L.N, age 17, “I’m tough no matter what.”
L.N, age 17, at Oak Creek Youth Correctional Facility. All images by Richard Ross for Juvenile-in-Justice.
“I’m from Salem. They had me in a take down a week or two ago. I got in a fight with a girl so they split us up and I spit on one of them, Mike…Nobody visits me. I’ve been here 3 months. My mom’s in Salem. She does a lot of meth. My dad lives in Arizona and works for Babies ‘R Us. My mom’s white, my dad’s black. The first time I was here I was here for 3 months. I was in juvi for 3 weeks after being on the street. My mom started doing meth when her dad died, she’s on probation, but my dad is clean… I have six sisters, one stepsister, two stepbrothers, one real brother.
“I’m here for disorderly conduct, false information– giving a fake name to a cop-– I gave him my cousins’ name. I was in a car where the driver was driving crappy. We were driving in snow and he couldn’t see the white lines… Yeah, he was on meth. I’ve been using since I was 15, but I wasn’t in any drug program on the outside. My dad moved out of the house and I ran away from my step-dad and my mom to some friends’ houses. They were my age, like 15, 16, 17, all drug dealers. They gave me a place to stay and all the meth and weed I wanted. I didn’t go to school and I was on probation so I had a bad UA [urine analysis].
Dormitory at Oak Creek.
“When they took me down I got tackled because I wasn’t looking at the wall when I was supposed to be looking at the wall. They, CS (campus security), pick you up and put you in handcuffs. I was in Birch [isolation] for 5 days. I was released 2 days ago. They only let you out to shower. I got to have a book there. I read Twilight. The girls in there were talking crap. I’m here, and I can go to the AA program and the NA program. Before this I was smoking meth everyday…
“I’m tough no matter what. If I wasn’t, these girls would walk all over me. I’m gang-affiliated, but I don’t bang, I rep and I claim, I’m all 4s. I’m all red. I have ADHD, I have a boyfriend, I have girlfriends. I’m a very hungry perso, I love to eat… I don’t like the rain or the clouds. The rain makes me sad… or hungry. I’m scared to die and I like the color purple.”
-L.N, age 17, Oak Creek Youth Correctional Facility, Albany, Oregon.
Read all the posts from Oak Creek HERE.
Katy McCarthy
Katy McCarthy is the blog and media director at www.juvenile-in-justice.com, where she has learned and worked for four years. She has a Bachelors degree from University of California, Santa Barbara but exists in a state of perpetual re-education, devouring reports from the Justice Policy Institute, the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the Crime Report, the Campaign for Youth Justice and many others dedicated in the fight for system reform. On the weekends she is a sculptor and performance artist.
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