Central Juvenile Hall (also known as Eastlake Juvenile Hall or Central) is a youth detention center in

Los Angeles County Los Angeles County, officially the County of Los Angeles, and sometimes abbreviated as L.A. County, is the most populous county in the United States and in the U.S. state of California, with 9,861,224 residents estimated as of 2022. It is the ...

. Central houses both boys and girls. The Central Juvenile Hall complex was originally established in 1912 as the first juvenile detention facility in

. The hall sits on twenty-two and one-half acres of land in Lincoln Heights, Los Angeles. The facility has 24 buildings including living units, two infirmaries, two school buildings, two gyms, kitchen facilities, a chapel, and mechanical areas.

Conditions

In 2014, the Los Angeles County Grand Jury criticized the conditions of the hall, and proposed that it be torn down. Into 2016, juvenile justice reform advocates pushed a proposal that would split the Los Angeles County Probation Department in two parts, one for overseeing juveniles and one for adults. One former Central ward wrote about his experience in solitary confinement in 1962. Into the 2000s, former inmates recalled being placed in solitary confinement at Central.

Programs

In 1997, Sister Janet Harris, then Catholic Chaplain at Central, cofounded

InsideOUT Writers InsideOUT Writers (IOW) is a Los Angeles-based non-profit organization that conducts weekly writing classes inside Los Angeles County juvenile halls and jails. IOW also serves as a support network for formerly incarcerated young people. The progr ...

(IOW). The organization uses creative writing to encourage personal growth and transformation within the California juvenile justice system and still teaches writing workshops inside Central. Mark Salzman taught for IOW at Central, and wrote a book about his experience. In 2011, IOW teamed with the

Los Angeles Opera The Los Angeles Opera is an American opera company in Los Angeles, California. It is the fourth-largest opera company in the United States. The company's home base is the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, part of the Los Angeles Music Center. Leadersh ...

to perform stories written by incarcerated youths at Central. In 2012, rap artist

RZA Robert Fitzgerald Diggs (born July 5, 1969), better known by his stage name the RZA ( ), is an American rapper, actor, filmmaker, and record producer. He is the ''de facto'' leader of the hip hop group Wu-Tang Clan, having produced most albums ...

spoke to teen fathers at Central. UpRising Yoga has held yoga classes for boys and girls incarcerated at Central. In 2016, Center for the Empowerment of Families (CEF) Executive Director, Renee Curry, introduced the first Therapeutic Ballet-Mentorship program. The Dance for Healing Project was developed by Renee and Jamie Hammond-Carbetta, Pony Box Theatre's Choreographer. A dance program model the two first created in 2014, it includes all genres of dance for incarcerated girls and boys identified as impacted by trauma experiences. Namely youth previously affected by sex trafficking, domestic violence, neglect & caregiver substance abuse. The program includes coping skills continuance monitoring and mentorship upon release. CEF Mentors Cambreisha Montgomery, Akwi Devine & CEF's Board Member Roz Freeman, are also responsible for the innovation and functionality of this mentorship program. Mentors and the dance instructors are survivors, yet many hold Masters in Public Health, Masters in Counseling Psychology; or Fine Arts degrees in Dance. CEF is 10 year nonprofit provider for therapeutic programming at LA County Probation facilities, and it is also responsible for RZA's visit to Juvenile Hall through its Fatherhood program developed by Dr. Sharon Jacques-Rabb.

Notable juvenile inmates

* Jonah Deocampo, rapper better known as "Bambu"; arrested for robbery at 16 and served 2 years *

Stanley Williams Stanley Tookie Williams III (December 29, 1953 – December 13, 2005) was an American gang member and spree killer who co-founded and led the Crips gang in Los Angeles. He and Raymond Washington formed an alliance in 1971 that established the ...

(1953-2005), Crips gang member and spree killer; did stints in Central

References

External links

Image of youths sleeping on mattresses on the floor at Central Juvenile Hall in Los Angeles, California, 1983.
Los Angeles Times Photographic Archive (Collection 1429). UCLA Library Special Collections,

Charles E. Young Research Library The Charles E. Young Research Library is one of the largest libraries on the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles in Westwood, Los Angeles, California. It initially opened in 1964, and a second phase of construction was completed ...

, University of California, Los Angeles. {{coord, 34.0641, -118.2072, type:landmark_region:US-CA, display=title Juvenile detention centers in the United States Boyle Heights, Los Angeles Crime in Los Angeles Prisons in California Government buildings in Los Angeles Buildings and structures in Los Angeles County, California Schools in Los Angeles County, California Government buildings completed in 1912 1912 establishments in California