This is an essay I wrote for Law 12, my online course in the summer of 2007. It voices some of my opinion on the juvenile justice system and the need to treat young offenders differently.
Why do we need different treatments for young offenders?
Children and youths are, undeniably, the future of our society, the pillars upon and through which advancements can be made. With this concept in mind, it is understandable why we make amends and offer special laws to deal with youth delinquency. The three central beliefs behind youth criminal laws are the youths’ culpability on the basis of their grasp of right and wrong, the external factors influencing the development of youths, and the emphasis on education, rehabilitation, and reintegration instead of punishments.
Historically, young people who committed crimes were treated the same way as adults as there were no separate laws dealing with youths. Starting in the 1700s, society realized that children and youths have not yet fully developed the sense of moral right and wrong and the capabilities of appreciating the nature and consequences of their actions, as do their adult counterparts. By the 1800s, Western societies began to write special laws for youths who committed crimes.
In today’s Canadian judicial systems, the rights of young people are recognized in the 2003 Youth Criminal Justice Act, which replaced the Young Offenders Act from 1984. While the old 1984 Act outlined the rights and consequences for young persons ages 12 to 17 who commit criminal offences, some as severe as transferring young delinquents to adult courts to receive adult punishments, the YCJA deals with youth sentences and starts from the idea that young people should be held responsible for their actions but that they are still children who make mistakes and should be given the opportunity to mature, learn from their mistakes, accept the consequences of their actions, and make amends. In terms of humans’ development in the so-called teenage years, neuroscientists and paediatric psychologists alike have agreed that there exists much variation in the degree of ethical and moral developments in different individuals. Children often emulate actions or speech without realizing the repercussions. Many fail to recognize society norms and do not differentiate between right and wrong. Our legal system today classifies crimes based on intent, or malice forethought. How can we find a young person culpable for his or her actions without the said individual possessing mens rea, the guilty mind? Young people also tend to act in an impulsive and reckless manner, a lack of judgment related to their youthful spirit and limited experience in this world. It is the role of the parents/guardians and the society to teach a child what is acceptable and what is not. Therefore, to give children and youth who are not fully developed cognitively, morally and emotionally a punishment and hold them accountable as we would an adult who committed the same crime is simply unjustifiable. Giving children and youth different punishments does not mean we are shifting the blame to another source. We are simply holding them accountable in a developmentally appropriate way.
Statistic-wise, Canada has the highest youth incarceration rate in the Western World, including the United States. While most cases in youth court were non-violent, minor assaults made up nearly half of the violent offences. To process all these cases through the adult criminal court is both time-consuming and expensive. The financial reason for treating young people differently from adults who commit the same crimes lies in its quick and cost effective process.
The juvenile justice system is built upon the child-centered principle instead of the crime-centered principle found in the adult system. Experts like to use the term malleable in describing the growth of a child. The impact of this is twofold: young people are easily influenced by factors in their lives that they have no control over. Subsequently, they should be dealt sentences that are appropriate and responsive to each of their individual needs. Kids sometimes get into trouble because they are emotional traumatized, neglected, or abused. It’s unfair that they have to suffer consequences for another’s mistake. The second level applies in the "healing process", where the errors of the child’s ways could be corrected quickly and effectively by education and rehabilitation.
When the Youth Criminal Justice Act made clear distinctions between serious violent offences and less serious offences, the focus of the juvenile justice system shifted from punishments to education, rehabilitation, and reintegration. Youth ages 12 to 17 are still held responsible for criminal behaviour, but Canada now recognizes that effective rehabilitation is the key to long-term protection of the public. Young people’s malleability often results in successful re-education, after which they are given another chance to be productive members of society. Education, reintegration, and separate treatments in general give hope to the families of the youths and a future for the youths themselves.
Youths live in the chaotic transitional stage between childhood and adulthood, naivety and maturity, instinct and judgment. Their levels of cognizance of ethical behaviour differ from those of adults; thus in turn, they should receive different treatments by the law, treatments that place them quickly back on the path to rehabilitation. In this important developmental period, special laws for delinquency help young people who have committed crimes learn to take responsibility and realize the consequences of their actions. Education, rehabilitation, reintegration - these are the focus and values of our juvenile justice system.
(Copyright VSB #***697)
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I'm Crystal, a Canadian who thinks she can take on the world simply by getting up each morning. They call me the caffeinated IBer wandering on the Internet. 
