Administration of justice
The Juvenile Justice Process
EXAM STUDY GUIDE
1. From a historical perspective, as a separate institution for dealing with youthful offenders, the juvenile justice
system is actually a relatively new invention, having begun in the early eighteenth century.
2. Juvenile delinquency is a special category of offense created for youths in most U.S. jurisdictions involving
persons between the ages of 7 and 18.
3. Before the sixteenth century, the young were viewed either as property or as miniature adults who, by the age
of five or six, were expected to assume the responsibilities of adults.
4. In time youths began to be viewed as persons who required molding and guidance to become moral and
productive members of the community.
5. During the colonial period, a primary responsibility of the family was overseeing the moral training and
discipline of the young.
6. The apprenticeship system served as a primary means for teaching skilled trades to the children of the
middle and upper classes.
7. Under the binding-out system, poor children were bound over to masters for care, boys were often given
farming tasks, while girls were assigned to domestic duties.
8. The right of the state to intervene in the life of a child is based on the concept of parens patriae (a Latin term
meaning "parent of the country").
9. A primary goal of the houses of refuge was to prevent poverty and to respond to children who were freed by
the courts.
10. In the mid-19th century, reformers believed parents had failed to teach their children proper values and
respect for authority.
11. In the mid-19th century a separate juvenile court to assume the responsibility that had been the parents' job.
12. The juvenile court would seek to rehabilitate the juvenile offender.
13. Juvenile courts were designed to be informal, allowing the court to act as a parent or guardian for the child.
14. Changes in the social and economic life of the growing cities created a host of social problems. poverty,
vagrancy, drunkenness, crimes committed by children.
15. The inability of refuge houses to accommodate the large numbers of children needing placement and
reform led to the establishment of placing out which involved the placing of children on farms in the
West and Midwest.
16. In 1869, the state of Massachusetts formalized a probation system by authorizing visiting probation agents,
who were to work with both adult and child offenders who showed promise.
17. In 1878, an additional law was passed in Boston that provided for paid probation officers.
18. It would not be until after the turn of the century and the development of the first juvenile court that probation
gained widespread acceptance.
19. The failure of houses of refuge was well known by the late 1800s.
20. Cottage reformatories were usually located in rural areas to avoid the negative influences of the urban
environment.
21. Cottage reformatories contained 20-40 youths, who were supervised by Cottage parents charged with the
task of overseeing residents' training and education.
22. In the late 1800s, separate institutions were established for females who were often committed by parents
or relatives for moral offenses rather than criminal offenses such as "vagrancy, beggary, stubbornness,
deceitfulness, and running away."
23. The emphasis on separate facilities, for children, on rehabilitation, and on informal proceedings, the houses
of refuge and reform schools marked the beginnings of a separate juvenile justice system for offenders.
24. By the 1870s, a few states had begun to keep juvenile offenders separate from adult criminals at
arraignments, trials, and other legal proceedings.
25. The nation's first juvenile court was finally established in Cook County, Illinois in 1899.
26. Ten states had juvenile courts by 1904, and almost all states had them by the early 1920s.
27. Beginning in the 1960s, U.S. Supreme Court rulings gave adult offenders protections that did not
apply to juveniles.
28. In 1974, the U.S. Congress passed the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act. It required that
status offenders not be placed in detention. It identified status offenders as juveniles who violate
curfew or run away from home. It identified status offenders as juveniles who commit other behaviors
that would be legal for adults. Congressional legislation also required that juvenile offenders and adult
offenders should be separated at all times.
29. During the 1990s; 45 states between 1992 and 1997 made it easier to transfer juvenile cases into
criminal court.
30. A juvenile who violates the law is called a delinquent
31. A juvenile who is beyond the control of his parents is an incorrigible.
32. A pre-delinquent can be a runaway, or curfew violator.
33. A dependent is a minor who needs effective parental control and has no parent or guardian willing to
exercise or capable of exercising such care and control.
34. A ward of the court is a person found by the adult court to fall within the jurisdiction of the juvenile court.
35. As a general rule, the basis for arresting a juvenile is the same as for arresting an adult.
36. The police divert about one-fourth of all arrests and refer about 70 percent to juvenile court.
37. Juveniles awaiting court disposition may be not held with adult offenders.
38. Technically, juveniles are not "arrested" for status offenses, because such offenses are not crimes.
39. The Supreme Court, in Fare v. Michael C. (1979), ruled that parents or attorneys do not have to be
present for juveniles to waive their rights.
34. In Schall v. Martin (1984), the Supreme Court ruled that preventive detention of juveniles is acceptable.
35. When a case is referred to juvenile court, the intake process begins and is similar different than the
prosecution stage for adult offenders.
36. Possible intake decisions - dismissing the case, waiver or transfer of the case to criminal court, referral
of the youth to a diversion program, filing a petition (a legal form of the police complaint that
specifies the charges.
37. Adjudication is the juvenile court equivalent of a trial in criminal court.
38. Contested adjudications are similar to trials in criminal courts that typically employ the same rules of
evidence and procedure.
39. Uncontested adjudications are generally brief and consist of a reading of the charges, advice of rights
and possibly the testimony of parties involved.
40. The dispositional hearing is when the judge decides what sentence, or disposition, the juvenile
offender should receive.
41. Probation is the most common disposition and the judge can impose a number of conditions on the
juvenile.
42. Because of recent heightened concerns about violent juvenile offenders, many states have legislatively
redefined the juvenile court's mission.
43. Courts have de-emphasized the goal of rehabilitation and stressed the need for public safety, punishment,
and accountability in the juvenile justice system.
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