Connecticut officials often speak with pride about the state’s juvenile justice system, and by some measures, rightly so—the state far and away surpasses most of the country in key benchmarks that juvenile justice advocates use to measure a fair system.

These metrics include the number of juveniles tried in adult court, the overall number of delinquency charges, and the number of juveniles in detention facilities, all of which, they say, indicate success. 

But there is one area where the state has stagnated: the number of juveniles in detention facilities for long periods of time before their disposition, when they have not been found or pleaded guilty to any wrongdoing.

The number of juveniles in detention facilities is a metric repeatedly emphasized by Office of Policy Management (OPM) officials as one of the most important. Although the overall number of juveniles in detention is low compared to the rest of the nation, it is high compared to the rest of New England. 

In 2024, 61 juveniles were kept in detention facilities for 60 days or more before their disposition, according to the most recent datafrom the Connecticut Judicial Branch. The year before, 50 people were held in juvenile detention facilities for that length of time pre-disposition, but a few years before that, in 2020, 100 juveniles were detained for 60 days or more pre-disposition. 

Every year, dozens of juveniles are detained in Connecticut for lengthy periods of time before their disposition, and officials are seeking ways to get that number closer to zero. 

Alternatives to Detention

Connecticut’s criminal justice system has different rules for juveniles and adults. Since state officials are trying to rehabilitate juvenile offenders without detaining them, the judicial branch leans heavily on various programs to keep juveniles outside of detention and keep their criminal records clean once they become adults.

For decades, studies commissioned by both government entities and activists have consistently found that detaining juveniles, especially for long periods of time, can have life-long deleterious impacts on them.

People who are detained when they are juveniles for criminal offenses are more likely to engage in more crime when they are adults. A 1999 study conducted in Arkansas found that incarceration is a greater predictor of recidivism than whether or not a person has access to a weapon, their poor parental relationships, or is a member of a gang. 

More recent research from the criminal justice advocacy group, the Sentencing Project, found that programs centered around “restorative justice,” which include diversionary programs, substantially lower the recidivism rates. This study pointed toward Connecticut’s criminal justice program as a model example.  

Part of the reason detention can be so detrimental is that it exacerbates conditions correlated with juvenile crime. Many juvenile offenders suffer from mental health problems, unstable homes, and addiction. Juveniles from low-income households are significantly more likely to have “contact with juvenile justice systems” than juveniles who have higher socio-economic status. Black and Latino youth, who are more likely to have a lower socioeconomic status than white youth, are more likely to be tangled in the juvenile justice system. 

In 2024, 53% of juveniles admitted to juvenile detention centers pre-disposition were black, while only 42% were white, even though 77% of residents in Connecticut are white alone, 13% are black, and only 2% of all residents are mixed race. 

Additionally, more than one-third of juveniles in detention were Hispanic, while only one-fifth of state residents are Hispanic. Since Hispanic is treated as an ethnicity in the data, Hispanic people can be black or white and can overlap with other races and ethnicities. 

When juveniles are removed from support systems, including loved ones, social services, and education, it can worsen pre-existing problems in their lives.

In Connecticut, that is why diversionary programs exist.

Diversionary programs are intended to keep juvenile offenders out of detention facilities, instead offering programs which, if completed, allow jail time to be avoided and often come with stipulations that allow crimes to be kept off an individual’s record. There are several types of diversionary programs in Connecticut, some of which are implemented by local Juvenile Review Boards (JRBs), and others that are assigned by judges themselves, without a jury.

There is some evidence that diversionary programs decrease the long-term recidivism rate of juvenile offenders. For example, a study from Connecticut’s Office of Legislative Research found that juveniles who completed diversionary programs for motor vehicle offenses had a 13% one-year recidivism rate, and that 66% to 80% of juveniles in these programs complete them. This is substantially lower than the recidivism rate of offenders of all ages. Connecticut data reports usually group all offenders under the age of 25 together. 

But sometimes diversionary programs aren’t ideal.

Cameron Atkinson is an attorney in Connecticut who works with juveniles accused of crimes. He described the juvenile justice system as “incredibly inefficient” and draining on attorneys, juveniles, and families.

“The parents, who are the ones who are going to make the decision, are going to say, ‘We’re going to just roll over and take whatever deal that’s being offered, because it mitigates what could (happen),’” Atkinson said. “No parent wants to see their kid go to jail, and once you explain to parents jail is a possibility, detention possibility, no parent wants to see that. You walk out of the prosecutor’s office with an offer that does not involve detention or jail. Most parents are going to take it, and I can’t blame them, because a lot of times you’re looking at troubled kids, and probation structure and enforcement is good for them at that time.”

Even though diversionary programs keep juveniles out of detention, they’re not get out of jail free cards. Sometimes, juveniles are still detained for lengthy periods of time, and pleading guilty to delinquency to enter a diversionary program comes with its own costs. 

Juvenile Detention

Only a small fraction of juveniles are detained before their disposition. In 2025, 4,850 juvenile cases were filed in the state, but only 240 orders to detain were requested and approved by judges.

Usually, a judge will decide to detain a juvenile before a trial if law enforcement or probation officers recommend it. In 2022, there was a wave of criminal justice reforms. One of the new laws created that year requires judges to explain specific justifications for detaining suspected juvenile offenders in writing. Since that law took effect, every request for an order to detain a juvenile in Connecticut has been granted. 

According to Atkinson, a juvenile is only detained for a lengthy period of time if they commit a serious crime and may be tried in adult court, or if they repeatedly violate their conditions of parole. Atkinson has represented between 20 and 25 juveniles in the past five years, all of whom were boys.

Atkinson said that in his experience, the only crimes resulting in lengthy pre-trial detentions, but don’t automatically result in a juvenile being sent to adult court, are motor vehicle thefts and sexual assaults. 

Atkinson has represented numerous juveniles who were detained for lengthy periods.

“For most of my clients, it’s usually violating pre-trial monitoring conditions—using drugs, staying out after curfew, repeatedly, hanging out with people that you’ve been told not to hang out with, being disrespectful to your probation officer,” Atkinson said. “Usually that requires open defiance of the probation officer.”

He said he has only represented one person who was detained because he was charged with a serious offense, and it involved a motor vehicle theft and “what he did after.” 

Atkinson could not disclose many details about these cases because they involved juveniles. 

Even in the most ideal facilities, detention has a detrimental impact on juveniles. Most facilities in Connecticut are far from ideal.

The Department of Corrections’ (DOC) most recent “Conditions of Confinement Report,” which was released earlier this year, found systemic problems in detention facilities, including understaffing and poor healthcare, and in the youth justice system. The state has a Restoring Promise program for youths and juveniles. People who are placed in Restoring Promise houses have substantially lower rates of violent incidents than those placed in detention centers, but spots are limited. 

The Office of the Child Advocate also found that there was repeated and unjust use of force against juveniles in the Manson Youth Institution, in part because of a lack of training and accountability for staff. Manson Youth Institution officials have been accused of mistreating juveniles, sometimes in very serious ways, for many years. 

Since 2006, the overall number of juveniles detained pre-disposition has decreased substantially, although not in any meaningful pattern. From 2006 to 2016, the total number of detentions fluctuated from around 1,800 to 2,900, with no clear trend. After 2016, the overall number of detentions dropped significantly, although it wasn’t a linear decline. By 2024, only 929 juveniles were placed in pre-trial detention, which was the highest number of juveniles detained pre-disposition since 2019, when the number was 1,090. In both years, around two-thirds of these people were detained for less than two weeks.

In contrast, the average number of days in detention has remained relatively consistent until it jumped slightly from 14 days in 2018 to 19 days in 2019. This number peaked in 2020, with an average of 25 days per juvenile in pre-disposition detention, before dropping again. In 2024, the average juvenile in detention before their disposition was 25 days.

Juveniles in Detention for 60+ Days Pre-Disposition

Average Days in Detention Pre-Disposition

Although the overall trend is clear, significantly fewer juveniles are being detained both before and after disposition; there is no clear pattern in the number of juveniles detained for longer periods of time. 

In 2006, 120 juveniles were kept in detention facilities for 60 days or more. Since then, from 2007 through 2024, the number of juveniles kept in detention for this length of period has bounced between 16 and 100, depending on the year. Sometimes the year-to-year numbers have changed dramatically—for example, in 2018, 33 people were held in juvenile detention centers for 60 days or more, and in 2019 that number jumped to 71.  

“I would say that I’m a little surprised by that number,” Atkinson said about the 2024 data. “That either tells me that they’re dealing with more serious cases than I would think they’d have in juvenile, or that there’s an abuse of the juvenile detention system. Unless you’re just a complete screw up in the pre-trial phase or you did something really bad, more than 60 days is just not appropriate or necessary.”

Motor vehicle theft, one of the two types of serious crimes Atkinson listed which can lead to a juvenile being detained for lengthy periods of time, has increased substantially in the last few years. In 2022, 202 juveniles were arrested for motor vehicle theft, then in 2023, over 900 juveniles were arrested for motor vehicle theft—a 350% increase. While the number of arrests dropped off after that, they have remained substantially higher than both pre-2022 and pre-COVID levels.

The spike in motor vehicle theft among both juveniles and offenders 24 years old and younger coincided with the rise of “Kia Boyz” gangs. These are groups of teenagers and young men who stole Kias and Hyundais. The first Kia Boyz gang was in Milwaukee, but groups popped up across the nation after publication of a 2022 YouTube documentary about the Milwaukee Kia Boyz. Andrew Sullivan, an independent journalist, investigated this trend and claimed that the Connecticut Kia Boyz were the most “fearless and brazen” in the nation.  

In 2019, Connecticut legislators expanded diversionary programs for juveniles so that larger numbers of people charged with motor vehicle theft under the age of 18 could avoid any time in detention, which kept some juveniles out of detention facilities. 

The longest one of Atkinson’s clients was detained for over six weeks, and he says that outlier was the result of drug use. 

Substance abuse among youths and juveniles in Connecticut is both higher than the national average, and overdoses have increasedin recent years.  

“He just could not get off drugs,” Atkinson said. “At one point, we had to go and get a restraining order on his dealer. I believe that the police actually went, marshals served the restraining order and arrested the guy.”

Atkinson’s client was 16 years old at the time. 

‘They never had a fighting chance’

Atkinson says that half of his clients who had lengthy pre-trial detention left in a better situation than they entered in—they were able to sober up or were scared straight by the experience—but for the other half, things got worse. Sometimes, they met new drug dealers, or the experience of detention sent them spiraling.

“Once you’re an addict, you don’t know how to stop, and it’s a lot harder to stop when you’re a kid,” he said. “Sometimes you’re dealing with kids who never had a fighting chance, because mom was using it during the pregnancy, so they were born addicted. It’s terrible.”

Atkinson has noticed some patterns among the juveniles he worked with: almost all of them were raised by single mothers, and don’t have any father figures in their lives. He pointed toward one 16-year-old he represented, who was detained for more than 40 days pre-disposition because he kept violating his parole terms, as an example.

“I can’t tell you how many times I told his probation officer and his mom that he needed a father figure to whoop his ass, because that, to me, was the only thing that he would get through to him,” he said. 

Atkinson believes that the juvenile court should partner with organizations like Big Brothers, Big Sisters to match troubled youth with mentors, and provide resources to help addicts get sober. He thinks that sobriety programs, and any form of structured community—which can be something as simple as a basketball team—would go a long way to stop juveniles committing other crimes or violating their terms of parole. 

“Some of the things we see that on a systemic level,” he said. “That’s why it’s a little bit surprising to me that we see the number of longer detentions. If those are in any way drug-related, I would urge the legislature, with all my might, to set up some sort of state-funded inpatient drug facility, because that would be better for those kids than detention.”

Some additional changes have been made in recent years. 

There are also more opportunities for people who were given lengthy sentences as juveniles. Currently, people who are convicted of crimes before the age of 21 and have served 85% of their sentence are eligible for parole, even if said crimes are considered ineligible in other circumstances. In 2026, the Senate passed reforms to expand parole eligibility for people who were convicted of crimes before the age of 26. If the bill passes, over 700 people will be eligible for parole, including over 300 people convicted of murder and 90 people convicted of sexual assault, but only if their parole is approved by the Board of Pardons and Parole. 

There have been other, less controversial reforms as well. For example, the Manson Youth Institution stopped using solitary confinement as a punishment for juveniles in 2024, when the federal Justice Department intervened. And, while overall juvenile detention rates have increased since 2020, they are still substantially lower than they were in the mid-2010s, before major criminal justice reforms were implemented.

Atkinson also believes there is another way to reduce juvenile detention: let them stand trial in front of a jury.

“There are cases where you truly understand the concept of the jury being the last unpoliticized, unbiased fashion in our country,” he said. “The fact that we don’t get juvenile jury trials, criminal cases that really, really hurt them… Let’s have a jury trial. The jury convicts delinquency, you preserve the kid’s record, and you respect your Constitutional rights at the same time.”

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