Juvenile Delinquency and Juvenile Crime
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CJS 201
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Instructor
Juvenile Delinquency and Juvenile Crime Have you ever wondered how juvenile and adult courts operate? How they are similar but yet how they’re so different from each other? This is a very misunderstood topic and process. We will try to shed light on some of the situations that surround these types of courts, and help provide a clearer picture to help understand exactly what happens and what’s going on inside the two.
Juvenile and Adult Courts Before we go into how juvenile and adult courts compare to each other we will first look at a few terms that are often misconstrued. The act or behavior of someone that is young often seen as illegal or going against laws are known as a delinquency. The second term we should get familiar with when talking about juveniles are status offenses. Status offenses for juveniles are actions that wouldn’t be considered illegal if they were of age. Prime examples being running away from home and underage drinking, things of that nature. So what exactly is the difference between juvenile court and adult court one might ask? Or how are they similar? Well we will discuss that now and try to get a clearer picture of these two questions. Juvenile courts are of course for people that are under the age of 18, and have committed some sort of act or acts that are considered to be against the law. Even though some people may be a juvenile they could still be put on trial in an adult court if the crime is serious enough, but that also depends on the state that they are being tried in. Juvenile courts look to reform the offenders or help them so that they can learn from their mistakes, because they are still young adults that are often misguided. Adult courts are more along the routes of punishing adult offenders because they know that the adult knows the risks of the actions they are taking and that it is a crime. Juvenile courts also could have a few more people involved in the process such as parents, probation workers, foster parents, or foster homes. How the juvenile is being raised, their living situation, parent’s backgrounds, single parent home, peer pressure. Some of the same variables that also affect adult crime rates are those that could potentially affect juvenile crime rates also. There is a multitude of things that could be a variable in how or why a juvenile is behaving the way that they are when committing crimes. According to Juvenile Offenders and Victims National Report series, juvenile crimes have been declining a bit compared to how they were in previous years. Most of the juveniles that are charged are males under the age of 16. I was shocked to learn that there was so many white American juvenile males involved in drug offenses. As of 2011 the Juvenile Offenders and Victims National Report white American juveniles accounted for 77% drug offenses for juveniles, black juveniles accounted for 40%