Nassau court seeks to give teens a second chance

Nassau Judge Sharon Gianelli looked down from the bench at the two teenage boys who stood before her facing drug charges.

Under a pilot program aimed at helping most 16- and 17-year-olds avoid jail, Gianelli had decided that the frightened-looking boys were at low risk for getting into trouble again and should have their cases dismissed. But not before she gave them a warning.

"I went to the wake recently of a 21-year-old who appeared before me in a drug case," she told the boys as their parents looked on. "He overdosed on the same drugs involved in your case.

"This is a chance for you never to come back into the criminal justice system. I don't want to see you dead."

This month, Nassau became one of nine counties across the state to open a courtroom devoted to hearing the cases of 16- and 17-year-olds, youth who until now have been treated as adults by the state's criminal justice system. The initiative is part of an ongoing effort by the state's chief judge, Jonathan Lippman, to raise the age at which young people are treated as adults in the criminal justice system.

If it is successful, Lippman hopes it will push the State Legislature toward passing a law that will raise to 18 the age at which teens are treated as adults in court.

At present, New York is the only state in the nation to treat nonviolent 16- and 17-year-olds as adults.

"It's progressive, it's meaningful, and it's the right thing to do," said Nassau's chief administrative judge, Anthony Marano.

Nassau District Attorney Kathleen Rice said she lobbied Lippman to put a pilot court in Nassau.

"We're prepared to show the rest of the state that this approach is the best way to rehabilitate young offenders, save taxpayer money, and protect the public," Rice said.

Under the program, 16- and 17-year-olds charged with nonviolent crimes will be screened by case workers from the Nassau Department of Probation, said John Fowle, who heads that department.

If they are found to be at low risk of reoffending, their case will be dismissed, said Christopher Quinn, supervising judge of Nassau's First District Court in Hempstead, which houses the youth court.

If they are found to be at moderate or high risk of reoffending, they are put through a more extensive screening process, and lawyers and the judge search for a solution that will both solve the teen's underlying problems and protect the public, Quinn said.

The point is to divert as many young people as possible from jail and permanent records, and toward services such as anger management, drug treatment and counseling, Quinn said.

The cases are also processed extremely quickly -- those that are dismissed are usually dismissed within 10 days -- in an effort to get kids back on track as fast as possible.

Statistics show that once a young person has had contact with the criminal justice system, 81 percent of girls and 89 percent of boys will be rearrested by the time they're 28, according to the state Division of Criminal Justice Services.

Joseph LoPiccolo, who heads Nassau's Criminal Courts Bar Association and helped plan the adolescent diversion courtroom, said he's already seen it work in a case that his office handled. In that case, three young girls had been arrested on charges of shoplifting. It was clear that they had fallen victim to peer pressure, he said. Their cases were dismissed within a week, LoPiccolo said.

"It has been proven that children don't have or use good judgment while making decisions," said LoPiccolo, of Garden City. "This program will give them the opportunity to have a clean second chance and get out of the criminal justice system as quickly as possible."