NCJ Number
139507
Date Published
1991
Length
34 pages
Annotation
These three papers describe some of the changes in youth justice, care, and protection procedures that have occurred since New Zealand's Children, Young Persons, and Their Families Act became effective in November 1989.
Abstract
The first paper examines the family group conference as an innovative method of involving families in statutory care and protection and youth justice processes. It discusses some of the potential problems and advantages of such an approach and certain concerns that have been expressed to date. The second paper presents statistical data for 1990 on the disposition of children and young people who came under the care and protection of youth justice provisions of the Act. In that year, 3,715 care and protection family group conferences and 5,851 youth justice family group conferences were held. Agreement as to a plan, recommendation, or decision was reached in 91 and 94 percent of these family group conferences, respectively. The third paper compares the pattern of juvenile crime in the last quarter of 1989 and the first quarter of 1990 with the previous pattern. It shows that the rate of detection, type of offending, and offender distribution (ethnicity, age, and gender) did not change. A sharp reduction occurred, however, in the number of arrests, court appearances, convictions, and court orders. Most offenders were dealt with by police warnings, diversionary measures, and family group conferences rather than by judicial processes. References, tables, and figures