by SP Biloxi
Youth Today reports that Lindsay Hayes, a project director for the NCIA, handed a report to former OJJDP Administrator J. Robert Flores on a study of juveniles who committed suicide while in confinement in winter of 2004. In the study, it showed that more than a third of the 110 suicide deaths that occurred between 1995 and 1999 weren't known to the supervising or licensing state agency. Flores did nothing on Hayes' report in five years nor disclosed to Hayes why.
Now this report called Characteristics of Juvenile Suicide in Confinement is now available online and has become Acting Administrator Jeff Slowikowski 's problem. Reporter John Kelly of Youth Today reports:
OJJDP published the study and made it available on its website today.
Among the major findings in the report:
Youth Today reports that Lindsay Hayes, a project director for the NCIA, handed a report to former OJJDP Administrator J. Robert Flores on a study of juveniles who committed suicide while in confinement in winter of 2004. In the study, it showed that more than a third of the 110 suicide deaths that occurred between 1995 and 1999 weren't known to the supervising or licensing state agency. Flores did nothing on Hayes' report in five years nor disclosed to Hayes why.
Now this report called Characteristics of Juvenile Suicide in Confinement is now available online and has become Acting Administrator Jeff Slowikowski 's problem. Reporter John Kelly of Youth Today reports:
OJJDP published the study and made it available on its website today.
Among the major findings in the report:
*More than one state agency was unaware of suicides at private juvenile facilities with which it held a contract.
*More than half of suicides at juvenile detention centers occurred within six days of a juvenile's commitment to the facility, and only 35 percent in detention centers had been provided a mental health assessment before the suicide.
Because the issue was so important, Hayes said, OJJDP allowed NCIA to post an unofficial version of the study on its website. Shortly thereafter, he met with OJJDP Administrator J. Robert Flores.
"He said they were going to make it a bulletin, publish the full report and fast track it," Hayes said. "But then, [the report] just sat there."
Hayes said he called regularly to check on the report and was not called back, and ultimately "moved on to other things."
But Hayes's frustration grew, as recent consulting jobs with juvenile facilities made him realize how preventable many suicides were. He became "so infuriated" with Flores, he said, that in summer of 2008, "I wrote a fairly nasty letter to him."
A day or two later, Hayes got an email from OJJDP staff saying the study had been approved and was in the publication stage, with an expected release date of 2008.
Then last December, Hayes said, he got an e-mail saying the study was no longer approved. But in January, after Flores left the agency, he was told by OJJDP that the publication would be released, five years after its submission.
"I have a sense that Flores' hands were all over this," Hayes said, and that "senior staff were supportive of what I was doing."
I found Hayes' 2006 report [Click here]. Mr. Flores clearly ignored Hayes' study. It read:
May 1, 2006
Further Information
Juvenile Suicide in Confinement: A National Survey will appear as an OJJDP publication in the near future. The full report, however, can be be accessed through the NCIA website:
http://www.ncianet.org/cjjsl.cfm
The House committee need to probe this matter as Flores is still under investigation into the grant decision making process, illegal hiring of a contractor, and questionable business expenses. Now, Flores knowingly and willingly ignored a key study which he chose to not disclose this to juvenile detention centers to rehabilitate the youth.
A day or two later, Hayes got an email from OJJDP staff saying the study had been approved and was in the publication stage, with an expected release date of 2008.
Then last December, Hayes said, he got an e-mail saying the study was no longer approved. But in January, after Flores left the agency, he was told by OJJDP that the publication would be released, five years after its submission.
"I have a sense that Flores' hands were all over this," Hayes said, and that "senior staff were supportive of what I was doing."
I found Hayes' 2006 report [Click here]. Mr. Flores clearly ignored Hayes' study. It read:
May 1, 2006
Further Information
Juvenile Suicide in Confinement: A National Survey will appear as an OJJDP publication in the near future. The full report, however, can be be accessed through the NCIA website:
http://www.ncianet.org/cjjsl.cfm
The House committee need to probe this matter as Flores is still under investigation into the grant decision making process, illegal hiring of a contractor, and questionable business expenses. Now, Flores knowingly and willingly ignored a key study which he chose to not disclose this to juvenile detention centers to rehabilitate the youth.
More importantly, Flores lied to the House committee on his leadership role as the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) Administrator and violated the mission statement the agency.
If I were the Senate committee, I would comb through Flores' 2007 testimony to the committee to see if Flores committed perjury given the light of this new scandal.
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