CJUS 310
Lecture Notes: Juvenile Issues
CHILDHOOD AND DELINQUENCY
The study of delinquency is concerned with the nature and extent of the criminal behavior of youths, the causes of youthful law violations, the legal rights of juveniles, and prevention and treatment. The problems of American youths have become an important subject of academic study. Many children live in poverty, have inadequate health care, and suffer family problems. Kids today are also at risk from threats that are on the internet, ranging from cyberbullying to sexting. Furthermore, adolescence is a time of taking risks, which can get kids into trouble with the law.
Our modern conception of a separate status for children is quite different from the past. Previously, relationships between children and parents were remote. Punishment was severe, and children were expected to take on adult roles early in their lives. The seventeenth century saw greater recognition of the needs of children. In Great Britain, the chancery court movement, Poor Laws, and apprenticeship programs helped reinforce the idea of children as a distinct social group. In colonial America, many of the characteristics of English family living were adopted. In the nineteenth century, delinquent and runaway children were treated no differently than criminal defendants. During this time, however, increased support for the parens patriae concept resulted in steps to reduce the responsibility of children under the criminal law.
The concept of delinquency was developed in the early twentieth century. Before that time, criminal youths and adults were treated in almost the same fashion. A group of reformers, referred to as child savers, helped create a separate delinquency category to insulate juvenile offenders from the influence of adult criminals. The status of juvenile delinquency is still based on the parens patriae philosophy, which holds that children have the right to care and custody, and that if parents are not capable of providing that care, the state must step in to take control. Juvenile courts also have jurisdiction over noncriminal status offenders, whose offenses (truancy, running away, and sexual misconduct) are illegal only because of their minority status.
Some experts have called for an end to juvenile court control over status offenders, charging that it further stigmatizes already troubled youths. Some research indicates that status offenders are harmed by juvenile court processing. Other research indicates that status offenders and delinquents are quite similar. There has been a successful effort to separate status offenders from delinquents, and to maintain separate facilities for those who need to be placed in a shelter care program. Some jurisdictions have implemented curfew and parental laws, but so far there is little evidence that they work as intended. Research indicates that neither of these attempts at controlling youthful misbehavior works as planned. Consequently, the treatment of juveniles is an ongoing dilemma. Still uncertain is whether young law violators respond better to harsh punishments or to benevolent treatment.
OUTLINE:
The Risks and Rewards of Adolescence
There are now more than 75 million children in the United States under age 17, many of whom have multiple problems.
B. The problems of American society have had a significant effect on our nation’s youth.
Adolescence is a time of trial and uncertainty, a time when youths experience anxiety, humiliation, and mood swings.
During this time, the personality is still developing and is vulnerable to a host of external factors.
Adolescents undergo a period of rapid biological development.
E. Two hundred years ago, girls matured sexual at age 16, but today they do so at 12.5 years of age.
F. In later adolescence (ages 16 to 18), youths may experience a crisis that psychologist Erik Erikson described as a struggle between ego identity and role diffusion.
Ego identity is formed when youths develop a firm sense of who they are and what they stand for.
Role diffusion occurs when youths experience uncertainty and place themselves at the mercy of leaders who promise to give them a sense of identity they cannot mold for themselves.
Each year, about 11,000 teens lose their lives from illness but also from such unexpected and preventable events as motor vehicle accidents, homicide, and suicide.
4. Youths considered at risk to these damaging social, emotional, and physical outcomes are those who engage in dangerous conduct, such as drug abuse, alcohol use, and precocious sexuality.
5. At least 10 million American teens fall into the category of at-risk youths.
The Problem of Youth
Typically the most pressing problems facing American youth include:
1. Child poverty
2. Inadequate health care
3. Parental separation and divorce
4. Foster care system
5. Inadequate educational attainment
6. Abuse and neglect
7. Coping with the modern world
Teen Risk Taking
Child Poverty
Today, poverty is more prevalent than in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Between 14 and 16 million children in America are considered poor. Of these, 7 million children live in extreme poverty, which means living on less than $11,800 for a family of four.
Health Problems
Receiving adequate health care is another significant concern for American youth.
Only one in three children is physically active every day.
While most kids now have health care coverage of some sort, about 10 percent or 7.5 million youth do not.
Parental Separation and Divorce
It is estimated that 40 to 50 percent of first marriages in the U.S. end in divorce.
Second marriage failure rate is 60-67 percent, and third marriages fail at a rate of 73-74 percent.
Foster Care System
Among the 3 million children (4 percent of all U.S. children) not living with either parent, 54 percent (1.7 million) live with grandparents, 21 percent live with other relatives only, and 24 percent live with nonrelatives.
There are still about 400,000 kids in foster care, many of them entered care before age 6.
Inadequate Education
About 60 percent of fourth and eighth graders in public schools cannot read at grade level.
Only 78 percent of public school students graduated from high school in four years.
One in 3 black students and 3 in 10 Hispanic and Native American/Alaska Native students did not graduate from high in the past four years.
More than 1 in 6 black students received at least one out-of-school suspension, compared to 1 in 50 Asian/Pacific Islander students and 1 in 20 white students.
Adults 25 years of age and older with less than a high school diploma earn 30 percent less than those who have earned a high school diploma.
Child Abuse and Neglect
Up to 700,000 children are legally abused each year.
Child abuse is defined as any act (or failure to act) by a parent or caregiver who is responsible for the child’s welfare that results in imminent risk or serious harm to a child’s health and welfare due to physical, emotional, or sexual abuse.
Social Media and the Internet
Cyberbullying: willful and repeated harm inflicted through the medium of electronic text.
A bully can send harassing emails or instant messages; post obscene, insulting, and slanderous messages on social networking sites; develop websites to promote and disseminate defamatory content; or send harassing text messages via cell phone.
One study found that about 25 percent of students from nearly 100 different schools throughout the United States have been cyberbullied at some point in their lifetimes.
Cyberstalking refers to the use of the Internet, email, or other electronic communications devices to stalk another person.
Sexting is sending sexually explicit photos, images, text messages, or emails via a cell phone or other mobile device.
Is There Reason for Hope?
Children are polarized into two distinct economic groups: affluent and poor.
Teenage birthrates have declined especially among African American girls.
Fewer children with health risks are being born today than in 1990.
Education is still a problem area; however, more parents are reading to their children and more kids are going to college.
College enrollment is now about 21 million.
There are indications that youngsters are rejecting hard drugs.
Fewer kids are using heroin and crack cocaine.
The number of kids smoking cigarettes has declined.
Juvenile Delinquency
The problems of youth in modern society have long been associated with juvenile delinquency.
The study of juvenile delinquency is important because of the damage suffered by its victims and the problems faced by its perpetrators.
Juvenile delinquency is the participation in illegal behavior by a minor who falls under a statutory age limit.
About 1.7 million youths under age eighteen are arrested each year for crimes ranging from loitering to murder.
More than 800 thousand youths belong to street gangs.
Chronic juvenile offenders, chronic delinquent offenders, or chronic recidivists are considered a serious social problem.
The study of delinquency involves analyzing the juvenile justice system from law enforcement to the courts to the correctional agencies designed to treat youthful offenders.
The Development of Childhood
A. Treating children as a distinct social group with special needs and behaviors is a relatively new concept.
B. During the Middle Ages, the concept of childhood as we know it today did not exist.
C. In the paternalistic family of the time, the father exercised complete control over his wife and children. Severe physical punishment was common.
D. Custom and Practice in the Middle Ages
1. During the Middle Ages, as soon as they were physically capable, children of all classes were expected to take on adult roles.
2. Boys learned farming or a skilled trade such as masonry or metalworking; girls aided in food preparation or household maintenance.
3. In many families, newborns were handed over to wet nurses who fed and cared for them during the first two years of life.
E. The Development of Concern for Children
1. The development of concern for children and the recognition of children’s rights began in seventeenth and eighteenth century England.
2. Changes in family structure began to take place and attention started to be given to children’s independent needs and interests.
3. Poor laws allowed destitute or neglected children to be placed as servants in the homes of the affluent.
4. The apprenticeship movement placed children in the care of adults who trained them in specific skills.
5. Chancery courts were established to protect property rights and seek equitable solutions to disputes and conflicts.
6. Parens patriae is a Latin phrase that refers to the role of the king as the father of his country. It establishes his right to intervene in the lives of the children in his realm.
F. Childhood in America
Colonists themselves produced illegitimate, neglected, and delinquent children.
Virginia in 1646 passed legislation requiring poor and independent children to serve apprenticeships.
Massachusetts and Connecticut followed in 1673 with similar legislation.
It was also possible, as in England, for parents to voluntarily apprentice their children to a master for care and training.
G. Controlling Children
1. In the United States, as in England, moral discipline was rigidly enforced.
2. Stubbornchild laws were passed that required children to obey their parents.
Developing Juvenile Justice
Until the twentieth century, little distinction was made between adult and juvenile offenders.
Children were treated with extreme cruelty at home, at school, and by the law.
2. Groups known as child savers were formed, which created community programs to service needy children and to lobby for a separate legal status for children.
Juvenile Justice in the Nineteenth Century
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, delinquent, neglected, and runaway children in the United States were treated in the same way as adult criminal offenders
During the early nineteenth century, various pieces of legislation were introduced to humanize criminal procedures for children
Several events led to reforms and nourished the eventual development of the juvenile justice system.
Urbanization
Urbanization gave rise to increased numbers of young people at risk, who overwhelmed the existing system of work and training.
The Child-Saving Movement
The problems generated by urban growth sparked interest in the welfare of the “new” Americans, whose arrival fueled this expansion.
2. Groups concerned with the plight of poor children began to form focusing on extending government control over youthful activities (drinking, vagrancy, and delinquency) that had previously been left to private or family control. These activists became known as child savers.
3. The most prominent care facilities was known as the House of Refuge, which opened in New York in 1825.
4. There is continued debate over the true objectives of the early child savers.
Development of Juvenile Intuitions
1. The child savers influenced state and local governments to create institutions, called reform schools, devoted to the care of vagrant and delinquent youths.
2. New York philanthropist Charles Loring Brace helped develop the Children’s Aid Society in 1853.
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (SPCC)
Established in New York in 1874
2. Leaders of the SPCCs were concerned that abused boys would become lower-class criminals and that mistreated young girls might become sexually promiscuous women.
The Illinois Juvenile Court Act and Its Legacy
1. The principles motivating the Illinois reformers were:
Children should not be held as accountable as adult transgressors.
The objective of the juvenile justice system is to treat and rehabilitate rather than punish.
Disposition should be predicated on analysis of the youth’s special circumstances and needs.
The system should avoid the trappings of the adult criminal process with all its confusing rules and procedures.
2. The legislation allowed children to be committed to institutions and reform programs under the control of the state.
3. Programs of all kinds, including individualized counseling and institutional care, were used to cure juvenile criminality.
Reforming the System
Reform efforts, begun in earnest in the 1960s, changed the face of the juvenile justice system.
In the 1960s and 1970s, the U.S. Supreme Court established that juveniles had the same rights as adults in important areas of trial process, including the right to confront witnesses, notice of charges, and the right to counsel.
3. Title I of this law established the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration (LEAA) to provide federal funds for improving the adult and juvenile justice systems.
4. Because crime continued to receive much publicity, a second effort called the National Advisory Commission on Criminal Justice Standards and Goals was established in 1973 by the Nixon administration.
In 1980, the LEAA was phased out, and the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) became an independent agency in the Department of Justice.
Delinquency and Parens Patriae
The designation delinquent became popular at the onset of the twentieth century when the first separate juvenile courts were instituted.
2. Minors who engaged in illegal behavior were viewed as victims of improper care at home.
3. The state should act in the best interests of the child and children should be given the care necessary to control their wayward behavior as opposed to being punished.
The Current Legal Status of Delinquency
Today, the legal status of juvenile delinquent refers to a minor child who has been found to have violated the penal code.
2. Most states define minor child as an individual who falls under a statutory age limit, most commonly until their eighteenth birthday.
3. Adults are tried in court; children are adjudicated. Adults can be punished; children are treated.
4. Each state defines juvenile delinquency differently, setting its own age limits and boundaries and the federal government also has a delinquency category.
Legal Responsibility of Youths
Two types of law: criminal law and civil law.
2. Juvenile delinquency falls somewhere between criminal and civil law.
3. Under parens patriae, delinquent acts are not considered criminal violations.
4. The legal action against them is similar (though not identical) to a civil action that, in an ideal situation, is based on their need for treatment.
5. Delinquent behavior is treated more leniently than adult misbehavior, because the law considers juveniles to be less responsible for their behavior than adults.
6. DNA collection, a tool that has become common in the adult justice system, is now routinely applied to juvenile offenders.
7. Juveniles offenders also have the same legal protections conferred on adults accused of criminal offenses including the right to consult an attorney, to be free from self-incrimination, and to protected from illegal searches and seizures.
Is There a Bright Line Between Juveniles and Adults?
1. There is much debate whether adolescents who commit serious crimes should be treated equally as adults.
2. Roper v. Simons
3. Miller v. Alabama
4. The Supreme Court has noted the immaturity of juvenile offenders, the more serious juvenile offenders can be treated in a manner similar to adults.
VI. Status Offenders
Conduct that is illegal only because the child is underage:
Child in need of supervision
Unruly child
Incorrigible child
Minor in need of supervision
Each year, approximately 115,000 youths are sent to juvenile court as status offenders.
Origins of the Status Offense Concept
It was common practice early in the nation’s history to place disobedient or runway youth sin orphan asylums, residential homes, or house of refuge.
There is now a separate status offense category in every state jurisdiction, known respectively as children, minors, persons, youths, or juveniles in need of supervision (CHINS, MINS, PINS,YINS, or JINS).
The Status Offender in the Juvenile Justice System
Separate status offense categories may avoid some of the stigma associated with the delinquency label, but they have little effect on treatment.
May see little difference between the treatment they receive and the treatment of delinquent offenders
Reforming the Treatment of Status Offenders
1. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (1974)
2. Authorized to distribute funding to states to improve services and development of alternative procedural methods
3. Placed non-serious cases in community based treatment programs as opposed to correctional facilities
The Effects of Reform
1. A number of states have changed the way they handle status offense cases. Some treat them as neglected or dependent children giving protective services the primary responsibility for their care.
The Future of the Status Offense Concept
Changes in the treatment of status offenders reflect the current attitude toward children who violate the law.
Some juvenile court judges believe that reducing judicial authority over children will limit juvenile court jurisdiction to hardcore offenders and constrain its ability to help youths before they commit serious antisocial acts
3. Other experts find status offense laws are still too draconian, resulting in nearly 10,000 youth being confined annually for status offenses.
Curfews
1. One way jurisdictions have attempted to maintain greater control over wayward youth has been the implementation of curfew laws.
2. Some research has found that after curfews were implemented victimization increased significantly during the hours that curfew are not in effect.
3. Other studies have found that strict enforcement of curfew laws actually increases juvenile crime rates.
I. Disciplining Parents
1. Since the early twenthieth century, there have been laws aimed at disciplining parents for contributing to the delinquency of a minor.
2. All states make it either mandatory or discretionary for the juvenile court to require a parent or guardian to pay at least part of the support costs for a child who is adjudicated delinquent and placed out of the home.
3. Parent liability laws exist and fall into three categories:
a) Civil liability
b) Criminal liability
c) General involvement
4. A great deal of variation exists between states in regard to these laws.
THE NATURE AND EXTENT OF DELINQUENCY
There are a variety of ways to measure and record juvenile delinquency. The Federal Bureau of Investigation collects data from local law enforcement agencies and publishes them yearly in their Uniform Crime Report (UCR). The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) is a nationwide survey of victimization in the United States. Self-report surveys ask people to describe, in detail, their recent and lifetime participation in criminal activity.
Many serious crimes are not reported to police and therefore are not counted by the UCR. The NCVS may have problems due to victims’ misinterpretation of events, and underreporting due to the embarrassment of reporting crime to interviewers, fear of getting in trouble, or simply forgetting an incident. Self-report studies have problems because people may exaggerate their criminal acts, forget some of them, or be confused about what is being asked. These data sources show that crime rates peaked in 1991, when police recorded almost 15 million crimes. Since then, the number of delinquent acts has been in decline. Teenagers have extremely high crime rates. Crime experts view changes in the population age distribution as having the greatest influence on crime trends. There is general agreement that delinquency rates decline with age.
As a general rule, the crime rate follows the proportion of young males in the population. There is debate over the effect the economy has on crime rates. Drop in the delinquency rate has been linked to a strong economy. Some believe that a poor economy may actually help lower delinquency rates because it limits the opportunity kids have to commit crime. As the level of social problems increases—such as single-parent families, dropout rates, racial conflict, and teen pregnancies—so do delinquency rates. Racial conflict may also increase delinquency rates. Minority youth are overrepresented in the delinquency rate, especially for violent crime.
Some experts believe that adolescent crime is a lower-class phenomenon, whereas others see it throughout the social structure. Some experts believe this phenomenon is universal, whereas others believe a small group of offenders persist in crime at a high rate. The age–crime relationship has spurred research on the nature of delinquency over the life course.
Delinquency data shows the existence of a chronic persistent offender, who begins his or her offending career early in life, and persists as an adult. Marvin Wolfgang and his colleagues identified chronic offenders in a series of cohort studies conducted in Philadelphia. Early involvement in criminal activity, relatively low intellectual development, and parental drug involvement have been linked to later chronic offending. Measurable problems in learning and motor skills, cognitive abilities, family relations, and other areas also predict chronicity. Apprehension and punishment seem to have little effect on offending behavior.
Teenagers are much more likely to become victims of crime than are people in other age groups. A majority of teens have been victimized by other teens, whereas victims age 20 and over identified their attackers as being 21 or older. Teen victimization is intraracial. White teenagers tend to be victimized by white teens, and African American teenagers tend to be victimized by African American teens.
OUTLINE:
I. Measuring Delinquency
Uniform Crime Report
Each year, the FBI compiles information gathered by police department on the number of criminal acts reported by citizens and the number of persons arrested.
2. This information is published in the annual Uniform Crime Report (UCR). More than seventeen thousand police departments participate.
Part I offenses include homicide and non-neglect manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny, arson, and motor vehicle theft.
Part II offenses include vandalism, liquor law violations, and some drug related offenses.
6. Each month, law enforcement agencies report on crimes cleared.
When at least one person is arrested, charged, and turned over for prosecution.
By exceptional means, offender leaves the country.
B. Validity of the Uniform Crime Report
Less than half of all victims report the crime to police.
Arrest data counts only adolescents who have been caught.
Measuring Delinquency with Survey Research
Surveys typically involve sampling.
Population is defined as an entire group that has similar characteristics.
National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS)
National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), a comprehensive, nationwide survey of victimization in the United States conducted annually by the U.S. Census Bureau for the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS). People are asked about their attitudes, beliefs, and values, as well as their experiences with crime and victimization.
2. The greatest advantage of the NCVS over official data sources such as the UCR is that it can estimate the total amount of annual crimes, not just those that are reported to police.
The validity of the NCVS has some methodological problems, e.g., over reporting, underreporting, inability to record the personal criminal activity of those interviews, sampling errors, and inadequate question format that invalidates responses.
Self-Report Surveys
1. Another survey tool commonly used to measure extent of delinquency
Research approach that requires subjects to reveal their own participation
Given in groups and responses are anonymous
4. Most focus on juvenile delinquency and youth crime
F. Validity
Some adolescents may exaggerate their criminal acts.
Some contain overabundance of trivial offenses.
G. Evaluating the Primary Data Sources
1. Each source of crime data has strengths and weaknesses.
H. Alternative Measures of Delinquent Behavior
II. Crime Trends in the United States
The homicide rate, which had actually declined from the 1930s to the 1960s, also began a sharp increase that continued through the 1970s; by 1991, police recorded about 15 million crimes.
Since then, the number of crimes has been in decline; about 10 million crimes are now being reported, a drop of more than 5 million since the 1991 peak, despite a boost of more than 50 million people in the general population.
Theft offenses have also been in decline.
Delinquency Arrest Trends
Juveniles are responsible for about 11 perfect of the Part I violent crime
arrests and about 19 percent of the property crime arrests.
Offenders (sex, approximate age, and victim-offender relationship)
3. While juvenile offenders continue to be overrepresented in the crime rate, the number and rate of juvenile offenses and offenders suffering arrest have been in a decade-long decline.
E. Victimization Trends
1. Like the UCR data, NCVS data show that criminal victimizations have declined significantly during the past 30 years
2. In 1973, an estimated 44 million victimizations were recorded, far higher than today; since 1993, the rate of violent victimization has declined about 80 percent.
F. Self-Reported Patterns and Trends
1. Unrecorded delinquent acts are referred to as the dark figures of crime.
2. A surprising number of typical teenagers reported involvement in serious criminal behavior.
3. If the MTF data are accurate, the juvenile crime problem is much greater than official statistics would lead us to believe.
What the Future Holds
1. It is possible that if current population trends persist juvenile crime may soon begin to increase, although not all agree.
Correlates of Delinquency
The Time and Place of Delinquency
Most delinquent acts occur during the warm summer months of July and
August.
There are also geographic differences in the incidence of delinquent behaviors.
Gender and Delinquency
With a few exceptions, males are significantly more delinquent than
females.
Shaping Teen Crime Trends
Race and Delinquency
There are approximately 40 million European American and 10 million
African American youths ages 5 to 17, a ratio of about four to one. Yet racial minorities are disproportionately represented in the arrest statistics.
2. In 2013, 63 percent of all persons arrested were white, 34 percent were black, and the remaining 3 percent were of other races.
3. Institutional bias – research shows that minority group members are more likely to be formally stopped, searched, and arrested than European American youths.
4. Institutional bias creates a cycle of hostility: young black men see their experience with police as unfair or degrading; they approach future encounters with preexisting hostility.
5. According to the racial threat theory, as the size of the African American population increases, the perceived threat to the European American population increases, resulting in a greater amount of social control imposed against African Americans by police.
6. According to the structural bias model, if differences in the delinquency rate are valid, then their source can be traced to the discrimination that pervades American society, resulting in race-based economic and social disparity that impacts crime and delinquency.
Social Class and Delinquency
1. Self-report data do in fact show that kids in all levels of society and in all social classes commit crime.
2. The lure of crime, drug dealing, and gang life is irresistible for kids living in a deteriorated neighborhood, with substandard housing and schools, and where the opportunity for legitimate advancement is limited or nonexistent.
Age and Delinquency
It is generally believed that age is inversely related to criminality: as people age, the likelihood that they will commit crime declines.
2. The elderly are responsible for a very small portion of the arrest statistics known as the aging-out process.
3. The younger people are when they get involved in a crime, the age of onset, the more likely they are to commit more crimes.
4. Although there is certainly disagreement about the nature of the aging-out process, there is no question that people commit less crime as they grow older.
Chronic Offending: Careers in Delinquency
The association between early onset and high-rate persistent offending has been demonstrated in samples drawn from a variety of cultures, time periods, and offender types.
Delinquency in a Birth Cohort
The concept of the chronic career offender is most closely associated with the research efforts of Marvin Wolfgang.
2. The most significant discovery of Wolfgang and his associates was that of the so-called chronic offender. The repeaters could be further categorized as non-chronic recidivists and chronic recidivists.
Stability in Crime: from Delinquent to Criminal
What Causes Chronic Offending?
Research indicates that chronic offenders suffer from a number of personal, environmental, social, and developmental deficits.
Youths who have long juvenile records will most likely continue their offending careers into adulthood.
Policy Implications
Efforts to chart the life cycle of crime and delinquency will have a major influence on both theory and policy.
Youths who have long juvenile records will most likely continue their offending careers into adulthood.
Juvenile Victimization
Teens are much more likely to become the victims of crime than citizen in other age groups.
The Victims and Their Criminals
Often victimized by their peers
Victimized by groups of offenders
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