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The violence in Katrina Gonzales' life didn't stop when she entered the Youth Diagnostic and Development Center in Albuquerque.

The 15-year-old from Las Vegas, N.M., who is serving a two-year sentence for accidentally killing a friend, has repeatedly attacked and injured YDDC guards. Her propensity for violence was so great, officials say, that she had to be confined to an isolation unit where she cannot hurt anyone.

To an extent, Gonzales agrees that being alone is safer. But she and her advocates complain that to get better, she needs intense psychological help to control her anger.

They say she's not getting it at the Albuquerque center.

In that regard, critics of New Mexico's juvenile justice system note that Gonzales epitomizes what's wrong with locking up children and not providing the treatment they need.

Her case, a judge says, is evidence of what's wrong with YDDC.

In a Nov. 7 hearing, Children's Court Judge John Romero echoed the call for treatment and urged all of Gonzales' advocates to "scour the countryside for information and treatment resources" to help her.

Romero said it's apparent YDDC needs better control and more staffing to be "a truly rehabilitative center. Unfortunately, we don't have that."

Everyone involved in her case agrees it is not an easy one and that Gonzales needs more help than the center can provide.

The American Civil Liberties Union has threatened to sue the state over its alleged failure to provide therapy for Gonzales.

Standing in shackles, Gonzales told her judge, "They aren't helping me. I'm worse off than when I came in."

Children, Youth and Families Department officials say they've tried to get her into a treatment program, but she's been rejected in five states.

Among those that rejected her was New Mexico's new secure treatment program for girls at the UNM Children's Psychiatric Hospital. The reason: Gonzales is too violent.

Her record of violence may be the most glaring of any YDDC resident.

According to YDDC records, she was blamed for 11 of the 17 violent incidents involving high-profile offenders (those who have killed) housed at the center from July 1, 2005 to July 1, 2006.

The ACLU has also objected to Gonzales' living conditions, which lawyers characterize as cruel and unusual.

Gonzales gets an hour outside each day for exercise. Staff members bring meals and her schoolwork to her room in the Sage Cottage for violent girls.

She takes her medication and she seems to be doing better, YDDC officials reported in court.

If nothing else, the attacks on guards have stopped.

YDDC officials say they want to try to move her slowly into the general population because they don't want to keep her locked up indefinitely. Still, they agree she's more in control in the isolated unit and has been cooperative there, not violent.

Gonzales' mother, Linda Martinez, said her daughter suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder from years of domestic violence.

"She's begging for help, and she has since day one," Martinez said.

Linda Begay, the behavioral health director for CYFD's juvenile justice division, said the center is trying to help Gonzales and will keep trying.

"She's not ignored," she said. "It's not fair to say she doesn't get any mental health treatment. Someone sees Katrina every day."

At age 13, Gonzales was found guilty of firing a gun she stole from her grandfather in Albuquerque and killing Adrian Lucero-Urioste, a boy she said dared her to "test" him while they were playing with the weapon in Las Vegas, their hometown.

According to her trial testimony, she put the gun to his forehead and pulled the trigger. It clicked without firing a round. She said the victim told her: "I bet you won't do it again."

She said she thought the gun was empty when she fired again.

Gonzales began her two-year sentence at YDDC for involuntary manslaughter in July 2005.

By October of that year, she had attacked a guard - trying to stab the woman with a pen she grabbed from the guard's shirt pocket, and biting the guard on her breast, according to a State Police investigation.

Court documents in Gonzales' case reflect Children's Court Presiding Judge Marie Baca's frustration with the system that has not seemed to help the girl.

When Baca sentenced Gonzales in December to a year at YDDC for the 2005 attack on the guard, she recommended that "appropriate treatment" be provided to the girl.

Eleven months later, Judge Romero called for the same.

Under the state's Children's Code, Gonzales' one-year sentence and two years probation for the attacks on guards must run at the same time she is serving her two years for involuntary manslaughter.

"But her odds for getting paroled are much less," said prosecutor Ken Fladager.

"She ought to be in a secure mental health facility," he said. "But there's no place for her that I know of."

The clock is ticking. Katrina Gonzales' two-year sentence will be up in July 2007. And then she'll be on the outside.