Raven Jackson

Work Cited
Cavanaugh, M. R., & McShane, M. D. (2016). Understanding Juvenile Justice and Delinquency.
Santa Barbara, California: Praeger.
This book provides a comprehensive, cutting-edge look at the problems that impact the way we
conduct intervention and treatment for youth in crisis todayan indispensable resource for
practitioners, students, researchers, policymakers, and faculty working in the area of juvenile
justice. Provides insights into juvenile justice from contributors and editors who have extensive
experience in teaching, researching, and writing on the subject Represents an ideal teaching text
for courses in juvenile justicea staple topic in all criminology and criminal justice college
programs Presents analysis and evaluation of techniques used and programs employed, enabling
readers to be better advocates for law and policy impacting youth Includes discussion questions
appropriate for classroom settings and lists of additional resources, related websites, and
supporting films that guide students in investigating the subject further Supplies updated data
and information on policy and law that will serve as a vital resource for students writing papers
or scholars teaching in the field of juvenile justice
Tracing beliefs about the causes of delinquency over time, we find that theories ranged from
demons and climate variations to glandular dysfunctions and a lack of wholesome recreational
activities.

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Children in adult jails. (2015, March 28). Retrieved March 15, 2016, from
http://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21647347-treating-young-offendersgrown-ups-makes-little-sense-children-adult-jails
The practice of charging young people as adults gained momentum in America in the 1990s, as
youth crime spiked. Between 1990 and 2010 the number of juveniles in adult jails went up by
nearly 230% (see chart). Now about a tenth of confined young people are in an adult prison or
jail. This is bad for two reasons. It is costly: more than $31,000, on average, to incarcerate an
adult for a year. And it tends to turn young tearaways into serious criminals. Young people who
are charged as adults are nearly 35% likelier to be rearrested than those who are tried as
juveniles, according to the Centres for Disease Control.
Two 12-year-girls lured Payton Leutner into the woods in Waukesha, Wisconsin, stabbed her 19
times and left her for dead. The girls claim they were trying to appease the Slender Man, a
fictional bogeyman who preys on children.
Knefel, M. (2015, January 22). Trying to Fix America's Broken Juvenile Justice System.
Retrieved March 15, 2016, from http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/trying-to-fixamericas-broken-juvenile-justice-system-20150122
That law, the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act (JJDPA), was passed in 1974 and
has been updated and strengthened several times throughout its 40 years. In addition to
establishing federal oversight for the states, it also set up core requirements for how states treat
their youthful offenders things like keeping kids out of adult prisons and addressing entrenched
racial disparities as well as a grant program to facilitate and incentivize states to meet those
requirements. Since 2002, however, Congress has failed to reauthorize the law, and advocates

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say it's long overdue for an update. This is another case to show how the system fails the
children.
As Congress begins its new session, youth advocates are looking forward to the passage of a
bipartisan bill that would strengthen protections for young people involved in the juvenile justice
system.
Moraff, C. (2014, October 18). 10-Year-Old Murder Defendant Shows Failure of U.S. Juvenile
Justice System. Retrieved March 15, 2016, from
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/10/18/10-year-old-murder-defendant-showsfailure-of-u-s-juvenile-justice-system.html
According to an affidavit provided by the Wayne County District Attorneys office (pdf), Tristen
Kurilla, a fifth-grader who celebrated his tenth birthday in July, confessed to beating 90-year old
Helen Novak with his fists and choking her with a cane after she yelled at him to leave her room.
Novak died shortly after the assault. On Monday, Kurilla was arraigned on charges of criminal
homicide and aggravated assault. He is currently being held without bail in a segregated area of
Wayne County Correctional Facility away from other inmates. By mid-week the story had made
the rounds of the national mediawith headlines in a number of major outlets focusing on the
age of the defendant and the callous brutality of his crime. But youth advocates tell The Daily
Beast that the details of the case are secondary to what it says about the lengths the U.S. still has
to go in its treatment of juvenile offenders.
If Pennsylvania had set out to intentionally highlight the glaring defects in the U.S. juvenile
justice system, it couldnt have picked a better case than one initiated this week in rural Wayne
County. Prosecutors there charged a ten-year old boy as an adult for the murder of an elderly

Raven Jackson

woman under the care of his grandfathermaking him one of the youngest Americans ever to
face a criminal homicide conviction.
Tyler, T. R. (2015). Why trust matters with juveniles. American Journal Of Orthopsychiatry,
85(6, Suppl), S93-S99. doi:10.1037/ort0000104
Discusses why trust matters with juveniles. Several facts point to the importance of building trust
in the law and legal authorities among the young. Most important, adolescence is the primary
socialization period for attitudes about the law. Although adults can later change their views, the
residue of socialization is strong and shapes later attitudes and behaviors. Legal authorities, in
particular the police, are the face of government for most adolescents. Almost all of the contact
that people, adolescents or adults, have with the legal system are contacts with the police.
(People seldom go to court and are infrequently incarcerated.) In addition, most of the personal
experiences that people have with the legal system, in particular instances in which they are
involved in violating some aspect of the criminal law, occur before they become adults.
Although it is true that there are many empirical arguments for the value of minimizing the
contact of young people with criminal justice authorities, it is also true that many aspects of
current policing policy and practice are inconsistent with this advice.