In the fourth quarter of 2024, Los Angeles County had the highest average daily population of incarcerated youth in California, with 508 juveniles as of July 2025. They are held in facilities like Juvenile Hall for pending court dates. pending placement after adjudication, instead of state facilities, which closed in June 2023 due to state-level reforms. Similar to counterparts in Los Angeles County adult facilities, LA County incarcerated youth also face abuse from jail staff.

In addition to abuse and humiliation at the hands of jail staff, the Education Justice Coalition Los Angeles, a consortium of youth advocacy and civil rights groups, released a report that examines the historical failures of Los Angeles County’s juvenile detention system and the current conditions that young people incarcerated face when it comes to education of incarcerated juveniles in LA County custody. 

Who Has the Power? Chronicling Los Angeles County’s Systemic Failures to Educate Incarcerated Youth outlines decades-long, systemic dysfunction and lack of accountability by the L.A. County Board of Supervisors and its agencies in their approach to juvenile detention that have led to current conditions.

In March, California Attorney General Rob Bonta filed criminal charges against 30 current and former officers accused of orchestrating and enabling “gladiator-style” fights between detained youths at Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall in Los Angeles County, casting a spotlight on what officials described as a deeply broken juvenile justice system. The charges, which included child endangerment, assault, and conspiracy, stem from a monthslong investigation into claims that staff forced minors to fight as a form of punishment or entertainment. In some instances, officers allegedly placed bets on the outcomes or watched without intervening. 

Dovontray Farmer was one of those victims. Farmer was only 13 years old when he was first put on probation and spent most of his childhood in house arrest. He emphasized that anyone at Los Padrinos unaffiliated with a gang, also known as “non-affiliates,” were especially vulnerable. 

“Every Thursday, the non-affiliates would go and line up, and then you gotta fight each other,” Farmer told a reporter for Prism. “If you don’t want to fight each other, you’re going to have to fight a gang member. If you don’t want to do that, you get jumped.” According to Farmer, the officers on site rewarded the boys for “winning” fights, especially against those whom certain probation officers did not like. 

While the 30 indicted officers have been placed on leave without pay, advocates contend that the situation at Los Padrinos reflects larger structural issues in juvenile detention. The LA County Probation Oversight Commission (POC) has joined a growing chorus of advocates and community groups raising alarm about ongoing youth detention practices, calling the conditions inside Los Padrinos unsafe and deeply unjust.

The stories of abuse and reports of sub-standard educational practices come as the county is ordered to depopulate Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall, weeks after California attorney general Bonta filed a motion for receivership, which forces the county to relinquish control over the juvenile detention facilities. This move comes in response to growing concerns of overall conditions at juvenile facilities across the county. 

“We didn’t learn. The teachers wouldn’t do anything,” a youth leader who was incarcerated at Los Padrinos in 2024 shared his experience, as cited in the report. “The teachers would hand us a packet that we do over and over and over. I get that we have a variety of age groups in one unit, but I was already in high school. It’s not fair to be learning about vowels and nouns like we’re dumb.”

“Young people have been telling us what they need, and the county needs to start showing up for them,” said Elida Ledesma, executive director of the Arts for Healing Justice Network, a member organization of the EJC. “Our report provides the county a blueprint of systemic solutions to address its systemic failures. It’s time for us to hold our county leaders accountable.”

You can read the full report here —>>> Chronicling Los Angeles County’s Systemic Failures
to Educate Incarcerated Youth