From a story on NPR's Morning Edition, February 9, 2010.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=122791527
According to the young men's stories, many of them weren't responsible for their own injuries. Some were robbed, one was walking home and caught in the line of fire, and others were in the wrong place at wrong time. Dr. Rich explored the emotional wounds these young men were feeling. Those wounds dealt with their safety. Dr. Rich grew up in Queens with a father who was a dentist and mother a teacher. He was exposed to a different upbringing than these young men were. His opportunities were a lot more plentiful.
My research of connecting social class with juvenile behavior includes this lack of opportunity for most lower income families. Young men who grow up in low income households receive fewer opportunities than men in middle-upper class ones. Juvenile behavior and activities can be a result of these limited opportunities.
When you write, "according to teh young men's stories, many of them weren't responsible to their own injuries" it's a shocker. That's why this guy's investigations made the national news. (Gotta cite where you got this by the way; just a line at the top in italics or something would do: "From a story on NPR's Morning Edition" and give the date and reporter who filed it.) Anyway, if your paper contained the statement: "according to their stories many of them weren't responsible to beginning the chain of events that led to their incarceration" it would also be a shocker. And it might a good kind of question to ask in that just be asking it the boys are asked to look at how the context of their lives leads to their "decisions" or lack thereof. We should talk about it. But the point of my comment here would be to consider asking the guys in detention what they see as having led them to be here. They may get into self-exploration, and even self-blame and deprecation on the one hand, and/or a more critical socoilogical understanding of how opportunities, role-models, and resources vary by social class level. And all of that could help them for the rest of their lives, and it could also provide a revealing view for sociologists on how jouveniles understand their own decision making and contexts. I'm excited about the fact that, at minimum, Jim, your interviews could be beneficial to them, let alone you and me and the rest of the world. Anyway, let's talk soon.
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