Rehabilitating the juvenile court system: Limiting juvenile transfers to adult criminal court

Northwestern University Law Review

Volumn 90, Issue 3, 1996, Pages 1254-1281

  Cintron, Lisa A ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0039791452     PISSN: 00293571     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (35)

1. Julie Grace, There Are No Children Here, TIME, Sept. 12, 1994, at 44.
2. Nancy Gibbs, Murder in Miniature, TIME, Sept. 19, 1994, at 54.
3. In the Robert Sandifer case, the Juvenile Court judge ordered Sandifer's alleged murderers to be tried as adults. Boy Denies Killing Robert Sandifer, CHI. TRIB., Jan. 8, 1995, § (Metro Northwest), at 3.
4. This Comment refers to the process of relinquishing juvenile court jurisdiction over a young offender's case to an adult criminal court as "transfer." See infra note 69 for the various ways that state laws refer to the transfer method.
5. A "juvenile" is a "young person who has not yet attained the age at which he or she should be treated as an adult for purposes of criminal law. . . . Under the federal Juvenile Delinquency Act, a 'juvenile' is a person who has not attained his eighteenth birthday." BLACK'S LAW DICTIONARY 867 (6th ed. 1990) (citing 18 U.S.C.A. § 5031).
6. "Serious crimes" often include "murder, rape and armed assault." Richard Lacayo, When Kids Go Bad, TIME, Sept. 19, 1994, at 60.
7. The question of whether to transfer a juvenile most often arises for juvenile offenders of serious violent crimes. Jeffrey Fagan, Social and Legal Policy Dimensions of Violent Juvenile Crime, 17 CRIM. JUST. & BEHAV. 93, 94 (1990).
8. See, e.g., DEAN J. CHAMPION & G. LARRY MAYS, TRANSFERRING JUVENILES TO CRIMINAL COURTS: TRENDS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR CRIMINAL JUSTICE 59 (1991) (discussing the present trend toward transferring increasing numbers and types of juvenile offenders to adult criminal court). Instead of separately addressing the transfer law of each state, this Comment discusses transfer laws categorically by the most common state transfer methods. See infra Part III.
9. MICHAEL A. JONES & BARRY KRISBERG, IMAGES AND REALITY: JUVENILE CRIME, YOUTH VIOLENCE AND PUBLIC POLICY 31-32 (1994).
10. See, e.g., Eric Zorn, Even Young Thugs Are Still Children, CHI. TRIB., Sept. 22, 1994, § 2 (Chicagoland), at 1;
11. 'That's a Baby in There', N.Y. TIMES, Sept. 9, 1994, at A14.
12. JONES & KRISBERG, supra note 7, at 21. One recent U.S. Department of Justice survey indicates that most Americans believe that criminals who commit violent crimes can be rehabilitated given early intervention with the right treatment program. BUREAU OF JUSTICE STATISTICS, U.S. DEP'T OF JUSTICE, SOURCEBOOK OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE STATISTICS 196 (1993) (Of those surveyed in 1994, 17% agreed that most criminals can be rehabilitated, 47% agreed that some criminals can be rehabilitated, 25% agreed that only a few criminals can be rehabilitated, and only 6% agreed that no criminal can be rehabilitated.).
13. This Comment suggests that rehabilitation and individual treatment be provided to most juvenile offenders. See Don Terry, Sentences for Boy Killers Renew Debate on Saving Society's Lost, N.Y. TIMES, Jan. 31, 1996, at A7 (quoting a psychiatrist who studies violence in children: "[T]he best place for . . . deeply troubled and violent children is in a well-secured residential treatment center, where there are fewer inmates, where more intensive rehabilitation therapy is available and where the staff generally is trained in counseling."). Rehabilitative treatment can result in positive development of the juvenile offender.
14. Jeffrey S. Schwartz, Note, The Young Offender: Transfer to the Adult Court and Subsequent Sentencing, 6 CRIM. JUST. J. 281, 285 (1983). Unlike a justice system seeking deterrence through punishment, a system directed at rehabilitation seeks crime prevention by focusing on correcting and preventing antisocial tendencies that cause or contribute to the juvenile's delinquency.
15. David M. Altschuler, Tough and Smart Juvenile Incarceration: Reintegrating Punishment, Deterrence and Rehabilitation, 14 ST. LOUIS U. PUB. L. REV. 217, 219, 223 (1994); Schwartz, supra, at 286.
16. Lacayo, supra note 5, at 61-62 (Public consensus about the current juvenile justice system indicates that the system "takes forever to punish kids who seriously break the law, and it devotes far too much time and money to hardened young criminals while neglecting wayward kids who could still be turned around.").
17. Zorn, supra note 8, at 1 ("Far better . . . would be to put our money and our efforts into adding stronger doses of both rehabilitation and punishment to juvenile justice. Catch them early. Help them grow up. Make them grow up. . . . Give them a real chance not to be burdens and threats for the rest of their lives.").
18. Id. ("The threat of long prison terms - of losing adult liberties they never had in the first place - is not an effective deterrent to immature criminal minds. . . . When we send youths into adult prisons, where no real rehabilitation takes place, we're just giving up, all but dooming them to permanent failure.").
19. 'That's a Baby in There', supra note 8, at A14.
20. In 1991, 34% of the juvenile cases transferred were for offenses against persons, while 44% were for property offenses. Between 1987 and 1991, the largest increase occurred in the number of juveniles transferred for drug law violations - a 152% increase. JONES & KRISBERG, supra note 7, at 4.
21. In 1990, the chance of an adult being convicted in adult criminal court for the offense of murder, rape, robbery, or aggravated assault ranged from 13% for aggravated assault to 55% for murder. In comparison, the juvenile court dispensed guilty dispositions to 57% of robbery referrals, 55% of violent sex crime referrals, 53% of murder referrals, and 44% of aggravated assault referrals. Id.
22. The recidivism rates of juvenile offenders sanctioned in juvenile court are lower than those of juveniles sentenced in adult criminal court: "[Juveniles] sanctioned in the juvenile court were rearrested less often, at a lower rate and after a longer crime-free period." Id. at 26-27.
23. For a description of the rights conferred by the juvenile system and some consequences associated with adult criminal conviction, see infra notes 59 & 60.
24. This Comment is not the first to suggest that a discretionary approach to transfer be readopted in most states; it contributes to the current scholarship by reviewing New Mexico's new transfer statute as a model compromise between both discretionary and automatic transfer methods. Other articles defending a discretionary approach to transfer include: Royce S. Buckingham, The Erosion of Juvenile Court Judge Discretion in the Transfer Decision Nationwide and in Oregon, 29 WILLAMETTE L. REV. 689, 691 (1993) (identifying "theoretical implications of any further erosion of judicial discretion in juvenile transfer");
25. Franklin E. Zimring, The Treatment of Hard Cases in American Juvenile Justice: In Defense of Discretionary Waiver, 5 NOTRE DAME J.L. ETHICS & PUB. POL'Y 267, 268 (1991) (arguing that "discretionary [transfer], with all its faults, is superior to alternative methods of handling juvenile justice's hardest 'hard cases'").
26. CHAMPION & MAYS, supra note 6, at 35, 38.
27. Buckingham, supra note 19, at 691-92.
28. Gordon A. Martin, Jr., The Delinquent and the Juvenile Court: Is There Still a Place for Rehabilitation?, 25 CONN. L. REV. 57, 62-63 (1992).
29. Buckingham, supra note 19, at 691. By 1912, 22 states established juvenile courts modeled after those in Illinois. By 1925, all but two states had juvenile courts. Mark Dowie, When Kids Commit Adult Crimes, Some Say They Should Do Adult Time, 13 CAL. LAW. 55, 57 (1993). After the establishment of the juvenile court, the juvenile justice system developed. The juvenile justice system also consists of the police, juvenile corrections, and juvenile organizations. CHAMPION & MAYS, supra note 6, at 33-42. By 1987, more than 3000 juvenile courts and about 1000 juvenile correctional facilities were in existence.
30. Charles A. Polen, Youth on Death Row: Waiver of Juvenile Court Jurisdiction and Imposition of the Death Penalty on Juvenile Offenders, 13 N. KY. L. REV. 495, 496 (1987).
31. See State of W. Va. v. Charles Pfizer & Co., 440 F.2d 1079, 1089 (2d Cir. 1971) ("Parens patriae, literally 'parent of the country," refers traditionally to the role of the state as sovereign and guardian of persons under a legal disability to act for themselves such as juveniles, the insane, or the unknown.").
32. Buckingham, supra note 19, at 691.
33. Id.
34. Jeffrey Fagan & Elizabeth P. Deschenes, Determinants of Judicial Waiver Decisions for Violent Juvenile Offenders, 81 J. CRIM. L. & CRIMINOLOGY 314, 318 (1990).
35. Jeffrey Fagan & Elizabeth P. Deschenes, Determinants of Judicial Waiver Decisions for Violent Juvenile Offenders, 81 J. CRIM. L. & CRIMINOLOGY Id.314( 1990).