Brighton Police explain ‘expedited’ appearance tickets for teens

BRIGHTON, N.Y. — Brighton Police issued expedited appearance tickets to two 15-year-olds driving a stolen car on Linden Avenue.

Police said three teens tried to steal another car, before they got caught. Now, we’re working to learn more about what exactly an expedited appearance ticket is.

The concept of expedited appearance tickets is pretty new for Monroe County. County officials said it’s not happening anywhere else in the state. It has to do with a new initiative for handling teen arrests; getting them quicker access to support, and supervision.

When Monroe County officials examined teen arrests, they found huge gaps of time where the teens were left alone without any supervision or help.

When a teen is arrested, it could be 20 days before appearing in court again, before a judge.

But now, police departments in Monroe County have access to an expedited appearance ticket.

It’s part of a new initiative called JEDS. George Markert, Assistant Director of Public Safety said that stands for “juvenile enhancement diversion supervision.”

“After an examination of the system and the timeline, we removed all the downtime where nothing occurred with a juvenile in the process,” said Markert. “The whole purpose is to break the cycle of violence, interrupt that circle of peers involved in criminality, with the one juvenile that gets arrested.”

Teens repeat-offending is something Sgt. Keith Woodard with Brighton Police has seen before.

And on Monday night, officers attempted to put a stop to that using JEDS.

“An officer left work, and was heading home, going down Linden Ave,” said Woodard. “He observed a suspicious vehicle.”

Woodard said three 15 year-olds from Rochester were driving a stolen car, and attempting to steal another at 81 Linden Ave.

They got caught, and two teen boys were given expedited appearance tickets. The other teen girl was transported to the juvenile detention center; Woodard said this decision was based on bed availability.

“The juvenile and the juvenile guardian are expected to be at probation the next business day, they’re given a time, they need to be at probation with that,” said Woodard. “It sets up services immediately within one business day.”

An expedited process that needed to happen, said Markert.

“It’s instant accountability that they’re being supervised immediately,” he said. “They can’t just get away with stealing a car, getting an appearance ticket and getting out. We’re trying to be rapid about that accountability.”

The teens from Monday night were allegedly trying to steal another car in the area of 81 Linden Ave. That included Linden Knoll Independent Senior Apartments.

The home said they’re working with Brighton Police for this investigation, and have 24-hour on-site security and surveillance cameras.