Mental health services to the Department of Juvenile Justice

Background Material:
You are the director of a nonprofit agency that provides mental health services to the Department
of Juvenile Justice in your state. You have just learned through a listserv for juvenile justice
topics that the Department of Juvenile Justice in your state has issued a Notice of Proposed
Rulemaking that will affect all of the facilities where your employees work. The Notice seeks
comment on the following proposal:
20 Il. Admin. Code 2602.160(b)(9)(A) would be amended as follows (amendment to be added is
underlined):
(9) Use of Restraints
Instruments of restraint, such as handcuffs and straitjackets, shall not be applied as
a penalty, and such instruments shall not be applied in any case for any longer time
than is necessary.
A) Other instruments of restraint shall not be used except:
i) As a precaution against escape during transportation, except that all
restraints shall be removed from any juvenile while correctional
officers are appearing with the juvenile in court, unless the court
orders otherwise.
ii) On medical grounds by direction of the physician.
ii) By order of the superintendent in order to prevent a youth from
injuring himself or others or from damaging or destroying property,
provided the superintendent personally reviews such cases every 24
hours.

You have decided to submit a comment on behalf of your organization about the proposed
amendment. The comment can be in support or in opposition to the proposed amendment. Keep
in mind that the amendment seeks to add the underlined portion only to the existing code (all the
other parts of 20 Il. Admin. Code 2602.160[b][9][A] written out above that are not underlined
are already part of the code and are not a part of the proposed changes). Your comment should

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  focus on arguments relevant to your role as the director of a nonprofit agency that provides
  mental health services to youth in the Department of Juvenile Justice in your state. You are not
  an attorney and do not need to focus on legal arguments. Though you have followed this issue
  casually in the past, you do some additional research on some of the legal issues to understand
  the discussion. This additional research consists of using Westlaw to locate a journal article that
  addresses the issue of juvenile shackling. Your comment should be no longer than two pages,
  double-spaced, in Times New Roman size 12 font, with one-inch margins all around.
  Criteria for Evaluation:

1. Does the comment meet the assignment guidelines?
2. Does the comment advocate a specific action or position?
   a. Does the comment clearly support or oppose the proposed amendment?
3. Does the comment reflect an understanding of who the audience is and advocate for an
   action within the listeners’ power?
   a. Is it clear that the comment is written to a reader at an executive agency?
   b. Does the comment use formal written language as opposed to informal or casual
   language?
4. Does the comment use any techniques to divide arguments or ideas?
5. Does the comment effectively select the arguments most related to the writer’s role as a
   director at a nonprofit that provides mental health services?
6. Does the comment reflect editing?
   a. For example, does the comment use short sentences, subject-verb proximity,