Cause of teen's injury at lockup in dispute

The cause of a teenager's broken collarbone at a south Arkansas juvenile-treatment center remains in dispute three months after it happened.

Disability Rights Arkansas reviewed video of the June altercation that caused the injury and concluded that a Dermott Juvenile Correctional Facility staff member used "excessive" and "improper" physical force.

But the director of the nonprofit that operates the lockup said the video shows that the staff member, who had his arms wrapped around the 18-year-old's chest, lost his balance and accidentally fell on top of the teen.

The injury -- a hairline fracture -- was disclosed this week in Arkansas Youth Services Division documents released to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in response to a request under the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act.

In a six-page letter, Disability Rights Arkansas also accused staff members at the Dermott facility of failing to provide timely medical care for the teenager, saying he wasn't examined for injuries until the next day.

Disability Rights Arkansas is a monitoring group with federal authority to investigate the treatment of people with disabilities.

"DRA concludes that this youth was abused and neglected as a result," wrote Sam Kauffman, an attorney with the group.

Jerry Walsh, director of South Arkansas Youth Services, said he believes the Disability Rights Arkansas letter is inaccurate. South Arkansas Youth Services operates the lockup under a contract with the Youth Services Division.

The staff member wasn't trying to intentionally harm the teen, Walsh said, noting that he put the man on leave for a month while the matter was investigated internally. The staff member has since returned to work.

Walsh said the youth reported no injuries immediately after the altercation. When he complained of pain the next day, he was seen by a doctor and taken to the emergency room, where the fracture was diagnosed, Walsh said.

Walsh said he reported the injury to the Youth Services Division for its internal review. He also reported it to 10th Judicial District Prosecuting Attorney Thomas Deen for a criminal investigation.

"We self-reported ourselves. We requested a criminal investigation. Where that's at, I do not know," Walsh said. "It's up to them."

Reached by phone, one of Deen's employees said a message had been passed to him regarding a reporter's inquiry into the status of the investigation. Deen did not respond to the message by late Thursday.

Arkansas State Police spokesman Bill Sadler said that his agency was not involved in any criminal investigation of the youth's injury.

Documents reviewed by the newspaper also show that the injury was called into the state police child-abuse hotline and the adult-abuse hotline. Neither accepted the report.

Youth Services Division Director Marcus Devine said he's concerned any time a youth in the division's custody is injured, but he reviewed the video and believes it shows that the employee accidentally fell.

Scott Tanner, juvenile-justice ombudsman for the Arkansas Public Defender Commission, said he reviewed the video and the written reports documenting the injury and couldn't determine from that material whether the employee's actions were intentional or accidental.

Tanner said the video showed extensive efforts by the employee and three others to calm the youth by talking with him. But it also exposed some problems with the employee's physical restraint of the youth, which should be reviewed and addressed through better training, he said.

"My view is that we need to learn from this event," Tanner said. "My professional preference would be to avoid a forceful takedown. ... It's an unfortunate consequence of a takedown."

Tom Masseau, director of Disability Rights Arkansas, said his group stands by its letter and the findings.

Masseau said he and his monitors have yet to receive a formal response from the Youth Services Division or South Arkansas Youth Services regarding the letter, which was sent Aug. 17.

"We issue this report with recommendations over what we believe is a physical takedown -- abuse -- and we don't get a response back. I'm quite surprised," Masseau said.

"Whether we agree or disagree, I think we need to be at the table and communicating, and that's not happening," he said.

Descriptions of the altercation that led to the broken collarbone were laid out in letters from Disability Rights Arkansas and South Arkansas Youth Services.

According to the documents, the teen was in the administration building's library about 6:45 p.m. on June 9 after he had been disruptive and ran from staff members. A group of staff members was around him, talking with him and trying to calm him down.

He then became angry, threw a chair toward a wall and ran out of the room.

One of the employees -- a man much larger than the teen -- attempted to grab the youth and wrap his arms around him. But the teen struggled and attempted to hit the staff member.

The staff member then grabbed the teen's upper body, and they went to the ground.

According to the letter from Disability Rights Arkansas, monitors reviewed the video and determined that the staff member "deliberately planted his feet firmly on the floor, lifted [the] youth off the ground and slammed [the] youth onto the floor."

The staff member "pivoted and positioned the Youth so that the brunt of impact with the floor fell upon [the] youth's shoulder," the group reported, adding that a slow-motion review of the video supported its finding.

But Walsh said he slowed the video down and had several senior staff members review it.

They all concluded that the employee fell, he said.

"If this would have been a throw-down or a slam on the kid, I would have fired the guy immediately. ... I didn't even see that this was close," Walsh said.

In response to the injury, the disability rights group has made several recommendations to the Youth Services Division, including that the division increase monitoring of the lockup, hire an outside consultant to review the facility's restraint procedures, retrain staff members and ban "physical takedowns."

In a letter to Devine, Walsh said he would accept any help or recommendations the division deemed appropriate, but he said the facility doesn't have a problem with a high number of restraints.

Walsh noted that, in the past 5 1/2 months, the facility averaged one restraint every five weeks and that those restraints involved two youths "with serious mental health issues."

Devine said this week that he was considering the disability rights group's recommendations.

A Section on 09/04/2015

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