Essay On Juvenile Justice System

The data for this project was collected by administering an anonymous survey to incarcerated juveniles at (name of facility), the (name) receiving center and at the NAACP office in Sacramento, California. The survey asked for gender and parental status (incarcerated versus not incarcerated). Participants were given a paper survey and a pencil to complete the survey. See Appendix for a copy of the survey.

In today's society juveniles are being tried in adult courts, given the death penalty, and sent to prison. Should fourteen-year olds accused of murder or rape automatically be tried as adults? Should six-teen year olds and seven-teen year olds tried in adult courts be forced to serve time in adult prisons, where they are more likely to be sexually assaulted and to become repeat offenders. How much discretion should a judge have in deciding the fate of a juvenile accused of a crime - serious, violent, or otherwise? The juvenile crime rate that was so alarming a few years ago has begun to fall - juvenile felony arrest rates in California have declined by more than forty percent in the last twenty years. While

The juvenile justice system is a foundation in society that is granted certain powers and responsibilities. It faces several different tasks, among the most important is maintaining order and preserving constitutional rights. When a juvenile is arrested and charged with committing a crime there are many different factors that will come in to play during the course of his arrest, trial, conviction, sentencing, and rehabilitation process. This paper examines the Juvenile Justice System’s court process in the State of New Jersey and the State of California.

Juveniles at CCJTDC are also not given the opportunity to exercise the third central human capability. It is evident they do not have the ability to move freely from place to place, and as mentioned before, are not secure against violent assault, including but not limited to sexual assault. One can argue that the general public is not guaranteed safety, and question why deviant misbehaved children should be protected from it. Although it is true children that have violated the law should not be rewarded, it is troubling for this to occur in a government run center. America is not a nation that supports abusive government authoritative figures over its people. Even given the circumstances, human dignity must still be maintained. The promotion

When it comes to kids, we tend to baby them. We organize their lives and set limits on everything. If they want to do something outside those limits we tell them they are not old enough or they have not experienced enough of the world yet. After all, what can they possibly know about love, major decisions, and what is best for them? Yet somehow, despite all this, when they commit a crime we turn into hypocrites. Magically, they are geniuses who know everything about the world. In society’s eyes, they are no longer a child, but a monster.

The main reason for having the two different justice systems is that children cannot be held to the same punishment levels as an adult. Even though a child has committed the same crime an adult may commit, not every child has a mental understanding to make mature adult like decisions. The juvenile

The juvenile justice system was subject to a lot of corruption and civil rights violations in its early stages. Juveniles did not have the same rights as adults and could be forced into terrible living or working conditions. With no child labor laws, delinquent juveniles could be sentenced to forced labor in factories or to houses of refuge. With the ruling of Ex Parte Crouse, the state took ultimate responsibility of children and send them to these institutions, even against the will of the parents. Some of these institutions, such as houses of refuge may have started with good intention, but they ultimately led to rampart corruption and abuse of juveniles.

“The juvenile justice system was first created in the late 1800s to reform United States policies on how to handle youth offenders. Since that time, a number of reforms - aimed at both protecting the "due process of law" rights of youth, and creating an aversion toward jail among the young - have made the juvenile justice system more comparable to the adult system, which is a shift from the United States’ original intent (2008,Lawyer Shop.com).” The

Not all states think that the juvenile justice system is persistent in rehabilitation into changing the child’s behavior. In a nationwide height of delinquent behavior in late 1980’s and early 1990’s, some states adopted a “get tough” policy on crime. Considering the fact that juveniles needed to experience the dangers and probable abuses ascribed to incarceration with adult offenders in the criminal justice system. However, when this is being regulated into the youth all they are seeing is negative aspects that may not even fear them. They are so use to crime and looking at more crime within itself in the criminal justice system is just another reality of what is set into their future.

There are three ways cases are sent to adult court, there is concurrent jurisdiction where certain cases can be tried in either juvenile or adult court, statutory exclusion, where certain offenses are automatically tried in adult court and judicial waiver where a hearing is held to decide whether the case will be transferred (Seigel & Welsh, 2011). While the process does differ from State to State there are some basic guidelines “…states that have transfer hearings provide a legitimate transfer hearing, sufficient notice to the child’s family and defense attorney, the right to counsel, and a statement of the reason for the court order regarding transfer” Seigel & Welsh, 2011).

The American criminal justice system is comprised of criminal courts, correctional facilities, and law enforcement officials. Each of these components also make up the juvenile justice system but the operations of each differs with juveniles than with adults who are suspected of committing criminal acts. A juvenile offender is an individual under a certain age who is suspected of having committed a crime or a status offense. A status offense is an offense that if committed by an adult, would be legal or acceptable. Examples of status offenses are truancy, under aged consumption of alcoholic beverages, and running away from home. Law enforcement officials use their discretion when determining how to pursue status offenses involving

Juvenile justice system deal with three types of case; Delinquents, status offenders, neglected, abused or dependent youth. Over the years, many states have established family courts to deal with offenders and cases with the status of neglect. Throughout the years, there has always been some type of tension between police and young offenders. In my personal opinion, I think this comes from the music that the youth listens to. Most state statues provide some guidance for arrest procedures. As an officer, you have the discretion in deciding when to arrest juvenile offenders.

Although based on the adult criminal justice system, the juvenile justice process works differently. Juveniles can end up in court by way of arrest, truancy or for curfew violations or running away. A youth may also be referred to the juvenile court system by school officials or a parent or guardian for being continuously disobedient. The juvenile justice process involves several different steps including intake, detention, adjudication, disposition and aftercare following release from a juvenile correctional facility. In this paper we will breakdown the numerous steps involved in the juvenile justice process as well as compared some

Within this paper the writer will be discuss the public policy on Juvenile Justice Reform. Within the paper the writer will describe the issue, tell if the policy a regulatory or legislative-initiated policy, and who initiated the issue or policy. Also the writer will discuss is there a constitutional issue, and how will the issue or policy affect the community, the accused, and the victims and a conclusion at the end of the paper.

Serious crimes such as murder, burglary and rape have raised questions as to whether the young offenders should face severe punitive treatment or the normal punitive measures in juvenile courts. Many would prefer the juveniles given harsh punishment in order to discourage other young people from engaging in similar activities and to serve as a lesson to these particular offenders. However, results from previous studies indicate such punitive measures were neither successful nor morally acceptable. Instead, the solutions achieved have unfairly treated the youths and compromised the society status (Kristin, page 1).