With head hung and hands clasped the teenage boy tries to explain how someone so young can commit such vile crimes.
He says he wants to go home and promises he's changed.He seems remorseful and the adults deciding his fate seem moved by his words. He appears a likely candidate for success on the streets, but, according to statistics, he probably won't make it.
Who decides when a juvenile delinquent is ready to go back onto the streets? Who decides when he's no longer a danger to the society he's already victimized?
Right now, only the Youth Parole Authority can make those decisions. But juvenile judges throughout the state think they should have more control over such decisions, and the battle lines have been drawn.
Similar to the job of the adult system's Board of Pardons, the Youth Parole Authority consists of 10 citizens who decide when a teen has paid his debt to society.
The judges have been fighting for more control over those decisions for more than two years. Tuesday, the juvenile subcomittee of the Sentencing Commission unanimously voted to support Senate Bill 181, which gives a juvenile court judge the power to send a teen to a lock-up facility for a minimum amount of time.
Right now it is the Youth Parole Authority - and only that board - that sets the minimum stay for a youth.
The committee also included a recommendation that the Youth Parole Authority be reshaped into a full-time, independent board. Tuesday's unanimous vote is ironic only in that this is an issue that has deeply divided many of the players in the juvenile justice system for years.
Salt Lake Police Chief Ruben Ortega, a member of the commission, says the diverse and often divided group saw one thing the same.
"They all know one thing: The current system isn't working," Ortega said. "The public doesn't trust it."
Another member of the commission said that distrust is something the juvenile system didn't nec-es-sar-ily earn.
"The glare on the juvenile system has been unprecedented," said Russell VanFleet, a professor at the University of Utah and member of the Sentencing Commission. "Juvenile crime, according to statistics, is not any worse, with the exception of (the use of) weapons. The (media) coverage . . . has given somewhat of an illusion of a juvenile system that's out of control. I don't think the juvenile system has failed."
The distrust in the system is fueled by high-profile failures. When a teenage offender appears to have the advantages of the juvenile system but commits such a violent crime he goes into the adult system, the public wants to know why.
Seventh District Juvenile Judge Scott N. Johansen believes the people the public looks to and blames are usually the ones wearing black robes.
"If I'm going to be held accountable, I want the responsibility," Johansen said. "Under the current system, I can sentence a (teen) to secure care, and they can walk out tomorrow."
How many times has Johansen taken heat for a decision he doesn't make? "I haven't," he said, "but if I did, I'm an elected official and the public has a remedy."
VanFleet points out that a juvenile court judge has never been ousted, but the Division of Youth Corrections has had six directors in just 12 years.
"It's the directors that get fired, not the judges," he said.
While the state's leaders decide its fate, the Youth Parole Authority quietly, and behind closed doors, decides which teens are ready to go back into society.
Bill Nelsen, a commission member and director of Youth Corrections' region two, said that when the division was created in 1981, release decisions were made by the division director and the three regional administrators. About a year later and in an effort to make the process "even fairer," citizen representatives were added to the parole authority.
The authority has evolved over the years, changing as recently as the last legislative session, into a 10-member, part-time, all-citizen board. The members were once appointed by the division, but the most recent change gave that power to the governor.
"The youth system was trying to return kids to communities. . . . It seemed community representa-tives should be making those decisions," VanFleet said. "In my mind that still makes sense."
Johansen said he doesn't want to do away with the parole authority, but he wants to see judges have more power.
"Some of our street-wise, sophisticated youth know that the judge they're standing in front of doesn't have anything to say about how long he'll be at Decker Lake," Johansen said. "It detracts from our ability to persuade a kid to change."
"We're the ones responsible for sentencing the kids," said 3rd District Juvenile Judge Sharon Mc-Cully. "When we determine (that a teen needs) secure care, we probably know best at that time (what the) minimum should be. That's what judges do is sentence. We're certainly the ones who take the heat."
But Youth Corrections officials say the power of the parole authority persuades a teen to change. Authority members guarantee they keep a teen longer if they feel he's not getting better.
Holding the possibility of parole over a resident's head is also an effective management tool, officials say.
"I think you have to remember there are people working in those facilities," VanFleet said. "They have to have the ability to manage their populations."
But several judges have accused Youth Corrections of making release decisions based on resources such as bed space - and not on a teen's progress. Some judges say parole authority members are "spoon-fed" by Youth Corrections and essentially told what decisions to make.
"They make bed-space decisions," Johansen said. "If you want to operate a system according to what money you wish to spend, then you've got a pretty good system. If you want to operate it for community protection, then we need to make some changes."
Third District Juvenile Judge Andrew Valdez, who was once a member of the Youth Parole Authority, agrees that decisions aren't always made according to the teen's progress.
"I knew kids were being released too soon, but all the information pointed toward release," he said. "(Youth Corrections) spoon-feeds you the information."
VanFleet said the management issue has to be considered along with the sentencing issue. But regardless of who makes those release decisions, it's clear the system needs a revised set of release guidelines - something one Youth Corrections official says she asked for two years ago.
Release guidelines provide a recommended range of months that a juvenile should spend behind bars based on the crime and his previous criminal history.
"The (current) guideline is wholly inadequate for our needs," said Stephanie Carter, the administrative officer for the Youth Parole Authority. "It's weak. It doesn't meet our needs. I'm sure it doesn't meet the judges' needs."
She said as of a year ago, the Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice was working on revising the guidelines, which haven't been updated since 1990.
But Carter takes issue with Johansen's assertion that decisions are made based on bed space.
"That is never a consideration," she said. "The authority is not driven by the resources of Youth Corrections."
In fact, she said, members of the authority would like to see intervention much earlier. Cathy Ortega, the authority's chairman, said that the number of crimes a teen commits before going to secure care is one of the things that shocked her when she became a member a little more than two years ago.
Another authority member, Randy Johnson, also takes issue with the idea of being "resource driven and spoon-fed" and says such talk makes him "extremely offended."
"I can tell you from my experience," he said, "we are not resource driven. When we deliberate, we deliberate with the question of what's best for this kid every single time. If it costs the state some money, so be it."
One of the reasons that last week's recommendation included a plan for an independent board is to quiet criticism that the authority cannot operate with autonomy under the direction of Youth Corrections.
Nelsen said previous changes, like having the governor make the appointments, came from criticism about the authority being under the thumb of Youth Corrections.
"Instead of minimum sentencing, which would clog up the system even more, there needs to be a full-time parole board appointed by the governor," Nelsen said. "Whether a kid is locked up for six months or 12 months, they're all still coming out."
One of Nelsen's concerns expressed during a May subcommittee hearing was the lack of con-sistency if judges set the minimum sentences instead of the Youth Parole Authority.
"You're going to have 21 different judges making those decisions," Nelsen said. "I'm not so sure the application of justice is going to be consistent across the board."
Johansen agreed there might be inconsistencies, but they could be reduced by coming up with release guidelines. He said the local community could hold a local judge accountable.
"That's called democracy," he said. Carter said the authority only needs "the same tools" to do its job effectively.
Valdez said he would like to see some type of review process so he can ensure that a teen is getting "meaningful treatment" while locked up and some way to hold the teen accountable for his actions.
"It's a public safety issue," Valdez said. The current system, with its high recidivism rate, "is a fraud on the public."
Nelsen said if Youth Corrections stays with the assertion that its main goal is treatment for the young offenders, then it must turn them around sooner.
"We're a treatment facility," he said. "If we can't turn a kid around in 12 months, then you're just ware-housing them."
And that's something the state could do a lot cheaper without treatment, Johansen said at the May meeting. He referred to cheaper options, which he jokingly said could include "a Motel 6 and a shotgun."
"Youth Corrections doesn't believe in incarceration," Johansen said. "They deliberately under- build. Their philosophy is `treat the kid, don't punish him.' "
But Johansen believes being lenient with a young offender not only harms his victims and his community but himself. A teen usually isn't locked up until he commits several crimes, and he's severely delinquent by the time he gets locked up or gets treatment.
"It's not fair to them," he said. "In fairness to the kids we ought to have some accountability in the juvenile system."