Juvenile Justice in the Beginning

Juvenile Justice

In the beginning the idea of establishing a juvenile court was to put into place a separate institution for juvenile offenders in which the rehabilitative attempt could proceed without the alleged corruption of incorrigible adults. Up until this point there were no laws in place to deal with juvenile offenders other than the common law's substantive infancy defence (Fox, 1996). On July 1, 1899, the first juvenile court in the world came into existence in Chicago, Illinois. This has been widely commended as a ground-breaking advance in the treatment of delinquent and neglected children and as the beginning of a new era in the collaboration of law, science, and social work in the field of child welfare (Caldwell, 1961).

In 2008, law enforcement agencies made over two million arrests of persons who were under the age of eighteen (Puzzanchera, 2009). After an arrest there are three main outcomes that can take place in the juvenile justice system. A juvenile may be placed in secure detention at various times during case processing. Detention is mainly used for temporary holding while youth await adjudication, disposition, or placement elsewhere (Knoll & Sickmund, 2010). A second outcome is that of probation. Probation can be court ordered or voluntary (Livsey, 2010). The last outcome is that of residential placement. "Juvenile facilities are known by many different names across the country: detention centers, juvenile halls, shelters, reception and diagnostic centers, group homes, wilderness camps, ranches, farms, youth development centers, residential treatment centers, training or reform schools, and juvenile correctional institutions. Some facilities resemble adult prisons or jails, some resemble campuses, and others resemble houses" (Sickmund, 2010).

Guiding Principles

Before juvenile courts were formed the common criminal law did not differentiate between the adult and the minor who had reached the age of criminal responsibility. The fundamental thought in criminal jurisprudence was not reformation but punishment. Punishment was seen as amends for the wrong and as a warning to other possible wrongdoers (Mack, 1909). According to Platt (1969) the juvenile court system was part of a general movement directed towards removing children from the criminal law process and creating special programs for delinquent, dependent and neglected children.

The thought process changed though and when juvenile courts were founded, it was thought that the child who had begun to go wrong, who was incorrigible or who had broken a law had to be taken in hand by the state. The state was not as the enemy but as a protector, as the ultimate guardian. There was a feeling that parents were either unwilling or unable to guide children towards good citizenship and thus intervention of public authorities was necessary (Mack, 1909).

Today the philosophy surrounding juvenile court is still a one of protector. Things are done with the best interest of the child in mind. The idea is to figure out what it is that the child needs in order for them to become productive citizens and try to provide them with that. Key questions and concerns

When looking at some of the questions and concerns that the authors have in regards to the formation of juvenile court one can see that the main concerns in the founding of the had to do with the drive to bring undesirable behavior under control (Platt, 1969) and to prevent children from reaching the condition in which they have to be dealt with in any court (Mack, 1909).