More than 98% of respondents indicated experiencing at least one severe childhood trauma, with respondents reporting an average ACE score of 6 or higher.
More than 30% reported being a victim of trafficking, and one in ten had someone who had previously abused or trafficked them directly involved in their offense, whether as a victim or codefendant.
“[I]f ever a pathological background might have contributed to a 14–year old’s commission of a crime, it is here. Miller’s stepfather physically abused him; his alcoholic and drug-addicted mother neglected him; he had been in and out of foster care as a result; and he had tried to kill himself four times, the first when he should have been in kindergarten.”
“Since I was four years old, I’ve been abused. Mentally, physically, emotionally, and sexually. My mother had severe mental health problems, and my father was a drug addict. I was burned over my heart, and did six months in a coma at the age of four.”
“One of my earliest memories was from being abandoned in a GA pine forest by my mother when I was very young. Many hours later, maybe 10 to 12 hours, she came back for me, but that was only due to pressure from my step-dad.”
“Though I know my grandparents loved me, the home lacked the companionship needed. It did not help that once my mother joined us in California, her addiction forced me to witness her prostitute herself to some of my friends’ fathers and older brothers.”
“From 12ish on I needed drugs to escape my demons. By that time, I’d seen multiple men murdered. I had emotional pain. Throbbing physical pain. The threat of death because of that scary word people threw around my name, cancer. And the ever present threat of being beaten or abandoned by the person I loved most in the world, my mother. Sometimes I feel she was taking all the hurt [my father] caused her on me because I do look like him.”
80% of children prosecuted as adults were held in adult correctional facilities while as minors.
75% of children prosecuted as adults were abused by older adult prisoners with 88% experiencing physical abuse, 57% experiencing emotional abuse, and 15% experiencing sexual abuse.
80% of children prosecuted as adults were placed in solitary confinement where their longest average stay was just shy of 1 year.
27.55% reported being forced to commit a criminal offense by someone else.
Only 9.89% had their trauma histories meaningfully considered by the court during their transfer and sentencing proceedings.
Unfortunately, the trauma histories of children prosecuted as adults are largely ignored by the criminal justice system, which further harms and brutalizes them during their incarceration.
Incidents of physical, emotional, or sexual abuse by older adult prisoners were commonly reported, as was being placed in solitary confinement. The rampant human rights violations experienced by children prosecuted as adults are sadly a feature, not a bug, of the American criminal justice system.
Our most vulnerable children deserve better than this. If we truly care about child victims of abuse, neglect and human trafficking, we must also care about the children in the criminal justice system.