NCJ Number
81197
Journal
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology Volume: 72 Issue: 4 Dated: (Winter 1981) Pages: 1867-1891
Date Published
1981
Length
25 pages
Annotation
This examination of the juvenile justice system and waivers to adult courts demonstrates that the ideal of individualized decisionmaking as to a juvenile's status reflects rhetoric more than reality.
Abstract
Although the parens patriae and treatment ideals still influence the juvenile justice system, tensions have arisen between the court and the community over methods of handling serious or repetitive delinquents whose rehabilitative prognosis is unfavorable. In theory, juvenile court processes allow the courts to consider individual factors before assigning certain youths to adult court jurisdiction. A judge's decision may reflect the probation officer's prehearing report, which in reality tends to focus on culpability and the seriousness of the offense at the expense of any extenuating social or personal factors. Moreover, the law assumes that as juveniles grow older they become more culpable, although it has never been proved that all older youths have reached judgmental maturity. Indecisiveness regarding the maximum age for juvenile court jurisdiction is reflected in the wide variations among State laws and waiver decisions. An outline of a four-tier paradigm of the juvenile justice system -- probation, foster care, institutionalization, and waiver of jurisdiction -- notes that the final tier indicates the court's recognition that a particular delinquent is incompatible with traditional rehabilitation programs. Courts are sensitive to public fears of victimization, however, and the decision to waive jurisdiction appears to rest more on the seriousness of the offense than rehabilitative concerns. Thus, the rhetoric of individual rehabilitation frequently disguises the pattern of standardized bureaucratic processing in accordance with predetermined court policy. Courts follow the tier process religiously, except when serious crimes are involved that threaten public safety. Some individualization in correctional programming does exist, but adherence to the tier process discourages the development of any truly individualized plan. Courts need to perpetuate the illusion of individuality in treatment because they are accountable to elected officials for the expenditure of public funds and subject to political manipulation. Professionals and lay volunteers have also overemphasized the notion that the best treatment for delinquents involves individual counseling and casework, although budget constraints and public demands for retributive justice actually produce an impersonalized, collective approach to the delivery of such services. Proposals to individualize this system are offered, such as eliminating statutory requirements that arbitrarily determine when a youth cannot be helped by the juvenile court and establishing a special offender category for persons between adolescence and adulthood. The article contains 74 footnotes.