Juvenile Crime, Juvenile Justice (2001) / Chapter Skim
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The Juvenile Justice System
The Juvenile Justice System
Pages 154-227
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From page 154... ...
The very language used in juvenile court underscored these differences. Juveniles are not charged with crimes, but rather with delinquencies; they are not found guilty, but rather are adjudicated delinquent; they are not sent to prison, but to training school or reformatory.
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From page 155... ...
The federal government has jurisdiction over a small number of juveniles, such as those who commit crimes on Indian reservations or in national parks, and it has its own laws to govern juveniles within its system. States that receive money under the federal Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act must meet certain requirements, such as not housing juveniles with adults in detention or incarceration facilities, but it is state law that governs the structure of juvenile courts and juvenile corrections facilities.
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From page 156... ...
The center of the juvenile justice system is the juvenile or family court (Moore and Wakeling, 1997~. In fact, the term juvenile justice is often used synonymously with the juvenile court, but it also may refer to other affiliated institutions in addition to the court, including the police, prosecuting and defense attorneys, probation, juvenile detention centers, and juvenile correctional facilities (Rosenheim, 1983~.
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From page 157... ...
They were not to be accused of specific crimes. The reason a juvenile came before the court be it for committing an offense or because of abuse or neglect by his or her parents or for being uncontrollable was less important than understanding the child's life situation and finding appropriate, individualized rehabilitative services (Coalition for Juvenile Justice, 1998; Schlossman, 1983~.
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From page 158... ...
Three Supreme Court decisions in the second half of the 20th century resulted in more procedural formality in the juvenile court, but other decisions maintained differences between juvenile and criminal courts.
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From page 159... ...
In 1970, the Supreme Court raised the standard of proof necessary in juvenile court to that required in adult criminal court. In in re Winship (397 U.S.
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From page 160... ...
Some critics of the juvenile court argue that, given the punitive changes in juvenile justice legislation since the 1971 decision, the only remaining procedural differences between juvenile and adult criminal courts are access to juries and access to counsel (Feld, 1993~. The lack of access to juries may have consequences for the outcome of a trial because judges and juries may decide cases differently.
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From page 161... ...
Concern over housing juveniles with adult criminals led to other requirements under the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act. Sight and sound separation of juveniles and adults in detention and correctional facilities and removal of juveniles from adult jails and lockups were mandated.
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From page 162... ...
THE JUVENILE JUSTICE SYSTEM IN THE l990s Juvenile justice systems vary greatly by jurisdiction. The organization of courts, case processing procedures, and juvenile corrections facilities are determined by state law.
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From page 163... ...
, nonviolent crimes (e.g., shoplifting and other theft) , and traffic offenses.
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From page 164... ...
Figure 5-1 provides a simplified view of case flow through the juvenile justice system. Cases that are referred to the court are screened through an intake process, in which charges are delineated.
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From page 165... ...
court system; in others, it occurs outside the court system, for example, in a probation department, a state juvenile justice department, or the prosecutor's office. The intake screening determines whether a case should not be filed because of insufficient evidence, resolved by diversion to a program or specified set of conditions, or should proceed to formal processing in the juvenile court (i.e., petitioning, which is similar to indictment in criminal court)
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From page 166... ...
In over half the states, juvenile courts administer their own probation services, and many are responsible for detention and intake as well (Torbet, 1990~. Some researchers have expressed concerns regarding certain juvenile justice procedures.
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From page 167... ...
After adjudication, minors may be diverted from incarceration by being placed on probation or given some other sanction or intervention. One concern that is often raised about diversion programs is that they may result in net widening which is "a phenomenon whereby a program is set up to divert youth away from an institutional placement or some other type of juvenile court disposition, but, instead, merely brings more youth into the juvenile justice system who previously would never have MA case represents a youth processed by a juvenile court on a new referral regardless of the number of violations contained in the referral" (Sickmund et al., 1998:1~.
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From page 169... ...
Other research has found no difference in recidivism rates between juveniles diverted from the juvenile justice system and those who remained in it (Rausch, 1983; Rojek and Erickson, 1982) or more recidivism among diverted juveniles (Brown
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From page 170... ...
= 766 Diversion without not Offenders Project experimental N(comparisonl) = treatment; diversion reported (Rojek and 508 with referral to Erickson, 1982)
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From page 171... ...
among treatment group No differences in arrests of self-reported delinquency between diverted with or without referral; no differences in arrests among diverted groups and comparison groups of samples drawn of arrested status offenders before .
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From page 172... ...
= Foster care parents 12- to treatment assignment of 42 trained in behavioral 17-year foster care referred boys N(treatment techniques olds (Chamberlain to one of two foster care) = 37 (mean and Reid, 1998)
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From page 173... ...
py; 12- to Average: 4 years Treatment group Improved family used 17-year- 24 hours of less likely to be relations; decreased ; within olds treatment rearrested and, if psychiatric school, (mean for multi- rearrested, had symptomatology rhood; age 14.8) systemic longer time to ies as therapy rearrest and , group; 28 less serious ~avioral hours for offenses rtrol individual ed therapy rerapy controls arents 12- to up to a 1 year Fewer arrests and Treatment foster care havioral 17-year- year days incarcerated group more likely to olds among juveniles in finish treatment (mean treatment foster age 14.9)
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From page 174... ...
In addition, attention is paid to treatment fidelity through supervision of and support for treatment providers. A study that randomly assigned serious, violent juveniles either to multisystemic therapy or to the usual juvenile justice system processing (Henggeler et al., 1993)
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From page 175... ...
concluded that for offenders, "participation in mediation appears to not have significantly increased their satisfaction with how the juvenile justice system handled their case." The study included interviews with victims and offenders who completed the mediation process. Two comparison groups were devised the first of victims and offenders who had been referred to the mediation process but did not participate and the second victims and offenders who had not been referred to mediation in the same jurisdiction as the mediation sample, and matched on age, race, sex, and offense.
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From page 176... ...
Placement in a secure facility is reserved for those juveniles who continue to offend or who pose a high risk to others. (For a more complete discussion of restorative justice, see Bazemore and Umbreit, 1995; Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 1998.)
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From page 177... ...
However, because the overall number of criminal delinquency cases coming to the court has increased, the number of cases that result in secure detention has increased, even though the percentage of cases detained has remained steady. Research consistently shows that juveniles who have been in detention are more likely to be formally processed and receive more punitive sanctions at disposition than those not placed in detention, after controlling for demographic and legal factors, such as current offense and history of past offenses (Frazier and Bishop, 1985; Frazier and Cochran, 1986a; McCarthy and Smith, 1986~.
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From page 178... ...
The two generally accepted uses of preadjudication detention are to ensure that a juvenile will show up for his or her hearing and to prevent reoffending prior to adjudication. However, detention is also used as punishment, protection, and as a place to keep juveniles when more appropriate placements are unavailable (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 1997~.
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From page 179... ...
found the programs to provide less restrictive options to secure detention in a cost-effective manner without compromising public safety. Over three-quarters of the cases served by the alternative programs successfully avoided secure detention.
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From page 180... ...
= 185 monitoring of school reported Intensive Probation to IPU, MHS, attendance, general Unit (IPU) , CYTCIP, behavioral supervision; Michigan Human or state MHS: Youth and Services (MHS)
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From page 181... ...
. trammg lness d 11- to Up to a 1 year In first 1-1/2 years In first 1-1/2 years Tact 16-year- year of program of program nselor, olds implementation, implementation, outh's youths with no youths with no prior ssional prior delinquent delinquent offenses terapeutic offenses less likely more likely to fable to be referred to successfully complete juvenile court for protective supervision a delinquent act program, but no during period of difference in second supervision, but no 1-1/2 years of program difference in second 1-1/2 years of program continued
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From page 182... ...
The early founders of juvenile courts saw probation as one of the most significant components of the juvenile court system (Schlossman, 1983~. Probation provided the opportunity to rehabilitate juveniles in their homes rather than incarcerating them.
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From page 183... ...
As with other ideals of the juvenile court, the reality of probation did not always live up to its expectations, either at the beginning of the juvenile courts 100 years ago or today. Nevertheless, probation has remained the overwhelming dispositional choice for adjudicated offenders of juvenile courts since statistics were first kept in 1927 (Torbet, 1996)
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From page 184... ...
Intensive supervision coupled with treatment and well-supported staff appears to have the potential to keep status offenders who have not already been involved in criminal delinquency from committing criminal delinquent acts. Most of the intensive supervision probation programs instituted beginning in the late 1980s and throughout the l990s have been targeted not at status offenders, but at high-risk juveniles for whom community safety demands more intense supervision than can be provided under routine probation (Armstrong, 1991~.
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From page 185... ...
The program was originally intended for serious and violent offenders, but many nonviolent, less serious offenders ended up in the program. The authors concluded that regular probation suffices for most juvenile offenders and that intensive supervision should be reserved for serious and violent offenders who have failed under regular probation conditions.
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From page 186... ...
What they learn through the juvenile justice system is likely to influence their behavior later. Their access to appropriate education and vocational training and to mental health services may make all the difference between successful reintegration into society and reoffending.
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From page 187... ...
Almost all of the teachers are uncertified, instruction amounts to as little as an hour a day, and until recently there were no books." In late 1999, three boot camps in Maryland were closed and top juvenile justice officials lost their jobs after physical abuse of juveniles by staff was found to be widespread (The Washington Post, 1999~. The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported in tune 1998 that boys in the Central Arkansas Observation and Assessment Center seldom saw daylight, were given clean clothing only every other week, and were subjected to the unsanitary condition of raw sewage backing up into shower drains whenever toilets were flushed (Coalition for Juvenile fustice, 1999~.
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From page 188... ...
In fact, Ferris is the only education program in a juvenile secure care facility in the Mid-Atlantic region to receive accreditation (Coalition for Juvenile Justice, 1999~. Even in well-kept settings, however, some misbehaving youth are punished through isolation or deprivation of privileges.
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From page 189... ...
Nevertheless, this finding points to widespread inadequacies in services available to juveniles held in residential facilities. Educational Needs and Services Many children and adolescents involved in the juvenile justice system have fared poorly in school and have significant educational needs.
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From page 190... ...
Juvenile offenders have been found to have a high rate of drug and alcohol use. In 1998, the Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring Program found illegal substances in the urine of 40 to over 60 percent (depending on the city)
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From page 191... ...
Evaluations of Treatments in the Juvenile Justice System Although no treatment program works 100 percent of the time for 100 percent of the participants, there are treatment programs that have been found to reduce the rate of future offending, whereas some get-tough sanctions have been found to increase recidivism. The panel did not have the resources to examine all the literature relevant to treatment of juveniles under the control of the juvenile justice system (Lipsey and Wilson, 1998, alone found 200 experimental or quasiexperimental studies for their meta-analysis)
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From page 192... ...
This pattern held for programs conducted under the auspices of the juvenile justice system and for those run by other institutions. Of particular concern are programs that increased delinquency.
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From page 193... ...
note that the primary lesson of their study is "that sufficient research has not yet been conducted on the effects of intervention with serious juvenile offenders." They found that the dimensions that characterized good programs for incarcerated offenders differed from those for nonincarcerated offenders. Therefore, they searched separately for effective programs in these two settings.
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From page 194... ...
As with the adult system, juvenile corrections officials have a poor record of controlling juvenile parolees released from secure detention into the community. As in the adult system, concerns have been raised that heavy caseloads and poor quality and delivery of services affect offender rehabilitation and public safety.
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From page 195... ...
Intensive supervision after-care programs often include goals similar to those found in the restorative justice model, such as restitution and reintegration. How successful programs are in having juveniles pay fines, complete victim restitution conditions, attend school, or find a job are some of the other areas that could be considered in addition to recidivism measures.
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From page 196... ...
probation or including education, traditional job placement, and probation counseling Maryland Drug Quasi- N(aftercare) = 120 Intense supervision, not Treatment Program experimental N(comparison)
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From page 197... ...
. supervision 2 years Fewer arrests among intensive probation group; lower rate of subsequent conviction and incarceration among experimental group 18 months No difference (from between groups on entry proportion arrested, into study)
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From page 198... ...
For example, an evaluation of the Philadelphia Intensive Probation Aftercare Program, in which serious juvenile offenders in one institution were randomly assigned to intensive after care or typical probation, found that, although the same proportions of youths in after care as without after care had been arrested, those in after care had fewer arrests (Sontheimer and Goodstein, 1993~. The Philadelphia youth in the intensive probation group who were arrested were significantly less likely to be convicted or reincarcerated than those assigned to typical probation.
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From page 199... ...
Minor and Elrod (1990) found no significant differences in self-reported or officially recorded delinquency overall, although juveniles in intensive supervision with extensive offending histories had significantly fewer offenses during an
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From page 200... ...
Several intensive after-care programs are currently being evaluated through grants from the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. JUSTICE SYSTEM INVOLVEMENT AND EMPLOYMENT Being caught by the police and caught up in the juvenile or criminal justice systems are especially hazardous for youth from disadvantaged backgrounds, because becoming involved in crime can produce not only future criminality, but also later problems in finding employment.
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From page 201... ...
Other data indicate that while more than half of state prisoners are employed before going to jail, only about a fifth of those on parole are employed following imprisonment (Irwin and Austin, 1994~. It is therefore important to emphasize the role of the police, courts,
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From page 202... ...
In each of these ethnographies and in the related studies noted earlier, it is embeddedness in crime networks, including the juvenile and the criminal justice systems, that seals the economic fate of these young people. Thus a number of studies now confirm that as time spent in prison increases, net of other background factors and involvements, the subsequent likelihood of disengagement from the legal economy increases.
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From page 203... ...
(Stahl et al., 1999~. The handling of girls in the juvenile justice system also appears to have changed somewhat over the past 30 years.
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From page 204... ...
RECENT LEGISLATIVE CHANGES AFFECTING THE JUVENILE COURT In response to the rise in violent crime by juveniles during the late 1980s and early l990s, states around the country made changes to their juvenile justice laws. These changes mainly involved making it easier to transfer juveniles to adult court, changing sentencing structures, and modifying or removing traditional confidentiality provisions.
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From page 205... ...
Ease of Transfer to Criminal Court -) r - ~1 ~1 ·Ci1 ·~3~ 1l ~c~= Determining which children belong in juvenile court has been an issue since the court's beginnings (Tanenhaus, 2000~.
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From page 206... ...
Transfer Mechanisms From the inception of the juvenile court, juvenile court judges have had the discretion to waive jurisdiction to the criminal court. These waivers generally fit one of three case types: serious offense, extensive
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From page 207... ...
The state laws, including the District of Columbia, use one or more of the following methods to place a child in the adult criminal court: judicial waiver, prosecutorial direct file, and statutory exclusion. Judicial waiver, in which the transfer decision is left to the discretion of the juvenile court judge, is the traditional method that juvenile courts have used for transfer.
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From page 208... ...
These provisions are sometimes referred to as reverse waiver. In some states, the statutes authorize the transfer from criminal court to juvenile court even if the case arrived in criminal court by direct file, statutory exclusion, or waiver.
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From page 209... ...
Prosecutorial Direct File. The statutes in 15 states designate a category of cases that may be tried in either the juvenile court or the criminal court (i.e., the juvenile and criminal courts have joint or concurrent jurisdiction)
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From page 210... ...
In some states, a juvenile or criminal court may impose a sanction in either the juvenile or the criminal system. In some states, the juvenile or the criminal court may sentence a youth to the juvenile corrections system to be followed by a sentence in the adult corrections system, which may be suspended if the juvenile successfully completes his juvenile sanctions.
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From page 211... ...
Other critics say that blended sentences represent a procedural and substantive convergence between juvenile and criminal courts and erode the rationale for a separate juvenile justice system (e.g., Feld, 1997~. Mandatory Minimum Sentences Since 1992, a number of states have modified their laws to allow for mandatory minimum sentences for certain serious crimes.
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From page 212... ...
These measures were aimed at minimizing the stigma attached to court involvement and promoting the goal of rehabilitation. As state legislatures began stressing punishment and retribution over rehabilitation, many states changed their laws concerning confidentiality in the juvenile J tJ As of the end of 1997, 30 states permitted or required open juvenile court hearings in cases involving juveniles charged with violent or serious offenses or repeat offenders (Torbet and Szymanski, 1998~.
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From page 213... ...
These changes included allowing juveniles convicted as adults to be housed in separate facilities or in juvenile facilities until a certain age, creating special programs for juveniles convicted as adults, and enhancing programs in the juvenile correctional system. Between 1992 and 1995, these laws focused on the need for secure detention of violent juvenile offenders; more recently, they have focused on authorizing and funding community-based interventions and supervision of offenders (Torbet and Szymanski, 1998~.
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From page 214... ...
, and 10,000 cases were judicially waived in 1996 (Stahl et al., 1999~. Transfer to Criminal Court Judicial waivers have been tracked for a number of years, but data on cases transferred by prosecutorial direct file or statutory exclusion are not systematically counted.
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From page 215... ...
At least in some states, the change to prosecutorial direct file appears to have resulted in more juveniles being processed in adult criminal court. Recent changes in statutory exclusion laws have generally increased the population of juveniles potentially subject to transfer to the criminal courts, but no national data are currently available to determine the actual number of juveniles affected by exclusion laws, the characteristics of such juveniles, or the offenses for which they are transferred.
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From page 216... ...
Instead, they prosecuted and stigmatized many juveniles who did not represent a threat to public safety and who could benefit from the more rehabilitative programs of the juvenile court. A high proportion of the juveniles transferred to adult court are minorities.
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From page 217... ...
Pagan also found higher rates of rearrest and reincarceration among young people processed for robbery in the criminal courts than in the juvenile courts; no such differences were found for burglary cases. A comparison of cases transferred to adult court with those adjudicated in juvenile court in St.
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From page 218... ...
There appears to be variation by state in length of stay, however, with some states well above the national average. For example, in California, the average length of stay in Youth Authority institutions was 25.7 months in fiscal year 1997-1998 (California Youth Authority, 1997-1998~; in Texas, the average length of stay in Texas Youth Commission facilities was 23 months for violent offenders (Criminal Justice Policy Council, 1999)
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From page 219... ...
. Nearly one-third of those receiving blended sentences in 1996 were 14 years old or younger (Criminal Justice Policy Council, 1997~.
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From page 220... ...
Minority juveniles are disproportionately represented among juveniles sent to adult prison. In 1997, minorities made up three-quarters of juveniles admitted to adult state prisons,~3 with blacks accounting for 58 percent, Hispanics 15 percent, and Asians and American Indians 2 percent (Strom, 2000~.
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From page 221... ...
Nonetheless, half of the juveniles who were sent to these state prisons had been committed for property rather than person offenses. The average length of sentence for juveniles committed to San Quentin and Folsom prisons in the 19th century was 3.5 years (compared to under 2 years for reform schools)
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From page 222... ...
The balance between rehabilitative goals and concerns about the best interests of the child, on one hand, and punishment, incapacitation, and protecting public safety, on the other, has shifted over time and differed significantly from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Given the local nature of juvenile justice in the United States, there has never been a single dominant vision of how to deal with delinquent children in law or in practice.
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From page 223... ...
Punitive policies include easier waivers to adult court, excluding certain offenses from juvenile court jurisdiction, blended juvenile and adult sentences, increased authority to prosecutors to decide to file cases in adult court, and more frequent custodial placement of adjudicated delinquents. The great majority of recent changes in juvenile justice law and practice have not been evaluated.
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From page 224... ...
Replication of programs that have been found successful, such as treatment foster care or multisystemic therapy, is particularly important to advancing knowledge about what works and for whom. Recommendation: Federal and state funding should be provided to replicate successful research-based community-based treatment programs for all types of offenders with continuing evaluations to ensure their safety and efficacy under the specific circumstances of their application.
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From page 225... ...
Recommendation: The Congress should provide adequate funds to Ol}DP and the Bureau of Justice Statistics in order to assure proper data collection on conditions of confinement as well as new funds to develop national data collection systems to measure the number and characteristics of children and adolescents outside the juvenile jurisdictions, those transferred to criminal court, and those held in adult prisons or jails. Despite the large amount of descriptive literature about the juvenile justice system, little research has identified how different laws regarding juvenile crime or different practices in confinement affect juveniles in the juvenile justice system.
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From page 226... ...
Recommendation: Congress should provide funding for the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, in collaboration with other relevant federal agencies (such as National Institute for Mental Health, National Institute on Child Health and Human Development) , to develop a research agenda with the goal of expanding knowledge needed for policy making in the following areas: How police decisions and current police practices affect the number, type, and outcomes of juveniles in the system; The nature of decisions made in juvenile court by various professionals, including probation officers, judges, prosecutors, and other key actors; The extent, systemic effects, costs, and cost-effectiveness of the various possible dispositions of juvenile cases; Long-term effects of transferring juveniles to adult court and incarcerating them in adult facilities;
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From page 227... ...
THE JUVENILE JUSTICE SYSTEM 227 The effect of using informal sanctions for juveniles committing first offenses if they are not serious crimes. The benefits and disadvantages of secure confinement versus providing services in the community; and Identifying appropriate treatments for female juveniles.
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