A Reflective Comparison of the Juvenile Criminal Justice System v. the Adult Criminal Justice System
11 July 2006
by Michelle Calderon, staff writer for AnaiRhoads.org
AnaiRhoads.org -
People in modern society take for granted the basic rights and principles upheld by the law today providing protection from abuse and harm from others. However, life was harder in the past. Certainly, the medicinal options, educational opportunities and privileges, means of earning a living, commercialized products and services, government and community programs, and many such others were not available then as it is now to provide easier way of living. The evolution of reforms through laws and policies has certainly changed society’s moral standards or reflect them (which ever great deal of thought to the rights of all citizens. Today, citizens of the world live in a much better standard way of living than in the past. This surely has accounted for the means and ways to create opportunities for better humanitarian lifestyles.
As accounted for the era of harder living, not only were adults experiencing hard lives but the treatment of children was probably worse. First of all, history accounts for the high mortality rates in infants. This played a major role in parents not forming special bonds with their children due to the reality that these children may not face adulthood. (Steckel, 1944). Additionally, prior to the 1700’s, and the era of the Dark ages, children were viewed as non-persons. Not only did they not receive any special treatment, but recognition. Discipline had a different meaning. In today’s standards, the strict disciplining can constitute abuse. Even worse were the consequences of being considered a problem child.
Problem children can mean many things: delinquents, criminals, truants, orphans, runaways, and many other things that are considered out of the norm of a healthy environment that poses the burden on society sanctions. Society had to deal with them. As harsh as it maybe, there were not much distinction from segregating these problem children from adult criminals.
As a result, many reformers took the initiative, in what is considered the Progressive Era, to create policies as well as methods of detainment and punishment in dealing with problem children. Perhaps one of the most serious reforms included the treatment of serious child offenders. The juvenile justice system was created in the late 1800s to reform U.S. policies regarding youthful offenders. This progressive era was also responsible for the women’s suffragist movement and was considered a time of newly awareness in humanity. Certainly, the Age of Enlightenment (an era culminating in a new beginning) can also be considered a factor in the change in societal thinking. (Age of Enlightenment, 2006). Again, through all changes, the fact that society has better means of standard of living can be attributed to this adjustment in realization for the special needs of children.
The first modern juvenile court was created in Chicago in 1899. The aim was to rehabilitate and apply the parens patriae concept of being surrogate parents to children in need of help as oppose to the harsh punishment that had been the long practice in dealing with them. Certainly the harsh treatment of children, government sanctions as well as the revelation that upbringing plays a part in moral values and healthy adulthood have given society good reasons to think of ways in correcting the problem. The question is when is it enough for the government to play surrogate parents? When do children need to be accountable for their actions?
Today, with more methods and newly formed ideas, these reforms are being questioned. Some say the juvenile justice system needs to be abolished and re-integrated back into the adult criminal justice system because it is not working. Perhaps, a comparison of the two systems needs to be looked into before administering any conclusions.
Today the juvenile justice system is a special separate system from the adult criminal courts. In some way the two have differences and in some ways they collide. Perhaps it is the collision and the differences that create controversies in sustaining or maintaining separating the treatment of juveniles from adult offender.
One of the first issues that need looking into is that of a status offender. First of all, a status offender is someone charged with an offense that would not be a crime if committed by an adult. Obviously, this term is exclusively for juveniles. Common examples are running away from home, inappropriate sexual behaviors, being truant from school, drinking alcohol or smoking before the legal age, and being beyond parental control. Laws aimed at preventing status offenses are more a conscientious of society in preventing future harm to children and the community and not just for disciplinary actions.
However, how does society and the criminal justice deal with status offenders? After all, many of these delinquent behaviors can be attributed to future criminality. For example, truancy has been linked to future involvement in crime. Therefore, status offenses may not be considered a serious crime needing incarceration, but its’ overall influence on further enhancing such behaviors into serious ones are a concern to law enforcement officials, policy makers, and society. To answer this question, society needs to look into the maturity level of children as well as life experiences. Cognitive levels of understanding, peer influences, family environment (including neglect and abuse), lack of education, and poor health and economic levels are all factors needing attention in deciding the future of juvenile treatments.
With some respect, what is being done about such cases are warnings, citations, and referrals to social service workers that make appropriate decisions about these children. Community-based treatment programs and prohibiting incarceration has been the known practice. Arrests can occur but long-term incarceration is not practiced. In certain cases, detention is needed for further processing. The social service may decide placement in healthier homes rather than furthering detention in institutions or other alternative facilities in hope of altering and enhancing living environments that could turn the child into better moral human beings. Programs such as drug rehabilitation centers, anger management, after care activities, furthering education as well as many others have been tools used to counter status offenders. In the long run, do these types of behavior in the long run lead to criminality? That is one of the basis of the parens patriae concept and a concern for the criminal justice system in general. Society is responsible for rearing children into the modern world with better means of coping with the reality of adulthood in hope they learn not to be involved in criminality. Family, friends, peers, the community, social workers, the justice system, and everyone in society play a role in rearing a child.
The Juvenile Justice System starts in many ways much like the Adult Criminal Justice System. Besides the status offenders mentioned or in lieu of them, law enforcement officials are even much more involved because it extends to criminal sanctions. As in adult offenders, law enforcement officials are given discretion over many aspects of the criminal justice process. Part of the thinking behind this reasoning has to do with the role police officers play in the matter. As in the adult arrest and investigation process, the officer involved are exposed to a variety of issues that sometime include their judgment surrounding family matters that may not entail criminal prosecution or interference. However, their roles in the juvenile process extend to the social service nature of the job which can entail involvement with other agencies such as social service agencies. The concept is aimed at helping needy children.
The arrest process obviously involves more serious offenders. Since discretion occurs at all levels of the criminal justice system, there needs to be serious reasons for the arrest to take place. Discretion exists in adult offenders but the parens partriae concept is not an issue. Although, there are data that can account for the discrepancies of minorities being arrested more than whites even in the juvenile proceedings, it seems the process of arrest seem to occur with more serious offenses and certainly pertains to the discretion of the arresting officer. (Juszkiewicz, 2006).
After the officer decides to take the delinquent child into custody, the decision is made in a juvenile court hearing. Here the process is similar to the preliminary (sometimes an indictment) bail hearing that adult criminals are entitled to where the reading of charges also occurs. However, adults have constitutional rights to bail, children do not. The juvenile court decides instead if the child can be released into the custody of parents, detain the child into the temporary custody of the state, or in restrictive facilities pending court decisions or transfer. There have been reforms on children’s rights to bail and some states do allow for bail for juvenile delinquents. (Cramer, 2005). Most states, still however, refuse juveniles the right to bail. Non-participating States argue that juvenile proceedings are civil, not criminal, and that detention is rehabilitative, not punitive. In addition, States argue that “juveniles do not need a constitutional right to bail because statutory provisions allow children to be released into parental custody” (Siegal, 2002, p. 320). In cases where transfers are given, bails are entitled. (Findlaw, 2006).
However, ordinarily, those that are inclined to runaway are detained. Typically, these detained children have a maximum of 24 hours before a formal petition can be drawn. In order to detain a child, there must be clear evidence of probable cause that the child has committed the offense being charged and that the chances of fleeing is high (Siegal, 2002, p. 318). The concept applies to adult cases as well but it seems adults have more say in the bail process due to life experiences, family, obligations, work history as well as other factors not applying with juveniles.
In the indictment process, similar to both justice systems: once the juvenile has plead not guilty, the trial is called the Jurisdictional Hearing for juveniles and must be held within 15 days, up to 30 days if the juvenile is not in custody. Despite the speedy right to trial, adult criminal proceedings can take up much longer time due to many factors: change of venue, new motion for new evidence as well as many other factors.
One major difference is that juvenile courts are not held before jurors. Juveniles are not entitled to jury trials. The actual court proceedings held in juvenile courts are called adjucatory hearing where the judge makes the final decision. The juvenile court proceedings are also generally closed to the public unlike adult court proceedings. The findings or results of these juvenile court hearings are called a disposition, which is the same for adult courts. Types of dispositions result in “dismissal, a fine, probation, treatment programs and institutionalization” (Siegal, 2002, p. 341). The goal again of the juvenile system is rehabilitation and treatment. Therefore, the least restrictive alternative has been considered by many courts.
One other significant difference between juvenile court and adult court is the right to a jury trial. In order for a jury trial to occur in juvenile cases, the case must be transferred or appealed to a Circuit Court.
A major problem in juvenile justice is placing youths in adult jails. Many cities are not equipped to handle the problems of detaining juveniles. In general, this is usually done in rural areas where no other facility exists. “Almost all experts agree that placing children under the age of 18 in any type of jail facility should be prohibited because youngsters can easily be victimized by other inmates and staff, be forced to live in squalid conditions, and be subject to physical and sexual abuse” (Siegal, 2002, p. 320). With the high rates of suicide and chances of being victimized, it seems the youths of society are at a high risk being placed with adult criminals.
Until a few years ago, placing juveniles in adult facilities was common. Again, more recent reforms and funding have played an effort in changing this situation. In 1989, the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act ( JJDPA) of 1974 was amended to require that the states remove all juveniles from adult jails and lockups. In addition, the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974 prohibit the placement of status offenders in secure detention facilities. Not all states have completed accomplishing this goal.
Today, more rights are given to juvenile delinquents than in the past. With recent court rulings, children have due process rights in appointed attorneys in both criminal proceedings as well as custody interrogations. The Miranda rights are applied but vary per State in involvement of parental consent and/or participation in the process.
As in the adult criminal justice system, the intake process plays a major role in decision-making. The probation/parole officer, alternative program directors, both attorneys (defense as well as prosecutor) as well as the judge makes efforts to come up with a solution. In adult cases, where crimes charge can qualify for plea bargaining, juvenile crimes can result in many other things as well. The interview process will take into consideration family factors, social involvement, church (if any), education level, job skills and/or condition, history of criminality, IQ level, psychological factors (if any) and many other such issues in making opinions about the juvenile/adult in the criminal system. As in many adult cases, some of these issues can determine if the child can be detained at alternative programs, some dismissed, some proceeded to the juvenile court, and even some disturbing percentage go through the waivering process (transferred to adult courts). The product is a disposition: the term used for the end-result of the case. However, there are more differences.
Important in the outcome (disposition) is a predisposition report which stresses the importance of the intake process. Unlike the adult criminal courts where the question raised in the proceedings is whether the defendant is guilty or innocence, the respondent in juvenile cases is found to be delinquent beyond a reasonable doubt.
In rare cases, judges decided which youth were so violent or such chronic offenders that they were "not amenable to treatment" in the juvenile court. In such cases the jurisdiction of the juvenile court was "waived" and the youth were transferred to adult criminal court. Some states had legislation that automatically excluded youth charged with the most serious offenses, notably murder, from juvenile court jurisdiction.
An important issue to compare between the two courts is plea bargaining. In adult courts, many cases result in plea bargaining for several reasons: the perception of lenier sentencing, admission or positive evidence in guilt as well as lesser costs involved in the proceedings. In most cases involving juveniles, the case involves the juvenile court system. Many times the respondent pleads guilty of the charges. The choice of plea bargaining is on the table as well as in adult offender.
In recent years, the get tough policy philosophy of policy makers and citizens tired of repeat juvenile offenders, have made changes in the sentencing structure of the juvenile system. Many feel that children are committing more violent crimes and that the juvenile system as it stands is not working at prevention. As a result, more juveniles have been referred (waived or transferred) to adult courts. Some states have even passed laws that use blended sentencing: that is, he or she is adjudicated as a delinquent and sentenced as an adult at the same time, for the same offense. “The adult sentence is suspended while the youth has the opportunity to successfully complete the conditions of the juvenile disposition” (Walcott, 2006). In fact, laws are moving away from the indeterminate sentencing structure that seems to be lenient in punishment and more towards determinate forms of disposition. Early release does not seem effective in rehabilitating youth offenders. This perception is very similar as well for adult criminals and policies for adult criminal sanctioning have changed over the years to reflect those issues.
Shockingly, the use of the death penalty has been implemented to children as young as 16 years of age to reflect on the get tough policy. Children criminals threaten society in many ways. Not only do citizens find the thought of children committing adult crimes abhorring but the penalties do not seem to match the actions made by these delinquents. People neither expect children to be criminals nor expect crimes to be committed by children. The unforeseen intersection between childhood and criminality creates a dilemma that most people find difficult to resolve. Hence, the issue of abolishing juvenile criminal courts has been proposed to reflect more appropriate punishment for criminal actions committed by juveniles that coincide with adult crimes.
In summary of the comparison between the two, children have been given more rights recently with reforms, including appointed attorneys as well as protection from Constitutional rights. Certainly, the due process rights as well as the rights to unreasonable searches and seizures have been a recent development that has given more rights to children than has been in the past. States do vary in the process of interrogation. While all agree in the appropriateness of the Miranda rights, the overall consensus as far as what age can be considered appropriate to make certain legal decisions vary. As stated above, the maturity level of individuals varies and it certainly pertains not only to experience but to education as well as IQ level. The court has ruled in the overall totality of the circumstances in many cases. While it may be obvious to have parents present in the interrogation process, it is not a necessity in some states.
There are many more complications in the juvenile criminal justice that are also present with the adult process of criminals. Other players are involved: the defense attorney, the prosecutor, the social service worker, the probation officer, the family, and the judge. In each case, these roles play a part in the criminal proceedings similar to adult courts. Prosecutor and law enforcement officers have discretion of what charges brought while judges has authority to rule which motions to suppress, accepting a plea bargain as well as many other decisions such as choosing to waive the child to adult courts as well as the acting jury in the decision of the case. The judge is the leader of decisions in juvenile crimes while interacting with the other officers of the court. In certain cases, a guardian ad litem (an advocate) may be appointed where there is question of a need for a particular treatment for the juvenile such as placement in mental health programs. Depending on the seriousness of the offense, these players play an important role on the proceedings as well as follow-up or aftercare. Just as alternative sentencing is available for adult criminals, the same is offered to juveniles.
The actual court proceedings involve the following:
(1) the arrest procedure, (2) search and seizure, and (3) custodial interrogation.delinquent children from adult offenders, society has placed greater importance on the delinquent being a child rather than being a criminal.
Rehabilitation rather than punishment has traditionally been the goal. However, there are many aspects of the juvenile justice system that challenge society's ideas about the natures of human development. One of them is the cause of serious juvenile crime. People are dumb-founded at the concept of children committing heinous crimes. Society cannot fathom the concept of children being considered criminals. The unforeseen tangent between childhood and criminality creates a dilemma that most people find difficult to not only comprehend but resolve.
History has dealt with juvenile offenses by treating most of them as delinquent acts. Children have been adjudicated within a separate juvenile justice system designed to recognize the special needs and immature status of young people. The goal has always been rehabilitation over punishment.
Society and certainly the early founders of the juvenile system believed that juveniles have different competencies than adults and have different potential for change than adults. A second chance with the help of rehabilitation has been the parens patriae influence over the juvenile justice system. However, as society has changed since the Dark Ages period, the Enlightenment eras of a new beginning, modern society has also come to a new enlightening evolution in 2006.
Criminal histories of children have changed in patterns. There is a rise in violent crimes. As a result, society increasingly is opting to redefine them as adults and transfer them to the adult court and criminal justice system. People have come to agree that a small number of young offenders should be transferred to the adult system due the thinking that these juveniles pose a genuine threat to the safety of other juveniles and the community. Certainly the rise of the severity of juvenile offense merits a relatively more severe punishment. Juvenile recidivism bodes a poor picture of the future of juveniles.
The study of normal development indicates that there are scientific reasons to warrant the differential treatment of young people and adults within the legal system. Transferring juveniles to criminal court has important implications. For one, transfer to adult court alters the legal process by which a minor is tried. Criminal court is based on an adversarial model, while juvenile court is based on a more cooperative model. This difference is significant because it is unclear at what age individuals have sufficient understanding of the ramifications of the adversarial process. The ramifications of being tried as an adult is a serious one for a juvenile that will affect not only society but the future of the juvenile.
Additionally, the different vested interests of prosecutors, defense attorneys, and judges make the system even more complex. Second, the legal standards applied in adult and juvenile courts are different. For example, competence to stand trial is presumed among adult defendants unless they suffer from a serious mental illness or substantial mental retardation. No one knows if the presumption of competence holds for juveniles. Given the absence of mental retardation or mental illness, children still may lack sufficient competence to participate in the adjudicative process purely because of their cognitive abilities that can be attributed to many factors.
Finally, the choice of trying a young offender in adult vs. juvenile court determines the possible outcomes of the adjudication. In adult court, the outcome of being found guilty of a serious crime is nearly always some sort of punishment. In juvenile court, the outcome of being found delinquent may be some sort of punishment. Juvenile courts typically retain the option of a rehabilitative disposition, in and of itself or in combination with some sort of punishment. While laws may have changed in releasing juvenile records, the standard practice is to have it remained closed for the public.
Since the subject is about children’s rights, it is important to know what juvenile delinquents think about both systems. While it costs more to detain juveniles than adults for the programs as well as people involved in the process, it seems becoming an adult has little impact on the rates on juvenile criminality. Several important concepts are crucial in this factor: (1) the closed trial in public exposure, (2) the closed file involved in juvenile delinquency, and (3) the adult status ramifications that is the product of being tried as an adult. People need a second chance to survive in the real world. Children, despite the presumption of their immaturity level, are aware of these issues. The punishment and stigma involved in the adult process can hinder the economic progress of juveniles convicted of adult crimes. Jobs that entail extensive background checks involving adult criminal dispositions may in the long run prevent young children or young adults from becoming successful individuals. No one wants to be labeled.
The parens patriae model is an important concept to include in the juvenile court system proceedings. Children are not adults and deserve a separate system in determining not only punishment but rehabilitative opportunities to develop into mature adults. Certainly, the awareness of the seriousness of criminal actions must be looked into. No one wants children to commit heinous acts such as rape and murder in such an early age only to be proned to juvenile punishments. Society wants get tough policy. However, each case should be determined in reflection to the totality of the circumstances of a child’s life progress and exposure. The one main point to be considered is when to stop being a parent to a minor. Society certainly has to give them a chance by trying its best in providing the necessary programs. If that fails, then the adult system needs to take over. Meanwhile, the juvenile justice system serves a major purpose in juvenile delinquents. Rather than elimination and reintegration into the adult criminal justice system, an overhaul, more funding, and more initiatives in implementing social programs that provide the parents patriae concept into rehabilitating juvenile delinquents are more reasonable than giving up on society’s innate duties to children.
References:
Age of Enlightenment. (2006). The Age of Enlightenment.
Bail. (2006). Bail Case Law.
Cramer, M. & Ellement, J. (2005, August 5). Boy's high bail concerns youth advocates.
The Globe.
Juszkiewicz, J. (2006). Youth Crime/Adult Crime: Is Justice Served?
Siegal, L. (2002). Juvenile Delinquency: The Core. (318-325).
Steckel, R. (1944). New Light on the Dark Ages.
Steinberg, L. (2001). Juvenile Crime and Punishment.
Walcott, C. (2006). Policy on Blended Sentencing.
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