Corrections and Police Special Offenders

Corrections and Police

Special Offenders found in Prison

Special offenders are inmates who circumstances, conditions or behaviors require that they be managed or treated outside of the norm. Juvenile offenders in the adult system are one example of such a special offender. It is ever more common for juvenile offenders to end up in the adult criminal system. As many as 25% of all juvenile offenders who are younger than age eighteen are now prosecuted in adult court. There was a 208% increase in the number of juveniles serving time in adult prisons, between 1990 and 2004 (Border Disputes between Juvenile and Adult Criminal Justice Systems: Exclusion and Transfer Laws, 2008).

America's juvenile courts have changed considerably over the past 30 years. The reasons for and procedures of juvenile courts have become very comparable to adult criminal courts. No state keeps a sacred, legal difference between the rank of juvenile and adult, and the age minimum for trial in adult court seems to fall every time a new incident of juvenile violence captures the nation's attention (Butts and Harrell, 2009).

Almost every state in the country has been sending a greater amount of juvenile offenders into the adult court using a variety of devices known collectively as transfer. When juveniles are moved to adult court, they lose their legal position as minor children and become fully liable for their behavior. Reassigning is often exercised for juveniles charged with violent crimes, but many youth are transferred for lesser charges (Butts and Harrell, 2009).

The underlying foundation for transfer to adult court is that minors should serve adult time for adult crime. Along with the assumption that juveniles who commit sophisticated crimes possess adult maturity of judgment and competency, has led to a significant increase in the number of juveniles who are transferred to adult court. Many of the laws passed during the 1990s to increase the numbers of youth tried in adult court have roots in the fears of the coming super predator. In many media stories that occurred in the 1990s, the adolescent offender was depicted as violent, incorrigible, and on the fast track to a life of crime. While state legislatures have acted quickly to change policy, the reality has become apparent that most crimes committed by juveniles are nonviolent, making the need to incarcerate them for extended periods of time in adult prison unnecessary, and the vast majority of individuals who offend during adolescence do not continue to do so in adulthood (Border Disputes between Juvenile and Adult Criminal Justice Systems: Exclusion and Transfer Laws, 2008).

There are many ways that a minor can enter the adult criminal system:

Judicial waiver: the juvenile court judge makes a decision about whether a particular youth should be transferred to adult court, allowing for the consideration of the individual's characteristics such as the juvenile's maturity level, personal circumstances, and prior history.

Statutory exclusions: are laws that rule out youth from the juvenile court, usually if they meet certain age or crime criteria or both.

Concurrent jurisdiction and direct file which is also referred to as prosecutorial discretion. In these cases the prosecutor decides whether or not a juvenile will be transferred directly to adult court. In most states, in order to qualify for direct file, the juvenile must be of a certain age or committed an eligible offense.