oregon. NORCOR’s director maintains youth there do not suffer inhumane treatment. eatment. 1 Youth in isolation 2 Juvenile jail accused of inhumane methods Editor’s note: This story was published in the Dec. 6 edition of the East Oregonian. It appears here in its original version but with annotation. By PHIL WRIGHT East Oregonian Disability Rights Oregon in a new report accused the juvenile jail in The Dalles of skirting Oregon law and using inhumane means to punish youth. The director of the Northern Oregon Regional Correctional Facility admitted the juvenile detention center can improve, but said in no way is the treatment there inhumane. 3 Disability Rights Oregon is the federally designated Protection and Advocacy System for Oregonians with disabilities, which grants the organization the authority to inspect jails and other facilities that care for or confi ne people with disabilities. Disability Rights attorney Sarah Radcliffe 4 visited the NORCOR juvenile jail on three occasions between June and September and interviewed 23 youth there, some who told her about long stays in isolation with little or no mean- ingful human contact, including youth who were suicidal. “I was just really shocked by the conditions,” she said. “Kids are getting disciplined for normal behavior, and some for mental health-related behavior.” Offenders as young as 12 faced discipline for talking in line or not looking forward, according to the report, 5 and most youth reported spending three to six hours per day locked in their cells. Youth could spend weeks “on disciplinary status,” according to Radcliffe, in which they cannot participate in any group activities, have to eat alone, receive solitary education in their housing unit and cannot have phone calls or visits from family. Radcliffe called NORCOR’s disciplinary process “regressive and aggressive.” NORCOR also does not docu- ment how long youth remain in isolation, a violation of Oregon law. Dr. Ajit Jetmalani is the director of child and adolescent psychiatry at Oregon Health and Science Univer- sity and a member of the statewide juvenile justice mental health task force. He said in the report the NORCOR juvenile detention facility “appears to be unaware of the neuroscience of adolescent development” that shows “the crit- ical importance of attachment and sustained positive relationships” for juveniles. “The key to recovery for these kids is not enforcing strict compliance with rules, but rather in forming healthy relationships that help to foster an intrinsic desire to engage positively with the world,” he said. 6 NORCOR Director Bryan Bran- denburg said that is what NORCOR is trying to achieve, and he disputed much of Radcliffe’s report. “The kids are not treated inhu- manely,” he said, “they are treated appropriately.” The facility provides programs such as self-esteem classes and drug treatment. NORCOR even offers yoga. “We really are about teaching kids better behavior,” he said. “We certainly don’t punish, as she said in her report, nor do we treat them inhumanely.” Staff do place youth who are disruptive or who break the rules in disciplinary segregation, he said, which means isolation in their cell. But staff and mental health workers regularly check on youth in segre- gation, he said, “so they are not deprived of human contact.” But he admitted NORCOR had “silly” 7 rules for enforcing behavior and it was time to replace or change them, including prohi- bitions against looking around or looking out of windows during class. In the wake of Radcliffe’s report, he said, those rules are gone. And NORCOR is installing clocks in easy-to-see places so youth don’t have to ask staff for the time of day. NORCOR also will do a better job of documenting how long youth are in isolation, Brandenburg said, and he and Jeff Justesen, NORCOR’s detention manager, are crafting grievance and appeals processes for youth who get into trouble. Oregon law requires juve- nile jails to offer a hearing prior to imposing “roomlock” in excess of 12 hours or denial of any privilege in excess of one day. Inmates in Oregon’s state prisons can fi le complaints against staff and fi le appeals for discipline, Brandenburg said, and youth in NORCOR should have those same rights. And youth in isolation now can have journals and safety fl ex pens in cells, as well as phone calls and visits. Brandenburg was at a business trip and not in his offi ce Tuesday, so he said his numbers were from memory, but two years ago NORCOR averaged 19 youth offenders a month and that has dropped to 15 a month. There were a total of 276 youths booked into the jail between January and October and six are in the facility now. NORCOR does keep youth longer than other sites, he said, but that is due to the programs it offers. “We are one of two detention centers in Oregon that have those programs, so they are sent to NORCOR to complete those programs — 30-day and 90-day programs,” he said. 8 Umatilla and Morrow counties are among 17 Oregon counties that send detainees to the juvenile facility, along with the Warm Springs Indian Reservation and counties in southeastern Wash- ington. The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement sends youth there from throughout the country. Dale Primmer is the director of Umatilla County Community Justice, which oversees services for juvenile offenders. He said the county rents two beds as needed per day from the facility and the county has no one there now. Those beds are for often used for longer stays, he explained, such as youth undergoing treatment in one of the facility’s programs or a defendant facing serious Measure 11 crimes. Primmer said he glanced through the Disability Rights report and could not comment on whether it was factual or not. County offi cers transport youth at NORCOR to court hearings, doctors and other appointments, but Primmer said he has not heard if any inmates complained about their treatment. He also said if NORCOR’s treatment of youth is inhumane, he would confer with county commis- sioners and law enforcement partners to determine options for incarcerating or monitoring youth. 9 County Juvenile Department Director Tom Meier didn’t immedi- ately return a call seeking comment, but Morrow County District Attorney Justin Nelson said youth defendants or their attorneys have not told him or his deputy about concerns at NORCOR. He added that does not mean the report is inaccurate. The Pew Charitable Trust reported juvenile confi nement dropped by half nationwide, but Oregon is moving the opposite direction. According to Radcliffe, only Wyoming incarcerates a higher percentage of its youth than Oregon. Disability Rights Oregon made several recommendations, including guarantees from the Oregon’s Department of Education that youth in NORCOR receive an appropriate education, to ending solitary confi nement. Radcliffe’s No. 1 recommendation is the creation of “comprehensive rules governing treatment and conditions at juvenile detention facilities.” Primmer said the lack of a consistent method of evaluating youth detention sites for best prac- tices was a signifi cant takeaway. Brandenburg maintained Radcliffe “exaggerated for impact to dramatize a situation that is not as dire as she wants to portray it,” but her report also shows NORCOR can do better. “We are in the service business,” he said, “so we will look at those recommendations we see as legiti- mate and valid and make an effort to address them.” 2. Choosing the right head- line is about generating interest while accurately represent- ing the content of an article. We opted to emphasize the isolation found in the report. The Oregonian’s headline was “Regional juvenile jail in The Dalles blasted as ‘inhumane’ in new report,” while Oregon Public Broadcasting used “‘Psy- chologically harmful conditions’ for kids at NORCOR juvenile detention center.” 3. The fi rst two paragraphs set up the scope of our report- ing, summarizing both the contents of the report and the response from the jail. 4. We spoke to Sarah Rad- cliffe before the full report was available to get an idea of what it would include. 5. The report included per- sonal accounts from anony- mous youth inmates, but for the sake of space and focus we opted not to include them in this story. We attached the complete report, as well as NORCOR’s response, to the article on our website. 6. This line was taken di- rectly from the report between two quotes attributed to Dr. Jetmalani. After publication, we were notifi ed by a DRO spokes- person that the line was not his quote, but a summary of fi nd- ings in the report. We corrected the story online and you can fi nd a correction on Page 2A of today’s paper. 7. We will sometimes select a single word, usually a power- ful one, from a quoted source to summarize a description or explanation. The direct quote here was an answer to a ques- tion: “We’re getting rid of those silly rules.” 8. The fi rst half of this article is based on nearly an hour of interviews with Radcliffe and Brandenburg and a full reading of the 37-page report. The sec- ond half focuses on potential impacts to our readership. 9. Days after the DRO report was released, Wasco County commissioners announced they would stop sending youth to the facility until an indepen- dent investigation is completed. The Oregon Youth Authority and Umatilla County followed suit a day later. More online: For the doc- uments used in this report- ing, an audio interview with reporter Phil Wright about the process and updated stories about response to the report, visit www.eastoregonian.com
