U.S. District Judge Roger Benitez said he was trying to scare girl away from drugs and ending up in court, but studies show 'scared straight' tactics don't work
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According to a transcript of the hearing, Benitez gave the man a chance to address the court before being sentenced back to prison for violating the terms of his probation. The defendant told the judge he grew up in San Diego, which means he’s constantly running into people he knows and falling into prior bad habits.He went on to say that the only way he believed he could turn his life around was by “leaving what I know, leaving everybody I know.
“Now, don’t go away,” Benitez told the girl twice. “Look at me. Look at me for just a second. You see where your dad is?”“I didn’t like it,” she responded.A view of San Diego’s neighboring federal courthouses downtown. Benitez then told the girl to go back to her seat and proceeded with sentencing her father to 10 months in prison — the term recommended by his attorney, the prosecutor and the U.S. Probation Office. But he addressed the girl again after imposing the sentence.
Days after the hearing, her father’s attorney filed a motion asking for a different judge to re-sentence her client. The case was transferred to U.S. District Judge Robert Huie, who re-sentenced him to a term of time already served. That was the “most appropriate sanction given the distressing events,” Lopez had argued.
“If anything, she was showing that she was an upstanding daughter, making sure her father felt loved and supported,” Smoot Evans said. “And in the process, she got humiliated.”over the years have shown that “scared straight” tactics — which typically involve youths being exposed to harsh conditions in adult prisons, usually with parental permission — are not only ineffective, but can actually increase criminality and delinquency.
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