PARENTING ON TRIAL

By Jill Smolowe

For three days, Susan and Anthony Provenzino sat grim-faced in the paneled courtroom of St. Clair Shores, Michigan, their emotions ricocheting between anger, bewilderment and remorse as they pleaded for understanding. Pressed by city attorney Robert Ihrie to explain why they had supported the release of their son Alex, 16, from juvenile custody last summer, even though he had committed several burglaries and attacked his father with a golf club, Susan snapped, "I didn't want him in a youth home with murderers and rapists." Had she sought counseling for Alex? "I couldn't force him to go," Susan said. "I tried to talk him into going, and he refused." Did she feel responsibility for Alex's crimes? "I feel partly to blame," she allowed. "But I do not feel as though I was negligent as a mother."

Plainly, the four men and two women in the jury box felt otherwise. After just 15 minutes of deliberation, they convicted the Provenzinos of violating a two-year-old city ordinance that requires parents to "exercise reasonable control over their minor children." It was the first time parents had been charged under the ordinance. The Provenzinos were fined $100 each and ordered to pay $2,000 in court costs. Given that they could have been socked with civil damages of up to $27,000, Anthony, 48, a restaurant cook, and Susan, 44, a bookkeeper, got off easy.

But the verdict may be alarming to any parent who has ever come up against the intransigence, sneakiness or willfulness of a child--which is to say, just about every parent of an adolescent. In recent years, states have championed a variety of approaches to stemming the nation's soaring juvenile-crime rate, from boot camp to charging children with adult crimes. Among the most popular--and controversial--are laws that hold parents accountable for the sins of their children. In 1995 alone, 10 states and a number of communities enacted sanctions against parents, from counseling to jail time.

Though the Provenzinos were charged with a misdemeanor, the media attention created an aura of criminal notoriety. Six satellite trucks descended on the courthouse, and portions of the trial were broadcast by CNN and COURT TV, sandwiched between segments of the Bosnia war-crimes tribunal. Within minutes of the verdict, the jury foreman was telling COURT TV that the message here was to "get involved with your kids." But the picture painted in court was not of inattentive parents; it was of frightened ones. Asked who controlled the Provenzino household, Alex's friend Andrew Nowak, 17, testified, "Alex did."

Alex was first interrogated by police last May about three church burglaries. Though Alex was let go, police warned Anthony to "take control" of his home. The next month, Alex attacked his father, who is four inches shorter, with a golf club. After Anthony phoned the police, Alex was arrested and placed in a youth home for one night. Over the next several weeks, Alex burgled homes, stashing the loot in his bedroom, which he would not allow his parents to enter. As Alex grew more confrontational, Anthony began to fear for the safety of his wife and their two younger daughters. Last September, when police wanted to return Alex to a youth home, the parents did not resist. Two months later, Alex pleaded no contest to burglary, weapons and drug charges, and began a one-year sentence in juvenile detention.

Many experts doubt the constitutionality of parental responsibility laws. A basic principle of our society, notes Professor Martin Guggenheim, a specialist in juvenile law at the New York University School of Law, is that "we are each responsible for ourselves under the criminal law--it's not guilt by association." Says Mark Kappelhoff of the American Civil Liberties Union, "I don't think there's any way family life will ever be strengthened or improved by the intrusion of the criminal justice system." The Provenzinos would no doubt agree.

--Reported by Michael McBride/St. Clair Shores and Andrea Sachs/New York

With reporting by MICHAEL MCBRIDE/ST. CLAIR SHORES AND ANDREA SACHS/NEW YORK