Suicides by Troubled Teens Expose Safety Breakdowns Behind Bars
May 25, 2010, Steve Mills and Louise Kiernan, Tribune reporters, Chicago Tribune
Sometime before 3:09 a.m. on Sept. 1, 2009, Jamal Miller began to tear the bedsheet in his room at the Illinois Youth Center in St. Charles.
The stocky 16-year-old tied the sheet to a sock and tied the sock around the metal bar at the top of his bunk bed. He attached three notes to the cinder-block wall with toothpaste and placed another piece of notebook paper in the narrow window of his door.
View the full text of this article