Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
Superior Court Judge Robert Burner is frustrated.
"Is there a juvenile problem around here? Anybody with half a brain knows there's a juvenile problem around here, especially if they drive downtown in Warsaw at 11 o'clock at night," he said recently.
He has dealt with juveniles in Kosciusko County for 32 years, and laments his lack of options in dealing with juvenile offenders. He believes his hands were tied when federal authorities took away the county's ability to put juveniles in jail.
"They took one of the most effective tools I had," he said. "Our system is not responsive."
He is still amazed by a letter he received last fall from the Indiana Department of Corrections, notifying him of the limit on the number of boys that would be accepted into Indiana Boys' School. The letter also said the U.S. District Court had threatened to fine the state for each day the population at the Boys' School exceeded the limit.
"I just committed a kid to house arrest. It will be two weeks to three months before we can get him into Boys' School," he said. "You're 14, 15 years old, waiting to go to Boys' School. What would you do? He's got nothing to lose while he's waiting."
While Burner deals extensively with juveniles, he said he sees no direct evidence of gang membership in Kosciusko County.
"Any time you get a bunch of kids together you can call it a gang," he said. "I'm not saying there ain't no gangs, I'm saying I don't see evidence of them."
Kosciusko County Prosecutor David Kolbe also said he has no proof that big-city gangs have moved into Kosciusko County, though he sees kids congregating in groups that others call gangs.
"I think there are groups of kids who perceive themselves as something akin to gangs," he said.
The gang problem is the symptom, not the root, he said. "What we want to do is hold each individual responsible for his or her own behavior," he said.
Kolbe and Burner both said they see an enormous correlation between broken and dysfunctional families and juvenile crime.
"If the kids aren't finding a sense of value at home or at school, they're getting it from their peer group," Burner said.
"They just don't get it in terms of moral conduct," Kolbe said of the juveniles he sees in trouble. Civility, virtue, common decency, integrity - all seem to be absent. "We've lost our moral compass, then we wring our hands and act shocked."
So what happens to juveniles that commit crimes?
Kolbe said informal probation is tried for the first two offenses. If the action or behavior continues, the juvenile is given formal probation. If violations continue, the juvenile is committed to boys' or girls' school; further offenses will see the juvenile waived to adult court.
The system breaks down, they said, when it comes to boys' or girls' school - in reality, there is little available space, and kids sent there are usually out too soon.
Burner said the recidivism rate for adult convicts is about 70 percent - seven out of 10 return to prison. For kids the rate used to be three out of 10, he said, but now the rate is 60 percent and quickly approaching the adult rate.
"We couldn't get them processed right the first time because we don't have the resources," he said. "I just want to quit losing people. I don't like losing kids."
To keep a juvenile in a detention center, the county pays an average of $100 to $120 per day for a minimum detention with no treatment. With treatment, the cost can be as much as $800 per day. What's more, the facilities are usually far from home - Kosciusko County sends juveniles to a detention center in New Castle.
Burner sees more than 300 cases a year of children in need of services, and for each delinquency case filed there are three to six more that should be filed but never make it to the court system, he said.
The juvenile boot camp run by the Kosciusko County Sheriff's Office works, Burner and Kolbe said, but there are only few spaces available and a limited budget.
"It all comes back to money," Burner said. "People don't want to be personally responsible for addressing problems in society. They would rather pay someone to do it for them," but they want to pay as little as possible.
Kolbe said that society is expecting government to do more and more of what used to be done by families.
"I believe that the expectations of the system to correct problems are misplaced," he said. "We can't do it. We simply can't do it."
