One week after ordering all Clark County, Nv., juvenile offenders removed from a state facility amid allegations of hogtying, a Las Vegas Family Court judge said he wants to tour another youth center as well, reports, the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Judge William Voy said he is concerned that staff at the Caliente center, about two hours north of Las Vegas, used “mechanical restraints” on juvenile offenders held in isolation.
“If a parent did that, it would be child abuse — probably charged criminally,” Voy said. Bruce Burgess, the superintendent at the Caliente Youth Center, told the judge that uncontrollable juveniles have been restrained with handcuffs and leg shackles while in cells. “When you treat a kid like an animal, you're going to get an animal,” Voy said. “There's other ways of dealing with it, without resorting to something that would otherwise be child abuse if it wasn't in an institution.” Last week, after receiving reports that staff had hogtied juveniles at the Nevada Youth Training Center in Elko, Voy ordered 12 offenders returned to his jurisdiction.