Human Behavior & Judiciary CRJ-554

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The Juvenile Justice System

The Juvenile Justice System

William J. D’Urso

Saint Leo University

Human Behavior and the Judiciary

CRJ 554

Professor William Jordon

December 6, 2020

Abstract

The Juvenile Justice System is that part of the judiciary that deals with those young people under the age of eighteen, who have committed certain crimes but, because of their age, can be tried by juvenile court, rather than the criminal court that deals with most crimes of the day. There are occasions when a judge will rule that a crime committed by a juvenile can be tried in criminal court. If a crime committed is an extremely violent crime such as a sexual assault against a child or a very violent sexual assault and murder against an adult, are some of the crimes that would cause a judge to send a case to adult criminal court. Issues that arise in the juvenile justice system are adolescent psychopathy, forensic psychologist, right to a jury trial, sentences meted out and suicide among juveniles, to name but a few.

Keywords: Juvenile, forensic, sentences, suicide, psychopathy.

The Juvenile Justice System

Introduction

The juvenile court system was brought into being at the turn of the twentieth century. It was felt that this court would give a youth a chance at rehabilitation, while offering treatment to the youth, rather than just putting him on trial, convicting him and send him to prison, (Melton et al, 2007).

The issue of juvenile justice involves several factors. When one speaks of juvenile delinquency, the question arises as to which aspect is being discussed. The myriad of issues covers history, procedures, legal, differing populations, to name just a few.

Juvenile court is the institution that is separate from the adult criminal court system. The United States Supreme Court, in its rulings over the years, has equalized the juvenile courts with the adult criminal courts. The Court has put into place the same rights, such as the right to a jury trial, for juveniles as with adults, along with the reasonable doubt dictum, that is proof beyond a reasonable doubt that the crime did, in fact happen and the defendant did commit the crime, (Melton et al, 2007).

Legal Issues

There have been some studies that indicate there are many young people in the juvenile justice system that have mental health disorders that can be diagnosed. There are also vulnerable young people found in the mental health system who have eventually gone into the juvenile justice system. As research continues, it has been found that most of the young people in the justice system are victims of some mental health illness. Six-hundred thousand of the more than two million young people arrested each year are put through juvenile detention centers. In excess of one-hundred thousand have been sentenced to secure juvenile correctional institutions. Of this number, about sixty-five to seventy percent have been discovered to have some sort of mental disorder, and many in the mental health system wind up in the juvenile court system, so the juvenile system is under pressure from both directions. Obviously, collaboration between the justice and mental systems can prove to be beneficial. The problem, which should not be difficult to solve, is to mesh the two together. Cooperation between community mental health and juvenile justice systems is a partnership that has provided benefit to youthful offenders and has shown the clinicians and administrators some valuable ways to improve service and overcome some of the barriers, (Kapp et al, 2013).

A study conducted in three states indicated that the figures provided previously in this report are nearly identical. This study, which took place in Louisiana, Texas and Washington, did exhibit the fact that females were at a higher risk than males, eighty percent for girls and sixty-seven percent for males, were found to have some sort of mental problem that was able to be diagnosed. It was also found that even though these high rates exist, youth referral for mental health services is very infrequent. The study also concluded that causes for young people being in the mental health system are incarceration of parents, drug/alcohol use, as well as ethnicity, (Kapp et al, 2013).

In 2004, a multi-state program was started that was aimed at juvenile justice reform. This initiative was started by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation with the purpose of having a method to assess and provide access to mental health services. The reason given was the fact that the community-based mental health system has failed to meet the mental health needs of the juveniles. Those conducting research have validated the fact that community-based care that has been coordinated between agencies, serving the needs of the young people, can reduce the chance of a young person’s entering into the justice system, or at the very minimum, delay the entry, (Kapp et al, 2013).

Practice of Forensic Psychology

There are findings however, from some previous studies that do not predict better times for juvenile offenders who suffer from mental defects. A study, (Cocozza, 1992), indicates that the young people in juvenile incarceration have some form of mental problem at two to three times higher than the general population. According to this study, about twenty percent of the young people in juvenile detention have a serious mental problem and one-half of those people also have, at the same time, substance abuse problems. This particular study notes that improved science will allow clinicians to use their enhanced understanding of behavioral genetics and other advances to better understand psychopathologic happenings in the brain. For instance, there is research that indicates it is possible to identify some children who are at high risk for schizophrenia, at an early age of eight to ten. For some of those children, it may be possible to treat them with prophylactic medicine. The Mental Health Juvenile Justice (MHJJ) and the Community Mental Health Council and the Division of Mental Health’s Juvenile Forensic Program have banded together with funding provided by the Department of Human Services of Illinois. This program helps young persons who have been in a detention center and who show they have at least one symptom that is linked to a mood, or some type psychotic disorder, (Williamson et al, 2007). This program seeks to have the child subject stay in a home environment, rather than in a detention facility. The assigned clinician serves as a coordinator by working with the family to identify community and public health services, as well as child psychiatrists or psychologists, and other professionals, qualified to assist in treatment programs. The clinician does not get involved in legal matters and has no role as a therapist. Although treatment is limited to six months, the program stays involved in long-term support, including support for long-term treatment plans. Northwestern University conducted an assessment of the program and the results were that young people who had mental health problems were shown to be involved in some risky behavior. The study indicated that about twenty-seven percent of those who were under Mental Health Juvenile Justice program services were re-arrested, which compared favorably to seventy-five percent rate for young people not receiving treatment. Furthermore, it was determined that Mental Health Juvenile Justice was successful in identifying young people who had some serious psychotic issues but there was a visible reduction in recidivism, while also directing them to needed services, (Williamson et al, 2007).

Child and adolescent psychopathy have not received the extensive study that adult psychopathy has, but, due to the stricter standards that have been adopted, there has been more study of the effects of psychopathy on juvenile crime. Although there have been reductions of adolescent crime, a smaller segment of the adolescent population has been shown to be responsible for a big part of criminal acts, about six to eight percent of the offenders. While the traditional Conduct Disorder (CD) and the Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD) tests did not produce needed results, there is still a possibility the psychopathy is still a variable in being able to identify children who may develop into future criminals. Different studies have produced differing results, (Cruise et al, 2003).

Summary

Juvenile probation officers have perceptions of the issues concerning psychopathy in young people that are different from those held by juvenile detention officers. Detention officers approximate that psychopathy is present in the youth at twice that estimated by probation officers. Of course, these people work in different environments. The detention officers work in an institutional setting and the probation officers work in a community setting. The more violent youths, probably psychopathic, will more likely be found in detention facilities. One curious fact emerged from this study that about fifty percent of probation officers saw psychopathy as unable to be changed but sixty percent also had the opinion that a psychopathic youth could be rehabilitated. Research has indicated that juvenile justice workers can possibly be trained to see the difference between those children that are problematic and those that are not a problem, (Cruise et al, 2003).

Adolescence is a time when children change and developmental changes, in particular, begin to appear. For one thing, guilt and shame begin to appear. Guilt increased with age in both males and females, but only females saw an increase in shame. Some research has indicated that shame has been connected with several psychological problems, but guilt has not been shown to be associated with similar problems, (Spice et al, 2015).

Over the past ten years, psychopathy in both children and adolescents has been the subject of attention for the reason that researchers want to see who “are the chronic offenders of the future”. Also, the researchers want to find out when and why, psychopathy appears in the children. If this can be determined, it may possibly lead to some treatment. The focus of the research has been to discover risk factors and try to determine if there is a direct link between psychopathy and delinquency. Empirical research has discovered that there are cognitive factors along with personal attributes of some children which provide a type of protection against what would be high-risk issues. Some of those personal attributes are vulnerability protection factor, intelligence (IQ) and motivation, (Salekin et al, 2010).

White et al (1989), ran a test of the protective issues of IQ on delinquency. No significant association was found but did show IQ as a protective force. It was suggested that one with a high IQ may be assisting young people in avoiding delinquency. Although there has been progress in the understanding of child psychopathy, but little or no progress, in finding out what causes child psychology, (Salekin et al, 2010).

The influence of IQ on psychopathy is a complex issue, as there have been mixed results in how IQ affects offending. Some say that high IQ is an added risk as a person is manipulative and smart. This combination makes for a very deviant person. It has also been suggested that those with a high IQ may be the ones able to cope and resist re-engaging in criminal activities. In other words, they may be able to use alternative actions and evaluate the consequences of their actions and generally make more rational decisions. These same attributes could also serve to make a more deviant person. Neither was supported by the current findings, (Salekin et al 2010).

Young people who are involved in the justice system are at a high risk of committing suicide. It is significant to note that mental health risk factors are prominent in the suicide rate of young people. In the non-committed population in 1999, it was estimated that ninety percent of those who either committed suicide or those who attempted suicide, had many risk factors, such as depression, substance abuse and anti-social behavior, to name a few. It is estimated that young people who have contact with the justice system are at risk for suicide attempts. It has been shown that those young people who have contact with the justice system, ranging from the first contact to prison or probation, have a higher suicide risk than youths in the general population. At this point, mental health tests can help to identify, and help those who may be at risk,

(Scott et al, 2015).

Conclusion

There are those that advocate what is called, restorative justice. If we leave out, for the moment, violent crimes, restorative justice can serve as an alternative to the traditional remedies, such as incarceration. There are some who want the system to correctly address the problems of juvenile correction, by means other than incarceration. Detention, according to Tsui (2014), creates a void in proper response that can be filled by bringing in restorative justice methods, (Tsui 2014).

This system may be sufficient for most types of criminal activity, but how effective are they for the very violent type criminal, such as those who murdered Carin Streufert in 1991, an eighteen-year-old college student. The killers were convicted and sentenced to life in prison, (Tsui 2014).

References

Cruise, K. R., Coiwell, L. H., Lyons, J. . P. M., & Baker, M. D. (2003). Prototypical analysis of

adolescent psychopathy: investigating the juvenile justice perspective. Behavioral Sciences &

the Law, 21(6), 829–846. https://doi-org.saintleo.idm.oclc.org/10.1002/bsl.560

Kapp, S. A., Petr, C. G., Robbins, M. L., & Choi, J. J. (2013). Collaboration Between

Community Mental Health and Juvenile Justice Systems: Barriers and Facilitators. Child &

Adolescent Social Work Journal, 30(6), 505–517.

https://doi-org.saintleo.idm.oclc.org/10.1007/s10560-013-0300-x

Melton, G., Petrila, J., Poythress, N.G., Slogogin, C., Otto R.K., Mossman, D., & Condie, L.O.

(2007). Psychological evaluations for the courts: A handbook for mental health professionals

and lawyers (3rd ed.) Guilford Press.

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protective factors: IQ and motivation to change. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, 16(2),

158–176. https://doi-org.saintleo.idm.oclc.org/10.1037/a0019233

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517–527. https://doi-org.saintleo.idm.oclc.org/10.1007/s10560-015-0390-8

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https://doi-org.saintleo.idm.oclc.org/10.1037/lhb0000137

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Techniques into Chicago’s Juvenile Justice System. Journal of Criminal Law &

Criminology, 104(3), 634–666.

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justice system. In Adolescent Psychiatry (Vol. 30, pp. 47–53). Taylor & Francis Ltd.