Juvenile Justice System More Focused

¶ … juvenile justice system more focused on procedures and technicalities since the United States Supreme Court case decision in Gault or does the juvenile court system remain primarily an informal process that is concerned mostly with the welfare of the child and protection of society?

The constitutional rigor of the legal procedures regarding juvenile justice has undoubtedly improved since the fateful day when Gerald Gault was accused of making an indecent phone call. In re Gault, the Supreme Court held that the due process clause of the 14th Amendment held true for both children and adults. For example, young Gault was not allowed to confront his accuser. Moreover, instead of the evidence regarding the crime, the focus of the trial's proceedings centered on Gault's status as a habitual truant and general 'bad boy.' The Supreme Court also held that due process meant notifying the boy's parent or guardian, which did not occur when Gault was accused of making the phone call (Humes 25).

The juvenile justice system is in a kind of double bind: on one hand, it is supposed to judge juveniles less harshly than adult criminals, because juveniles are presumably more capable of being rehabilitated, unlike adults. On the other hand, judging an individual's ability to be rehabilitated is an essentially moral judgment, which seems to require judges to evaluate the character of juveniles to a greater degree than other criminals. Although author of No matter how loud I shout Edward Humes would not want a return to the bad, pre-Gault decision days whereby individuals such as Gault could be confined until adulthood for a childish prank, Humes portrays a world in which the original purpose of the juvenile justice system has been lost, given the prosecutorial obsession with proving who committed the crime, in the style of the adult justice system, rather than upon making the future of the accused better.

Does the juvenile justice system treat victims of crime well or, are the victims "re-injured" by the system because of the way they are treated?

Humes' book is not only sympathetic to juveniles accused of crimes: he admits that juveniles do commit terrible acts of violence. This is another problem with the juvenile justice system, namely it ends up re-injuring the victims, and the victim's families. In the adult justice system, there are formal procedures for dealing with how victims should be treated: juries receive a clear picture of the humanity of the individuals whose lives have been affected by the defendant's actions. But even in cases of violence, victims only have a few minutes input in the juvenile justice system: in one of the cases chronicled by Humes, the family had only ten minutes in which to speak (Humes 268).

Humes sees this as a defect of the system both from the point-of-view of justice and rehabilitation. On one hand, it is not fair that a family has less time to talk about the loss they have experienced, simply because the person who victimized their beloved son, daughter, mother, or father happened to be below the age of eighteen. On the other hand, perpetrators do not have to confront the consequences of their crimes: they are shielded from learning about the full effects of the tragedy they have caused. Humes even implies that this makes it easier for prosecutors to cut deals with juveniles, since the prosecutors do not have to suffer the uncomfortable and impolitic sight of the family in court, talking about their tragedy.

Even for more minor offenses, victims are 're-victimized' by the system -- because of lax policing and procedures juvenile cases are frequently dismissed because witnesses do not show up and are not tracked down and found. Because it is a juvenile crime, even the representatives of law and order -- the police -- show little interest in ensuring that a case is presented in a complete fashion before a court of law (Humes 132).

Is the juvenile court system an effective means for deterring juvenile delinquency?