Abuses detailed at center for youth
Good morning!
Welcome to Your Week, our exclusive newsletter where each Sunday we feature our best coverage and highlight what we have coming up during the week ahead.
I'm Duane Gang, the government and investigations editor.
The details were disturbing. Staff at the Wilder Youth Development Center in West Tennessee assaulting teens; youth isolated for up to 23 hours a day.
Then there was this:
"The bounties were packets of Ramen noodles," Tennessean investigative reporter Josh Keefe writes this week. "Collecting them required violence."
A new watchdog report by two independent groups details a series of failings at Tennessee's only state-run youth development center. The facility, operated by the Department of Children's Services, houses youth who have been found guilty of serious crimes.
But under state law, the center is mandated to provide services and the skills and treatment needed for the youth to succeed in society upon their release.
The new report, by Disability Rights Tennessee and the Youth Law Center, found multiple violations of state and federal law.
A Department of Children's Services spokesperson said the agency is reviewing the report but some corrective action has already been taken. The spokesperson declined to provide specifics and said DCS disputes some of the report's findings.
This is an important story. DCS serves some of our state's most vulnerable children and has regularly faced questions about how well it is living up to its mission.
Read Josh's story about the Wilder Youth Development Center here, and be sure to check out this this piece on the center and its role in the state.
Josh is new to The Tennessean but already is making an impact. He will continue to follow and report on these DCS issues — and many others. He joined us in early April from Maine, where for the past three years he was an investigative reporter at the Bangor Daily News.
While there, Josh reported on sexual misconduct in the Maine National Guard and worked to expose how one of the largest private real estate lenders in Maine collapsed.
Last year, Josh received the national Sidney Award from the Sidney Hillman Foundation and the 2021 Michael Donoghue Freedom of Information Award from the New England First Amendment Coalition for a series on misconduct in Maine sheriff’s offices.
We are lucky to have him as part of our newsroom now. If you have a tip for Josh, contact him via email at jkeefe@tennessean.com or call or text 207-356-7660. You can also DM him on Twitter at @thejoshkeefe.
Your subscription gives you access to exclusive stories like these and is why we are able to have reporters here like Josh. Subscriptions are how you can support the work of our journalists and our mission of shining a spotlight on the good in our community, telling stories that matter to you and holding those in power to account.
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— Duane W. Gang, The Tennessean
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Abuses detailed at center for youth
