Chapter 14: The Juvenile Court
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The Processing of Juvenile Offenders
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Due Process Issues in the Juvenile Court (Pivotal Supreme Court Cases)
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The Right to Due Process
Right to Counsel
Burden of Proof
Jury Trial
Double Jeopardy
The Right to Bail and Preventive Detention
Public Access to Juvenile Court Proceedings and Records
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Arrest
Court Intake
Detention
Court Hearings
Right to Public Hearings
Confidentiality of Juvenile Hearings
Media Involvement
Destruction of Records
The Transfer of Serious Offenders to Criminal Court
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Reasons for Transferring Juveniles
Legal Criteria for Transfer
The Transfer Process
Who is Transferred?
The Impact of Race and Ethnicity in Transferred Cases
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1) Arrest and Court Intake
a. Arrest – Though adult offenders are arrested, juvenile offenders are "taken into custody"
(this reflects the civil nature of the juvenile court)
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i. Police are generally the first to make a formal determination as to whether or not to process the
juvenile
ii. Arrest policies for juvenile offenders vary widely from state to state, but during an arrest, a
juvenile is typically taken to the police station for initial screening and interrogation
iii. From here, an officer will decide whether to terminate the case or to divert it to an alternative
program, rather than initiating the legal process
b. Court Intake – About 85 percent of all delinquency cases are referred to juvenile court by
law enforcement, with the rest being referred by social service agencies, schools, parents,
probation officers and victims
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i. Once juvenile offenders are referred to the court, they go through a process known as intake, (or
the initial case screening process of the juvenile court system designed to screen out cases that do
not warrant a formal court hearing)
Case Reported By Police
Police refer case to court
Processed by the Court intake department
Formally charged by the prosecutor
Tried in a Court Hearing
Youth assigned to some form of correctional activity
The basic processing of juvenile offenders
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c. Cases that are screened out usually fall into one or more of the following categories
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i. Cases involving matters over which the court has no jurisdiction
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ii. Cases in which the evidence against the child is insufficient
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iii. Cases that are not serious enough to require juvenile court adjudication
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v. Cases that should be waived to criminal court
d. Informal hearings, adjudications, and probation supervision are frequently administered
at the intake levels, without referral to a judge (discussed later)
e. Though several elements are examined during the process of intake, the seriousness of
the offense is often the most important
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iv. Cases in which the youth or his or her family have already compensated the victim (i.e. through
civil law suits)
i. If a child has been referred to the court on a relatively minor charge, the intake worker can
determine that court intervention is not necessary and that the child should be released, (possibly
after a stern lecture)
f. Informal adjustment, or cases that are handled through discretionary non-judicial
proceedings, is often determined by the intake process
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ii. Informal probation is widely used, and is just one of the many options taken into consideration by
intake workers
g. Problems can arise though, especially if parents and juveniles are unaware that they
have a right to a court hearing before the probation staff has any sanctioned authority over
their behavior and that their admission of guilt (which is a requirement of diversion), will
become part of their formal juvenile record
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i. Similarly, informal probation (a case adjustment practice in which the child and family comply
with requirements of probation personnel without a formal court order—typically for a 3 to 6 month
period) is often determined by intake workers during the initial processing phase
i. In many jurisdictions, statements that juveniles make during intake can be used against them at an
adjudication hearing (discussed later)
h. After a petition, (or the document that sets forth the specific charge against a juvenile),
is filed, the prosecutor evaluates the case in terms of its legal adequacy
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i. A petition is the counterpart of an indictment in an adult criminal prosecution
ii. It is important to note that if the prosecutor decides not to file the petition, this decision is
regarded as final and the case is then dismissed
iii. If a petition is filed, then it is usually followed by a report by the intake officer about the social
and behavioral patterns of the juvenile in question
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2) Detention
a. The detention, or the temporary confinement of a juvenile pending adjudication,
disposition, or implementation of disposition, requires that a petition be filed within 48 to 72
hours
b. Preventive detention of juveniles is usually practiced for 3 reasons:
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i. to protect the child
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ii. To protect society from further law-breaking by the child
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iii. To assure that the child will appear at subsequent hearings
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c. Juveniles may also be detained for purposes of evaluation, or while they await placement
in a long term correctional or treatment facility
d. Both federal and state courts have held that a juvenile may not be detained pending trail
on charges of delinquency without a prompt determination of probable cause
e. Detention and arrest disparities are frequent in the juvenile justice system
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i. However, some overrepresentation may stem from factors other than discrimination such as factors
relating to the seriousness and volume of crime, prior record, and life circumstances (which may
influence the decisions of police, justices, etc.)
ii. According to the Regoli/Hewitt, few studies that examine disparities in our justice system control
for offense seriousness, let alone family and school circumstances
iii. While the actual causes of disparities or overrepresentation based on race and sex continue to be
debated, blacks and females are certainly treated differently by the juvenile justice system
f. Race –In 1997, 15 percent of delinquency cases involving white youths included detention
at some point between referral and disposition, while among case involving blacks the
figure was 27 percent
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i. Detention was used in 14 percent of drug cases involving white youths, in 38 percent in cases
involving black youths, and in 16 percent of cases involving youths of other races
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g. Sex – In 1997, 20 percent of male delinquency cases involved detention while that
number was 15 percent for females
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3) Court Hearings
a. In recent decades, juvenile court proceedings have taken on many of the characteristics
of the adversarial adult criminal court system
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i. Girls were more likely to be detained for minor offenses such as status offenses, public disorder,
and traffic offenses (they are also more likely to be placed in detention for probation and parole
violations)
i. This is primarily due to "get tough on crime" legislation and landmark Supreme Court Cases
ii. There is a noticeable convergence between juvenile and adult court proceedings, and Barry Feld
argues that juvenile courts tend to operate with two competing conceptions of adolescents
iii. One on hand, juveniles are considered to be children, while on the other hand they are
increasingly being held accountable for their "adult-like crimes" (the worst of both worlds?)
b. In an adjudication hearing, or a hearing held to determine whether the child
committed the offense of which he or she is accused, the required standard of evidence is
proof beyond a reasonable doubt (as it is in the adult criminal court system)
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i. The right to refuse to testify and the right to counsel are protected
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c. In order for a confession to be used in court, it must be voluntary and corroborated by
someone other than an accomplice and preceded by the Miranda warning:
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ii. The right to have an attorney present during questioning and to have an attorney provided free of
charge if the youth cannot afford to hire one
d. After hearing all of the evidence, the court may dismiss or continue the case or sustain
the petition
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i. the right to remain silent
i. If the petition is sustained, the court will then set a date for the disposition hearing or the judge
may ask for a social investigation report and make an immediate disposition report (this should show
you how much discretion there is in the juvenile justice system)
e. At a disposition hearing, (or a juvenile court hearing in which the court determines
what action will be in the youth's and community's best interests; the equivalent of the
sentencing stage in the criminal court process), the probation officer, the prosecutor, the
defense attorney, and the child's parents typically discuss available options
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i. Hearsay evidence and opinions are admissible at this stage and depending on community
resources, the judge may have a considerable range of disposition options (ranging from dismissal to
incarceration)
ii. Disposition decisions are made in a relatively small amount of juvenile cases (In 1997, nearly 1.8
million juveniles were referred to the juvenile court while 57 percent were petitioned to the juvenile
court for an adjudicatory hearing)
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iii. Of these cases, 1 percent was waived to criminal court, 41 percent were non-adjudicated, and 58
percent were adjudicated as delinquent
iv. From the cases in which juveniles were adjudicated as delinquent, 55 percent were placed on
probation while only 28 percent resulted in out-of-home placements (i.e. boot camp, ranch, group
home, correctional institution, etc.)
f. There are many disparities in adjudications and dispositions (mainly race and sex)
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i. In 1997 males accounted for 77 percent of all delinquency cases handled by the juvenile courts,
and cases involving males were more likely than cases involving females to be adjudicated (59-53,
respectively)
ii. Of petitioned youths, 59 percent of whites and 55 percent of blacks were adjudicated (national
statistics, 1997)
iii. 1997 dispositions – Males were more
likely to placed in an out-of-home facility than
were females, (30-22, respectively) and blacks
were more likely than whites to be placed in
out-of-home facilities (32-26, respectively)
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g. It is important to note that these national
statistics are compiled without controlling
for the seriousness or context of the crime,
the criminal histories of youths, the amount
of harm to society, or for the offenders family life
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An example of the juvenile
court process
(from Maricopa County, Arizona)
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Juvenile Court activity, 1988 v. 1997
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4) Due Process Issues in the Juvenile Court
a. In Kent v. United States (1966), the court ruled that a formal waiver hearing must
take place before the transfer of a juvenile to criminal court
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i. This was the first case to deal with the rights to due process with respect to juvenile offenders, and
it set the stage for In re Gault (1967), in which the court determined that juveniles may not be
denied basic due process rights in juvenile adjudicatory hearings
ii. Justice Fortas, who wrote the majority opinion for the court in re Gault, argued that the "basic
requirement of due process…" must be satisfied in juvenile proceedings because "neither the
fourteenth amendment nor the Bill of Rights is for adults only" (this was contrary to parens patriae)
b. Fortas then set out the essentials of due process for juveniles and how they should apply
to adjudicatory hearings:
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i. The juvenile has a right to counsel and to court-appointed counsel, if necessary
ii. With the aid of counsel, the child can present his or her defense and confront witnesses, who must
present testimony under oath through cross-examination
iii. The child also has the right to confront his or her accuser as well as a right against selfincrimination. Since his or her freedom is at stake, this right has a special urgency
iv. To make use of the available elements of the defense, the child has a right to timely notice of the
charges against him or her
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c. Note that this initially only applied to the adjudicatory hearing, where guilt or innocence
is determined
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d. While most state juvenile codes now provide juveniles with a statutory right to counsel,
(i.e. public defender, defense attorney) few states ensure effective legal counsel
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i. Jane Knitzer and Merril Sobie studied defense counsel performance in New York and reported that
there is inadequate representation of juveniles in 45 percent of observed cases
ii. Most attorneys (especially public defenders) cite that they are stretched very thin and carry large
caseloads (Barry Feld found that in urban communities, public defenders often had between 600 and
800 caseloads)
e. In In Re Winship (1970), the court determined that juveniles, in delinquency cases,
have the right to be convicted only if there is proof beyond a reasonable doubt
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i. In re Gault did not deal with the rights a juvenile reserved at a disposition hearing
i. It is interesting to note that Justice Burger (who dissented) stated that "Since I see no
constitutional requirement of due process sufficient to overcome the legislative judgment of the
States in this area, I dissent from further strait-jacketing an overly restricted system... [which]..
requires breathing room and flexibility in order to survive" (on a side note, Burger wrote the
concurring opinion in Roe v. Wade (1973))
f. In McKeiver v. Pennsylvania (1971), the Supreme Court decided that juveniles do not
have a constitutional right to a jury trial in juvenile court
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ii. In 1999, the Appellate Court of Illinois ruled that a juvenile charged with first-degree murder and
tried in the juvenile court may not be denied a jury trial
g. In Breed v. Jones (1975), the Supreme Court decided that the criminal prosecution of a child
following a juvenile court hearing is unconstitutional because it constitutes double jeopardy (the
prosecution of an individual a second time for the same offense. It is prohibited by the 5th amendment)
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i. The court ruled that a jury trail is an adult right that is not essential in juvenile proceedings, and
felt that the states should be allowed to have jury trials in their own juvenile proceedings if they
wished (in other words, the decision was completely left up to the states)
i. In other words, a juvenile cannot be tried and convicted in a juvenile court and then tried
and convicted of the same crime in an adult court (this would be contrary to the 5th
amendment)
h. In Schall v. Martin (1984), the Supreme Court ruled that juveniles may be held in preventive
detention while awaiting adjudication if they are determined to be "serious risks" to the community
I. The preventive detention of juveniles was found to be constitutional and the court articulated that
there were three primary justifications for its use:
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i. The legitimate and compelling state interest in protecting the community from crime
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ii. Protecting the juvenile form his or her own "folly" and the consequences of criminal activity
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iii. Preventing the child from absconding (fleeing)
j. Pre-trial detention is also constitutional as long as one or more of the conditions are met,
providing that the authorities have probable cause to believe that the juvenile is responsible
for the commission of a crime
5) Public Access to Juvenile Court Proceedings and Records
a. Since 1985, stage legislatures have made significant changes in how information about
juvenile offenders is treated by the justice system
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i. By 1996, 22 states provided for open hearings of juvenile offenders in certain cases
ii. Moreover, nearly all states have statutes that specify circumstances in which juvenile records may
be made available to the public
b. Around 80 percent of states permit the release of the certain juveniles' names and/or
photographs to the media, but a few states forbid publication of the juvenile's name and/or
any other identifying information
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ii. In Oklahoma Publishing Company v. District Court (1977), the Supreme Court held that once
information is "publicly revealed" or "in the public domain" its publication or broadcast cannot be
restrained
iii. In Smith v. Daily Mail Publishing Co. (1979), the Supreme Court ruled that when information is
lawfully obtained with respect to a juvenile's identity/record, the state cannot prohibit its publication
c. In more than half of all states, provisions exist that permit the destruction of certain
juvenile court records
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i. In Davis v. Alaska (1974), the Court ruled that a defendant's sixth amendment right to confront
witnesses must prevail over the state's interest in protecting juveniles from adverse publicity
i. These statues allow for either the sealing or destruction of juvenile records
ii. Should all juvenile records be destroyed to protect these people later in life from information
leaks?
iii. There is also a debate of whether or not an adult who is facing a criminal charge should have
his/her juvenile record taken into consideration at trial
6) The Transfer of Serious Offenders to Criminal Court
a. The old system of juvenile corrections emphasized treatment and concern for the privacy
of the offender, but much has changed in recent decades
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b. In response to demands for getting "tough on crime," many states have advocated one
or more of the following changes:
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i. Lowering the age for waiver (dropping the minimum age for waiver from 15 to 14, for example)
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ii. Expanding the list of crimes eligible for waiver
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iii. Establishing "presumptive waiver" provisions requiring that certain offenders be transferred unless
they can prove they are suitable for juvenile rehabilitation
iv. Excluding certain offense from juvenile court jurisdiction, such as violent crimes against the
person
v. Adding prior record provisions making certain repeat offenders eligible for waiver
vi. Requiring that once an offender is waived from criminal court jurisdiction or is convicted in
criminal court, all subsequent cases are under criminal court jurisdiction
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c. When Congress passed new crime control legislation in 1994, it lowered the minimum
age for transferring juveniles for adult prosecution from age 15 to age 13 for certain violent
federal offenses
d. There are 3 main reasons for transferring a juvenile to criminal court
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i. If the offense is determined to be severe enough to warrant such as transfer
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ii. Some youths are viewed as not amenable to treatment programs
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iii. Some citizens and penal experts argue for longer term incarceration, which a criminal court can
provide
e. The legal criteria for transfer lie within the landmark Kent case, in which the court stated
that there is no constitutional requirement for a separate juvenile court system
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vii. Lowering the maximum age of juvenile court jurisdiction (from 18 to 16 or 15, for example), thus
allowing criminal courts to prosecute younger offenders without the need for the waiver process
i. However, most states have legislated that juvenile courts have original jurisdiction over all youths
who are under the age of 18 at the time of their arrest (most states also set a minimum age for the
transfer of a juvenile to criminal court for certain offenses)
f. There are several methods to initiate the transfer of an offender from a juvenile court to a
criminal court
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i. A judicial waiver, (or a method used for transferring youths to criminal court in which the
juvenile court judge is the primary decision maker in determining whether the youth should be
transferred), is the most commonly utilized waiver in the juvenile Court
ii. Legislative exclusion, (or a method used for transferring youths to criminal court, whereby the
most serious or persistent offenders or those over a certain age are excluded from juvenile court
jurisdiction and automatically prosecuted as adults), has been used by many states as an alternative
to the judicial waiver, in order to bypass the juvenile court completely
iii. The Prosecutorial waiver, (a method used for transferring youths to criminal court in which the
prosecutor is the primary decision maker in determining whether a youth should be transferred; the
prosecutor typically has concurrent jurisdiction to file charges in either juvenile or criminal court), is
utilized by at least 15 states
iv. The Reverse waiver allows a juvenile who is being prosecuted as an adult in criminal court to
petition to have their case transferred to juvenile court for adjudication or disposition
v. The Demand waiver allows a juvenile to request to have his or her case transferred from
juvenile court to criminal court (this is often utilized by a juvenile who feels that they will be
acquitted in a jury trial)
g. Who is transferred to criminal court varies, but there is certainly a disparity between sex
and race/ethnicity
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i. Males are significantly more likely than females to be waived to criminal court, comprising 95
percent of all waived cases
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ii. Over 85 percent of waived cases involve juveniles who were age 16 or older at the time of their
offense
iii. In 1997, white youths accounted for 50 percent of waived cases, black youths-46 percent, and
other youths-4 percent
iv. National statistics may cloud the extent of these disparities in certain areas
v. In a study conducted by Jeffrey Fagan and associates that examined transfer cases in Boston,
Detroit, Newark, and Phoenix, it was determined that black youths were 75% more likely to be
waived to criminal court than white youths
h. However, most youths who meet the offense and statutory-age criteria for waiver are not
transferred to criminal court
End of chapter 14 notes