Hour-long virtual session on Friday, Oct. 2, is open to journalists, students, court staff and members of the public interested in how the state's juvenile justice system works.
Two experts in juvenile law will lead free, virtual training this week on how South Dakota's juvenile justice system works.
The hourlong session, sponsored by SDPB, South Dakota News Watch and the South Dakota Bar Foundation, will be held at noon-1 p.m. CT Friday, Oct. 2, on Zoom and then archived on SDPB's YouTube channel. Participants may submit questions through chat. Registration is not required.
It's designed to arm South Dakota journalists with what they need to know to cover juveniles and also should be of interest to students, elected and appointed officials, court staff and members of the public.
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Wendy Hess, a professor with the University of South Dakota Knudson School of Law in Vermillion, and Nicole Laughlin, a Sioux Falls child's attorney, will lead the session that will cover:
- Laws on what can be released about juveniles accused of a crime
- The process of petitioning someone to juvenile court
- When it becomes legal to release information about a juvenile
- The potential consequences to media organizations for releasing information
Hess has been teaching at USD since 2012. She directed the legal writing program for many years, later transitioning to teaching torts and other upper-level courses, including children and the law.
Her legal practice experience includes: directing the Prison Reform Project at the Public Justice Center, a nonprofit law office in Baltimore, where she also worked on educational access for children in foster care and enforcement of freedom of information laws; serving as the Francis Murnaghan Appellate Advocacy Fellow where she worked on poverty law and civil rights appellate cases in state and federal courts; and provision of civil legal services to prisoners and pretrial detainees in central Pennsylvania with the Pennsylvania Institutional Law Project.
Hess also completed two judicial clerkships, one for a judge on the Maryland Court of Appeals and the other for a judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland. She is also a licensed foster parent, having welcomed several teens and pre-teens into her home.
Carson Walker
Laughlin is a Sioux Falls attorney who has been in private practice since opening her own law office in 2013. Her practice focuses primarily on criminal defense, abuse and neglect matters, and juvenile law, with additional work in personal injury and family law.
She frequently serves as a court-appointed Guardian ad Litem for children and for adults with mental health or competency concerns and has represented children who are victims or witnesses of crime in matters requiring special protections.
Before entering private practice, Laughlin spent more than five years with the Minnehaha County Public Defender’s Office and previously served as a law clerk for South Dakota’s Third Judicial Circuit. She earned her J.D. from the University of South Dakota School of Law in 2006, where she served as both a staff writer and lead articles editor of the South Dakota Law Review.
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