Update: The Indianapolis City-County Council approved the new youth curfew with a 21-2 vote at the May 4 meeting.
Corrections & Clarifications: An earlier version of this story misstated which age groups will be subject to the stricter curfew. Children 16 and under are affected.
Teens and kids in Indianapolis will likely face a stricter curfew again this summer.
Indianapolis City-County Council members on April 15 advanced a new curfew for children 16 and younger that would be two hours earlier than the statewide curfew. If the full council approves the policy May 4, the stricter curfew would last at least four months through Sept. 1.
Last year, councilors approved a similar curfew about a month after two teenagers died in a July 5 mass shooting following the Fourth of July fireworks show downtown.
Councilors said they want to prevent similar tragedies this summer, after a number of shootings involving youth have made headlines this year. The stricter curfew complements the city’s new youth violence reduction plan, a partnership with community organizations to curb crime by engaging with high-risk youth and doing targeted law enforcement.
“Will it prevent and stop every single crime by a young person? Absolutely not,” City-County Councilor Leroy Robinson told IndyStar after the Public Safety and Criminal Justice Committee recommended the curfew 9-1.
“What it will do,” added Robinson, the committee chair, “is give [police] some enforcement policies and actions they can put in place to help our young people this summer, giving them some guardrails … to help reduce violence in our city.”
When is the new Indianapolis youth curfew?
The temporary curfew backed by councilors would apply throughout Marion County. The rules state:
IMPD chief outlines rise in youth violence
A slightly higher percentage of homicides and non-fatal shootings involved children in the first three months of this year than in the same period last year, according to Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department data.
While overall homicides and non-fatal shootings have fallen roughly 30%, IMPD Chief Tanya Terry told councilors that children have been victims more often. Three children were killed and 20 injured in shootings in the first quarter of this year, Terry said.
What’s more, Terry says police are concerned that the “teen takeovers” happening in cities nationwide will sweep through Indianapolis.
Typically organized on social media, these takeovers invite kids to flood streets and public spaces. The events have caused chaos in Detroit and Chicago, where a 14-year-old boy was killed and eight others were injured last November when shootings erupted during a takeover.
“We owe it to our youth to keep them safe and out of harm’s way by using every tool that’s available to us to do just that,” Terry said during the April 15 committee meeting. “In response to what we have seen so far this year and in past summers, we need to intervene early.”
The only councilor to vote against the curfew, Democrat Rena Allen of District 15 on Indy’s far east side, pushed unsuccessfully to cut the 120-day timeline in half.
Allen said the city doesn’t do enough to help teens stay out of trouble over the summer. She doesn’t want a stricter curfew to make them more likely to end up in the criminal justice system, she said.
Terry said that during busy weekends, IMPD will bring kids violating curfew to a juvenile connection center, where they’re connected with social service providers who reach out to their parents. She said curfew violators brought to the center don’t automatically get a criminal record unless they’ve broken another law.
“When a young person is out past curfew, or engaged in concerning behavior, arrest is really not our preferred option,” Terry said. “We want a meaningful intervention.”
What are the penalties for kids violating curfew?
Last year, council Democrats rejected an attempt by Republicans to set specific fines for parents whose children repeatedly violate curfew.
No such fines have been proposed this year, but households could potentially be on the hook for financial penalties.
State law allows the city to fine people up to $2,500 for a first violation of any ordinance and up to $7,500 for any subsequent violations, according to city attorney Brandon Beeler.
Indianapolis law allows the city’s Office of Corporation Counsel, a legal team that includes prosecutors who enforce city ordinances, to recommend fines or other actions needed to prevent recurring violations. The decision about whether to impose a fine and how large to make it ultimately rests with the juvenile division of the Marion Superior Court, according to city ordinance.
Email Indianapolis City Hall Reporter Jordan Smith at JTSmith@indystar.com. Follow him on X @jordantsmith09 and Bluesky @jordanaccidentally.bsky.social.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Indianapolis’ youth curfew could be 2 hours earlier this summer
Reporting by Jordan Smith, Indianapolis Star / Indianapolis Star
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