Boy, 12, Uses Sheet to Hang Self at Sylmar Juvenile Hall

A 12-year-old Los Angeles boy who was being detained in San Fernando Valley Juvenile Hall on suspicion of auto theft hanged himself early Monday morning in his room, county officials said.

Samuel Salas, dressed in a county-issued sweat shirt, pants, T-shirt, socks and sneakers, tied a bed sheet to an air vent and hanged himself at about 2:45 a.m. Monday, said Hervle Lowrey, deputy director of detention services with the Los Angeles County Probation Department.

The boy’s body was discovered by a detention service officer at the Sylmar facility who noticed during a routine check of the 16-room housing unit that Salas was not in bed, Lowrey said. Such checks are made at least once every half hour, he said.

The officer was working his second eight-hour shift of the day, officials said.

“We have no indication that this was a contributing factor,” Lowrey said. “Everyone was doing what they were supposed to do as far as I know.”

Salas had been sleeping in a private room while he awaited a transfer to a boys home, Lowrey said. The youth had been admitted on June 11 on charges of grand theft auto, receiving stolen goods and driving without a license.

Salas’ father, Raul Salas, said the family believes the boy was murdered because “Sammy had scratches and bruises on his face” and was not “the type to do this.”

He said the boy was “very social” around his friends, although “in the last few months, he didn’t let his feelings out.”

“He once told us there was a security guard there who pushed him around and didn’t like kids,” Salas, a baker, said through a Spanish interpreter. “And that air vent was too high for him to reach by himself.”

The coroner’s office listed the cause of death as suicide by hanging. The death is being investigated by county authorities.

Third Since 1984

Salas was the third youth since 1984 to commit suicide in one of the county’s three juvenile detention facilities, Lowrey said. Both previous suicides occurred at the central juvenile hall in Los Angeles, he said.

All juvenile hall employees receive suicide prevention training, said Dr. Bert Indin, director of the facility’s mental health unit.

But “every time you think this place is foolproof, you find that there are still blind spots and problems,” he said.

There have been 100 suicide attempts in the county’s three juvenile detention facilities this year, Lowrey said. In 1985, there was an “epidemic” of attempted suicides, with 1,000 reported at the San Fernando Valley facility alone, Indin said.

“You have to take all threatened suicides and attempts seriously,” Indin said. “There are a lot of dead kids out there who people said weren’t really serious.”