judge mary beth bonaventura and her five fellow judges will hear more than 3,000 cases in a year.ome will be simple detention hearings. while others will be trials for serious offenses. 16-year-old ayryana has spent the weekend in detention for disorderly conduct at a high school football game. it's not her first time in juvenile. with two previous trips to the courtroom, the judge will have to decide whether ayryana should remain locked up or be allowed to go home with her mother. >> i want to tell the judge the whole story and just let her know that i -- i am going to school. i have changed a lot since the last time i have been to court. >> with the long, tense weekend behind her, it is finally ayryana's turn to tell her story. >> tell me what happened. >> me and my brother and a friend, we was going in line to get our tickets for the football game. and the principal had stopped me, and she said, well, um, i don't go to the school no more so either i had to leave or i had to go to the other side. when she came up, she came up with a police officer. so i said, um, okay, well i go

. >> for 26 years lake county juvenile judge mary beth bonaventura has been making tough decisions that aim to get kids like aaron back on track. >> they're coming back into the community. i want to do everything i can do first before i send them to the doc or department of corrections. >> because of aaron's age, his long history with the juvenile system, and the fact that he's still on probation for attempted car theft and battery, the stakes are much higher this time. aaron has already been warned that the prosecutor's office is looking at waiving him to the adult system. >> i've got a bad record. so i'll probably beg please don't let take my life away from me. to me that's taking my life away. that will be three adult felons instead of just one. i have three pending. >> aaron admits he has an unquenchable thirst for taking cars that aren't his own. his other vice, playing escape artist. >> my staff called me to let me know that he was trying to be a trickster and had a detention officer bring him up sunday night for the release for the weekenders. and our intake officer elizabeth not

judge mary beth bonaventura will make the decision. >> there's two reasons why you order a child detained whether he's a danger to himself or others or there's an unlikelihood that he'll come back to court for the second hearing. so if you make the decision that they are a danger, you detain them, and if you find that they're not a danger then you release them to the parent. >> brown. >> right now, i feel like i'm going to go home. like my probation officer for how good i been doing since i been home from boy's school. so i may go home today. hopefully. >> you ready, your honor? right this way, rodrick. stay to your left, young man. go stand next to your attorney. >> y'all supposed to be helping me. it ain't nobody helping me. nobody. >>> i'm todd piro, here's what's happening. >> come on out. >> hey, morris, how are you? don ruck, i'll be your lawyer for today. >> 17-year-old morris is locked up for possession of marijuana and more importantly for failing to appear at a prior court hearing. before he enters the courtroom to face the judge he meets with his court-appointed attorney, don r

judge mary beth bonaventura will make the decision. >> there's two reasons why you order a child detaineda danger to himself or others or there's an unlikelihood that he'll come back to court for the second hearing. so if you make the decision that they are a danger, you detain them, and if you find that they're not a danger then you release them to the parent. >> brown. >> right now, i feel like i'm going to go home. like my probation officer for how good i been doing since i been home from boy's school. so i may go home today. hopefully. >> you ready, your honor? right this way, rodrick. stay to your left, young man. go stand next to your attorney. >> y'all supposed to be helping me. it ain't nobody helping me. nobody. you wouldn't buy a car without taking it for a spin, and it's...well...just a car. test-drive our full lineup only at your local john deere dealer. and starting each day with a delicious bowl of heart healthy kellogg's raisin bran. how's your cereal? sweet! tastes like winning. how would you know what winning tastes like? invest in your heart health, with kellogg's raisin

. >>> if there's one thing senior judge mary beth bonaventura has learned in her 26 years in juvenile when parents and kids face off in court. >> you can sentence someone to death. you can sentence someone for life imprisonment. but to try to figure out how to put a family back together in about 30 minutes after you read the report of a certain pattern of behavior that has probably gone on for years is a very tricky thing to do, very important thing to do, and wow, the impact we can have if we get it right. >> kymyada is charged with running away, and although she's told the judge her side of the story, her mother has yet to establish why she turned her daughter over to the police. >> she chose to go and be with her god mother. >> okay. so she didn't leave the house without your permission, did she? >> no, she didn't. because i gave her an option. i said you abide by the rules, or you can go. >> at some time you called the police and reported her as a runaway. >> she didn't call, she didn't check in. she didn't do anything. so the same pattern with me she did with the godmother. and i