Did the Progressive 'Broward County Solution' (HCSO's JAAP) Cost 17 Student Lives?

[Unregistered]

"Lower arrests by not making arrests." ----- INSERT APAD JAAP here !!!!!!!!!!!!!!




https://www.americanthinker.com/arti...ent_lives.html

"We're not compromising school safety. We're really saving the lives of kids," boasted Michaelle Valbrun-Pope, executive director of Student Support Initiatives for Broward County Public Schools, in August 2017.

Valbrun-Pope was referring to what an article by Jeffrey Benzing in Public Source calls the "Broward County Solution." As Benzing relates, Broward County used to lead the state of Florida in sending students to the state's juvenile justice system. County leaders responded with a perfectly progressive solution: "lower arrests by not making arrests."

Authorities agreed to treat twelve different misdemeanor offenses as school-related issues, not criminal ones. The results impressed the people who initiated the program. Arrests dropped from more than a thousand in 2011-2012 to less than four hundred just four years later.

One particular motivation behind programs like Broward County's was the pressure from multiple sources to reduce the statistical disparity between black and Hispanic student arrests on one hand and white and Asian student arrests on the other. Benzing writes, for instance, how a Denver organization called "Padres & Jóvenes Unidos" successfully advocated for a program like Broward's to help achieve "racial and education equity" in Denver schools.

By virtue of his name alone, Nikolas de Jesús Cruz, the adopted son of Lynda and Roger Cruz, became a statistical Hispanic. As such, authorities at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland had every reason not to report his troubling and likely criminal behavior to the police.


According to a source who spoke to the Miami Herald, Cruz had been suspended from Stoneman Douglas High for fighting and also for being caught with bullets in his backpack. This was apparently at least one of the reasons why administrators reportedly emailed a warning to teachers against allowing Cruz on the campus with a backpack. He was later expelled for reasons that have not been disclosed, but he was apparently not arrested.

This is not the first time that this "solution" to school crime has produced lethal results. An earlier case in the nearby Miami-Dade County public school system should have been a warning, but unfortunately, the media conspired to suppress the details of the case. The victim in Miami-Dade was one Trayvon Martin.

Miami-Dade schools have their own police department. The exposure of the department's practices began inadvertently with the Miami Herald story on Martin's multiple suspensions. The article prompted M-DPD's police chief to launch a major internal affairs investigation into the possible leak of this information to the Herald.

As the investigation began, the officers realized immediately that they had a problem on their hands. "Oh, God, oh, my God, oh, God," one major reportedly said when first looking at Martin's data. He could see that Martin had been suspended twice already that school year for offenses that should have gotten him arrested. In each case, however, the case file on Martin was fudged to make the crime seem less serious than it was.

As one detective told investigators, the arrest statistics coming out of Martin's school, Dr. Michael M. Krop Senior High School, had been "quite high," and the detectives "needed to find some way to lower the stats." This directive allegedly came from the police chief. At least a few officers confirmed that the chief was particularly concerned with the arrest rates of minority males in the Miami-Dade system.

In July 2012, the Obama administration formalized the pressure on school districts with an executive order warning school districts to avoid "methods that result in disparate use of disciplinary tools." The White House focused on black students in particular and headlined the press release announcing this dubious stroke of racism "President Obama Signs New Initiative to Improve Educational Outcomes for African Americans."

Like Cruz, Martin was frequently suspended, three times in his final school year. In one case, Martin had been found with stolen jewelry and burglary tools in his backpack. Had he been arrested and not merely suspended, his parents and his teachers would have known how desperately far he had gone astray. Instead, Martin was "diverted" into nothing useful. Just days after his last non-arrest, he was allowed to wander the Retreat at Twin Lakes high and alone, looking, in George Zimmerman's immortal words, "like he's up to no good or he's on drugs or something."

The media's larger motive in suppressing the facts of this story was to protect the narrative of innocent black youth killed by white cop wannabe George Zimmerman. A secondary motive was to protect Obama's misbegotten quest to achieve racially statistical "equity" for youthful offenders by not arresting them for very real crimes.

Cruz had to have done something more troubling than carry bullets in his backpack. Before even talking about gun control, Republican leaders should demand a complete audit of Cruz's school records and the rethinking of the "Broward County Solution" wherever it is applied.

[Unregistered]

"Do you want to stop criminals from getting guns?...YES?....Then that means they have to be put in the system. That means they have to be CONVICTED!"

[Unregistered]

JAAP and APAD are only available for first time misdemeanor offenders. Only felony convictions prevent you from owning a gun. While there may be a valid argument that students are sometimes suspended when they should be arrested, this is a problem with the school administration. JAAP has nothing to do with it.

[Unregistered]

Funny that sounds just like JR Burton when he was explaining the program which he championed. Another brilliant concept. Lets just pretend these little thugs arent committing crimes and then the problem will go away. And our new Sheriff thinks its a great program as well since it wins over minority votes. And isnt this what thats all about, getting elected at all costs.

[Unregistered]

JAAP and APAD are only available for first time misdemeanor offenders. Only felony convictions prevent you from owning a gun. While there may be a valid argument that students are sometimes suspended when they should be arrested, this is a problem with the school administration. JAAP has nothing to do with it.

First time misdemeanor arrests often prevent more serious crimes. Especially with juveniles. That is very elementary.

[Unregistered]

First time misdemeanor arrests often prevent more serious crimes. Especially with juveniles. That is very elementary.

If that is true, and I’m sure it is. Isn’t it reasonable to think that those who would be deterred from re-offending after a misdemeanor arrest would also be affected in the same way by JAAP and APAD? These programs still result in negative contact with law enforcement and the court system. It is essentially a mini probation program. It’s really a very similar program as for first or second time misdemeanor arrestees. By your rationale we should get rid of notice to appears also. People can’t be afforded one petty mistake?

[Unregistered]

If that is true, and I’m sure it is. Isn’t it reasonable to think that those who would be deterred from re-offending after a misdemeanor arrest would also be affected in the same way by JAAP and APAD? These programs still result in negative contact with law enforcement and the court system. It is essentially a mini probation program. It’s really a very similar program as for first or second time misdemeanor arrestees. By your rationale we should get rid of notice to appears also. People can’t be afforded one petty mistake?

People who commit crimes should prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. When the entire neighborhood or the entire school learns that little Johnnie got 21 days for pulling the fire alarm, or little suzy got 21 days for possessing and drinking alcohol, that shiitt will stop real quick.

Also, (although a felony) when the hood learns that little Ricky got 366 days in prison for stealing his very first car, the very first time, word will get around and that shiiiiit will stop in no time. Instead, we teach people that there are no consequences to committing crimes.

Notices to appear only teach people that there are no consequences to committing crimes. If someone commits a crime, they should go to jail.

[Unregistered]

Go over to the Broward County board and you will see all the Deputies over there RAGING about how the diversion programs helped create that nightmare.

They claim their diversion programs not only embolden the criminals making it easier for them to go from petty misdemeanor crimes to violent felonies, but the diversion programs also tied the hands of the cops making them essentially impotent.

[Unregistered]

Go over to the Broward County board and you will see all the Deputies over there RAGING about how the diversion programs helped create that nightmare.

They claim their diversion programs not only embolden the criminals making it easier for them to go from petty misdemeanor crimes to violent felonies, but the diversion programs also tied the hands of the cops making them essentially impotent.

Yup. Same goes on here in this decaying hole that is this county. To make things worse, after the diversion programs ENABLE these juveniles to progress into the Juvenile Justice System, its such a joke that it enables them even further. 3 hours in JAC? Judicial warnings? Constant rienstatements in probation? BS. Thats why i make it a point to arrest no juveniles. If im going waste my time, may as well do it with no report. Bad time to be a cop people. If it wasnt for agencies like TPD who still have balls, this county will be like detroit in a few years. Starting with the outskirts.