Recriminalizing Delinquency Violent Juvenile Crimes and Juvenile Justice Reform
Book and Related Issues Analysis
Adolescent delinquency and later adult offending have been proved to be the main reasons for the increased problematic behavior among young children whose anti-social behavior took roots in the early childhood (four-six years old) and later under the various negative influences led to more criminal consequences and juvenile delinquency. Their persistent oppositional behavior, conduct problems and physical aggression in the preschool and early primary school years are usually the strongest predictors for the future anti-social behavior and negative long-term outcomes (Farrington, 1991).
Chapter 1 Recriminalizing Violent Juvenile Crime (pp. 5-23) provides historical background for the occurrence of waiver legislation in New York concerning violent juvenile crimes by analyzing the case of 15-year-old Willie Bosket that triggered a crisis in the juvenile system of New York after murdering two subway passengers. When the delinquent acts of juveniles are very serious, they may be considered crimes and the juvenile may be tried in the adult system. If being admitted guilty, children at age from 10 till 17 are usually sent to the divisions of youth services. Singer (1997) is convinced that despite Willie was only 15 years old, the jury should consider the seriousness of his murder crime, which should not be neglected due to his young age since it is absolutely obvious that murders have been done consciously and on purpose, thus, Willie Bosket should be charged according to the adult justice system.
While the main purpose of the adult criminal justice system is to punish the criminal according to the level of his crime, aim of the juvenile justice system is to apply rehabilitation or mentoring of juvenile offenders in order to prevent further crimes and change their delinquent behavior. Since juveniles might not being fully developed mentally or physically, they cannot be accountable for their actions in the same way as adults do in the level of responsibility and potential for rehabilitation. Chapter 2 Taking Stock of Juvenile Justice Reforms (pp. 24-45) and Chapter 3 Recriminalization on the Move and Its Legal Rules (pp. 46-74) analyze the social and legal circumstances that influenced juvenile justice reforms, including the beliefs, crisis and administrative concerns about the ability of the system to identify juveniles as delinquents and offenders.
By the federal standards, any juvenile under the age of 18 who committed a crime is a subject for juvenile delinquency, which can be considered as a crime if heshe was 18 or older (Rashid, 2004). However, robbery and murders committed by Willie Bosket go beyond the issue of crime prevention and should be punished accordingly (Singer, 1997). If a juvenile is thirteen years old and admits guilt, heshe can be given informal disposition to meet requirements of a consent decree. It is believed that his criminal actions might be influenced by external forces like parental neglect, inappropriate living conditions or relations inside the family. Though, if a juvenile is seventeen years old, as mentioned in Chapter 4 Contextual and Legal Reasons for Identifying Juveniles as Criminal Offenders (pp. 75-96), hisher guilt might be considered more serious being heard either in juvenile or criminal courts, especially in the case of violent felonies like kidnapping, rape or murder like in the case of Willie Bosket (Rashid, 2004).
While Chapter 5 The Case Processing of Juvenile Offenders from Arrest to Disposition (pp. 97-151) describes that juvenile delinquents experience after the arrest, Chapter 6 Recriminalization and Organizing for Deterrence (pp. 152-164) addresses the issue of restorative justice system that is mainly based on the idea that if local citizens participate in reacting to crimes, finding out their reasons and analyzing the circumstances, communities could face with fewer crimes and be strengthened. Until restorative and community justice are less attractive for courts in comparison with the traditional justice system, restorative justice approaches are more used in cases of juvenile crimes than adult crimes. Recently, juvenile delinquency became a very important and complex problem since juvenile crime rates increased dramatically. The main reason for such situation is that many children are growing up homeless, in single parent homes and in poor living conditions. Recently ethnic groups in detention have the following order African-American, Caucasian, Hispanic, Asian, and Native American. During recent years the number of minority youth in detention increased by 80 in comparison to only 10 of white youth. Minorities make up two-thirds of the detained American youth (Kurki, 2002).
According to Chapter 8 Concluding Real Reasons for Recriminalizing Delinquency (pp. 187-196), the majority of juvenile criminals are gang members, rapists, and murderers, have serious problems with alcohol and drugs and are mentally ill or retarded. Criminal behavior of juveniles is influenced by many factors, including social psychology, family situation, surrounding environment, economic situation, and others. As Fisher, Cullen and Turner (2000) wrote in their report, many college female victims do not characterize their sexual victimization as a crime since they blame themselves for their sexual assault or cannot perceive offender from their college mates as a rapist or criminal. Such situation gives red light toward the concerns on the lack of awareness about sexual harassment and victimization among young people (Singer, 1997). Moreover, today social implications of crimes also include such terms as date rape and domestic violence, which were largely neglected in the past. Juvenile criminality especially blossoms in the college campuses, which were used to be perceived as ivory towers, though recently, became hot spots for juvenile criminal activities.
Steps to Address Juvenile Delinquency Issue
As a proposal of actions to prevent juvenile delinquency, which can be implemented by the administration of each city and country, following aspects should be carefully considered. For teenagers without crime history and their families the suggestions are the following (a) educational programs about the effects of drugs, weapons, gangs, alcohol, etc. (b) recreational activities that help to fit the personalities and skills of different children, including sports, art, photography, hiking, music, dancing and others (c) community activities like church youth groups, boy scouts, girl scouts, and summer camps to help to tie teenagers to the community and give understanding of each persons place and role within the community. For juveniles with crime history the following activities and interactions might have positive effect (a) different programs that help to end repeat offenses and help teenagers to adapt to free life after being in juvenile detention facilities or adult system and (b) involvement of such teenagers into different activities or trainings courses, lectures, outdoor activities, communication with other children that have the same situation or, on the contrary, without any crime history. Other ways to prevent juvenile delinquency is to implement preschool programs, social process interventions, cognitive-behavioral interventions, careful assessments of juvenile crime on the subject on whether to put them into adult or juvenile systems, and ability to provide necessary treatment, training and education for juveniles that are committed to state facilities (Dimeglio, 2003).
All these actions are very important both for children with crime and without crime history. However, the main attention to any child should be given both in the family and school where they perceive the main part of information. Parent training and family support interventions should be developed in every region to provide social support services like day care, family needs assessment, medical care and other services.
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