A 17-year-old at Oregon’s largest locked youth detention center was held for 32 days in a dirty isolation cell that reeked of urine and feces, a tactic that the Oregon Youth Authority used as punishment for the teen’s conduct, a new federal lawsuit alleges.
The lawsuit, filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Portland by the Oregon Justice Resource Center, accuses the state of using solitary confinement as part of a harmful and illegal behavioral management strategy.
“It appears to be arbitrary,” said Thaddeus Betz, an attorney handling the case. “The youth are not afforded any process to contest the reasons that are placed there or question in any way the duration of their placement.”…