Explanatory Synthesis on Juvenile System

The juvenile system is made up of different sentencing rules, court formation, and juvenile detention facilities. It also includes juvenile probation officers and regulations that help to determine the offense. According to Arteaga (1), the juvenile system looks out to protect the community from violent juveniles as well as humanely treat the juvenile offenders. Because the two objectives are no longer reconcilable, the council has designed correctional reforms that make it possible to prosecute juvenile offenders to adult courts. Prosecuting juveniles as adults does more harm than good. These reforms increase the possibility that minors who could have been rehabilitated will face the outcomes of prosecution in the criminal court.

The reformers believe that juveniles should be responsible for their actions because if they are not made aware of their criminal actions they are more likely to commit the crime again or even a more serious one. To make juvenile offenders accountable for their mistakes, supporters of a more correctional federal juvenile justice system support that the laws that govern the transfer hearings take place must be changed Arteaga (1). This will ensure that the juvenile offenders that have committed the crime in the past and those that commit violent crimes do not continue. The federal prosecutors decide whether a juvenile offender should be transferred to the criminal court or should be judged in the juvenile justice system.

The supporters of the old and the separate juvenile justice system have both been critical to both the decisions concerning the system. Thomas & Bilchik (1) state that some have supported the transfer of juvenile offenders to the adult courts and others believe that the minors should remain in the juvenile system. The different opinions to this are that the juvenile system will be dismantled and the minors will be subjected to the harsh treatment of the criminal courts. Supporters of the old juvenile system believe that it should not be abolished and that the laws that govern the system should not be different from the ones used in the criminal courts.

Minors who have been on the wrong side of the law before and those who have committed serious crimes should be prosecuted in the criminal law. Being prosecuted in an adult court allows one to have more constitutional protections. Despite the protection, the disadvantages of it are that it involves more serious and extreme sentencing and most likely a juvenile can be subjected to serve time in an adult correctional facility. Criminal law does not allow immaturity and the fact that a person is minor as a legal excuse Thomas & Bilchik (1). A child below the age of 7 years is said to lack criminal capacity. As they grow into adulthood, the easier it is to initiate evidence that is convincing that the juvenile offender should be handled as adults who are responsible and can be prosecuted in criminal law. The older minors have no right to use immaturity as a defense.

In most of the states, a juvenile offender has to be 16 years of age for him to be eligible for a waiver to the adult court Arteaga (1). In other states, minors who are 13 years of age are also subjected to the waiver process. Other states subject minors of any age to the waiver process depending on the offense they have committed, for example in the case of a homicide offense. A court may accord a waiver petition and transfer a juvenile to an adult court if, the offense committed is a serious one, and if the juvenile offender has a long record. Another factor that is considered is if the minor is older and if there have been unsuccessful rehabilitation efforts in the past for the juvenile.

A juvenile offender should not be given the burden proof during transfer hearings because such a burden can give the prosecutor an intimidating tool for example to the poor juveniles Arteaga (1). This increases the chances of a juvenile who could be rehabilitated to be transferred to the criminal court. The transfer of juveniles who could have been rehabilitated makes the society unsafe. This is because the experience of juveniles in adult prisons and the stigma that comes with a lasting criminal record hinders their ability to become effective law-abiding citizens. The society is better protected when the rehabilitation laws prevail in the juvenile justice system. The juvenile justice system has traditionally been on the lookout to protect society from violent juveniles.

According to Ainsworth (1), the hearings that were conducted in the juvenile court happened too fast and were not conducted seriously. The attitude of the juvenile court personnel hindered the ability of the accused to have a just trial. The procedural inefficiency of the juvenile justice system was inadequate in comparison with that of the adult system. Several juvenile suspects waive their right to an attorney. The juvenile offenders that are not represented by an attorney fail to perform their operational rights successfully. They cannot challenge their detention and the charges against them. The right to represented by an attorney is important and essential for justice. Through prosecution waivers, a prosecutor can send a juvenile offender to a criminal court without any judicial hearing. This is in contrast with the judicial waiver which can be appealed.

Recently, compulsory waiver statues that require the unmanned move of juveniles to the adult systems have been put by the different jurisdictions. The compulsory waivers apply to juveniles who commit serious or brutal crimes Ainsworth (1). In some states, the waivers are focused on a certain age group where it automatically transfers the offenders to the criminal courts. One of the main reasons why compulsory waivers were put in the belief that minors committed the crime knowing that there are no serious consequences for those crimes. They committed serious crimes knowing that they would only face lenient punishments from the juvenile justice system. Compulsory waivers were passed to hinder the juveniles from executing the crime in the first place. After the introduction of the waivers, a test was done to show if they worked in reducing crime. The findings showed that there were no changes in the rate of serious crimes that were being committed by juveniles in the years that followed the introduction and adoption of compulsory waivers. This shows that prosecuting juveniles as adults in the criminal court had little or no impact on the criminal behavior of the juveniles.

The waiver policies have greatly increased the rate at which the juvenile offenders are transferred to the criminal courts and the number is more likely to increase. This is mostly due to the political pressure to get tough measures on the juveniles. This is a result of the highly publicized criminal act which motivates the lawmakers to increase the list of the crimes that should be subjected to the compulsory waivers Ainsworth (1). The transfer of juveniles into the criminal court is built on the aspiration to make solid laws for them. It is still not entirely clear if the minors who are tried as adults are subjected to severe punishments compared to what they would have if they remained in the juvenile justice system.

According to Ainsworth (1), research has shown that the juveniles who are prosecuted and sentenced as adults often receive a shorter sentence compare to that of the adults with equal offenses. Other researches have shown that juveniles who have been waived in the adult system receive lighter punishments compared to what they would have encountered if they were in the juvenile system. These findings clarify that the highest number of transferred offenders are property offenders. This type of offender in the adult court is given provisionary or short term jail rulings in the adult court. Another explanation is that judgment in the adult court is difficult and so many of the transferred cases are dismissed or end being exempted.

Conclusion

Juvenile offenders were initially rehabilitated in the juvenile facilities that offer rehabilitation programs. Transfer of the juveniles to the criminal court began due to the increase of serious offenses that were committed by the juveniles. Mandatory waivers were passed to transfer offenders of certain crimes to the adult courts for prosecution. These waivers were passed to reduce the rate at which the juveniles committed serious crimes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Works Cited

Ainsworth, Janet E. “The Court's Effectiveness in Protecting the Rights of Juveniles in

Delinquency Cases.” The Future of Children, vol. 6, no. 3, 1996, pp. 64–74. JSTOR,

www.jstor.org/stable/1602594. Accessed 23 Apr. 2020.

Arteaga, Juan Alberto. “Juvenile (In) Justice: Congressional Attempts to Abrogate theProcedural

Rights of Juvenile Defendants.” Columbia Law Review, vol. 102, no. 4, 2002, pp. 1051–1088. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/1123650. Accessed 23 Apr. 2020.

Thomas, Charles W., and Shay Bilchik. “Prosecuting Juveniles in Criminal Courts: A Legal and

Empirical Analysis.” The Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology (1973-), vol. 76, no.

2, 1985, pp. 439–479. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/1143613. Accessed 23 Apr. 2020.