Sometime before April 1985, juveniles confined in the Juvenile Detention Unit filed a class action lawsuit in the Washington County Superior Court, State of Vermont, against the director of the Juvenile Detention Unit and the Commissioner of Social and Rehabilitative Services. The class consisted of all juveniles in the custody of the state that were or would be confined in the Juvenile Detention Unit. The plaintiffs sought injunctive relief. Juveniles in Vermont were being placed in the Juvenile Detention Unit without any court proceedings to determine the appropriateness of the confinement.

On April 19, 1985, the Washington County Superior Court entered a Stipulation Of Facts, to which the parties had agreed. The Stipulation Of Facts included profiles of the named plaintiffs, a description of the policies and conditions at the Juvenile Detention Unit, and a description of the administrative procedures for placing a juvenile at the Juvenile Detention Unit.

On May 3, 1985, the Washington County Superior Court (Judge Alan W. Cheever) granted the plaintiffs a permanent injunction. The defendants were permanently enjoined from confining juveniles at the Juvenile Detention Unit without a court order or procedural safeguards. The court found that minimum due process safeguards were necessary, because confinement in the Juvenile Detention Unit deprived the juveniles of liberty. The defendants' practice and policy of confining juveniles without judicial review violated the due process guarantee of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Vermont State Constitution, and the Vermont Juvenile Law, 33 V.S.A. § 657.

The only documents we have regarding this case are the Stipulation of Facts and the court order.

Kaitlin Corkran - 05/24/2006


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