Categories Juvenile Justice
Attorneys from Disability Rights Tennessee, Sanford Heisler Sharp, and the Youth Law Center filed a class action complaint today challenging illegal and unconstitutional conditions in Tennessee’s juvenile justice facilities.
The complaint alleges that the State of Tennessee, among other Defendants, warehouses children with disabilities in prison-like facilities and subjects them to violence and abuse. The complaint details routine use of solitary confinement, pepper spray, and physical assaults on youth with disabilities. The complaint also accuses staff members of beating children and bribing youth to attack one another. According to the complaint, the Defendants resort to such abuses instead of providing evidenced-based assessment, education, healthcare, and other rehabilitative services.
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