Group home editorial deceptive

The recent Deseret Morning News editorial (July 31, Page A10) on the proposed group home in Holladay was misleading and deceptive. It spoke of lofty goals, rehabilitating criminals, improving felons' life skills and helping dangerous sexual predators safely re-enter society.

The editorial suggested that these goals are easily obtainable and implied that if only the selfish people of Holladay would welcome these violent felons into their neighborhood the felons would miraculously become productive members of society.

The editorial failed to mention that the average youth in a residential treatment center in Utah has 9.6 previous offenses (for which they were caught). If rehabilitation is so simple, why has the state failed to rehabilitate these criminals after their other nine crimes, and why should we think that their next crime would not be perpetrated on one of our innocent children or elderly neighbors?

The editorial claimed that the scope of the proposal has been narrowed to exclude sex offenders. However, this is misleading. Blake Chard, the director of Juvenile Justice, said he would exclude adjudicated sex offenders, clearly implying that non-adjudicated sex offenders would be allowed. When asked to guarantee that there would not be sex offenders in the home, Chard cavalierly replied, "There are no guarantees in life."

The editorial failed to mention that there is little data to show that rehabilitation is successful, particularly with low-functioning sex offenders, such as would be in the proposed home.

The Deseret Morning News claims Jerry Jeffries has a "solid track record" of operating group homes. However, neighbors of one of Jeffries' other group homes tell of disorderly conduct, violence on a weekly basis and complete deterioration in the quality of their life since Jeffries' home opened. These neighbors tried to contact Jeffries 15-20 times by phone, but he would not return their calls. A home that Jeffries runs in the Ogden area (that has a similar population to the home he proposes in Holladay) is averaging one AWOL per month! Remember, these are criminals who would be in prison if they were a year or two older, yet once a month Jeffries loses track of them. This same home has had 24 "reported police events," ranging from runaways, to assault, to allegations of physical or sexual abuse. Is this a solid track record?