Louisiana Senator Pat Connick says he is working to get something done about the troubled Bridge City Youth Center after five juvenile inmates escaped and 20 juveniles took over the facility in a siege.
On Thursday, the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office sent in a SWAT team to regain control of the facility in about two hours.
The detention center houses some of the most violent juvenile offenders and as Senator Connick tells WWL’s Tommy Tucker, he is talking with Governor John Bel Edwards to get something done, including closing the Bridge City facility, reopen other youth centers closed by the state and move the Bridge City inmates out of the troubled facility.
“We’ve gone to the governor’s office, I’ve been in contact with them since yesterday, on this again,” said Connick. “There is a facility called Jetson that they have mothballed, they have to reopen that facility, we have to get funding for that and move these kids out of there…and they are kids, a lot of them are punks…what do we do? Do we just throw them away?...we can’t do that we got to do something for the ones who want to be saved and lock up the ones who have no concern for the health and safety of others.”
He tells WWL that for now, he wants to see the governor possibly send additional staffing from the state’s penitentiary to help supplement staff at the Bridge City Youth Center.
“The staffing needs to be increased tremendously,” says Connick. “We need to get the folks from Angola in, the folks from Department of Public Safety, the State Police…somebody needs to come in and supplement these staff and individuals who are overworked, and overwhelmed, and are fed up.”
