A juvenile offender escaped from the New Beginnings Youth Center in Laurel after beating a corrections officer early Monday, officials said.
Sources told The Washington Examiner that shortly after midnight two teenagers pummeled veteran officer Sylvester Young and snatched his keys. One of them found a ladder to scale the fence and drove away in Young’s black Lexus.
It was the first breakout at the $46 million facility since an embarrassing number of youths escaped shortly after it opened two years ago. The 60-bed facility replaced the infamous Oak Hill Juvenile Detention Center and houses some of the District’s worst juvenile offenders.
As of late Monday, the 17-year-old escapee from Southeast Washington was still on the run.
D.C. Department of Youth and Rehabilitative Services Chief of Staff Chris Shorter said he could not provide information about the escapee because he was a juvenile and the agency didn’t want to jeopardize the search. He said officials notified D.C. police and Anne Arundel County police within an hour of the escape.
“We believe we’re very close to bringing him in,” Shorter said.
The corrections officer was taken to a hospital and released. Union members said he suffered numerous broken bones to his face and will likely need plastic surgery.
Corrections union members who asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation complained to The Examiner that Young was the only person on duty for the 10-person housing unit.
Shorter said a manager was floating between two units in the building where the attack occurred, but the agency now will staff each unit with two officers during the midnight shift.
“[Acting director Neil Stanley is] not wedded to the prior director’s staffing ratios,” Shorter said.
Stanley became the fourth Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services director in the past year. Since taking the helm of the often-criticized agency in December, he has focused heavily on New Beginnings, which has been overcrowded and home to frequent brawls.
In August, two D.C. wards briefly escaped after kicking out the back door of a van near the Laurel site.
In June, it took a SWAT team an hour to quell a riot that city officials said was the result of overcrowding at the facility. At the time, officials said there were 70 people in custody at New Beginnings.
After several youths escaped in the facility’s first weeks in 2009, District officials spent nearly $1.4 million to prevent more breakouts.
Sen. Benjamin L. Cardin, D-Md., has pushed for the District to relocate its juveniles inmates back in the city in space at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington.
Scott McCabe
