SANTA CRUZ -- Santa Cruz County is more likely than most counties in the state to try juvenile offenders as adults for serious crimes, a new study shows.
The study by the nonpartisan, San Francisco-based Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice describes "wild" disparities between California counties when it comes to prosecutors filing to try minors in adult courts. Titled "An analysis of direct adult criminal court filing 2003-2009: What has been the effect of Proposition 21?", the paper suggests that some counties use direct filing more than others based on prosecutorial discretion.
Proposition 21, passed by voters in 2000, allows prosecutors to "direct file" certain juvenile felony cases in adult court without having to review them first with a judge.
The usual reason for direct adult filing is to secure a potentially longer sentence, because youths sentenced in juvenile court typically can only be imprisoned until they are 25.
From 2003 through 2009, California prosecutors filed 4,045 youth cases in adult criminal court, the report says. During that time, for every 1,000 youths whose charges qualified for possible adult trials, the state average was 25.4 per 1,000.
Santa Cruz County had a higher-than-average rate of using the practice, with 31.4 filed per 1,000 cases, the report stated.
San Francisco County had the lowest rate, with an average of 1.5 per 1,000. Ventura County had the highest rate with 122.1 per 1,000.
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"We use direct filings for the most serious offenders," said Bob Lee, the Santa Cruz County district attorney.
Juveniles accused of murder and other serious acts of violence would meet that criteria, though Lee said he looks at all cases before they are direct-filed. Lee said he considers the offender's age and the severity of the crime.
"We try to protect the community from people who have demonstrated a callous disregard for human life," Lee said.
LOCAL CASE
Christian Speaker, who is charged with shooting and killing a Watsonville store owner in 2010, fit the criteria for direct filing, Lee said.
Speaker was 17 on Oct. 19, 2010, when police say he flashed a gun at the owner of the Fiesta Latino Market on East Beach Street and demanded cash from the register. After he took the money, he shot the 32-year-old store owner in cold blood, prosecutors said.
A surveillance video of the alleged robbery and murder helped authorities track Speaker to Eureka three days later. Speaker, a ward of the state, has pleaded not guilty in adult court to murdering Yahya Ahmed. He faces life in prison if convicted.
Lee said that if Speaker were tried as a juvenile and convicted, he could finish his sentence at age 25.
Scott MacDonald, Santa Cruz County's Juvenile Hall and Probation Department chief, said Tuesday that Speaker's case was an appropriate case for direct filing.
However, he said generally trying youths as adults is inconsistent with other reform practices in the county's Juvenile Hall.
Santa Cruz County's Juvenile Hall has been called a national leader in juvenile justice reform by limiting punishment and focusing on programs that foster physical, moral, emotional and intellectual growth.
MacDonald said recent national studies have suggested that youth offenders' brains are less developed than adults -- raising questions as to whether they should be tried as adults.
"The law's going one way, the research is going the other," MacDonald said. "There are definitely long histories of circumstances that lead to these crimes. The youth mind is nowhere near able to comprehend notions of culpability."
Lee said he has to answer to the families of murder victims who seek justice.
"The family of the murder victim doesn't care if the defendant is 17 years old or 17 months old," he said. "They just want the person to be held accountable."
Lee added that the county's direct-file cases have declined in the past three or four years simply because there have been fewer eligible cases.
YOUTH CRIME DOWN
The year Proposition 21 passed in 2000, it was billed as a way to rein in youth gang violence.
But the Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice's report says the law's application has had no effect on youth crime rates.
"Prosecutor predilection towards direct adult criminal court filing is not founded upon any demonstrable effect of reducing juvenile crime rates," the report states.
Youth crime has declined statewide, but the analysis found that the 30 counties using direct filing at higher-than-average rates actually saw less of a reduction in youth crimes during the seven years studied than the 28 counties that used it at lower-than-average rates.
That discovery, along with "radically different" practices among counties "is disturbing," the authors state. "This practice has not proven successful."
NO ROOM FOR MINORS
Now, some prosecutors warn that the state's "realignment" of its prison system could lead counties to send more youths to adult facilities simply because there's nowhere else to put them.
Starting in July, the state's youth prisons, once known as the California Youth Authority and now called the Division of Juvenile Facilities, were scheduled to stop accepting most minors from county courts.
A budget standoff delayed implementation of the change, but Monterey and other counties have already accepted the shift as inevitable. Where they will be housed and how counties will pay for it remain uncertain.
Monterey County Probation Chief Manuel Real has said the county has no place to incarcerate minors convicted of serious, violent offenses -- they've always been sent to the Youth Authority or adult prisons.
The California District Attorneys Association sent a letter earlier this year to Gov. Jerry Brown, warning that the closure of state facilities for serious youth offenders "will inevitably lead to more juvenile offenders being subjected to the adult court system, because a prison commitment would be the only viable option when dealing with certain serious offenders."
Julia Reynolds is a reporter with the Monterey County Herald. Herald staff writer Virginia Hennessey also contributed to this report.