There were no separate courts or jails for juveniles, which resulted in them receiving the same punishments as an adult. Starting in the early nineteenth century however, society started to slowly change the way it viewed juvenile offenders, bringing about the beginning of the juvenile justice system. During the early years of the juvenile justice system, three major milestones occurred: the child-saving movement, the concept of parens patriae, and the Illinois Juvenile Court Act. In recent years, further reforms to the juvenile justice system have come about. Juvenile offenders are now allowed due process, the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974, and the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention are a few of the major current reforms in the juvenile justice system.
The higher classes didn’t need an exam to enter, yet the poorer ones did. 1908 Children’s Act (Charter): Children were protected from being abused by their parents. Houses were inspected. Those under 14 not sent to adult prisons. Juvenile prisons made.
The original role for prisons was just to hold criminals and no regard was given for an inmate’s well-being. These prisons were often overcrowded and dirty (2011). The welfare of the inmates did not seem to matter. As Roth states in the text “Contrary to existing penal protocol, Rush envisioned a prison system in which convicts were housed in a large building equipped with single cells to segregate the more dangerous and disruptive prisoners. All others were lodged in apartments” (2011, p. 89).
Although no actual Foster Care program was official back then, they would most like stated be placed in a family at random with no background check required like present day. Child Protective Services or CPS is program in which children who are abused and/ or neglected are removed from their home and the county or state in which they reside has temporary custody of the child (Wikipedia). Every state has different protocol but they all have one goal, to protect abused and neglected children (Wikipedia) . Although their ultimate goal is reunite the child back to their parent or guardian (AdoptUSKids). Currently more than half 66% of children are or were abused or neglected by their parents in
Being released from juvenile Once a youth is released , the court must notify the victim. The youth must not contact the victim at all for any reason or they could return to custody. B. Effects of lock up The basic trauma of being locked up is often overlooked. Youth have institutional scars , and each inmate carries his own internal wounds.
This has a juvenile behind bars without any opportunity to ever return back into society. “There are currently 2,390 people in this nation who are serving life sentences (LWOP) for crimes they committed before they turned eighteen” (Bartollas & Miller, 2011). “There are seventy-three juveniles who have committed crimes when they were thirteen or fourteen and were given this sentence” (Bartollas & Miller, 2011). “Nationally, 59 percent of the juveniles serving life without parole sentences had no prior criminal convictions before being placed in prison for life” (Bartollas & Miller, 2011). The future of the country rests in the lives of these individuals.
Sadly , more so than not, the core of the family nuclear unit can be tainted. If a child is exposed to this type of dysfunction, they have no other family foundation to model his or her life’s choices and decisions against. When the rode less traveled by is chosen then the child/juvenile meets up with law enforcement within that path. The police come in contact with these children on a number of levels. Generally, the police do not follow the protocol of the juvenile justice system unless it becomes necessary to actually process a juvenile.
“Statistically black youths only account for 16% of the general population, yet are involved in 52% of the violent crimes and 33% of property crimes.” (Slowikowski & Acting, 2012). Economic factors dictate the crime rates even more so now than ever. With the youths it is more of a spinoff of the adult population involved in any type of violent or property crimes. Although the actual offense for which the juvenile is adjudicated as committing is a guiding issue, when at all reasonable a juvenile is to be placed back into his or her home and provided services through community-based programs. In regard to this type of placement option, there are not enough resources available to provide appropriate services to a juvenile offender serving probation from his or her home.
The question is should young offenders be treated like adults and receive the same sanctions for similar crimes that they might commit. The government of each state have issued what they think is the age of criminal responsibility, which is shown in the following diagram: As seen in the above figure each state agrees that children that commit crimes under the age of ten have no criminal responsibility. This is mainly because children under the age of ten are too young to have a criminal intent (mens rea); this is also referred to as doli incapax.
But not all criminal can go into the same classification and level of prison. Thus the reason for different types of prisons and levels. Classifying Different types of Prisons The Five types of prisons are Juvenile, Women’s prisons, Military prisons, Political prisons, and Psychiatric facilities. Juvenile facilities are for youth under the age of 18. Anyone who is not of a legal age is never locked up in a general prison with adults.