Meth Use Begins Before Age 15

Most teens who try methamphetamine say they started when they were age 15 or younger. Nearly a quarter of teens say that it would be "very easy" or "somewhat easy" to obtain meth. One in three teens believes there is only a "slight risk" or "no risk" in trying meth once or twice.

These national results were published yesterday by the Meth Project, a nonprofit organization based in California. They received wide coverage in national news outlets yesterday and today.

However, even our local press failed to research usage statistics in our own community. Had they bothered to look, they would have found that the Kansas Methamphetamine Prevention Project reports meth use has declined slightly in recent years among 12th graders in Kansas. In 1999, 7.7 percent of Kansas 12th graders reported some use of meth in their lifetime. By 2006, that number dropped to 5.3 percent.

Bipolar Label Increases 40 Times

The number of children and youth labeled as bipolar increased 40 times from 1994 to 2003. The frequency of the diagnosis has increased even further since then.

The numbers come from a study just published in the Archives of General Psychiatry. Many believe the jump comes from more aggressive diagnosis. Because of the size of the increase, some question the validity of the diagnosis.

Bipolar teens and children experience massive mood swings. During their manic stages, they may feel surges of energy and confidence. They might make grandiose plans that never come to fruition. They might also make impulsive decisions that violate the law.

These manic stages are soon followed by debilitating depression. They fail school. They might self medicate using alcohol and illegal drugs. As in their manic stages, they may make poor choices which lead to trouble with the law.

Families with bipolar children often retain my firm for representation in juvenile justice proceedings and special education. These families often find that the juvenile justice system offers little help. In many cases, inappropriate responses from juvenile justice might actually obstruct the family's efforts.

Punishing teens for bipolar behavior won't cure their disorder. Fortunately, a combination of medical intervention with mental health therapy can help these children become productive.

However, the pace of the medical and legal interventions might contradict each other. The juvenile court demands immediate compliance with its orders and conditions of probation. Meanwhile, the psychiatrist might need time to experiment with different combinations of drugs. Some of the medicines might need several weeks to take effect. Concurrently, your family needs training and community resources. Your child may require talk therapy over several months.

At the same time, the school system should evaluate your child for eligibility for special education and related services. If the bipolar mood disorder interferes with school, your child might need an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) to receive a free, appropriate public education.

Our firm helps families with bipolar children in all these systems. We ensure that the juvenile justice system coordinates with the mental health system to keep your child safe and compliant. We advocate for the school to provide an appropriate education so your child can succeed and stay out of trouble. We refer your family to public and private resources to learn how to manage your child's behavior while interacting with larger social systems.

You can get more done for less effort by acting before disaster strikes. If your child may be experiencing symptoms of bipolar mood disorder, seek early professional help.

Insurers Deny Benefits for Mental Illness

I received this post from the Mental Health Association of the Heartland, along with a request to circulate it widely:

Kansas law adopted in 2001 requires health insurance companies to cover up to 45 in-patient days and 45 outpatient visits on an annual basis for treatment of biologically-based mental illnesses. However, recent data from the top 10 health insurance providers, as reported by the Kansas Insurance Department (KID), reveal that policyholders typically receive an average of six in-patient days or outpatient visits regardless of diagnosis.

The 2006 Mental Health Parity Task Force of the Governor’s Mental Health Services Planning Council suggested that there must be a significant number of health insurance policy holders who have had one or more of the following experiences which have resulted in the denial of adequate, appropriate or timely treatment since the 2001 Mental Health Parity legislation:

• Denial of claims for treatment of mental illness
  
  
• Excessive co-pays or deductibles for mental health treatment
  
  
• Refusal to authorize an adequate number of in-patient days and/or outpatient visits
  
  
• Inability to obtain or understand the standards and rationale used to deny authorization of treatment by an insurer
  
  
• Insurers recommending that “difficult” cases be referred to law enforcement or public mental health services
  
  
• Other problems with authorization of treatment of a mental disorder

We want to hear from individual policy holders, group health care administrators and mental health providers who have experienced any of these problems. Please share with us your personal written and/or oral accounts of your experiences.


We will listen to your experiences and help you, as appropriate, to file a formal complaint with the Kansas Insurance Department. To initiate a complaint with the KID, you may click on the following link to their website: http://www.ksinsurance.org/consumers/complaint.htm.

You may also put your concerns in writing and address them to the KID using the following contact information:

Kansas Insurance Department
Attn: Consumer Assistance
420 SW 9th Street
Topeka, Kansas 66612-1678
Phone: (785) 296-3071
Toll-Free: 1-800-432-2484
TTY/TDD: 1-877-235-3151
www.ksinsurance.org

Please let us hear from you if decide to file a complaint with the KID. We are collecting this information to better understand how to help Kansans get the care and treatment they need.

Senate Bill 380 was introduced during the 2007 session of the Kansas Legislature to provide health insurance coverage for the treatment of mental illnesses that is equivalent to coverage for other illnesses. Equal coverage is known as parity. We are hopeful that the bill will be considered in the 2008 session.

The lack of parity in coverage for the treatment of mental illnesses is a major factor in the perpetuation of the stigma associated with mental illness and a clear barrier to accessing treatment and moving toward recovery.

Thank you for your assistance with this effort.

Rick Cagan
For the Kansas Mental Health Coalition

Rick Cagan, Executive Director
National Alliance on Mental Illness - NAMI Kansas
112 SW 6th Avenue
PO Box 675
Topeka, Kansas 66601
785-233-0755
785-233-4804 FAX
800-539-2660
rcagan@nami.org
www.namikansas.org

Mentally Ill Juvenile Sentenced To 50 Years In Prison

A Johnson County, Kansas court yesterday sentenced Andrew Ellmaker to life in prison for the murder of his mental health worker, Terri Zenner. He won’t be eligible for parole for 50 years.

The defendant was 17 years old when he killed the victim. Because he was a juvenile at the time of the incident he was not eligible for the death penalty.

Sue Ellmaker, the defendant’s mother, pleaded for mercy because of her son’s mental illness. The victim’s husband, Matt Zenner, would have nothing of it.

“I’m sick and tired of hearing about mental illness,” he said at the sentencing hearing. “Stand up and be a man. You sit there and stare at the floor.... It’s beyond my comprehension that you were able to do this.”

As the husband of the victim, Matt Zenner is entitled to his feelings of loss, anger and bereavement. The family of Terri Zenner deserves all our compassion.

However, as a society we must overcome our prejudice that mental illness is both incomprehensible and inexcusable. Otherwise, we could face even more tragedies like Teri Zenner's.

More than seventy percent of youth in the juvenile justice system suffer from at least one mental health disorder, according to the National Center for Mental Health and Juvenile Justice. For many of their families, juvenile justice provides their first and only access to mental health services.

Families raising a child with mental illness feel frustrated, overwhelmed and exhausted. In my law practice, we help these families by coordinating special education, juvenile justice and mental health services.

Andrew Ellmaker deserves to spend the rest of his life in prison. The rest of us must work even harder to prevent future tragedies from happening.

Scott Wasserman is a graduate of Harvard Law School. He practices special education, juvenile law and child custody litigation in Kansas and Missouri. His web site is www.yourchild1st.com .

Who Are Juvenile Sex Offenders?

Maybe you saw the Associated Press story yesterday about an alleged increase in the number of juvenile sex offenders. The reporter, Kim Curtis, noted that the number of juvenile sex offenses has increased-- 40 percent over two decades. Moreover, the offenders are getting younger and more violent.

Some attribute the increase to a society saturated with sex and violence. Others attribute the supposed increase to more awareness, better reporting and general hysteria over sex offenders.

I have represented several juvenile sex offenders. Once you meet these kids, you'll understand that the headlines don't show the whole person.

For example, I represented a 14 year old girl who had been terribly, sexually abused since a young age. At age 14, she was at a "party" with about four high school students. One of them, a 15 year old boy, invited her to engage in sex with him. My client looked for guidance from the older girl who had brought her to the party. The older girl smiled, which my client took as approval. So, she went upstairs and had sex with the boy. By the time they came to my office, both the boy and the girl were convicted of statutory rape.

In another case, I represented a boy who served as the lookout for his friend. His friend had persuaded a girl to give him oral sex under the stairs at school. She later claimed she had been coerced, even though she had walked with the perpetrator in front of the school office and past the security personnel. My client was convicted as an accomplice and listed on the sexual offender registry, even though he never engaged in the sexual activity itself.

These are just two examples of the many ways young people find themselves branded for life as sexual offenders. Perhaps somewhere some teens truly engage in predatory, violent sexual acts. However, my clients have been kids who get caught up in a system that wasn't designed for their situation. Eventually, they become a statistic in the alleged growth of sexual offenses.

Connecticut Restores Juvenile Status to 16 and 17 Year Olds

The Connecticut state senate voted last week to restore juvenile status to 16 and 17 year old offenders. Currently, teens in this age group are charged in criminal court as adults.

If the Connecticut House passes the law, only New York and North Carolina will automatically charge 16 and 17 year olds as adults. Other states provide mechanisms to waive juveniles to adult status.

Kansas allows children as young as ten to be charged as adults. Teens over thirteen are presumed to be tried as adults for serious offenses. Missouri may prosecute children as young as twelve in adult court for felonies.

The Connecticut bill reflects recent research proving that juvenile brains remain physiologically underdeveloped. During their teen years, children are still developing the capacity to think ahead and make sound judgments. Additionally, they lack the wisdom gained from experience.

Juvenile offenders placed in adult jails are more likely to reoffend, according to data released last month by the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. Nearly two thirds of juveniles tried as adults are dealing with personal trauma, such as rape, assault, death of a loved one, or suicidal tendencies.

Mental Health for Children and Adolescents

May is Mental Health Awareness Month. This video provides instruction about mental health issues in children and adolescents. Although the production quality is not great, it contains some information that might help a child and a family. It addresses:

• Understanding Of Mental Health
  
  
• Causes
  
  
• Families Assisting
  
  
• What To Look For
  

High Quality Child Care Prevents Depression

Impoverished children who experienced high quality child care incurred less depression as young adults than their peers. These findings were reported in the May/June 2007 issue of the journal Child Development by researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of Washington at Seattle.

Research shows a connection between childhood poverty and later mental health issues. Providing impoverished children with high quality child care protects them when they become teens and adults.

Children's Mental Health: The Elephant In the Courtroom

Many of our cases involve mental health issues. However, the cases appears under the guise of child custody disputes, juvenile law and special education.

The real issue remains the failure to diagnose or treat mental illness. Since no one recognizes the mental health issue, though, courts try to resolve these cases under traditional concepts of child custody or juvenile law. Sometimes it seems like mental illness is the elephant in the courtroom that everyone pretends to ignore.

Last Wednesday was National Children's Mental Health Awareness Day. To mark the occasion, Katie Couric from CBS news posted this one minute video about ignoring mental health issues in children. She cites that two thirds of children with mental health issues do not get treatment. She uses the perspective of the tragedy of Virgina Tech to show the importance of addressing the mental health needs of children and adolescents.

Copycats Threaten Schools

These past three weeks I received numerous calls from parents of kids who have made threats at their schools. The number of cases seems to have increased since the tragedy at Virginia Tech. The threats usually involve fantasies of mass killings or threats against specific individuals. In no case were the threats anything close to actual plans, but they alarm nonetheless.

• In one of my cases, a student wrote a threat on the bathroom wall about a mass shooting. I filed his appeal to the school's manifestation determination to try to prevent him from being expelled from school.
  
  
• In another case the teen posted threatening comments against a teacher on his MySpace. He also brought knives to school. He is charged in juvenile court with criminal threat and possession of illegal weapons.
  
  
• At a teen meeting last week, some of the students told me their school had been placed on lock down after a student threatened his ex girlfriend and brought a gun to school.
  

My Kansas juvenile practice is not just anecdotal. Kids are emptying schools around the country by making alarming threats. Incidents have been reported in Wisconsin, Massachusetts, Illinois, and Colorado, to name a few.

A juvenile in upstate New York was sentenced to 18 months in juvenile prison for making threats to a high school security guard. In California, students skipped school by the hundreds after a student posted a threat on MySpace.

Child Abuse Costs Money

Child abuse inflicts an incalculable human cost on its victims and their families. It also costs money.

Child abuse costs the nation $94 billion annually according to a 2001 study by Prevent Child Abuse America.

The good news is that prevention not only saves lives, it even saves money.

A RAND Corp. study found that for every $1 spent on working early with poor families in parenting classes, getting them help with health care and providing other social supports, about $4 will be saved in foster care, juvenile delinquency, drug abuse treatment and mental health costs.

MySpace Postings Charged in Juvenile Court

Two recent cases dragged postings from MySpace into Juvenile Court. In one instance, an Indiana Court of Appeals reversed the juvenile conviction of a teen who posted comments on MySpace. Her comments criticized her school principal's policy on body piercings.

The teen had created a web page under her principal's identity on MySpace. She cussed out her principal in saying that he could not control her anymore. She said that she would wear her body piercings anyway.

Her principal found the entry on MySpace and reported her to the police. The juvenile court convicted her of harassment, identity deception and identity theft. The Court of Appeals reversed the judgment, saying that the juvenile court had violated her right to free speech.

In a second case, on Wednesday students in Hartselle, Alabama left their high school after authorities discovered a post on MySpace threatening a mass homicide there. That student has been charged in juvenile court with making a terrorist threat.

Teens With Mental Illness Land In Juvenile Court

This week I spoke with two groups about teens with mental illness in juvenile court.

On Monday, I shared with the Wyandotte County, Kansas chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness. Last night, I was privileged to speak with about seventy parents and teens in the after care program at the Adolescent Center for Treatment of Johnson County Mental Health in Olathe, Kansas.

At both settings, we lamented the large number of teens in the juvenile system who suffer from mental health disorders. About seventy percent of all teens in juvenile justice suffer from mental health disorders, according to the National Center for Mental Health and Juvenile Justice. Twenty five percent experience severe disorders.

For many of these teens and their families, juvenile court becomes the only way for them to access mental health services. Some families relinquish custody of their children just to get help. In juvenile court, mentally ill teens might be removed involuntarily from their parents' home.

I appreciate the invitations from NAMI and the Johnson County Mental Health Center to speak at their forums. However, the views in this post are my personal opinions, and may or may not represent the views of NAMI or the Johnson County Mental Health Center. I welcome comments from anyone who has experienced this system first hand. I also encourage any suggestions for change.

Should children be strip searched at juvenile detention centers?

A Sacramento attorney filed a lawsuit against Alameda County, California. alleging that its juvenile detential officers illegally strip searched the teens in their custody. The teens had not been arrested for possession of drugs or weapons, and there was no reasonable suspicion that the strip search would discover anything illegal.

The juvenile detention center where I practice juvenile law in Johnson County, Kansas routinely strip searches every child who enters the facility. The teens are forced to bend over and open their buttocks so that a staff member may check the anus for contraband. Juvenile justice jurisdiction in Kansas begins at age ten.

I suspect that these searches rarely find anything worth the trauma to the child. Most of the youth in juvenile detention suffer from mental illness. Some already have been sexually traumatized.

The "searches" are inflicted immediately upon entering the facility as a traumatic rite of initiation. They intentionallly dehumanize the child.

Strip searches serve the same function as rape and torture. In each instance, the perpetrator inflicts sexual trauma to demonstrate the abuser's power and dehumanize the victim.

I'm not accusing our juvenile detention center of rape or torture. Fortunately, our juvenile detention center has a great staff. They do everything they can to minimize the trauma. The searchers must be the same gender as the victim, and the search must be wintessed by another person of that same gender.

Nonetheless, the many juveniles I have represented over the years have understood all too well the dehumanizing meaning of this horrific hazing. I'm complaining about the process, not the personnel. Strip searches intentionally traumatize the victim to establish authority. They should stop.

Texas Juvenile Free At Last

Last week I wrote about the unraveling of the Texas Juvenile Justice System. The problems became public when a judge sentenced an African-American teenage girl to juvenile prison for shoving a hall monitor at school. That same judge freed a white teen who burned down his house.

Once in prison, her sentence was extended for possessing contraband in her cell. Her "contraband" was an extra pair of socks.

After a year of imprisonment, the conservator for the juvenile justice system finally released her.

Texas Juvenile Justice System Continues to Unravel

The Texas juvenile justice system continued to unravel this week. The Chicago Tribune reported that the sentences of many of the 4,700 delinquent youths being held in Texas juvenile prisons might have been arbitrarily and unfairly extended by prison authorities. Thousands of youths could be freed in a matter of weeks as part of a sweeping overhaul of the scandal-plagued system.

Meanwhile, the Dallas Morning News and Houston Chronicle ran a story from the Associated Press that frustrated state lawmakers told the man put in charge of the scandalized Texas Youth Commission he isn't moving fast enough to change the agency and restore public confidence in the juvenile justice system.

"We're studying this thing to death," said Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, the chairman of the Senate Criminal Justice Committee. "It's time to act, heads to roll."

The problems in Texas arise from indeterminate sentences. Juvenile offenders can be sent to youth correctional facilities, such as the John Shero State Juvenile Correctional Facility pictured above, for an indterminate time up to the age of 21. However, they may become eligible for release any time after serving nine months at the discretion of prison officials.

The detaining authorities are supposed to use an elaborate point system to modify behavior. However, the system leaves too much discretion in the hands of the adults. In Texas, some of the adults abused that discretion to sexually abuse the youth offenders.

"The system is wide open for abuse and corruption," said the ACLU's Harrell. "How difficult would it be for a 12-year-old kid to file a complaint on an assistant superintendent of a facility when that assistant superintendent is actually the one who is sexually abusing her and that same person gets to decide when she gets out? Basically the official gets to say, 'Comply and keep quiet or I'll keep you here until you're 21.'"

Without excusing the individuals involved, the very structure of indeterminate sentences opens the children to abuse. This same structure appears not only in Texas, but in juvenile systems throughout the United States.

For example, in Kansas, where I practice Juvenile Law, direct commitments to the Youth Correctional Facility must state a determinate sentence. However, juvenile offenders might also be placed into the custody of the state's Juvenile Justice Authority for an indeterminate time. The Kansas Revised Juvenile Offender Code incorporates requirements from the federal Adoptions and Safe Families Act (ASFA) to ensure adequate progress toward returning the juvenile home. Nonetheless, the case managers and facility managers maintain substantial discretion on the child's daily privileges and duration of incarceration.

Discretion should permit the courts to adapt sentences to the specific needs of the child, especially for the seventy percent of juvenile offenders with mental disorders. However, that discretion should be excercised by a court, not by a prison guard. In court, the child and her family would have the right to legal counsel and the opportunity to present their case before an impartial judge. Of course, this proposal assumes that in practice juvenile courts extend due process to families of juvenile offenders. Whether that is true in practice remains another issue for a different post.