Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Are live. Welcome back to the House Judiciary Committee this Tuesday afternoon, February twenty fourth. We're gonna now turn our attention to h six forty two involving various changes to our youthful offenders law, And we will start with a walkthrough by legislative counsel. I'll just flag one thing, this probably came a little late in the whole process. So in re reviewing H-seven 21, which not taken up, it also had the sections related to youthful offender. And I have suggested to witnesses that if they want to address not the whole thing, but specifically changes to section 5,284, but welcome to hear from them on those few changes. I think that it'll come up one way or another anyway, because I think those pages are being copied right now, the pages that include the youthful fender. But the focus is really on H six forty two. But I know that the discussion is gonna bring in these other ideas, so I just wanted to flag that. But Eric's not doing a walk through of that.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: Are you mentioning

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: I'm from I'm from

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: I'll give you It's section fifty two eighty four. Section seven, specifically. It's page 14. Starts out it's a few pages. Okay, over to you, Eric. Thank you for being here.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Happy to be here. Eric Fitzpatrick with the Office of Legislative Counsel. Here to do a walkthrough, as the chair said, of H-six 42, an actuating youthful offender proceedings. I didn't quite follow that first other bill you were referring to. Hopefully, that wasn't one of mine that I totally forgot about. But No. No.

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: We thought that you were just

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: gonna do this and and but just in looking again at the this omnibus public safety bill from the administration. Oh, right. That's youthful fendering wear. And whether I said it or not, I'm sure some of the witnesses are going to talk about aspects of that. But specifically, if they are, I want them to focus on this one section, fifty two eighty four. The other sections, I take a very different approach to the full fender than what six forty two does. Right. That makes sense.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: That was the original was Michelle and Hillary. Right? Hillary?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Actually, I have to admit, it was me. I don't remember the number. Okay. Trying to sidestep it that way. So, yes, I did do the youthful counterparts of that photo.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Oh, you did? Okay.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Long time ago. Seems like in legislative time. Long time.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Exactly. It was what, in my mind, I had to look. I thought maybe if the pandemic started it. So

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Right. That's that's possible. Yeah. Was a long time ago. Anyway, circling back to the bill in front of us now. H-six 42, activating youthful offender proceedings. Just to refresh the committee's recollection for a moment, when you're talking about youthful offender proceedings, you're talking about how to treat a minor in Vermont who commits criminal conduct. And I'm sure the committee remembers very well that there are options for how a minor could be treated when criminal conduct is committed. Can be treated as a juvenile in the family division, could be treated as an adult in the criminal division. Depends on how old the person is and what offense was committed. Generally speaking, the important differences between being treated in the family division and the criminal division are, in the family division, the case is confidential. It's not public. Proceedings aren't public. The documents are confidential. You get services from DCF, from the Department for Children and Families. And you don't have the consequences of being convicted of a crime. If you complete your juvenile disposition and probation successfully, then you won't have a criminal. So big differences between going to the family division and criminal division. Youthful offender is, when it first got started years ago, was referred to as a blended sentence, because it has sort of pieces of both. You could think of it as a middle ground. But the way sort of, generally speaking, the offender approach works is the person is given an opportunity to be treated as a juvenile in the family division. So they would have those advantages that I just mentioned with respect to being treated in the family division, the confidentiality, the not having a criminal record if you successfully complete, that sort of thing. But if you don't successfully complete, you can have your youthful offender status terminated, be sent back to the criminal division for sentence. So you can think of it as kind of a carrot and stick, right? If you're in that person's position, and you wanna try and not have a criminal record, and get different sorts of treatment, have the whole thing be confidential, obviously the incentive is there to comply with your case plan, with your disposition, your conditions of probation, because if you don't, you could end up back to the criminal division with a criminal record and all the things that go along with being convicted of crime as an adult. So, that's the big picture. How do you end up in one place or the other? Like I said, it generally depends on how old you are and what offense you committed. I'm sure everybody remembers the phrase, it used to be big 12. Now we kind of refer to it as the big 14, just so you wanna have a nice piece of paper to throw in your bill file. This is the list of these offenses, which you have big 11 on one side, big three on the other, because you may recall a couple years ago, we made a bit of a distinction. So, basically, the 11 on the front side, if you're the young person, you commit this offense, and you're age 14 or over, then you go to the criminal division. Right? That's side number one. Slide number two on the back, there's three more, so 14 total. You commit one of those three and you're 16 and above, then you start in the criminal division. So these are the the offenses that decide, depending on how old you are, whether you start in the family division or the criminal division. Alright. As I mentioned, this deals this bill, eight six forty two, deals with this middle ground, this youthful offender proceeding. So how do you end up as a youthful offender? Well, one way is all these offenses that that are on this list that I just handed out, both sides, what there's two ways you can get to be treated as a youthful offender. One of them is called a direct file. And under this direct file approach, one of these offenses that ordinarily ends up that starts in the criminal division, the state's attorney can choose at the outset not to file that case in the criminal division. They can direct file it in the family division as a youthful offender proceeding, hence the term direct file. So think about how that that goes that way too. Because if they started in the criminal division, the case starts as a public case. In that situation, the fact that the filing, the associated records at that very beginning point are publicly available. Once it gets transferred to the family division for duty for offender treatment, it becomes confidential. But it has that moment at the beginning where it's public. So it kinda highlights the fact that that initial charging decision can be a very important one for the state's attorney. Because if they choose to file in the criminal division, public. But if they choose to direct file, then it's confidential from the beginning.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: So I know that Tom, I think, has a question about before. Just about that, if they directly file one of these into the family division, is there still a hearing on whether useful offender status should be maintained?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yes. We'll get that, definitely. Either way, however you end up there, you do have that theory.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: You still have that? Yes. Yeah, just a quick So it starts in criminal division and gets sent to family division. Right. When it started in criminal division, was there anything more than just deciding where it goes, or are they actually facing any sort of consequence of that sort? Were they sentenced? Well So then if they fail in family, if they have to come back?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Oh, yeah. I think if I usually, the the transfer if the case if if the case is transferred, then they would come back for purposes of sex, and nothing happened yet. It used to be under a previous iteration of the youthful offender statute that you had to plead guilty in the criminal division. You don't have to do that anymore. The rule has but it would come back, and they could have a sentencing debate at that time. But yeah. So that's one way. I just pointed I handed out that you could direct there's two ways to end up in the family division for youth offender treatment. One is the direct file, that piece of paper I just handed out. The second way is by motion. So if you're in the criminal division, either the the the young person's attorney or the state's attorney or the court on its own motion, they can say, well, this looks more like it should be a youthful offender case. So they can motion to transfer it for the family division in that situation as well. So there's kind of these two ways it can get to the family division for youthful offender treat. Either way, either way, whichever way it ends up there, you have to have this hearing, as the chair mentioned. Either way. That's the first thing you're gonna do when you get there is you have what's called the youthful offender consideration hearing, right? Step number one. And that is in the family division. That's confidential. So, that segues us into section one of the bill. So, you're having this youthful offender hearing in the family division, right? And the first question always at this hearing is whether it's sort of a two step analysis. Step one is, is public safety gonna be protected by treating the young person as a youthful offender? And the court has to answer that question. If they answer that question, no, public safety wouldn't be protected, then they send it back to the criminal division for treatment as an adult. But if they answer that question yes, public safety would be protected, then it stays in the family division for step two, which is to determine whether or not the youth is amenable to treatment and whether or not there are services available. So that first question is, is public safety gonna be protected? The statute has a list of, I think, 10 criteria that the court has to consider. Starts on page two, line 13, goes all the way over onto page three, halfway down the page. So as when determining whether public safety will be protected by treating the youth as youthful youthful offender, the court shall consider on the basis of the evidence submitted. And then there's this list of criteria. Won't read all the ones that are in existing law. Obviously, nature and circumstances of the charge, whether violence was involved, mental health treatment history, substance abuse history, etcetera, etcetera, all kinds of relevant factors. So first thing that the bill does is it proposes to add one factor to that list, and that's over on page three, line 10, whether the youth has acknowledged that harm was caused by the youth's alleged conduct. So it's sort of an acceptance of responsibility concept. And now that's section one. Occurred to me that it seems like every time I come in here, I'd say the bill does three things. This literally, I didn't plan it out the way, does three things. So this is thing number one. It adds one criteria to the list of criteria that the court has to consider when they're deciding whether public safety will be protected and minor will be treated as youthful effect. And that one thing is whether the youth has acknowledged that harm is caused by their conduct.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: The that's

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: all the criteria you have to meet for the incentive to family court?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yes, in a sense. I don't know. The way it's phrased is the court shall consider. So these are the things the court has to consider. Right. It's not don't

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: have to. I mean, even if you meet them, do all these a through k doesn't mean that it's automatic. Right.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: That's the way I would read that. Right. I should consider that.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: K is just another one. Yeah. Karen, Ian Goodnow.

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: Thank you for this. I always appreciate the overview to get grounded in where we're at, so thank you for that. Yep. And with that, I get that we're adding one more criteria that they have to consider in order to determine if public safety is is going to work out or not to stay in court. Yep. But I guess with this specific one, this seems like brand new language. Do we have we used this ever before, or it seems like it's gonna be. Is it new, or, like like, is

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: it in from any other laws or anything?

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: Or, like, how would you determine if a youth has acknowledged? Is there any of that? Yeah. I think

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: that concept isn't brand new. It's new to this particular list of criteria. Okay. But acceptance of responsibility, I think, a familiar concept

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Okay. In

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: In determining if it will

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: go to a certain court or not? Making determinations like that. What sentence might be appropriate? For example, acceptance of responsibility is a common consideration by the court.

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: Okay. And it's just an acknowledgment of saying, yes, that would fulfill this?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I don't know exactly how it would play out in practice, but I think it probably is gonna depend on the particular case and the facts and circumstances of what would constitute an acknowledgment. But yes, seems like an acknowledgment to me. Yes.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: Okay, great. Well, thank you.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: It's very interesting. So

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: everybody else has a question, but I'm gonna jump in on this. So my understanding was that that kind of question is asked of somebody going into a restorative justice process as well. Is that not correct, or

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: is it not quite the same question? No, it is. So this may be getting I'm just curious. But it's basically taking responsibility for your actions of saying there is harm. And this is before somebody has been found innocent or guilty, where restorative justice is a detour from that.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Right, nice point. And just a little further background and then we're going Ian and Ken Tom, is that this was to try to find compromise for what's in age seven twenty one, which is what they used to have was a provisional guilty plea. Is that

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: what it's called? Yeah, think it's conditional or provisional guilty. So

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: this is short of that. But it is to try to get at that issue.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: About taking responsibility. Right.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Right. So that now whether it works or not, we're gonna hear from witnesses. But Ian can't come to me.

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: Yeah, Karen mostly got my question in point, but I think just to clarify, they've not been at this point, no one's been convicted of anything. There is an allegation and a charge, correct? Correct. And

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: that's it. That was my question. Yeah. The only thing I would add, just also for clarification, is that it's not phrased to require that you've committed a crime. The phrasing is they acknowledge that harm was caused by the election conduct. That may or may not require that the young person committed illegal.

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: I think it'd be very interesting to discuss.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Yep. I'm trying to say the least.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: So I wasn't gonna go there, but I'm gonna say whether the youth understands that harm was caused. I'm not really sure where we're going with this language, but when a judge, no matter what, be looking the youth and going and seeing if how the reactions are in court and how, you know, if there's any understands what they've actually done. I mean, isn't that common sense?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I think that the way this is phrased, that's absolutely the court would be looking at that sort of thing, right? And the youth would have, if they're so desired, have an opportunity to make a statement if they wanted to, to go to that point that you're talking about.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: So I'm gonna ask this question, mean, is it a common sense that that's gonna happen anyway with a judge? Policy decision

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: or something. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's a sort of,

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: I mean, I I mean, I I don't get this this this verbiage. I I don't it's like it's like it's it's basic one zero one. I'm not a lawyer. I'm not a judge.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I'm not anything. Well, the youth isn't required to testify. You always have the privilege not to testify. So the way I think this is set up is that it provides an opportunity. The youth wants to take it to acknowledge the harm and thereby, by implication, least demonstrate some knowledge about what may have happened as a consequence of their act.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: Right, so you just said the youth has the ability not to testify if he doesn't want to, but the youth can testify anytime they want or They could choose to, yeah. I mean, that's already there, it's actually.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Well, yeah, I think it's generally true for a defendant. Yep, they could choose to waive their rights against self incrimination and testify.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: I'm not sure who that, but what precipitated putting this back in here or bringing this into? That cave? Yeah. I think that's what I mentioned before, that another proposal was to bring back the condition of guilt, plea. This was something that was trying to get at that without having to have a guilty plea because it's before they've been adjudicated. If it doesn't work, it doesn't work.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: I hear you. I think it was very much like a

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: drug court scenario to me. That's a you got a plea agreement for that. Well, there's conditional plea of guilty. I would imagine a plea agreement would go with that. I

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: had the same kind of question that Karen had been I kept reading it and kept reading it. It made sense after I read it, like,

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: three or four times. That there's not some kind of admission.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: It's not admission to unlawful conduct.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Whereas a conditional guilty keep

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: in mind? Yes, my original thing that I raised my hand for was that the way that I look at something like this is that the youth isn't going to acknowledge anything. They're just going to the lawyer is just going to write something up and if if they're listening, you know, to what the lawyer is telling them, they're they're just gonna say Yahweh said. So

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: alright.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: So alright. Alright. That

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: was point number that was point number one. What the bill does. Alright.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Number four points in the bill. Oh, maybe you're right. Maybe I forgot one.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Let's talk about instance. The second one, though, we'll total them up at the end, I guess. The second one, the So think about sort of where we are on the chronology here. So we're just talking about, let's say the court does find that public safety would be protected by treating the young person as a youthful offender. And let's say they then have to add, at the bottom of page three, the court then will grant them line 18. Court grants the motion the next two things that the court turns to. It finds that page three, very bottom line 18. So this you're at the point where the court has found that public safety would be protected. Then they have to consider whether the youth's medical treatment and whether there's services available. So the court will grant the motion. In other words, treat the kid as a youth offender if the court finds that the youth is amenable to treatment or rehabilitation as a youth offender, turn on to the next page, and there are sufficient services in the juvenile court system, and DCF and Department of Corrections to meet the youth's treatment and rehabilitation needs. So that's the next step. Alright. So let's say that happens. Then you go to subsection c. If the court approves the motion for people offender treatment, then the court, line six and seven, shall approve a disposition case plan and impose conditions of juvenile probation. So that's what happens, like juvenile case at that point. It's a disposition plan, disposition case plan, conditions of juvenile probation. All right. What happens if the youth violates these conditions of probation? That's point two of the bill. So turn over to page five, See line seven, section two, modification or revocation of disposition. So what happens if the young person violates what their juvenile probation offense are? Well, if you look at line eight, the state may file a motion for modification or revocation of their youth offender status. So that's kinda like remember I was saying it's sort of like a carrot and stick. Well, here's the stick. If you violate your conditions of probation, the state can come in and file a motion, look at line 10, for modification or revocation of the youth offender status. Court has to hold a hearing on the motion and then go down to the very bottom of page five. What if the court finds the youth has violated, there's several options available. Look at line 20 of page five. Important point or word. If the court finds that the use is violated, the court may. See that? That's discretionary. Court may do those things. Court may do the things I'm about to say. Go turn over onto page six. What may the court do? Subdivision a, line one. The court may maintain the youth status of youthful offender, but modify their conditions of probation. They think it's appropriate. Second thing the court may do, court may revoke the young person's youthful offender transfer the case back to the criminal division for sentence it. Right? There's that stick. Violent probation, you can go back to the criminal division for sentence it. All made, though. All discretionary on the part of the court.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: Yeah. Thanks. Before I get lost too much further down the road here. Yep. So going back to line seven, that modification of

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yep. Why aren't we already doing that? Say it again. Sorry.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: Why aren't we already doing that? Why is it that already

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Oh, this is this is this is existing one. Sorry. This is the way it's done. No. I got it. Modification. Or revocation.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: Okay. So so where what are we changing?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Oh, we're about to get to that. So this is what the court may do, right, if the if the kid violate if the young person violates now. What the bill proposes over on page six is to say, in a couple of circumstances, the court shall revoke the young person's probation and send it to the criminal division. Right? It may remind you, instead of men, Zachary a couple of situations. And those two situations are look at lines 10 to 12, line six. If the court finds that while on juvenile probation, he was charged with a crime, element of which involves an act of violence against another person, see line 12, again, the court shall, see, not may, court shall revoke the status as the youth offender, transfer the case, and that's just the same language that it's a repeat of the exact language that's on lines three to five of the same page. So it's the same procedure, it's just that it's a shall in that particular situation, that the youth is charged with a crime, an element of which involves an act of violence against another person. Now, just to fully explain that, it is shall, but there is an look at line 15. The youth does have an opportunity to show that they should still be treated as lethal offender despite that. So unless the youth prove so the burden is on the youth. Right? Burd is on the youth to show by a preponderance of the evidence that, and that's A and B at the very bottom of page six, public will be protected by continuing to treat the youth as a youthful offender, and the youth remains amenable to treatment or rehabilitation as a youthful offender. And that's the same language that's in the treatment, the decision the court has to make in the first place. So it's kind of like the youth having to show, Well, look, I should still be treated as youthful offender. I still am appropriate for youthful offender treatment, despite the fact that I was charged with this other crime, an element of which involved an act of violence against somebody else. Maybe

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: you clarified it. So it's not convicted. It's charged. Correct. You haven't been actually found guilty of the behavior, but you could have some kind of punishment.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Right. And that part is still the case. And then it could be a violation of probation. You could be charged for the crime anyways.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: It's okay, Eric. I I apologize. So, everybody, I apologize. I'm trying to catch up to this. So, on page six on line 12, you got that's the first place where I see Xiao. Correct? I think so. And then if I back up where where the May payment was on page five, line 10?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Line 20 is one place. Yeah. There yeah. There is one on line line five also. The crucial one, though, is line 20. See the court the May, the

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: last word of that line.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: Okay. So that's okay. So run that by me one more time. Line 20 is where the court So

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: right now, if the if the u May. Okay. I got it. So that's the first instance in which revocation is required, so there's two, revocation would be required, assuming that it doesn't show that it's still appropriate for wider treatment. But the second situation in which revocation would be required absent another finding is over on page seven. You'll get subsection Sorry, Yep.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: If I go on to some.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Page five, court finds after the hearing the youth has violated the terms. The court may, right? And there's a, b, and c. Right. So I I violate a in in the court. It may may or may not put me into, you know, the criminal division. Right. So decided that I stay in family court, violate a again, there's still that choice to go either way. Violate a again, there's still the choice to go either way. There's nothing that says if I keep violating that there's a shall in there.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I don't think so. I think it's discretion of the court.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Right. Right. That's what I thought. Right. It's the same down below, and I forgot where it was now. But, anyway, yeah, that seems kinda odd to me that especially when you're talking, you know, the big 14. They obviously haven't got the message or potentially somebody hasn't got the message if they keep violating their conditions.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Not really a question. I did have a question.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: Didn't care. I'll defer. Have no idea. Yeah. So it

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: says youth was charged with a crime, an element of which involves an act of violence. So is that up for interpretation, or is it clear, like, there's a list of these crimes? Or it could be, Judge, I think this has an element. You could argue it. You could argue. And it is argued, because that's actually the same language that's

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: in the bail statute. That's where it's Okay. Where it's copied from, because the courts have that experience with litigation between prosecutors and defense attorneys about whether an offense contains such an element, and it's been going on for quite a while. So the idea was to use a standard that the court was familiar with.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: That's right. That's what that's from.

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: Just one quick question, Eric. Number two, the crime of violence that the youth has been charged with, that charge does not need to be what has

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: provoked the violation of the youth probation. Correct?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: You mean that the condition that the youth violated could be something other than the intervening crime?

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: Correct, yeah. Or at least, I'm wondering if that's how that reads, because I'm just curious if you've got somebody who's a youthful offender who's on probation. They do get charged with a crime of violence early on, they choose not to. They are successful in provocative evidence not to lose the youthful offender. But then they they have other violations, would would this still be invoked again for each of those violations after the fact because they were charged with a crime of violence during their probation?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Like, in other words, there could be separate violation proceedings always related to the fact that the one additional crime that was

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: charged with.

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: That it would just automatically shift into this number two, because while they were on probation, they were charged with a crime, with an alimony, which

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: was Yeah,

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: it could potentially work out, by way.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Okay.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I think you're right. It doesn't need to be the the violation. Yeah. Right? And so could be the trigger Each time.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Each time. Right? Okay.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: I

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: know if that's what if we want it to be the that it's the actual charge of the violent crime that gets you into number two, or if it's just the fact that you have been charged with one while you're on probation.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: I'm not sure if they're chat with this myself, but I'm confused. Okay, maybe I wasn't. Yes. If they're on probation, they're charged with a violent crime. Isn't that I'm not following.

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: Yeah, so you're on probation, you're charged with a violent crime. That will put you into number two. But then let's say they satisfy

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: they don't get kicked out of probate

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: youthful offender probation. They sat they're able to make the showings, and they're successful. They're on probation for five years. Three years down the line, they have another violation for something else. They violate some other term. Would it just kick them back into number two because while they were on probation,

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: they were charged with a crime of

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: No,

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: it's been dealt with once, presumably. I see what you're saying. I don't see how that

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: guess that's how I read that.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: We misused that term before. But it's like you've already shown that Yeah, let me think about that, Tom. I don't understand what you're saying, but yeah, Tom. So,

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Aaron, the same section on page six, too. If the court finds a hearing that while on juvenile probation now is this implying that they're on juvenile probation because of one of these 14 offenses or or

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: any juvenile probation? It's whatever it's whatever offense got them to be full offender status. Could be one of those 14, but for example So that's stealing a candy bar or it could

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: have been manslaughter? Well, some

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: of the well, some of

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: the first one you mentioned, it's always gonna be in the family division as a misdemeanor. Unless 19. Unless they're 19. That's true. In theory, it could be. Right. So it's whatever offense got them to the family division for youthful energy in the first place.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Does does that offense have to have

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: the the first offense that got them on probation Right. For this to apply, does that have to have the potential to go to criminal court? Or it could be simply a matter that

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: The first offense, the one that got him to youth offender in the first place? Yes. Yes. One way or another. Either well, it's either it's a either it's a case the prosecutor could have filed an internal division to begin with, which is one of those ones on the piece of paper, or it's one that was transferred to invoke the ping pong effect, no. But yes, it was one that would've been transferred to the criminal division, then back to the family division for youthful phantom treatment. One way or another, it would've been in the criminal division, unless it was direct filings. So,

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: I'm just trying to understand this. Yeah, yeah. So the first offense, I got him on juvenile probation. Yep. Chances are it's a pretty serious crime. Not necessarily one of these.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I'm gonna defer to the practitioners on the percentages of how these cases are I think many of them are.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Right. And the reason I'm thinking potentially a serious crime because it could be in criminal court, more serious crime.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Some of that, right. If it could be that the court or the parties had agreed in the place that it should stay in the stony

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: party. If that is the case where it is potentially a serious crime, I would have some issues with number two because they've already done something fairly serious and, you know, broken it in whatever conditions have been handed down and and they're doing an act of violence after a serious crime. Mean, that's me. That's

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: that's grounds for some serious accountability. So, Kenneth, did you have a this whole thing. I'm still trying to catch up with this this whole bill. It seems like we started out with a little fishbowl with this, and now I'm down in in Florida at at SeaWorld in a in a fish tank. Like it's like

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: now you have

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: to explain that before the

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: bill gets explained. Well, it's like it's it's point five. It's like

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: it's like going all over the place to try to like, do something that already should be enacted and I'm trying to understand what I'm missing here. And and I really don't have a question. Just

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: I mean,

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: I'm in the fish tank, man. I just So I mean

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: Dennis, out of the fish tank.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Yeah. So so there's this language here that was trying to do something I can't remember what because it was last fall. Oh, your bill? Yeah, it's my bill.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: And you don't remember? Well,

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: you know, it was a while ago. I had a discussion with we had a few people. I'll blame Tucker and Kevin. Everyone else was at that table back in September.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Need to escape responsibility.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Well, it's my fault. My name is on this bill. I'll take full responsibility for this. We don't have to have that language, presumably with the May language. If it's a serious crime that they're in there for and a serious crime that they have now committed, there's a pretty darn good chance that the court is going to sue. There's a decent chance that the court's going to transfer the person over to the criminal court. It's going to revoke it. So this may be surplusage here. It may not be necessary, but we were trying to force that. Say, hey, if this happens, have to send them there. Then again, have the escape clause. You sure? Let's move on.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Okay. Yes, Kenneth, go ahead. Don't

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: we, Is it just in the I can't pronounce

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: the word.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: Ominous bill Yes. Already from the

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: And you have the pages that it's in there.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: That's pretty They're different. Right. Okay. Yeah.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: So you know where I was going with that. You good? Not really.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: I think we're go to the other one. Maybe I'll I

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: I think I think that we would be having even deeper issues, but that's just me. Oh, I'm deep. Eric, over to you on page seven, I believe. I

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: thought this is the third point, but I

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: think you're quoting this to be No, I think

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: you're right. I'd agree. I concur with your interpretation. Four points.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: So if guys didn't like the last one, you know, that's it. I

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: already looked at this.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Alright. Go ahead, Eric. Sorry.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So this is another another situation in which in which rather than revocation of probation being discretionary for the court, the idea is to make it mandatory. So make it mandatory in this fact situation if the court sorry, if the youth fails to appear at a probation revocation. So in other words, we we saw when we're going through this that it's the state files a motion to revoke the young person's probation, the court has to have a hearing. Well, if the youth fails to appear at that hearing, then this provides that their probation gets revoked. Again, there's an opportunity that she lines to unless it finds there was good cause for the failure to appear. So if there is good cause that the youth can show, then the court doesn't have to revoke. But if there's no good cause, then the youth has to revoke I'm sorry, the court has to get information to the criminal division for sentencing, rather than it being discretionally permissible is required to do. So, it has these two situations, the committing another crime while you're on probation, an element of which involves an act of violence against another person, or failing to appear at a probation revocation. In either one of those two situations, court has to revoke probation absent some other circumstances, rather than discretion ability to revoke the person. So that's numbers two and pitch.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Michelle and unless, kind of way of doing it.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Right. Okay.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: And the last piece of it involves victims' rights at you for offender proceedings.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: You're gonna like this one. Everybody's gonna get on board to this one.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Well, the victims came along.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Crime victims already have a number of rights at at youthful offender proceedings. You see they're listed in the statutory section that on line 16, page seven. The first, as turned over on to page eight, the first right that is listed, what they have generates notification. So, in the youthful offender proceeding, the crime victim has the right to be notified by the prosecutor about court proceedings, conditions of release, that sort of thing. The second type of right they have under subdivision two starts on line seven, is to be present and to make a statement at certain parts of the proceeding. Existing language though, you'll see if you ignore the underlined language for a second on lines eight and nine. Part of the proceeding that the victim can be present at and make a statement at is the disposition hearing. That's on line nine, and they can prevent a statement at that hearing. Now remember when we went through this sort of type of proceeding, there's two hearings. Right? The first hearing was the consideration. That's where the court decides whether the young person is appropriate for treatment as a youthful offender. If the court says yes, then they have the disposition hearing, which is developing a disposition case plan, the conditions of probation, sort of like imposing the same sort of thing. So with this, under existing law, the victim can appear and make a statement at the disposition proceeding. But at that point, the decision has already been made to treat the person as a youthful offender, because that was done earlier at the youthful offender consideration. So what this does is it allows the victim the same right to appear and make a statement at the youthful offender consideration hearing as they currently have at the district attorney. That's it in a nutshell. Basically, an earlier stage in the proceedings that the victim can make a statement. And that's at the time when the court is still deciding whether or not to treat the young person as a youthful offender. Yeah, let's go through.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: I have a question.

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: So on the for that section too, but if you look at lines fourteen and fifteen, it says the court shall consider the victim's statement when ordering disposition, but it's not saying that it should consider the victim's statement when deciding useful offender status. Is that intentional? Or

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: It is not intentional. So I'm gonna say it could catch it like

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: Is that also a different vision?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Although, yeah, to be consistent

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: It's a difference up above. I'm looking at point up too.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yes. So I think you're right. It should be made consistent if that's the policy decision you made. It's also kind of an outlier in the sense that because over on page nine, when there's some more detail in subsection b about the procedure, it does say there that in ordering you for offender I'm on line six. Youth offender in order it does add you for offender status there. Court shall consider any views offered at the hearing by the victim. But you're right. It's purposes of being consistent, and we wanna add it there too. Any other questions for Eric?

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: All right. I would say I have one other question, is that if something manages to get through, we probably have to have a different effective date for non passage because it's a death penalty to rule out presumably. Right. Alright, so we will go to our next witness, I believe it's Kim or yeah. It's Kim or Tucker. Who wants to go first? We'll let you flip a coin. You're cutting. Is

[Rep. Kevin "Coach" Christie (Ranking Member)]: Tucker using that double sided coin again?

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: I think that's probably.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Well, you identify yourself, I'm hearing there's some pushback on some

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: of these things I have been doing as far as language.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: So definitely want you to discuss those. And if you have any like conceptually or from the other Bill seven twenty one to just kind of put before us to think about and perhaps in the next version, we're open to hear that, but that's also fine if you don't have that right now. If you just want to attack the painstaking we put together with the ball.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: We didn't help.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Thank you, thank you. As you can tell, I need it's the event

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: Director, Kim McManus, Department of State Attorneys and Sheriffs. Stepping back a second from the language right in front of you, What we appreciate about what this bill is trying to do is that it feels like the committee heard us last year that there are issues within youthful offender. There are a number of issues, but one of the issues is that when someone is on youthful offender, there is an ability for youth to age out and sort of run the clock. And if they don't appear at hearings or if there's a motion to revoke and the hearing schedule, if they do not appear, there's currently not a mechanism to move that case back to criminal court without And them being at that revocation the clock is able to run, run, run, and then the family division no longer has jurisdiction over them. And we've lost our window of having accountability on that case. So my understanding is that this bill is seeking to address some of that, in addition to making it clear that the victim can speak at the consideration hearing and be heard on whether or not a useful offender is an appropriate way for the case to go. And can we hear from the room? There are different opinions essentially on how soon and what sends these cases back to criminal court. And from our department's point of view, yes, there could be more to this in terms of what sends things back. But there is an initial start here of what would be a firm line in the sands for youthful offenders to know if you do not comply with probation, you will go back. Now, to Representative Burditt's point of view, it's up to your committee whether it's a matter of so many probation violations and then it has to go back. Or is it an allegation of a certain crime while probation? Does that send you back? That's what I believe this bill is trying to do and to start that conversation. I'm going to start with the easy part as far as my particular comments.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: The very end. Not

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: the effective date. Agree with the chair on that. So for victims' involvement, what we had presented to the committee last year is or sorry, I think it came up last year that courts are reading this section of the statute differently. Again, as Representative Burditt said, hey, I think this is already law that the victim should be able to be heard at the consideration hearing. Some judges do interpret the statute that way, and some do not. So this was something that we requested to clarify. I think the wording is a little complicated right now, and we could probably make it simpler. In that, I think the wording on page nine clarifies when considering the useful offender status, meaning that consideration hearing, that's when they can be heard and that the court shall take that into consideration. The wording on page eight, I think, is confusing. And so I would suggest maybe taking that out and just sticking with page nine. And if you did that, potentially moving that added language on page eight, line 11, the appropriateness of youthful offender status, that that's what victim is able to speak to at the consideration hearing. You can move that into page nine, probably right around line seven or so. So that's one suggestion, just that might be a little easier. Way, subsection two on page eight is talking about what the victims' rights are at disposition hearing. Page nine is talking about victims' rights at the consideration hearing. It might make it a little easier to understand. Just a suggestion. Diving into the five, modification or revocation or disposition. The way the bill is written, my understanding is sorry, let me back up a second. Current law allows anyone to motion to modify or revoke a useful offender's status. So there are times when the defense might want to modify the conditions that the useful offender is on during a final motion to do that. The state might want a motion to revoke useful offender status. The way this is written, there are now two ways that we could support that motion. One, a probation violation. And then the new addition is this language around whether someone's charged with a crime which involves an act of violence against a person. So that's just another that would be providing another avenue for the state to file that motion to revoke. Whether or not you all think that's appropriate, that's up to you all to decide whether a charge is enough. I believe what Ledge Council was stating was if a juvenile on probation is charged with a new criminal offense or a juvenile delinquency, more than likely that's also going to be a violation of their probation. So we still could do that under what we already have. The question before this committee is what behavior while youth is on probation gets them out of this useful offender status, which is a benefit to them to not be in criminal court. So what sends them back is ultimately the question for you all. And we as a department do not have 100% agreement on what that would be. Can say that the majority of our state's attorneys want a line in the sand for when, okay, we're done. We've tried this. It's not working anymore. You are showing us that you are not engaging in treatment. You're showing us that you're not benefiting from the status. It should go back. So we support anything that firms that up, where you decide to start drawing those lines. I'm not going to get into too deeply because it sounds like there needs to be a lot of conversation amongst you all before bringing us in.

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: Thank you, Chair. Kim, so the line in the sand, are you guys going to take a stance on where you think that should fall? Or are there any suggestions that the essays do, Corbin, have?

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: Again, we don't have 100% agreement on where that would be.

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: And I don't mean to interject, so I'm wondering if this might be helpful. Does it kind of go back to page one of six forty two? And it seems like I'm looking at lines twelve, thirteen, 14, there's several varying degrees of where if the youth isn't an active participant, if the public safety is not going be upheld by the youth, there's several conditions I feel like that could be met. Is that kind of in line with, you you only get so many bites of the apple and there's the line? Or is it something is it the type of offense that the youth commits while they're out that that will that will be a lie? Do you understand what I'm saying? Is it the preconditions that are kind of outlined here, or would it be more practical to have a certain penalty or offense that they commit?

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: I think what gets tricky is that there would be many possibilities of what would say to the state's attorney, like, this isn't working. So yes, potentially being charged with multiple crimes while on probation. Probation does not seem to be impacting your behavior. Being charged with a violent crime for some state attorneys I feel like that should be enough. But on the other end, it could be that continuous lack of engagement, just low level, running around DCF and not engaging. I'd be hesitant to say this. But I think the important part is that the factors that allow them to pull youth into youth offender status should be similar factors that you're weighing at that revocation hearing. You're sort of running through the fact or ideally, the judge is running through those factors again, given whatever new information has come to the court. And many judges do do that, even though that's not required. They often will run through that analysis as why they're keeping someone a useful offender or why they've decided to move both.

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yeah.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: No, thank you. And I

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: think if I could just

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: I mean, just mind 12,

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: I think it's interesting because it says, unless the youth shows that the public safety will continue to be protected, it really shifts the burden on youthful offender. I'm curious what your thoughts are on that. I am very much in support of that language. I think it's a great modification here.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: I appreciate that you pointed that out. Yes, we do support that. You've been given this benefit of a useful offender, and then you're exhibiting behavior, whether that's violating probation or allegedly committing new crimes, that it would seem fair to us that the burden shifts, that you're essentially arguing for why you should be able to maintain that penalty. So we do support that.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Thank you. Yes. Before I go to Ian, is that one of the possible solutions here, if we can't figure out exactly what this lever in the sand is, that we want the court to consider specifically or explicitly?

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: I think it could be, because I do think that, again, you see a wide range of responses to these motions to revoke when presented. And I think judges needed to make a more detailed finding on the record as to why they're deciding someone should stay a youthful offender, even with a probation violation or with two or three probation violations, or why it's being revoked. Do you think that would be helpful? And with, again, the burden shifting.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Quick question. Can you revoke an adult probation

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: without the probation or being there?

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: I do not believe so, but I would need to leave. But again, it's easier in criminal court, at least someone doesn't show up for their probation and revocation that the arrest warrant is issued.

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: Yeah, and I want yes, that makes sense. And I think the issue around running the clock out and not showing for the revocation hearing for the youthful offender side of it, that makes a lot of sense to try to resolve that issue. I was wondering if any of the reasons if you can't revoke someone's probation as an adult, if any of the reasons why you can't if they're not there, then the reasons why you can't do that as an adult does also apply for a youthful offender beyond the fact that you can do an arrest warrant. But if there's any other reasons why we're not allowed to do that, wondering if they would apply here as well, for why maybe we can't revoke someone's probation as a full offender because they're not present.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: I mean, the big picture is it's a due process issue, right? So they have their hearing. And so the question is, again, if we're treating these youth, some of them are adults, differently or giving them the benefit of youthful offender, can you treat that differently? And again, I'm not prepared to speak to that in detail. But I do think as long as if the case is transferred back to criminal court, the individual is going to have an ability, a moment, if they show up to court to make an argument, potentially to send it back. But if they're not, we need some mechanism to get them either into family court or into criminal court if they're not chosen.

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: And I think that gets at it, that the consequence for revoking youthful offender probation versus the consequence of revoking just an adult probation are very different. And so the due process consideration can be different as well.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: Well, to be fair, revoking a youthful offender's probation, you go back to criminal court, they're sentenced on the charge.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Is So

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: again, they would need a hearing to affirm why the case has gone to criminal court. And I'll leave the Defender General to inform about it.

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: Yeah, okay, thank you.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Coach, do you have a question?

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: If so, unmute.

[Rep. Kevin "Coach" Christie (Ranking Member)]: Yes. Just thinking about the process and thinking about family court and the fact that the youth will probably have, you know, possibly a, oh, guardian ad litem And additionally, be part of a local interagency team function, which the state's attorney's office is part of that local interagency team. When we look at, for example, possible violations, do you think things, know, like such as, you know, not going to school or completing certain agreements that are made between the team and the court around attendance would come into play?

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: So if attending school is one of the probation conditions for the use, that could be a violation of their probation. Now, a state's attorney is going to have a motion to revoke for that reason. That would depend on the state's attorney. But that's why the court has the discretion. Say a probation violation was filed because you were missing school and you were supposed to attend school. They could find that as a violation. But then the court has the discretion to either keep the youth on youthful offender status or revoke. So it is possibly a probation violation. Whether that would cause you to be revoked, say the odds are unlikely, but it would very much depend on the whole plethora of what the youth may or may not be doing.

[Rep. Kevin "Coach" Christie (Ranking Member)]: Right. Like you said, I think the key issue is what are they doing with that time? You know, if that time is, let's say, unaccountable for when the whole idea is you know where they are if they're there, you know, versus if they're out running the roads. That's a whole another issue.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: That's fair.

[Rep. Kevin "Coach" Christie (Ranking Member)]: Anyways, thank you.

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: I'm just curious, I'm kind going through this with

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: you as well, but if you

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: go to page four, line 10, and then I'm also looking at the top of page five, line one, and I'm looking at line 15 on page five as well, it seems that there's contradictory language in terms of the youth's age and the relevance of the situation. So I'm curious if the department has a view on whether there should be consistency across, whether it shall be twenty two years, if it shall be 18. It just seems strange that we're waffling back

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: and forth. So what tricky with this and we really have to chart it out, that's what I have to do every time, is that the court has jurisdiction up to 22. On page four, it's discussing that the court may transfer legal custody of the youth, but that's different than court jurisdiction. So the court could transfer legal custody up until the youth's eighteenth birthday. But our big issue with youthful offender is that once they turn 18, it doesn't matter what the parents are saying or not saying to them matters. Maybe a little bit what DCF is saying to them. They're making their choices and the court still has jurisdiction over them, but they are, for all other purposes, an adult making their decisions.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Well, I

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: think this goes back to some of the, maybe push and pull that we had last year around this time on the debate of Raise the Age is that there's one way that society views these individuals, and there's another way that the court views these individuals. And I think that's kind of the tension that I'm picking up on in this piece legislation, is that while very well intended, it seems like there are some points that maybe aren't fully considered. My words, not yours. Mean, that's a wide open invitation if you want to discuss it, but it just seems like there should be some kind of consistency.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: A youthful vendor does live in this murky middle where it's, for some, not all, those who are 18 and over are adults everywhere else, but treated as youthjuvenile in youthful offender. So that is attention. But we as a state have decided that this is helpful for certain cases. So again, is to you all where this goes. But as long as youthful offender continues, our department very much appreciates having some backstop to not run the clock out. And I do think this bill is seeking to address that, and we support that. I would guess that there's going to be potentially some edits done. We'd be happy to speak further on where you feel that place is to send the cases back. The only other comment I want to make, and this was everyone's least favorite section in the mail, so I'll leave this for last and then I'll let Tucker think over. Get you all fired up. So on page three, the addition of this factor, again, we appreciate that what DCF said last year was when they're trying to figure out whether they can supervise this youth on youthful offender probation, which is factor H for the court. Is this youth going to be successful if they go to youthful offender? We did hear testimony from DCF that youth's willingness to recognize that they've harmed someone, that they were the cause of that harm, is an important piece of that. Absolutely, when I read this, I thought, oh boy, there's no way the vendor general is going to allow any youth to acknowledge harm at this stage. The only thing I would put out there for consideration, if the committee did want this to be a factor for the court to consider. And there could be scenarios where this was helpful to the court. Maybe all the other factors the court is saying, no way, youthful offender, this is going to criminal court. But there is a youth who is ready to say, I can't believe I did this, but I did, and someone was really hurt. If they said that at a termination hearing, maybe that would sway a court to send a youth to youthful offender. If this language was to say, I think you would need some additional protective language about how anything said by the youth at the determination hearing could not be used at the merits hearing if it went to a youthful offender or in a future parole court case. So I think there is a way to protect that information if you all thought the youth providing that information at the determination hearing would be helpful.

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: Good question.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Kim, how familiar are you with Section seven, H. 21? That's the Omnibus Code.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: A little bit, and I did see that there were some additional factors suggested in there.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Yeah,

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: know you can't probably answer the question. So

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: comparing section seven to h six forty two, I think section seven has got myself has got more accountability in it. Guess if you could rate them as far as accountability goes and I don't know if you can answer it that way or not. That's why I said, I don't know if you can answer it.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: Well, what I did so, again and I was not able to go side by side.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Go, Pedro.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: On these two, we're on page 14, section seven. So the beginning of section seven for the determination, again, that moment of the will fender or keep this in criminal court. I did appreciate the addition of factor I on page 16, which is the has this individual been a useful offender previously, and were they successful or not? That was a good addition. The section seven also highlights the public safety piece of what the court has to consider. That public safety piece is already in law. It's sort of the overarching sentence, and then we get into how the court decides the public safety piece. But this bill, H. 70 seven-two-one, definitely highlights and again requires the court to further make very specific findings on the public safety side of the consideration. Beyond that, I didn't have enough time to read, so I can only speak to those two things. Right.

[Rep. Kenneth Goslant (Clerk)]: Eric?

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: Happy to come back if we're looking at these two sections, one bill and the other one together, with a little more time. Could come back and I'll Thank give a little more

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: you.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: Because I do think there were a number of beneficial items in there.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Any other questions for Kim? Well, I think we might have spoke today.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Well, it's around four or 04:30 or 03:30, but that's not today.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Was just gonna say, we're just about freaked out. Tucker, join us. I like that pile of notes, Tucker.

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: Buckle up.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: I'm kidding. We have many.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: Hello again, back on the record. Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety. Thank you for having me in on this bill. The Department of Public Safety is involved in this topic primarily because back in the pandemic, the commissioner would meet regularly with local law enforcement during the legislative session to get a feel for what was happening on the ground at that time. And there was a significant amount of feedback from local law enforcement of interactions with young people in which there was some sense that they knew because of their age that the likelihood of them being brought into criminal court was low and that there was a oppositional defiance towards the law enforcement officers who were apprehending them in some circumstances for quite serious offenses. That was somewhat surprising or shocking to the law enforcement leaders who were involved in those cases. It was primarily municipal law enforcement officers that were kind of reporting those back up as the nature of the offenses that mont state police dealt with on the highways didn't encounter this as much. At the same time or at a similar time during the pandemic back in 2021. So this brought this general topic onto the radar of the commissioner. And it was of some concern that we were having these experiences. Now granted, it was ultimately a collection of anecdotes of experiences, but they were alarming enough and consistent enough that it resulted, I know at one point in the Bennington County Police Department putting together a presentation on some of the concerns they were having or some legislative discussion about it, etcetera. At the similar time, DCF had written a memo to the legislature back in 2021 outlining some proposed changes to juvenile jurisdiction generally, delinquency and youthful offender to address concerns that they were having regarding youth's engagement with the juvenile justice process from the probation officer perspective. During this whole time, this was being dealt with in Senate Judiciary. They always own this topic. And so it's only really in recent years, last year, and now this year that you all are now owning this topic. You just raised the age last year, but now you're faced with this. Since 2020, 2021, over the last two years, that is when we were collecting the feedback from the DCF social workers the deputy state's attorneys that were handling these cases. And that was some of the feedback that I gave you last year when we were talking about raise the age, the so called weather reports from the practitioners who were handling these cases. And if you recall, that feedback from those two groups was quite critical and consistent between those two groups. And as a result, in part, there was a delay in ways of the age kind of a time out there. What you're now grappling with, a youthful offender generally, with this bill, some of the other bills, is that those concerns that were originally raised in 2020, 2021, there was some incremental changes that Senate judiciary made over the years, but there are large outstanding kind of changes that were not made, that were originally proposed back in that time. Now we're 2026, those gaps are still there. Those kind of concerns or critiques are still there. Cheri LaLonde, I think what you're approaching here is to say, all right, if youthful offender is going to stay and it's going to serve some important role for this 22 crowd to make sure that it addresses those underlying concerns that have been identified from practitioners over the years. That I think is the thrust of logic here. The logic is that the status quo on some of these provisions is not adequately addressing or kind of incentifying incentifying engagement with the youthful offender process the way that some of

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: the

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: practitioners would like to see, specifically for the youth who don't want to voluntarily engage. Of course, for some who walk in and say, yes, let's do it. I did this and I want to engage. Well, don't have a problem there. We don't need procedural provisions to address that. It's really the behavior of those who may have engaged in some very risky behavior that really did seriously impact public safety, who are not willing to voluntarily engage with the process. The question becomes, what do you do then? So I just give that background because it's, know, for better or worse, representative LaLonde has kind of assumed ownership over this baby of juvenile justice. And it's a lot, but it's an important one because the practitioners have been expressing concern over the years. And I would suggest that some of that concern over the last two years that they've been expressing is due in part to the failure to kind of make some of these more significant changes that were originally proposed back in 2021. Overall, what I think the goal is, is to create procedural provisions here that incentivize acceptance of responsibility for young people's behavior and incentivize meaningful engagement with the process to move back through it. One of the criticisms that again goes back five years now is that the current procedural process for youthful offender status doesn't do that. It doesn't meaningfully incentivize young people to accept responsibility and to meaningfully engage with their DCF social workers once they reach probation. And I think it's a legitimate criticism from the practitioners for some of those cases in which people are not engaging. The other goal here is to really incentivize for these young people that this is really an opportunity for them and that they view it as an opportunity, take it seriously and realize that if they don't take it seriously, they can lose that opportunity. And I think again, procedurally in the provisions that we currently have, we're not necessarily conveying that message. And as a result, in some of the cases, the social workers and prosecutors are quite frustrated because it's almost like the procedural process is working against the goal of what we're trying to instill into these young people who have this opportunity to move past this, but are kind of turned off from the whole process as they move along each step of the way. To that end, as it relates to this, well, before I speak to the four terms of this bill, the logic of the conditional pleas in criminal court served that goal originally of incentivizing acceptance of responsibility and viewing this as an opportunity in which you can lose the opportunity if you don't meaningfully engage. The legislature shifted away from that as a policy decision and went to this idea that first you can have this determination hearing of whether you full offender status appropriate and then have essentially a trial, a bench trial with the judge to determine whether you actually committed the offense if you want to challenge it. It's totally different approach to it. And I think for better or worse, we've lost some of the value of acceptance of responsibility and viewing this as an opportunity for some of the youth. Now in this bill, H-six 42, the first provision here about adding a line to the factors that the court considers for protecting public safety of whether the youth has acknowledged the harm that was caused by the youth's alleged conduct, well, that's an attempt to get at that issue. This issue of acceptance of responsibility that will result in meaningfully engaging with the services available. However, as some of you have pointed out as you're grappling with this language and where it fits procedurally, it is tricky because you have this opportunity to accept responsibility. And then you also then later have the opportunity to have a bench trial to say, I commit this offense or I don't want to accept responsibility. And then put on the evidence prove beyond reasonable doubt to the judge prosecutor that I actually committed this offense. So there is that disconnect there. There is a disconnect there. To Kim's point, well, first of all, that could be of benefit to some youth who do want to accept responsibility and get the benefit from the judge that this is a factor that they can consider in determining whether public safety will be protected. Because again, if that is a factor for public safety, they're informed of that, they want to accept responsibility, then they could get that benefit. I appreciate Kim's point though, that you may want to insulate that admission at that time from any subsequent hearing on the merits, if there is a subsequent hearing on the merits. The hope there in that YO as a factor in the YO consideration is that not only would they accept responsibility there for public safety, but be willing then to admit to some version of the charge and have some stipulation for the court and not proceed onto a merit hearing. That would be some of the logic there. But I appreciate your concern here of where this fits in to the procedural posture. It highlights the whole point that the shift away from the conditional plea in the first place kind of creates these problems. And the way I'm phrasing it is it creates it's shifting away from incentivizing the acceptance of responsibility that can be, from the social worker's perspective, helpful to the rehabilitation of the youth once they are on probation.

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: Karen? Good question. So this is learning about history that I didn't know about of the conditional plea.

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: So that was a part of the useful offender program at one point,

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: is that you had to plead to something. And if you did, you could go a useful offender. And if you weren't successful, was it that same charge as what you're convicted of in criminal court? To that effect. And I think

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: it was 02/2019, somewhere in there where you had this conditional plea in criminal court. So you'd start in criminal court. You have the option to conditionally play. So you basically plead to it. And then your case, as a result, would be transferred to youthful offender status. You comply with the conditions there. If it was revoked for a violation of the condition, you have already pled to the criminal charge. And so it can be returned to the criminal court that way. So that's how it was for about a decade in July.

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: This is helpful. And then you're saying we got rid of that, which I can understand why there's negative pieces to that. And that you're saying now we're trying to piece things back together to try to adjust to that change that was made.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: Yes, in light of the feedback that we've gotten basically originally from municipal law enforcement in the height of the pandemic, but then over the last two years from the practitioners, the social workers and the deputy states attorneys who are handling these cases. Yes. And I just

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: want to clarify that it is feedback. We don't have data specifically, because I know you mentioned the not engaging or I think somebody else maybe on the aging out. Is there specific data? Because I feel

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: like if that is a

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: goal that we're trying to achieve, it'd be helpful to know what is it now so that if we do implement some of these things, we can see, are we making an impact?

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: Yeah. So it's an excellent question, and it's a question that came up in a big way with Raise the Age last year when you're considering what to do there of the paucity of data that we have regarding not so much the number of cases, but the kind of the outcomes of those cases. And one of the issues is how little data there is other than some of the just the numbers of filings. Have some of that, but there seem to be very little data available regarding the outcomes and whether it was positive outcome, negative outcome, whether they age appropriately or not. Anyway, so that's the logic, I think, for that first one, page three, line 10. Page six places the burden on the youth to show that YO probation should

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: be

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: revoked in certain circumstances. I agree that the key piece there is the burden shifting. That is, I think, worth focusing on more than anything else. I would note that under current law 33 VSA 5,285, the standard for the circumstances in which wire probation should be revoked is very vague. So there may be an opportunity here to provide greater legislative clarity on the circumstances in which probation should be revoked or not. Right now in 5285 subsection C, it says if court finds after hearing that use has violated terms of probation, the court may obtain the youth status as a YO, revoke the youth status as a YO, transfer supervision to DOC. But there's no elaboration on what factors the court should be considering when doing that. I know in practice that some judges have used the original factors for YO determination to begin with as kind of a proxy analysis of what to do under that circumstance, if that makes sense.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Yeah, no. So let me ask a question I asked Kim. Than trying to figure out the lines in the sand, do we lay out, here's what you have to consider. Because there's gonna be so many different situations, it's hard to really draw lines in the sand. So do you have a view on whether that's what we should be doing instead of trying to figure out

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: the shelves? Yeah, I mean, one approach, and again, I'm just thinking of this in real time, and Judge Zonay may have thoughts about this eventually, is essentially cross referencing the initial factors that the court considers on making the determination in the first place. Will public safety be protected? Version of that, because you already have a whole framework and analysis of the litigation. For example, whether they're amenable to treatment at the stage of revocation may be a relevant factor because the court may find that continuing probation, whether it's DOC or still with DCF, well, if they're no longer amenable to treatment at that stage, that might be a relevant factor to consider.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Right. And actually I could see in the revocation stage, if there's been violations that at that point this kind of ultimate harm can be even more important to you. They're trying to I guess that's part of the amenability treatment, frankly. All right, so anyway, yeah, we can consider that and we'll take more tests during the event as well. Coach, do you have a question? You're muted.

[Rep. Kevin "Coach" Christie (Ranking Member)]: Yes. Just you know, a thought and something, you know, I heard from Tucker, you know, in his piece is what can we legitimately thinking in terms of the closed setting, you know, of family court actually extrapolate data because we'd wanna know the effects of some of these changes. You know, so what can we legitimately record either from the judiciary side, DOC side, or DCF side? That's a general question.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: And I think, through the past few years, DCF has been talking about their data management system. I think there's been some shift towards maybe a new one. They'll be able to speak better, I think, towards their goals in their kind of data management, data collection on what they're doing. And then of course, what valuable data we can get from the judiciary on the topic generally. I do recall during our conversations over the past few years on Raise the Age that there was pretty limited data relating to the federal filings, and it was hard to glean much meaningful insight from that alone. And

[Rep. Kevin "Coach" Christie (Ranking Member)]: that's been the case. I mean, because I'm thinking even pre COVID times when we were having these discussions about you know, family court especially and the implications of youthful offender having data to support any differences in the applications, if that makes sense, Tucker.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: It does. And, you know, I should point out, and I try to point out every year, what makes this even harder is that these cases occur in a black box of confidentiality. It is, it's very challenging, I think, or with the lack of data and the lack of ability for you to kind of go down to the court yourself and to view these proceedings or for the media to view these proceedings. So what I'm left with anyway is seeking feedback directly from the practitioners and kind of relying on their expertise on what they're seeing. And it's not ideal, but I do find that it's meaningful. And that's why I shared the feedback that we did get at least over the past few years, some of its practitioners. Because like you, the lack of quantitative data and the black box of confidentiality for all these proceedings and the overall complexity of these proceedings, it's quite a thing to be taking on as a public policy topic for for the committee.

[Rep. Kevin "Coach" Christie (Ranking Member)]: And and and maybe, you know, we might need to give some thought, you know, with our data partners, You know, as to, you know, how we might, you know, venture into that non identifying identifiers like education uses in some cases.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: And again, I'll just defer to DCF on the kind of like I know they've been, know, obviously grappling with the data collection over

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: the past few years. So,

[Rep. Kevin "Coach" Christie (Ranking Member)]: yep, thanks, Tucker.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Alright. So, on page six, I don't know if you.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: Yeah. So, that was what I just talked at page six with the burden on the youth. Placing the burden on the youth. It's a burden shifting and again, the main point there is looking at the existing standard is at a minimum, it doesn't provide a lot of direction or clarity on even one of the relevant factors that should be considered under that circumstance. So there's value, I think, in legislative attention, providing greater clarity. And I do think there's a role in potentially defining the circumstances in which the burden maybe should be on the youth to demonstrate why it should not be revoked. That's what you're kind of getting at in that provision. Whether it has to be that specific framework of active violence, I think there's a few ways to approach it. But there are circumstances there, which I do think that burden should be broken. Page seven is revoking probation if the youth fails to appear at a probation revocation hearing. That was a specific issue with the state's attorneys and the problems that they've had there in this broader issue of aging out, which is something that DCF has also previously identified, again with a cohort of individuals who are doing these proceedings. And then page A clarifying that victims can attend motion hearings for YO status, not just a disposition hearing expressing their views on the appropriateness of YO. I think there's a lot of value to engaging with that language and taking it seriously because currently, language to the extent it just is specific to disposition hearings, the train has kind of left the station at that point in my view, where there's a lot more thought that goes into the why I'm consideration area that we should be thinking about the victims at that stage or if there's a potential opportunity to.

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: Go ahead, Zachary. Thanks, Chittenden. So one of the questions I have is in terms of the commissioner and more broadly DPS' view of what does a working definition of success look like for a youthful funded program? Is it I mean, I guess it's I'll leave that to you. Is there a working definition that you the department has?

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Well, I'd say this.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: For the past few years, we've been talking a lot about accountability. That's been kind of a buzzword that we haven't kind of defined very well. And I think in our minds, there's this question of when we say that, or what we're really saying is, well, we're not always focused on rehabilitation. Sometimes we're focused on punitive response. And in my understanding, that is actually not what we mean when we talk about accountability in criminal justice public policy here in Vermont in the past week. What I think it really means is that we have well intentioned policies that are attempting to increase rehabilitation and decrease recidivism. But sometimes those policies result in a more permissive criminal justice response that actually undermines that rehabilitative goal. And that distinction there between whether you have a permissive criminal justice response or a rehabilitative criminal justice response is really where I think the public policy focus should be, and not on what I view as kind of a straw man, which is this distinction between a rehabilitative criminal justice response and a punitive. Because in the policy makers that I speak with, including Commission Morrison, that is not the focus there, the intuition, not the goals. It's really to make sure that when we talk about rehabilitation, we're actually getting that rehabilitation and we're not undermining it through taking a permissive

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: approach.

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: That's really helpful. I think one other question that I had is when we look at bios, and again, I think the burden shifting is a really critical component in all of this, and know that we'll be taking more tests on that and delving into it further. When anecdotally, and I don't know if you have specific data about this, but when you look at youthful offenders that want to reengage or engage in the program, you get the sense that a majority of them want to be part of this? How are they reacting in the program? Has it been successful in your view thus far?

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: I think it's successful for some. DCF has that window into the probation supervision in a way that law enforcement doesn't. So I don't get that direct view as much. I do think that for those who don't want to voluntarily engage, it can be quite problematic. My broader point is some of the procedural provisions themselves seem to disincentivize participation, meaningful engagement. And it's a hard age. I mean, this is not easy, I think, for anyone when you're dealing with teenagers of any age. It's hard to begin with. You do have sometimes folks who come in who do not have social supports. They have a high degree of oppositional defiance. And that's a tricky situation for everyone. I think the courts, the prosecutor, DCF. It's not an easy for that cohort of cases. And my last one, and

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: I'm just curious if you have thoughts on this is page two of six forty two, line 20, the youth's residential housing status. And again, I don't know if this would be for you or if it would be for a fellow witness, But I'm curious about you know, and this kinda goes to what you're talking about is that supportive nature within the home. And, you know, there are many different variations of definition of family and what a a nuclear family looks like, what a support structure looks like in the home. But if the individual is unhoused, how does that play into this? And again, I don't know if that's I I assume there's some of that in Rutland County, which is where where I represent, but maybe there's more of it in Chittenden County in Burlington. So I'm curious if you just maybe tease out what how that could impact the success of a youthful offender in the procuring.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: The distinction I would draw is that when you have older youth who are over 18, at that point, they don't have to legally be in school anymore. That's come and gone a while ago. They don't legally need to be in their parents' home anymore, and often they aren't. And so it's a different dynamic for DCF. Apologize, DCF. I don't mean to speak for them, but I think it presents a different dynamic for supervision generally when they don't have that obligation to be in school during the day. They don't have a legal guardian who is responsible for them at night. And so I think the burden on the state ultimately is higher for the older youth because they don't have any of those constructs that they can really impose. I mean, for a 15 year old, I've had the barge in diversion where they'll say, I'll pick you up and bring it to school tomorrow because you got to be there. I'm going to be there at 07:45, and legally they're obligated to get to that school anyway. So you have that greater level of engagement. So housing is a piece of it, but I think it's that broader network of supports. And to be clear, YO is up to age 22. So 18 to 22, you have this four year period where people can be in a pretty precarious situation. And all we have is this wire structure to say we really need you to meaningfully engage.

[Rep. Zachary Harvey (Member)]: So do you think there needs to be different stipulations for that bracket of eighteen twenty two to qualify for the UFO federal protections, Or you wouldn't go you wouldn't wanna go so far as to advocate for that here?

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Well, we have we have that to a degree. Yeah.

[Tucker Jones, Department of Public Safety]: We there's so many kinda carve outs. Right? I just I think the key takeaways to keep in mind with YO that we don't necessarily have all of those social supports that are going to result in the positive outcome. So you do have to have the meaningful guardrails to say, hey, look, this is an opportunity. You can lose the opportunity. In certain circumstances, this isn't a joke. Great.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Thank you, Tucker. And we'll go to Matt Valerio. Be our last witness on this today. And the folks I didn't get to, and I apologize, we'll scheduling more time on Friday afternoon. And you will hear from Nate. But Matt, if you could join us. Thank you for being here. What time are you? I think people will leave around quarter after.

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: Oh, we'll see.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Yes, and if we need to have you testify further on this, we'll find another time as well. I'm sure that there'll be another version that you'll need to wait in on, so.

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: About Valerio, defender general. I guess, fundamentally, before we get into anything, Just give you

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: the

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: overarching opinion of this bill from my department is that nobody likes it. They don't like any of it. And it I think part of this starts with why. You know? You hear about anecdotes. You hear about lack of data. I have a review that was done by the crime research group, the people who come in here, Rutland, routinely. They did a review of the youthful offender statute and the number of people who were in it. They produced a spreadsheet that did a snapshot. Over a two year period, there were 98 unique individuals who had a finding of youthful offender in family court. Nineteen of those youths over the that two year period earned a subsequent criminal conviction in adult court for offense after the finding of youthful offender. Ten of those committed were in the first year, 16 within two years. The one year recidivism rate was ten percent. Two year res recidivism rate, easy for me to say, was sixteen percent. You know what the recidivism rate is like in a court? It's almost sixty percent. Right? The bottom line is the youthful offender system, as it currently exists, at least during this snapshot, now this could easily be updated, is 40% lower than an adult court. Now if What's the date on that? This was September '25. Okay. September 16.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: You

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: want? There's a spreadsheet that attaches, but I didn't wanna print all of that out. Some of the concerns you hear about this is the people in youthful offender aren't doing what we want them to do. If the concern is that youth don't always do what we want them to do, alright. If the concern is we don't want you committing new crimes after you're a youthful offender, well, the youthful offender is being successful overall. This is under the new program. Now you might have particular recalcitrant individuals who are gonna annoy the hell out of local law enforcement because they run into them every day, and they find out that they're on youthful offender. And that gives rise to why why isn't youthful offender working? When you look at it as a whole, youthful offender is working. Right? But as a practical matter, when we drive things by anecdote and by a lack of, you know, lack of, I think, realistic expectations because I don't, personally, I don't have a lot of faith that, you know, anybody who's a youth is gonna do what I want them to do. But I'd be satisfied if they just don't commit any crimes. And and that's what we're trying to do here. Now what does some of these other words that we use about, you know, rehabilitation and accountability and however we define those things, to me, if somebody can go through their life and not be charged with crimes, that's a good thing. I always said that there were a couple of things that I wanted all my four kids to do is to not get arrested before they were 21 years old, graduate from high school, and then I had a third unrealistic expectation that they all graduate from college within four years and not cost me extra money. Luckily, they they did all of those things and even the unrealistic one. Bottom line was, it's not easy, actually, to go through your youthful years without having some sort of indiscretion and and get caught, and they luckily did not. Oh, crap. I have to grab my glasses because I can't read this stuff if I don't.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Sorry about that. I got a note there.

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: Much better. I wanna speak generally about the provisions of section one, section two of the bill and some of the overall concerns that we have. In general, section one kinda gets at the point of you can only get youthful offender effectively if you admit that you're guilty. Youthful offender status is not it's different than other statuses. It's not like diversion. It's not an alternative justice program. It tends to be for high risk, high need youth facing criminal charges in adult court. It provides a way for them to access juvenile resources through the supervision of DCF, but it doesn't eliminate the risk of criminal punishment. This is as the the law exists now. They are still facing the possibility of sentencing for an adult charge if they admit or ultimately are found guilty. The immunization, which is what we're really talking about of that that provision in section one, is something obviously that, you know, is a trigger for for defense counsel. Like, why would you ever have

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: your

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: client do that? The the key is that if they are amenable to the program, it doesn't matter if they admit to specific acts.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: So

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: if you are requiring that they admit before ever allowing them to go to youthful offender status, it means that a lot of the kids who most deserve a chance in a juvenile setting, those and some of those may not be guilty at all, will admit to something they didn't do so they could get access to youthful offender status. And as written, the bill proposes to make things easier for the kids who are the most culpable because they'll just accept and disadvantage to the kids who are least culpable because they'll admit even though they didn't do it or they didn't do exactly what was charged. Part of part of the overarching thing in this bill is there's an assumption that everybody who's accused of something is guilty of what they're accused of, which couldn't be further from the truth. Another way of looking at this in section one is it's based on the assumption and and again, I just kind of said this is that that whenever there is an allegation of a violation of the conditions or if there is an allegation of a crime, that they're automatically guilty of whatever it is they were alleged to do. Saying basic the way this is written, it's basically saying that if you can't have youthful offender status if you don't admit to something no matter what you're no matter what's alleged. Historically, youthful the youthful offender system that was discussed by Tucker earlier is it wasn't used during that ten year period that was being discussed. It was basically, on average, our stats show that it was used between fourteen and thirty times a year and only in a few counties. And primarily, it was used in Bennington because senator Sears was a big proponent of a youthful offender, and he was kinda on on the blood of the state's attorney down there to say, you know, could we get some people in the youthful offender? The change that eliminated the conditional plea concept made it so that people were willing to actually use the system, and it eliminated the requirement of an admission of guilt. If you go back to the old way and right now, we have hundreds of people who access over a period of time youthful youthful offender. My guess is we're gonna go back to a couple of dozen people a year accessing the the system. Much of what's in the bill is already considered by courts in making determinations about whether you're you're good for a youthful offender, whether you're not good for a youthful offender, whether you violated a condition. Because every single person who is on youthful offender status is has conditions of probation, not to commit any new offenses, not to commit any violent offenses. And if a violation is brought, violent or not, the judge can can and almost always will, particularly in the case of a violent offense, revoke the probation. Our experience is that they haven't seen many cases where someone gets to stay on youthful pro youthful offender probation in the face of a violation for committing a new serious offense and certainly not a violent offense. The provision, says that the court can revoke probation or commission of a violent offense as it currently sits. And they already can, and they do. But only if the but only if the kid can prove that public safety can be protected. That's the change. It's shifting the burden. So, currently, if a judge decides to revoke for commission of a new violent offense, which they almost always do, the kid has no recourse, and that is judicial discretion. This the provision as proposed would limit the discretion where there's not a problem. And if there are particular instances where it is not revoked, it's extraordinarily rare and and there's a reason for it. I think this seeks to fix something that's not broken. And so I I don't really know where it's coming from. Right? Because I don't think the people on the ground are seeing that as being the issue. The there's another part in section two. Somehow attendance has become, like, a big issue, but it targets the wrong people. So the portion in section two that says that if a youth fails to attend a hearing, their status shall be revoked. Youth fail to attend hearings more often because they don't have adults who they can rely on in their life to make sure that they get there. You wanna in in a situation where you have a 16 year old kid who's struggling to make it through the youthful offender status, and avoid, jail, but they end up they, you know, they have a parent who is has their own issues. You know? Maybe they're drug addicted. Maybe they have mental illness issues, but they aren't gonna be there to give them a ride to court. That's what happens oftentimes when kids miss hearings. They're relying on people around them, and those people are not the kind of people you can rely on to assist you. This is a situation where, effectively, we are kind of punishing the kids who are in the worst situations and rewarding the kids who have the most resources and supports. Weirdly, this wouldn't affect some of the more serious offenders, people who are a youthful offender for the most but still have the most serious charges. Those youth have who have the most serious charges tend to be in DCF custody. And those kids are never responsible for getting themselves to the court. DCF is in charge of getting them to the court. And oftentimes, DCF is not able to do that. They can't arrange transport, so the kids miss hearings when they're in custody. And as written, that could be held against them. So this provision targets kids who are not such serious offenders that they're in DCF custody, but who are trying to manage the youthful offender probation while living with people who might not be reliable or, with the supports that you need to help them get to court. And at the same time, the kids who are the more serious youthful offenders who are in DCF custody don't have that same responsibility. It's kind of a lot. I'm very supportive of victims and I'm talking about section three now. I'm very supportive of victims having as much knowledge about what goes on in a in a legal proceeding that involves something that had involved them as possible. There are times, however, when the elements that are considered by the court to make decisions cannot be commented on relevantly by victims. Making a decision, let's assume in a I mean, you have someone going into a youthful offender hearing, having a victim impact statement before they're ever adjudicated doesn't seem to make any sense to It makes sense when it comes to the disposition side, but whether somebody's amenable to youthful youthful offender yeah.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Okay. We do.

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: Drew, would you mind if I interrupt you? Yes. Sure.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: Are you sure?

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: I I just wanted to clarify, because trying to follow all the youthful offender, where things are at and which part we're talking about. So are you talking about the determination that the court's making in this bill that's on page two determining whether public safety will be protected by treating the youth as a youthful offender? Plaintiff witness. I understand the section you're talking about is section three as far as when, who's being heard. But is the process in which they're being heard in is that the determining the public safety will be protected by treating the youth as

[Eric Fitzpatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: a youthful

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: vendor? Right. Isn't isn't that part of what the the screening tool is doing? Like, that's a professional determination by DCF. I don't I don't know how a question. We need a lot of that going.

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: Yes.

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: That seems to me to be a professional determination about risk that is part of what the d DCF doesn't screen. You know, I would not expect that most victims would feel great about, you know, the fact that that maybe even the case is being considered for a youthful offender. I don't know. I mean, not everybody's that way. You've got there's all kinds of people, and I can't universalize. But whether a particular individual is amenable to youthful offenders seems to me to be a professional determination from a, you know, a risk, needs, and psychological standpoint as opposed to something that a victim would be competent to testify about. Like, that evidence is not relevant. Like, what they could provide is not necessarily relevant. It would make them feel better, perhaps, but I don't know that it'd be relevant to what the court has to find when making a determination as to whether somebody is amenable to youthful offender treatment. And this is and you you gotta remember, depending on how this all turns out, this could be before there's any any determination that anybody's guilty of any. Think the whole concept, and I know what Nick Sears was trying to get at with this, is it's not particularly relevant what the specifics of any particular event are that brings this person to the justice system. They may have committed a a criminal delinquent act. They may not have. It may not be exactly what was alleged. But if we identify the people who are in need of intervention, we can help them and then make sure that or try to make sure that they don't commit new crimes going forward. And if we can keep them out of the justice system when they're young, then we won't have to deal with them when they're old. That's what the point was. And so to me, I am I agree with that vision, and I'm trying to make sure that that is preserved. What I see the bill doing is unraveling what good came out of ultimately getting us to the point of the youthful offender statute and process that we see now, and really going back to the old way of doing things, which people just did not take advantage of because it wasn't in the interest of their clients to do it. So now I haven't had the chance to take a look at the other bill. I know it's, like, 60 pages or something. So I was looking at what what we had here and trying to balance that with 10 other things. But happy to come back and talk about whatever that says. It's I do there's a lot in it. That's all. Karen Dolan.

[Rep. Karen Dolan (Member)]: Yes. So on this piece of involving the victim, I appreciate you pointing out how very different when it's a point of disposition, like, after that's already been established versus at this point, it hasn't even turned the person did anything or that this is the victim of what actually happened. None of that is and they're not questioned at all. So they're able to just put something out as fact that can then influence the fate of the other person. Is this correct in how I'm

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: saying And and, like, honestly, if it ends up coming down to a, ultimately, a hearing, a trial on whether or not this occurred by court, the victim can say whatever they wanna say at in and that might not be even competent evidence, but now that evidence is before the judge, before we ever get to the point of having to come back and make a determination about whether or not something ever happened, if it's a violation. So it sort of pollutes the process. And, you know, I like I said, I I, you know, have some empathy for what the victims go through in these cases. And over the years, and I think I've told you folks this before, I've represented victims in civil cases against this is before way before I became a defendant attorney, but against, you know, perpetrators of all kinds of crimes. And, you know, there's a frustration because they don't know what's going on. Like, that's that's the biggest as far as I can tell, they don't know what's going on. Some don't wanna tell the story. Some wanna tell the story as many times as they can tell it, and disposition is not enough, and they wanna tell it at the wild determination stage. It's it's what drives any particular individual is I'm not exactly sure, but I don't discount it. What I'm trying to do is to keep the process so that the elements that have to be proved for youthful offender to make the determination of whether they qualify, those seem to be, to me, separate apart from what relevant evidence a victim could provide at that stage. And, again, I don't have any problem with them getting full information about what was going on at that stage, but I don't think it's the place for them to testify. I don't I don't think it'd be you know, if you were having that contested hearing, there's not a real an element that is relevant that they would testify.

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: One clarifying question. You said you don't wanna see it go back to the old way, which would defeat the spirit of what Yeah, the traditional It's a conditional plate. That's the old way. And so your position is like, yeah, the current proposal That's why people didn't use it. Yeah, because they basically we're never yeah. Do you think that if you added in the kind of language that Ian suggested that that would be enough to safeguard it?

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: You mean immunizing the emission?

[Rep. Thomas Oliver (Member)]: Yeah. And you talked about this already.

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: Yeah. Don't don't think so. I mean, that would solve that problem if this went forward. But if you created a condition a system that requires a conditional plea, then you're not going to see people use it. So

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: one draft form of nine swiped, and there'll probably be more or a different date. But this concept or concern that, in part is driving this is individuals finding out and not having the ability of not having done the programming, is there a way to address that?

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: Is it I mean, if that's the question you wanna answer, I guess, you know, the that's something to look at. To me I mean, I come back to that original question. Are we concerned about people doing what we tell them to do, or are we concerned about people committing new crimes? If they're not committing new crimes as a result of whatever participation they have in this and then they age out, do we really care? As opposed to, are they just not doing everything we tell them

[Kim McManus, Department of State’s Attorneys and Sheriffs]: to do?

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: And I kind of opt for the thing about, you know, I don't believe that most people would find it easy to comply with even, like, conditions of release. Even law abiding people have difficulty doing that. But, you know, conditions of mutual offender probation do tend to be tend pretty detailed, they require some work. And it doesn't surprise me that not everybody complies. But if the data is showing us that they aren't committing new crimes, then I think we should see.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: But if there's a situation where, there's been cause to revoke the, in full offender status and the person's just ducking the, hearing, then they would have to be there.

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: You mean cause? You mean allegations? Or has there been a new conviction?

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: There's been probation violation. Could be a new charge. Could

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: be but there's a ratification here. Approved probation violation as opposed to an alleged probation violation.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: So do do they have to have the youthful offender in court to have the case

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: approved violation? Yeah, you're done.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Yeah, I mean, there be an arrest warrant of some sort get All the uni offend to right, well there's some things to look at. We'll have another draft and seek your input. There's always one thing you

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: can be sure of. There's always another draft.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: There's not many things in life we can be sure of, but there will be another draft.

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: I was in house corrections and institutions before I came here, and they had posted the thing that they wanted us to talk about online. They posted it online. I pull it out. I read it. I'm getting ready to do it. And then we're sitting there. I asked him, like, oh, we have another draft. What?

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: Won't try not to be bad.

[Rep. Thomas Burditt (Vice Chair)]: I have done that before.

[Matt Valerio, Defender General]: Yeah. Know. Not bad.

[Chair Martin LaLonde]: But we're adjourned until tomorrow at 09:00. We'll go offline.