Report: Law change in '05 helped juveniles

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By Mike Riopell | Friday, June 27, 2008 10:26 PM CDT | () comments

SPRINGFIELD — Keeping young drug offenders in the juvenile court system instead of automatically transferring them to adult court helps them move on to productive lives, a report released Thursday suggests.

In 2005, lawmakers changed state law so fewer 15- and 16-year-olds accused of some drug charges would be automatically transferred to adult courts, a practice that occurred almost exclusively in Cook County.

The report released Thursday by the state Juvenile Justice Initiative suggests the change to lessen transfers better allows young offenders to rehabilitate their lives and doesn’t cause public safety problems.

Before 2005, the law called for young people arrested on drug charges near a school or public housing project to be immediately transferred to adult court without any review by a judge. About

99 percent of them were minorities, making the old process highly discriminatory, the report’s authors said.

Mike Riopell can be contacted at (217) 789-0865 or mike.riopell@lee.net.