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King County Considers Abolishing Youth Detention Facility Despite Increase in Juvenile Violent Felonies

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Crime, Law, and Order
Street Report

Wednesday’s Law & Justice Committee Meeting

Public comment during today’s King County Council’s Law and Justice Committee meeting was overwhelmingly in favor of abolishing the youth detention facility in Seattle. But surprisingly, Claudia Balducci, Reagan Dunn, Rod Dembowski, and Jorge Baron unanimously agreed there still needs to be a place to incarcerate young violent offenders. So they agreed to send this to the entire nine-member council for a vote next month.

Executive Dow Constantine, progressives, and far-left activists want it shut down by 2028 in the name of juvenile justice reform. Dunn’s office says in 2023, juvenile violent felony filings were up 57% from 2022 and 146% from 2021. As of late February, dozens of juveniles were involved in violent crimes including murder, rape, drive-by shootings, assault, and robbery, often involving a gun.

Recent Example of Juvenile Violence

Where would these juvies go if King County did not have a youth detention facility?

Jonathan Choe

Journalist and Senior Fellow, Center on Wealth and Poverty
Jonathan Choe is a journalist and Senior Fellow with Discovery Institute's Center on Wealth and Poverty, covering homelessness issues for its Fix Homelessness initiative. Prior to joining Discovery, Choe spent several years as one of the lead reporters at KOMO-TV, consistently the top rated television station in Seattle. His in depth stories on crime and deep dive investigations into the homeless crisis led to measurable results in the community, including changes in public policy. Choe has more than two decades of experience in television news behind the scenes and in front of the camera for ABC, NBC, FOX, CBS, and Tribune. He has also been nominated and honored with multiple industry awards including an Emmy. Choe spent several years teaching classes on emerging media and entrepreneurship to under privileged youth in inner city Chicago. As an independent journalist, Choe also contributes regularly to the Mill Creek View and Lynnwood Times and has reported on exclusive stories in the past year for Daily Wire and The Postmillennial.