There was nothing to prevent two teens facing criminal charges from just walking out of the Westmoreland County- administered shelter where they were staying, the county’s juvenile detention director said Monday.

The teens, Braedon M. Dickinson, 16, who was charged last year with second-degree murder, and Robert Cogdell, 14, who is facing drug and gun charges, did just that Saturday night, prompting a multi-agency search.

By Monday morning, Dickinson and Cogdell were in custody, and the county’s shuttered detention center, located adjacent to the shelter, was reopened to house Dickinson and another juvenile whom officials declined to identify.

“We were in the process of starting our evening routine, and the kids were sitting around watching TV until, without warning, they got up and ran out the back,” facility director Rich Gordon said regarding Dickinson and Cogdell. “Our shelter is nonsecure, and under state law there’s nothing to prevent them from running. They have the ability to come and go.”

Westmoreland County District Attorney Nicole Ziccarelli said in a statement Monday that juveniles who are charged with serious violent crimes need to be housed in secured facilities.

“Failure to secure them after serious, violent offenses puts not only public safety at risk but puts law enforcement at undue risk,” Ziccarelli said.

Jonathan Lindsay, president of Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 62, said the incident should have been averted.

“Had these juveniles not been housed in an unsecured shelter, they would not have had the opportunity to jeopardize countless members of the public or law enforcement,” Lindsay said. “Pennsylvania State Troopers will always answer the call to help, but the amount of resources exhausted this past weekend and the lives it endangered is incomprehensible.”

Juvenile detention center reopened

County commissioners approved the limited reopening of the detention center to address what they called an emergency.

“It was a crisis situation, and we are able to operate with a bare bones staff to ensure a bad actor is taken off the street,” Commissioner Ted Kopas said.

The county’s 16-bed detention center will be limited to Dickinson and an unidentified boy until additional staff is hired, according to Commissioner Sean Kertes.

State police originally said Dickinson and Cogdell ran away Saturday night from the detention center. On Monday, authorities reported that the teens actually had been housed at the shelter, which operates in the same Regional Youth Services Center building but in a separate area.

The detention center had been closed since June amid staffing shortages and following a series of state inspections that found it was understaffed and its workers were insufficiently trained.

Dickinson charged in New Ken shooting

Dickinson was charged last year with second-degree murder, along with six other co-defendants accused in the July 3, 2022, fatal shooting of Jason Raiford, 39, in New Kensington. A co-defendant, Amir Kennedy, 16, of New Kensington, was convicted last week of first-degree murder and other offenses. Two others, DaMontae Brooks, 17, and Elijah Gary, 20, both of New Kensington, were acquitted of second-degree murder charges. Brooks and Gary were convicted of robbery and conspiracy offenses.

Cogdell faced drug and gun charges in unrelated cases, officials said.

Dickinson and Cogdell were captured by state police Monday morning after a foot chase in Fayette County, according to authorities. They didn’t say where Cogdell was being held.

State police said a 2016 Ford F-150 stolen from South Greensburg during the search was found along Feathers Avenue in Uniontown. A handgun inside the vehicle at the time of the theft hasn’t been recovered. Anyone with information about its location is asked to call state police at 724-832-3288.

Dickinson had been a shelter resident since Nov. 14, Gordon said. He had been held in custody at the juvenile detention center this spring before its closing and was released on house arrest after a failed suicide attempt and the transfer of his criminal case to the juvenile court system. Officials said Dickinson went on the run this summer and was captured last month.

A hearing is scheduled for Dec. 21 to determine the legality of a request by Ziccarelli to transfer Dickinson’s case back to adult court. That hearing was scheduled earlier this month, officials said.

Cogdell lived at the shelter since Oct. 25, Gordon said.

‘Only alternative’

Common Pleas Judge Michele Bononi, who oversees the county’s juvenile courts, last month authorized Dickinson to be placed in the shelter program.

“When he got picked up (in November) there was no other place to put him. It was to protect him and for the community,” Bononi said Monday. “It was better than having him on the street. It was the only alternative.”

Officials said Westmoreland’s eight-bed shelter program is for troubled youths and teens with nowhere to go and who are typically monitored by the county’s children’s bureau. Its doors don’t lock and there are no guards to keep residents in the facility.

“The shelter program is designed to be a 30-day emergency youth program. We have no lockdowns, and they have the ability to enter and exit,” Gordon said.

Few options

Controller Jeff Balzer, who serves as the chairman of the county’s juvenile detention board, said June’s temporary closure of the juvenile detention center program left a substantial shortage of viable options to house children charged with serious crimes.

A study released in May by Pennsylvania’s Juvenile Court Judges’ Commission said in addition to Westmoreland’s facility, there is one other government-operated juvenile detention center in Western Pennsylvania — a 20-bed detention center in Erie.

Shuman Juvenile Detention Center in Pittsburgh was closed in 2021. Allegheny County officials are planning for its reopening next year.

“We’re in an interesting place here. We’re going to see much more of these children who are charged and we don’t have a place to keep them. We need to make arrangements to house them,” Balzer said.

The incident highlights a crisis across the nation, Lindsay said.

“What happened over the weekend was very preventable and jeopardized not only public safety but the safety of law enforcement,” Lindsay said. “Our entire nation is seeing an increase in youthful violent offenders, and this county is no different. We need a secure facility in place to house serious and violent juvenile offenders without the probability of them returning to the streets to reoffend.”

County leaders for months have planned for the reopening of Westmoreland’s juvenile detention center. Five new staff members have been hired since Thanksgiving, and the roster of employees is now at six. Gordon said at least a dozen workers are needed for the facility to resume full operations.

“We were trying to get it opened by the end of the month,” Balzer said.

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