DEATH, ABUSE AT S.DAKOTA BOOT CAMP PROMPT SCRUTINY

PLANKINTON, S.D. (Reuters) -- A 14-year-old girl's death at a South Dakota
boot camp for juvenile offenders has sparked an FBI probe and fueled a
national debate over whether harsh, military-style camps are the right way
to rehabilitate troubled teens.

The FBI said on Wednesday it had launched an investigation into the
treatment of juvenile inmates assigned to the state-run South Dakota State
Training School, which operates a girls' boot camp. Gina Score died at the
boot camp in Plankinton on July 21 during a forced long-distance run just
two days after entering the program as a convicted shoplifter.

Since Score's death, state investigators and parents of inmates at the boot
camp have alleged that other girls were injured by being shackled,
handcuffed and dragged on endurance runs until blood soaked their shoes.

FBI supervisory special agent David Heller said the agency, in conjunction
with the U.S. Justice Department's civil rights division, was looking into
possible violations of U.S. civil rights laws committed by law enforcement
employees.

Across the United States, there are more than 50 juvenile boot camps
housing about 4,500 juveniles as part of state correctional programs,
according to the Center for Juvenile and Criminal Justice, a San
Francisco-based think tank. The programs are aimed at reforming youthful
offenders by means of rigorous physical training and strict discipline.

``When you create a system where you bully kids, there's a risk of it
turning into abuse,'' said Larry Brendtro, president of Reclaiming Youth
International, a group that questions the boot-camp concept.

Critics argue that the harsh treatment meted out at boot camps can cause
injuries to inmates and subjects children with budding criminal tendencies
to physical and emotional abuse that can push them toward rather than away
from violent acts.

``The danger in this is that you create notions that if you subject kids to
brutalizing physical exercise, you change them,'' said Dan Macallair,
assistant director of the Center for Juvenile and Criminal Justice. ``You
create the notion in the staff's head that all you have to do is make the
conditions miserable and anything goes.''

Ridding Children Of Booze And Drugs

But South Dakota Gov. Bill Janklow, a former U.S. Marine and a backer of
the state's four-year-old juvenile boot camp system, said the camps help
liberate problem teens from substance addictions and improve their physical
and emotional well-being. He blamed ``rogue'' staff members for any
problems at the South Dakota State Training School's boot camp.

``We're getting the booze and the drugs out of their minds, getting their
body into decent physical shape. Nobody disputes that we're making these
kids feel good about themselves,'' said Janklow, a Republican.

``This approach works better than other approaches because it gives people
what they need,'' Janklow added.

Jeff Bloomberg, South Dakota's secretary of corrections, said a boot camp
requires teens to make an effort toward their own rehabilitation, adding
that ``it's not intended to be a pleasant experience.''

South Dakota operates two boot camps for juveniles aged 14 to 21, one with
about 120 boys and one with about a dozen girls, state officials said.
Juveniles who enter the camps either have been convicted of crimes or their
parents have asked the state to take charge of them.

A state agency assigns a small number of youths who have been sent into the
correctional system by judges to boot camps rather than traditional
facilities.

Authorities said Score died of heat stroke after she collapsed during a
forced 2.7-mile (4.3 km) run. The 226-pound (102 kg) girl lay in the sun
for three hours without treatment because staff members at the boot camp
believed she was faking, even though the girl had wet herself, was
drooling, and her eyes had rolled back in her head, state investigators
said.

Staff Members Charged

State prosecutors charged two of the boot camp's female staff members last
month with one count each of manslaughter and four counts each of child
abuse. Both entered pleas of not guilty. In addition, the superintendent of
the South Dakota State Training School resigned.

Incidents have been reported in other U.S. boot camps. Nicholaus Contreraz,
a 16-year-old boy with an undiagnosed lung infection, collapsed and died at
the Arizona Boys Ranch in 1998. Investigators said workers at the boot camp
forced him to exercise, ridiculing him for supposedly pretending to be
sick.

Not only are there problems with abuse in the facilities, but also with
recidivism, critics say. The Justice Department's Office of Juvenile
Justice and Delinquency Prevention found that many juvenile boot camp
graduates committed new offenses more quickly after release than other
young offenders.

``In the juvenile justice community, boot camps are really on the
decrease,'' said Darrell Wehmeier of the Topeka, Kansas-based Koch Crime
Institute, a research group. ``A state can please the community and look
like they are tough on crime, but there are better alternatives out
there.''