Balancing Scales
Presiding Justice David Nahmias of the Georgia Supreme Court sees one issue that brings people together across all the lines that separate and polarize—compassion for children.
As head of the court’s Committee on Justice for Children, Nahmias oversees a panel of experts who deal with children entering the juvenile justice system through one of two routes: some are accused of crimes; others are the victims of abuse or neglect. The two converge in cases of children who act out in response to family violence or neglect.
The goal in all cases is to see that the children exit the system safer and healthier, mentally and emotionally, than when they entered it.
For juvenile criminals, that means avoiding harsh punishment whenever that’s reasonable. The reaction to bad behavior in schools has often been, “if a child is doing something disruptive or dangerous, kick him out,” Nahmias said. “That results in the school-to-prison pipeline. When he’s no longer in school, he ends up on the street committing crimes, and then in prison.”
But, he said, “every kid who goes into a detention center is going to get out someday.” If he’s hardened and bitter because of his experience, he may do worse things after release than he did before being sentenced.
Nahmias cites two innovative programs in Georgia that are attempting to break the cycle—Clayton County’s Second Chance Court and Bibb County’s Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS).
In Clayton County, Juvenile Court Judge Steven Teske initiated Second Chance Court, acting on the theory that dealing with the issues that sent the juvenile to court in the first place is a much likelier route to success than harsh punishment. Results, as reported by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution last year, have been encouraging. The county has reduced the number of juveniles in detention centers by two-thirds, and the recidivism rate is below 20 percent, much lower than the state average.
Presiding Justice David Nahmias of the Georgia Supreme Court says his interest in helping children is reinforced by his parish, Holy Innocents’.
All of Bibb’s schools—and some others across the state—have trained leaders in the PBIS program. The premise, according to the Bibb school district’s website, is that the teaching of and feedback for positive behavior promotes a climate of safety and learning. As in Clayton, Bibb’s statistics show the effectiveness of the program, with discipline rates cut in half, Nahmias said.
Being creative can be more work upfront, he said, but it’s better for all of society in the long run if a child can become a productive member of society.
“I’ve Always had An instinct to help children. My position now gives me the opportunity to do something.”
— Presiding Justice David Nahmias
Because children who go through the juvenile justice system are disproportionately from low-income households, which, in Georgia, means disproportionately children of color, improvements in the system can have a large impact on those communities. Well-to-do youths do end up in the system, Nahmias said, but their families have resources that can often mitigate the effects.
For poorer families, financial help can make a big difference. A change in federal funding in 2018 is helping families in a way that makes them more likely to be able to take care of their children, keeping them out of the foster care system and, possibly, out of the criminal side
of the courts. The Family First Prevention Services Act provides resources to help families in crisis before children are removed from their homes.
Under past policy, money was directed toward getting children out of foster care once they had been placed there, Nahmias said. “Family First pushes money toward prevention.”
Studies show that children may suffer lifelong trauma from being removed from the home and put into the custody of the Division of Family and Children Services even for a day or two, he said. Keeping children with their parents isn’t always advisable, but when it is, it’s usually the best scenario.
In most situations, people realize that prevention is the best approach, he said. “Look at COVID. We can continue to deal with COVID and treat people who have it, but the goal is to find a vaccine to prevent it.”
Speaking of the pandemic, he said, the courts and child welfare system had to adapt to using remote technology for much of their business. “The core of the system is interaction with parents and children,” he said. “There are pretty dramatic adaptations the entire system has made in the middle of the COVID epidemic.”
Long before COVID-19, state agencies were developing computer software that allows staff in various parts of the system to share information, providing a more informed and holistic approach for dealing with cases. The program has been so successful that it has become a model for other states, Nahmias said.
Besides his role on the Supreme Court’s Committee on Justice for Children, Nahmias is a member of the board of Georgia Appleseed Center for Law and Justice, a nonprofit organization focused on children in poverty, children with disabilities, and children who experience institutional bias and racism.
He said his interest in children’s issues comes from his parents and is reinforced by his parish. He is the son of immigrants from Egypt and Germany. His father was a pediatrician, and his parish, Holy Innocents’, “was kind of founded on the idea that children can be sacrificed and we need to protect them.”
Nahmias, whose wife, Catherine O’Neil, died in 2017, is raising two teenage sons.
“I’ve always had an instinct to help children,” he said. “My position now gives me the opportunity to do something.”
The Supreme Court’s Committee on Justice for Children is a thirty-member panel that includes juvenile court judges, defense attorneys, state legislators, education specialists, the commissioner of juvenile justice, the director of the Division of Family and Children Services, the state attorney general, and Bishop Robert Wright. In existence since 1995, it administers the Court Improvement Project, a federally funded effort to improve juvenile dependency cases. Beginning in 2017, Georgia expanded the scope of the committee’s word to include improvement in delinquency cases.
