California

http://www.contracostatimes.com/california/ci_13396658?nclick_check=1

Excerpt:

Judge Marsha Slough relayed that message to community members, law enforcement officials and educators in attendance at West End chapter of the Gangs and Drugs Task Force's quarterly meeting on Monday at Chaffey High School.

And while the courts can only do so much, Slough said parents and the community need to intervene.

Excerpt: As an attorney with more than three decades in his profession including 21 years with the Tulare County Counsel's Office Bob Felts knows the court system well.

Now 79 and mostly retired, Felts is part of a renewed local effort to find nonpunitive solutions for cases involving young offenders.

The outside-the-courtroom initiative is being launched by the Sequoia Community Mediation Center, a six-year-old program that focuses on resolving conflict through negotiated solutions. It's an offshoot of the Samaritan Center in Visalia.

In this video, a parent describes her experience with the Santa Clara Juvenile Mental Health Court CITA (Court for the Individualized Treatment of Adolescents).

http://video.asterpix.com/v/335395441/juvenile-mental-health-court-paren...

Excerpt: [In addition to several other changes] the court has completed the first year of its new family violence court, an effort to reduce recidivism and bring broken families back together. Of 23 defendants so far, none has committed a new act of domestic violence, the court said.

"The fact that not one of these high-risk defendants has re-offended in the past year is truly a remarkable achievement," said Judge Verna Adams, the county's presiding judge and chief architect of the family violence court.

More: http://www.marinij.com/marinnews/ci_12336342