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Investigations into Suicides in Juvenile System Leave Families Wanting More

May 27, 2010, Steve Mills and Louise Kiernan, Tribune reporters, Chicago Tribune

On a cold, gray February morning, Cheryl Miller sat on a bus cradling the gym bag that held the box with her son's ashes. For five months, the ashes had sat in the embalming room of a Chicago Heights funeral home because Miller could not pay off the bill for the funeral of her 16-year-old son Jamal, who had committed suicide at the Illinois Youth Center in St. Charles. As soon as she received an income tax refund, she got a cashier's check for $2,500 and took the bus from Springfield, where…


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