Punishment or Rehabilitation: What Works Best for the Young Criminals

Punishment or Rehabilitation: What Works Best for the Young Criminals

  • Submitted By: smsmhelo
  • Date Submitted: 04/25/2009 10:40 PM
  • Category: English
  • Words: 1551
  • Page: 7
  • Views: 6

Punishment or Rehabilitation: What Works Best for the Young Criminals
Analyzing the current crime policies, it seems unlikely that legislators will find resources for delinquents while having a simpler option on hand. Indeed, public unwillingness to provide for the welfare of all children forces one to question whether the juvenile court can serve its role. The recent sentencing policy changes reflect dubious purposes of juvenile courts and the social control of children. Despite the supposedly softer roles of juvenile courts, youths whom judges imprison in institutions for terms of months or years receive substantially fewer procedural help than do adults convicted of comparable crimes (Sutton 78-92). As a result, juvenile courts punish delinquents in the name of the law but deny to them protections available to criminals. In view of this similarity with criminal courts, does a country need a separate system simply to punish younger offenders? This paper explores three possible solutions to the dilemma posed when the child is a criminal and the criminal is a child: a rehabilitative juvenile court, a juvenile version of a criminal court, and an integrated criminal court.
Proponents of a rehabilitative juvenile court urge that it is essential to “reinvent juvenile justice” and restructure juvenile courts to pursue their original purposes to help young offenders cope with their problems (Krisberg and Austin 45). Advocates of a juvenile version of a criminal court propose that it is vital to acknowledge juvenile courts’ criminal functions, incorporate punishment as a legitimate component of treating young offenders, and provide all procedural help but in a separate atmosphere (Forst and Blomquist 356). Advocates of an integrated criminal court recommend that it is worthwhile to abolish juvenile court jurisdiction over criminal conduct, try all offenders in criminal courts, and introduce certain procedural modifications to take care the youthfulness of...

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