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Sandra Averhart reports on JUST Pensacola s continued efforts to increase the number of civil citations issued to juvenile misdemeanor offenders, as an alternative to arrest.
The faith-based organization JUST Pensacola has renewed its call for increased use of the Civil Citation program to reduce juvenile arrests in Escambia County.
For the second year in a row, hundreds of community members from a coalition of Pensacola-area congregations assembled to urge local leaders to take action regarding the high number of youth arrests. The meeting was held Monday via Zoom
Rev. Dr. Rick Branch, minister of music at First United Methodist Church and member of the JUST Pensacola executive committee, says they picked up where the inaugural event left off.
The new state attorney for Escambia, Santa Rosa, Okaloosa and Walton counties is from a famous family.
But Ginger Bowden Madden is her own woman and her years of experience and plans for how legal matters throughout the First Judicial Circuit of Florida will be prosecuted are evidence of the impact she intends to make.
Bowden Madden told the News Journal she plans to give extra focus to keeping juvenile offenders out of the court system through civil citation and diversion programs while also, if necessary, aggressively using her power to keep the public safe.
Bowden Madden will be sworn in as the state attorney of the First Judicial Circuit of Florida on Jan. 5, succeeding outgoing State Attorney Bill Eddins.