Cape Girardeau juvenile center is nearly complete

Southeast Missourian

A nearly completed juvenile center has found a home in a 10,000-square-foot building in a commercial area of Cape Girardeau. The new center will include a 900-square-foot courtroom where juvenile cases will be heard. A large video monitor hangs on a wall that will allow the judge to interact with jailed, juvenile offenders without having to bring them to the juvenile center. Two conference rooms border a hallway that leads into the courtroom, which provide privacy for attorneys to meet with their juvenile clients and family members. Chief juvenile officer for the 32nd judicial circuit of Cape Girardeau Randy Rhodes says the new center will eliminate the need to hear juvenile cases in the Common Pleas Courthouse where there are crowded conditions and a lack of privacy that has adult and juvenile offenders in close proximity to each other. The facility has 18 security cameras that cover both inside and outside areas of the building. Rhodes says juvenile officers could be working out of the steel-framed, renovated building at 2137 Rust Ave. by July 1.