Kids in adult jail? Here’s why Pierce County resorts to such difficult steps
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- Four juvenile detainees were transferred from Remann Hall to the Pierce County Jail.
- The temporary relocations occurred amid safety concerns at the juvenile detention center.
- Remann Hall faces staff shortages, aging infrastructure and a growing population.
Remann Hall, the juvenile detention center owned by Pierce County, is struggling to safely operate and needs to be replaced, officials say.
There aren’t enough workers, the facility is wearing down, and more young people are being charged as adults and thus being detained for lengthier periods of time.
Those issues were put front and center last month when acting detention manager Steve Hill requested a shakeup to alleviate what he described as safety and security concerns at the facility. Hill asked Pierce County Superior Court Judge Joseph Evans to allow eight youth detainees being tried as adults — nearly a quarter of the incarcerated population — to be temporarily transferred to the adult Pierce County Jail.
Hill’s request in court on May 9 was partially approved, enabling four 17-year-old boys to be taken to the jail, court records show. The teenagers have been held there since May 13 in their own wing and separated from adult inmates, according to the Pierce County Sheriff’s Office. The request to transfer four other 17- or 16-year-old boys was denied.
Lawyers representing the detainees objected to their clients being moved from the juvenile facility in Tacoma, arguing that the adult jail was inappropriate for suspected offenders under 18. Complicating matters, the jail is facing its own workforce shortage and yet has needed to increase staffing per shift to manage the vacant wing now set aside for the juveniles, sheriff’s office spokesperson Carly Cappetto told The News Tribune.
“We’re not equipped for this,” Cappetto said in an interview late last month.
A hearing is scheduled June 16 to determine whether it’s still in the interest of justice to continue to hold the defendants in the adult jail, court records show. In Hill’s legal filing requesting the transfers, he had suggested that the detainees be returned to Remann Hall when “staffing levels are adequate.”
The move to relocate four juvenile detainees to the jail, first reported by KOMO-TV, might be a temporary measure, but recent history shows that sustainable solutions will be necessary to avoid more transfers in the future. For similar reasons — staffing, facility limitations and a growing population of youth charged as adults — a number of juvenile detainees were previously relocated to the jail in November 2023 for several months, according to officials and court records.
TJ Bohl, the administrator for Pierce County Juvenile Court, which oversees operations at Remann Hall, told The News Tribune that officials were actively working with partners and local leaders to overcome obstacles.
“At Pierce County Juvenile Court, our mission is to maintain a safe and healthy environment for youth and staff,” Bohl said in a statement through a spokesperson. “This mission is being strained by staffing shortages, an aging facility, and a rise in youth charged as adults who require longer stays. These challenges are impacting safety, rehabilitation, and daily operations.”
What we know about Remann Hall’s dilemma
Remann Hall, which is approved for 37 full-time juvenile detention officers, currently has four staff on leave and two vacancies, according to Bohl.
When Hill authored his request last month to the court, he said that there were six officers on either medical or administrative leave and three vacancies that could be filled by new hires potentially ready to work on their own by or before June 7.
In explaining the difficulties associated with hiring, Bohl pointed to the “uniquely complex” nature of the job — requiring highly trained individuals to manage the physical safety and emotional needs of young people — and a competitive job market.
Other jobs in law enforcement, adult corrections or social services pay better, he said.
Efforts to comply with federal and state standards on staff-to-detainee ratios have proven to be expensive. Remann Hall workers accumulated nearly 1,200 overtime shifts last year at a cost of more than $750,000, according to Bohl.
As Remann Hall seeks to rectify its staffing needs, its number of detainees has grown — including those being tried as adults, also known as “adult-status youth,” officials said. When Hill petitioned the court last month, 13 detainees were adult-status youth.
The facility’s daily average population increased for adult-status youth between 2019 (3) and 2023 (10), according to a county PowerPoint document presented last summer.
Similarly, the facility’s daily averages for all detainees rose from 13 in 2022 to 27 last year and reached 33 at the time of the recent transfers, Bohl said Tuesday. He added that most of those nearly three-dozen detainees were charged with Class A offenses, the state’s most serious category of felonies.
It’s worth noting that the population has dramatically declined from when 140-plus juveniles were housed at Remann Hall each day in the early 2000s, Pierce County data shows. Since then, officials have committed to reducing incarceration through alternative sentencing programs, according to previous reporting by The News Tribune.
Adding to Remann Hall’s current troubles, only five of its eight total units to hold detainees are usable, Hill informed the court last month. Two units were undergoing construction for a new HVAC system and expected to be unavailable until August, he said, and a third unit’s heating system doesn’t work and cannot be fixed.
The limited availability of holding units, coupled with the facility’s number of detainees, consistently forced officers into overtime because some units exceeded eight detainees and federal standards require an eight-to-one ratio of detainees to staff during waking hours, according to Hill.
“Doing mandatory overtime consistently causes burnout and fatigue with the staff,” Hill wrote in the legal filing.
Pierce County’s Facilities Management Department was expected next month to complete the replacement of HVAC units serving six detention pods, at a cost of $2.8 million, according to county spokesperson Libby Catalinich. HVAC units in the two other pods were scheduled to be replaced in 2028.
“For departments that rely primarily on the County’s general fund, there’s often a balancing act between maintaining facilities and delivering services,” Catalinich said in a statement. “We work together across departments to make sure essential services stay a top priority, even if that means postponing some maintenance needs.”
Ultimately, a new facility is needed to house juvenile detainees in Pierce County, according to Catalinich.
“Juvenile Court and the Facilities Management Department have been working together to find the best way to replace Remann Hall; and we will include the community in the decision-making process,” she said.
Remann Hall was built in 1971 and extensively remodeled in the 1980s, according to a 2015 audit that noted there had been no substantial upgrades to the facility at that time for three years.
The facility was due for nearly $4 million in building and site improvements over the next six years, a current Pierce County capital facilities plan shows. Most of the spending is slated for the next three years but the plan doesn’t specify work that is being done.
In light of the issues raised at Remann Hall, Pierce County Council member Paul Herrera has requested a tour of the facility to better understand what is happening, according to county spokesperson Bryan Dominique.
Herrera, chairperson of the county’s Public Safety Committee, declined an interview until he first could learn more about the situation but is “taking it seriously,” Dominique said.
‘An extraordinary step’
The teenagers transferred to the jail face charges of varying degrees of seriousness. Two are alleged to have committed either first-degree murder or attempted second-degree murder, court records show. Two others are accused of assault.
In requesting transfers for them and four others, Hill noted there had been documented incidents involving each during their detention, including some cases of physical harm or threats toward staff or other detainees.
Isaiah Williams, one of the detainees who was transferred to jail, had fewer incidents at Remann Hall than others: He allegedly had argued with other detainees and kicked a door. Williams arrived at the juvenile detention center after being charged with two counts of first-degree murder in connection to the deaths of two people in March at a house party in the Spanaway area.
Mary Kay High, the chief deputy of Pierce County’s Department of Assigned Counsel, represented Williams in a court-filed rebuttal to the request of his transfer and argued that the jail was more restrictive and ill-equipped to meet the needs of juveniles.
Under state law, juvenile detention facilities must provide a humane, safe and rehabilitative environment for detainees, who are legally entitled to certain services such as access to education programs.
Remann Hall detainees receive regular opportunities for education, therapy, mentoring, religion and extracurricular activities, according to High. As of May 28, Williams had only been able to leave his cell for six hours a day and interact with one fellow juvenile in a common area; he’s been meeting individually with an educator instead of being in a usual classroom setting; and he hadn’t been able to talk with a mental health counselor, she said.
High was complimentary of Remann Hall’s work to reduce incarceration numbers over the years but said she believed that it could manage its current issues without relocating detainees — perhaps by reassessing young people who are in custody on less-serious charges.
High, who expected detainees to return to Remann Hall following the June 16 hearing, called the transfers “an extraordinary step” that would probably reoccur without proper investment.
“It’s an aging facility,” she said. “I don’t know what the answer is.”
In authorizing the transfers, Judge Evans’ court order required there to be continuity of education, medical and mental health services; no visitation costs passed onto families; and no solitary confinement, court records show.
Cappetto, the Sheriff’s Office spokesperson, told The News Tribune in late May that the jail had known “a good month in advance” about the pending transfers and made preparations to ensure services were seamlessly offered. Notwithstanding a two-day interruption in education while detainees were moving, she said it was a pretty smooth transition.
The jail wing being used, one of multiple vacant sections in a facility that hasn’t been at full capacity for years, was searched and cleaned prior to the juveniles’ arrivals. The jail has needed to dedicate three staff members to manage the private unit at a time when it’s down 37 deputies, which in general has caused “a great deal of overtime and mandatory OT,” Cappetto said.
The juvenile detainees receive individual chow and recreational time and there’s no crossover between them and adults in the halls, according to Cappetto.
“There is a lot of, kind of, magic happening on our end,” she said. “It’s been kind of a challenge and work of art, I like to call it.”
This story was originally published June 9, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
