NCJ Number
139232
Date Published
1990
Length
132 pages
Annotation
This report explains the philosophical foundations of the juvenile justice system, the organization and operation of the system in Arizona, the processing of black adolescents involved in the system, issues relating to the racial and cultural context of juvenile justice, and current developments in juvenile justice.
Abstract
The report is intended to provide background information to aid the Arizona Black Town Hall to review the status of black adolescents within the juvenile justice system. The discussion notes that specific areas exist in which black juveniles are generally treated differently than non-black juveniles. Differential handling rarely involves overt racist condemnation of black juveniles or blatant acts of interpersonal racism. Instead, the impact of race is revealed more tellingly by the overall consequences of the way in which the system works, and discrimination is mostly institutional. As a result, black adolescents are overrepresented throughout the system. In addition, the limited availability of private residential placements for black juveniles results in many black juveniles remaining in locked institutional settings. To address this and other issues, the issue of the impact of race must be recognized as complex and multidimensional, resulting both from attitudes and from the systematic functioning of the system. Figures, tables, and 21 references