Editorial: Don’t arm probation officers

Tuesday, Aug. 3, 1999 | 8:49 a.m.

Juvenile probation officers deal with youngsters convicted of everything except murder or attempted murder. Many of these kids unfortunately are tough to handle. That is why they landed in trouble in the first place. When juvenile probation officers enter the picture a good deal of their work naturally involves law enforcement.

We must not lose sight of their primary role, however. They are social workers who attempt to straighten out youngsters' lives. The most successful officers are those who win the respect of juveniles under their watch.

That is why a new committee formed by Clark County Juvenile Judge Robert Gaston to consider whether juvenile probation officers should carry firearms needs to proceed cautiously. There are some officers who believe they should carry weapons because they consider their jobs dangerous. They often enter crime-infested neighborhoods with little or no backup.

But is an armed probation officer the right message we want to send to our troubled kids? The problem there is that youngsters may see mere adult authority figures turned into potentially deadly foes. There is also the question of liability. Imagine the community uproar if a juvenile delinquent is needlessly shot by a probation officer.

As Sun reporter Bill Gang noted, cases where officers could have benefited from access to a firearm have been extremely rare. Kirby Burgess, who oversees the juvenile probation officers as director of Clark County Family & Youth Services, is appropriately leery about the prospect of giving them firearms. Burgess realizes that officers are trained to de-escalate potentially dangerous situations, not make them worse.

A more appropriate solution may be to encourage Metro Police to step up efforts to provide backup when called upon to do so by the juvenile probation officers. Police have the equipment necessary to confront dangerous situations. Giving probation officers guns would not necessarily make them as effective as policemen.

We need to support juvenile probation officers. At this time we are just not certain they ought to be armed. Maybe more will be learned when the committee researches the issue.