History of Juvenile Justice, law homework help

Question: This was really short, concise and straight forward. There were a few grammatical problems, but you got your point across. I was wondering if you felt that the problems with youth gangs was that they were a result of culture and economical means? Also, could you define “capital searching”?


Original post:

1. History of Juvenile Justice

The separation of the justice systems of adults and children is not as old as many assume. The separation was not however done at once; it has been a process which is still being determined up to now. The determination is usually for different reasons and at different places. The one thing that I found interesting is the fact that a child was not being determined by the years but rather by their understanding and their knowledge. Children under the age of seven were ruled as incapable of committing any crime. Children between the ages of seven and fourteen were presumed to be capable of crime. The reasoning used was that if the child had the capabilities to understand what is right and what was wrong. This is the concept of malicious supplies of age (Mendiola-Washington, & Emeka, 2014).

It is also quite catchy that there was an emphasis for punishment rather than rehabilitation during the beginning of the juvenile justice. Children who were found guilty could even be given the death sentence. In any case the children even if they were being tried as adults they were not being accorded their due process rights including being informed of their charges as well as given a chance to question their witnesses. In my opinion it was chaotic as it was very disadvantageous on the accused children especially in their status of being vulnerable.

2. Juvenile justice

Juvenile justice is still being sought out even today; it is interesting that the constitutional rights of the children in the courts were not recognized until late 1960s and 1970s. The intriguing thing to note is that the family did not have a say in the delinquents being forcibly taken by the state and subjecting them to intervention. The 1838 case Ex parte Crouse provided that the Bill of rights was not applicable to the youths. It further provided that education which was of public interest is the one that gave the state the right to intervene without due regards to the parents or the delinquents family members (Kurlychek, 2014).

With time though changes have been seen in the society where that doctrine was challenged and which gave a new approach to the youth’s criminality. The protection of their rights through the adversarial system was a way which was aimed at protecting the children’s constitutional rights. The current juvenile justice system believes in the due process, retribution and rehabilitation of the youth rather than forceful intervention and punishment.

3. Youth Gangs

Youth gangs come about due to different reasons including poverty and peer influence. Youth gangs control efforts often are not successful due to the different strategies that the gangs develop in their bid to survive the hunting down. Ii is intriguing to know that there are different types of youth gangs with youth street gang being one of them and the most dangerous. They usually form an organizational structure whose membership makes the members have a sense of belonging. Accordingly some scholars have gone ahead and described gangs as “ a unique form but one of many kinds of armed groups that occupy the uncontrolled spaces of a ‘world of slums’. Some of the reasons why many youths end up joining gang groups include looking for other means that they can be someone after unsuccessful capital searching (Taylor, 2013). This leads to deprivation which makes them end up engaging in anti-social behaviors.

These groups have proven to be difficult in controlling despite numerous research being conducted over the years. The differences in their structures, behaviors and membership is what causes confusion. The one and probably most effective way would be to study a particular type of a gang and how it operates.

References

Mendiola-Washington, G., & Emeka, T. Q. (2014). History of Juvenile Justice. Encyclopedia of Criminology and Criminal Justice, 2191-2199.

Taylor, S. S. (2013). Why American boys join street gangs. International Journal of Sociology and Anthropology, 5(9), 339.

Kurlychek, M. C. (2014). History of Juvenile Courts. In Encyclopedia of Criminology and Criminal Justice(pp. 2181-2191). Springer New York.