The incarceration of seriously traumatized adolescents in the United States: Limited progress and significant harm

The purpose of this article is four-fold: 1) to describe who is held in the United States’ juvenile justice incarceration facilities and the pathway these youthful offenders took to placement; 2) to identify the harmful impacts of incarceration on these adolescents; 3) to summarize the serious problems - trauma, mental health, and related disabilities - these adolescents struggle with before, during, and after incarceration; and, 4) to highlight the effectiveness of less costly prevention, treatment, and mental health/trauma programming alternatives to incarceration, thus making communities in the safer.