the manner in which the courts have excluded some minors from juvenile justice. These include the determination of an age beyond which the juvenile court no longer has jurisdiction and various mechanisms for the transfer of minors under that age to a criminal court. In response to the increase in violent crime in the 1980s, state legal reforms in juvenile justice, particularly those dealing with serious crimes, emphasized concerns about punishment, accountability and public safety, and rejected traditional concerns about distraction and rehabilitation in favor of a harsh approach to delinquency and punishment of minors. This shift from the rehabilitation of the individual to the punishment of crime is exemplified by the 17 States that have redefined the focus of their juvenile courts to emphasize public safety, the security of sanctions and the accountability of offenders (Torbet and Szymanski, 1998). This shift in focus is inherent in the belief that the juvenile justice system is too flexible with respect to offenders who are suspected of posing a threat to public safety, such as their adult criminal counterparts. There have been very few scientifically rigorous evaluations of adolescent follow-up programmes. In addition, intensive care programs often mix probation officers and probation officers, making it difficult to separate the different possible effects on youth who have been distracted from incarceration and those who are released from incarceration. In general, these studies did not find consistent evidence of the effectiveness of intensive supervision programs and follow-up of adolescents in reducing recidivism (Altschuler et al., 1999). As we mentioned in the probation discussion, intensive supervision may simply bring to the attention of authorities more technical violations of probation conditions or other delinquent acts than would be the case with probation or routine probation.
Outcomes, in addition to re-incarceration or re-incarceration, should be considered when assessing the success of the program. Intensive supervision follow-up programs often include objectives similar to those of the restorative justice model, such as restitution and reintegration. How programs are successful in fining adolescents, meeting victim compensation conditions, going to school or finding employment are some of the other areas that could be considered in addition to recidivism measures. Evaluations of follow-up programs are summarized in Table 5-4. From the beginning, the juvenile courts had authority not only over children and adolescents who had committed illegal acts, but also over those who defied parental authority or social conventions by fleeing from home, skipping school, drinking alcohol in public or behaving sexually. These children and adolescents were classified as out of control and in need of counselling. Criticism of the treatment of these status offenders (whose actions were considered problematic only because of their status as children) in the same way as children and adolescents who had committed criminal acts increased in the 1960s. Juvenile courts are also responsible for abused and neglected children who have not committed a crime. In the 1960s, many states revised their delinquency laws to move offenders and non-offenders to new non-delinquent categories such as individuals, children or minors who need to be supervised (called PINS, CHINS and MINS). In 1974, in response to reported abuses in being caught by the police and being trapped in juvenile or criminal justice systems, is particularly dangerous for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds, as participation in crimes can cause problems not only to future crime, but also to subsequent problems in finding work.
These problems can be conceptualized further in the sense of a process of “criminal integration” (Hagan, 1993; Hagan and McCarthy, 1997). Studies have consistently shown that victims tend to be more satisfied with the mediation process than with court proceedings (Coates and Gehm, 1989; Marshall and Merry, 1990; Umbreit, 1990; Umbreit and Coates, 1992, 1993). This can be explained by the fact that victims only participate in the mediation process if they volunteer to do so. In their quasi-experimental study conducted at four sites in the United States, Umbreit and Coates (1992:12) concluded that, for offenders, “participation in mediation does not appear to have significantly increased their satisfaction with the way the juvenile justice system has handled their cases.” The study included interviews with victims and perpetrators who had completed the mediation process. Two comparison groups were developed – the first of victims and perpetrators who had been referred to the mediation process but had not participated in it, and the second of victims and perpetrators who had not been referred for mediation in the same jurisdiction as the mediation sample and who were matched by age, race, gender and criminality. More than 100,000 minors were in prison in U.S. youth facilities in 1998. A juvenile court may admit an offender to a public school, ranch, private treatment facility or juvenile prison. Schools of education exist in every state except Massachusetts, which abolished them in the 1970s. Most are holding serious offenders.
Almost all of them are managed and controlled by the state. To better treat violent youth, some states have created safer facilities called juvenile detention centers. Not all young people go to detention centres. Some are housed in adult prisons. The mix of adolescents and adults in adult prisons is considered unfair and remains a problem. Since the 1970s, juvenile justice has sought to house minors in separate facilities in order to protect them from the crimogenous influences (those that tend to produce crimes or criminals) of older adult offenders. The removal of children from prisons is an ongoing reform initiative. The Juvenile Justice and Prevention of Juvenile Delinquency Act 1974 requires that offenders with status should not be subject to juvenile justice. It also prescribes the detention and imprisonment of juvenile offenders in institutions for separate adults. (Note that the two main points of the law must be understood independently. Remove minors who have committed status-related offences from the juvenile justice system and remove most juvenile offenders from adult prisons.) Legal Exclusion. Some crimes are excluded from juvenile justice by law in 28 states.
The laws stipulate that a child who has reached a certain age and is charged with a certain crime will be charged as an adult in criminal court. All proceedings against the minor are conducted before the criminal court in the same way as if the offence had been committed by an adult. These laws focus on the nature of the crime and not on the background or needs of the perpetrator. Some states exclude only the most serious crimes, while others exclude age-based crimes. For example, in New Mexico, a child who is at least 15 years old and charged with first-degree murder is excluded from juvenile justice. Mississippi excludes all crimes committed by minors as young as 17. Offenses excluded by Indiana include the offense of carrying a handgun without a license. In some States, the focus is not so much on the type of crime and the age of the minor as on the previous juvenile offence. Arizona excludes any crime committed by a minor who is at least 15 years of age, if the minor has already been convicted of two or more crimes that would have been crimes if committed by an adult (Griffin et al., 1998).
Since the 1990s, juvenile delinquency rates have steadily declined, but the harsh sentences of the 1990s remain in many state laws. With this change, important distinctive and rehabilitative approaches to the juvenile justice system to the more serious consequences associated with the involvement of the criminal justice system have been lost. Traditionally, youth files could be sealed or deleted after a certain amount of time without offense. These provisions allowed young people who had been successfully rehabilitated to delete their files, so that the procedure was effectively treated as if it had never taken place (, 1985). Recent changes to state laws have extended the time limit before records can be sealed or prohibited the sealing of records for certain crimes. By the end of 1997, 25 States had made such changes (Torbet and Szymanski, 1998). Petrosino and colleagues conducted a systematic review of evaluations of deterrence programs such as Scared Straight, in which minors who have been in contact with the juvenile justice system are exposed to prison life and adult inmates. None of the nine assessments in which adolescents were randomly assigned to treatment or control groups found a positive effect on future crime. Seven of the studies found that the effects of the program were harmful, meaning that adolescents in treatment were more likely to commit additional delinquent acts than those in the control group who had not received treatment. In 1970, the Supreme Court raised the standard of proof required in juvenile courts to the standard of adult criminal courts.
In Winship (397 U.S. 358), the court required that minors accused of indictable offences be “beyond any doubt” proven that they had committed them. Prior to this decision, no constitutional decision required more than the less stringent civil standard of “preponderance of evidence.” The police have enormous discretion in the treatment of juvenile offenders. You have the following options: In a number of states, changes in transfer and sentencing laws have led to changes in correctional laws and bylaws.