This paper critically examines Edward Humes' No Matter How Loud I Shout (1996), which follows seven teenage boys through the Los Angeles juvenile justice system in 1994. Drawing on three key examples from the book — the story of George Trevino, the political exploitation of juvenile crime by Governor Pete Wilson, and the systemic failures of the Los Angeles probation department — the paper explores how incompetence, poor oversight, and political opportunism prevent the system from breaking the cycle of juvenile recidivism. The analysis argues that meaningful reform requires competent, well-trained professionals, better placement decisions, and early intervention strategies, echoing the perspective of then-U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno.
Edward Humes' book No Matter How Loud I Shout follows the cases of seven teenage boys as they work their way through the juvenile justice system. It is clear from the title that something was terribly wrong with the juvenile justice system in Los Angeles, California, in 1994. This paper does not focus on what reforms may have been instituted after that year; rather, it engages with what Humes reports from that era, which opens up numerous important questions for any alert reader to contemplate.
The central question addressed in this paper is as follows: when you look at kids who land in adult court, you often find that they have been bouncing through the system for years, essentially receiving a free pass for lesser crimes until they commit a horrific act. How might that cycle be broken?
George Trevino is a case in point when it comes to juveniles who have spent a significant amount of time in juvenile justice institutions. In his case, Trevino became a ward of the court not through any fault of his own; he was a "300 kid" because he had been abused and abandoned by a felonious mother. He bounced through a number of bad foster homes — indicating that the juvenile system in Los Angeles was poorly managed, with insufficient research into whether a given foster home was an appropriate fit — until he was finally placed in a much better group home when he was in the seventh grade. Humes writes that Trevino's grades were "all A's and B's" and that he did not get into any trouble; he became "a top student" and even tutored younger children (111).
That academic record should have been a clear signal that this foster placement fit his personality and aptitude. Something was genuinely working in this group home — Trevino even dressed in "bow ties and sweaters," projecting the image of a serious student who felt good about himself. However, due to another misguided decision by the Los Angeles juvenile justice system, that promising life was taken away from him. He was removed from the group home that had helped him flourish and placed instead with relatives who were not positive role models.
As Humes explains, this move was made "in keeping with the system's primary goal of bringing families, even abusive ones, together." As a result, Trevino was placed in a home where his uncle was a drug dealer. That uncle later became addicted and died of an overdose. His aunt also struggled with alcohol and drug problems. Trevino's response — staying away from that miserable household — was instinctively sensible, but the consequences were severe: he skipped school, his grades collapsed, and he joined a street gang.
The final sentence on page 111 speaks directly to the question of how this cycle might be broken: all of Trevino's troubles — his terrible home situation, his gang involvement, his truancy — went unnoticed by the juvenile system in Los Angeles. "The social worker assigned to track George's case somehow never noticed any of this." The most fundamental way to begin breaking the cycle is to hire competent people to make decisions about these kids.
The decision to remove Trevino from a home where he had found genuine social and academic success was, in hindsight, morally repugnant. Even setting aside the system's policy of reuniting troubled youth with relatives, any moderately attentive social worker or probation officer should have recognized that placing him with a drug-dealing uncle was a serious mistake. The system must be adaptive and thoughtful when dealing with young people — whether they entered the system through their own actions or not. Trevino tried to succeed, but the system failed him.
Even after his arrest, the system continued to fail him. The "harried-looking young blond woman from the Public Defender's Office" did not find time to speak with Trevino before his hearing. "It's been really busy," she whispered to him. That is one more strike against a young man who should never have been in that position to begin with. Once again, the cycle can be changed if qualified people are placed in positions of authority and properly trained to actually help young people exit the system.
Humes' account of then-Governor Pete Wilson is also instructive in understanding why the cycle of juvenile crime is so difficult to break. Wilson was re-elected partly on the strength of his rhetoric about cracking down on young criminals. At the national level, and not mentioned in Humes' book, the presidency of Ronald Reagan brought a political push to toughen penalties for street criminals dealing crack cocaine — rhetoric that resonated with a public exhausted by news of the crack epidemic, even if many of those mandatory sentences were subsequently reduced. Wilson similarly used the mothers of children killed by juveniles as a political prop to aid his reelection bid. Did this help break the cycle of kids who cycle through juvenile hall and ultimately end up in state penitentiaries? Certainly not. Wilson's only goal was to win votes. "When we punish cold-blooded killers, their age shouldn't matter," Wilson declared (185).
On page 186, Humes points out that murders account for "less than 1% of all juvenile cases," yet Wilson's law-and-order media campaign created the impression that fourteen-year-old boys were roaming the streets as killers going unpunished. Humes also notes that the sons of the mothers Wilson featured were not killed by fourteen-year-olds; the juveniles involved were actually sixteen years old. But "such bothersome details never come up," Humes observes (186). Wilson's use of the phrase "young predators" and similarly charged language generated far more media attention than his opponent Kathleen Brown's platform of jobs, education, and economic development.
"LA probation officers push paper instead of helping youth"
"Janet Reno calls for early childhood intervention strategies"
What Reno did not say — but what the evidence in Humes' book makes plain — is that competent professionals need to be put in place to keep better track of kids who run afoul of the law. Juvenile justice systems must be reformed wherever probation officers are merely pushing paperwork and where professionals fail to fully research the homes into which young people like George Trevino are placed. The cycle of juvenile crime is not inevitable; it is, in large part, the product of institutional negligence. Fixing it begins with demanding — and enforcing — genuine professional accountability at every level of the system.
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