“Use of Diversion Programs in a Graduated Sanctions Continuum”
Juvenile Justice and Youth Justice
By
John J. Wilson, Nancy Hodges, & James C. Howell
This paper promotes diversion of low to medium risk offenders who have committed minor offenses from juvenile justice system processing. The U.S. Department of Justice’s Comprehensive Strategy for Serious, Violent, and Chronic Juvenile Offenders (Wilson & Howell, 1993) is a forward-looking administrative framework organized around risk management that establishes a continuum of graduated sanctions and services that parallel juvenile offender careers. It incorporates best practice tools, including validated risk assessment tools, reliable treatment needs assessments, comprehensive service plans, and a disposition matrix to guide placements in a manner that protects the public. Every youth who enters the system is assessed for re-offending risk and service needs. Advanced tools include a protocol for developing comprehensive treatment plans that match effective services with each offender’s developmental needs and program quality assurance measures that enhance program fidelity.
A key principle of the Comprehensive Strategy is the need to divert children from the juvenile justice system who have committed nothing more than minor offenses and are low to medium risk, along with the provision of immediate sanctions or service programs—such as day treatment, youth courts (also referred to as teen, student, and peer courts), and community service. North Carolina diversion research demonstrated that use of two options, immediately closed complaints and use of service plans/contracts, proved successful in helping juveniles avoid committing further delinquent or “undisciplined” acts. For those with minor offenses, particularly the low to medium risk offender, a variety of treatment and supervision options were exercised by the parent/guardian/custodian or the school system. Court counselors also referred juveniles with low risk/high need profiles to local developmental and mental health programs across the state. Overall, these options proved to be remarkably effective, with a 76% success rate for diverted cases (M. Howell & Bullock, 2013).
Continuum Building Recommendations
A multi-component approach, including the recommendations that follow, can provide a continuum of services options for diverted youth: 1) provide counsel to all juveniles subject to the juvenile offender jurisdiction of the juvenile court; 2) immediately remove very low risk children at court intake, aided by a School Referral Reduction Protocol; 3) divert first-time misdemeanor offenders from juvenile courts via statutorily-mandated civil citations; 4) establish and support youth courts; and 5) provide intensive services for high-risk child delinquents under age 10 or 12—especially those who are abused or neglected—or otherwise inappropriate (too immature or below the age of juvenile court jurisdiction) for court processing.
Recommendation 1: A major juvenile justice system reform, and one that can be expected to have a significant impact on all of the reform efforts, would be to fulfill the promise of In re Gault, 387 U.S. 1 (1967), by providing a full measure of due process protections and the effective assistance of counsel to all juveniles subject to the juvenile offender jurisdiction of the juvenile court.
Recommendation 2: Excessive school referrals are especially problematic. Nearly two thirds of complaints on children ages 6–12 entering the juvenile justice system from 2014-2017 in North Carolina were for school-related issues, largely for disruptive behaviors that ideally should have been addressed as disciplinary matters. These young children are actually being charged by the educational systems that are legally mandated to serve them. In comparison, only about 40% of juveniles over age 12 were referred to juvenile court for school related misbehavior over the same three-year period.
The future success of low risk children should not be compromised by having an unjustified public record as a presumed “delinquent” child. The over-processing and heavy-handed atmosphere of the justice system could very well have a criminalizing effect, particularly on younger children. Very low risk offenders require only minimal intervention, such as restorative justice services or mediation. Many so-called “antisocial” children are simply going though age-normative disruptive behavior—not having yet learned appropriate behaviors. In addition, most criteria for affixing the “antisocial” label include behaviors that do not harm others—such as disobedience and frequent arguing. It is essential to avoid unnecessary labeling of children as “antisocial” or “delinquent,” particularly because this wrongful labeling can lead to arrest and subsequent juvenile court referral, and move these children away from appropriate early intervention with services that promote healthy child development. Even though children who commence with disruptive behaviors under 12 years of age have a relatively high prevalence rate for criminal activity during the early adult years, the reality is that most children these ages who are labeled as “child delinquents” soon grow out of problem behaviors (Loeber, Slot, Van Der Laan, & Hoeve, 2008).
Many court referrals are made by school resource officers associated with “zero tolerance” policies. This problem is addressed directly in the Georgia Clayton County Model (see Judge Teske’s Congressional Testimony, 2012). In a collaborative initiative with the School Superintendent and Chief of Police, a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) titled the “School Referral Reduction Protocol” (Teske & Huff, 2011)” was executed to: 1) reduce suspensions, expulsions, and arrests and 2) develop alternatives to suspension and arrests, including assessment and treatment measures for chronically disruptive students. The protocol identified misdemeanor offenses no longer eligible for referral to the juvenile court unless the student had exhausted a two-tier process that includes: 1) warning on the first offense to student and parent; 2) referral to a conflict skills workshop on the second offense; and 3) referral to the court on the third offense. A second MOU created a multidisciplinary panel to serve as a single point of entry for all child service agencies, including schools, when referring children, youth, and families at risk for petition to the court. The panel, called the Clayton County Collaborative Child Study Team, meets regularly to assess the needs of students at risk for court referral and recommends an integrated services action plan to address the student’s disruptive behavior. Immediately following implementation of the School Referral Reduction Protocol, referrals to the court were reduced by 67%. By the end of the 2011-12 school term, the number of students referred to the juvenile court for school offenses was reduced by 83%. The number of youth of color referred to the court for school offenses was reduced by 43%. It is noteworthy that, according to Judge Teske, “when prohibited from making arrests, school police began to engage students and developed an understanding that discipline should be applied on a case-by-case basis. This resulted in greater reductions in referrals.”
Recommendation 3: The third system reform is to divert wholesale the lion’s share of first-time misdemeanor offenders from juvenile courts via a system of statutorily-mandated civil citations. The Florida Civil Citation (Florida Statutes 985.12) has been in place since 2011, and its provisions and implementation information are detailed in: (http://www.lawserver.com/law/state/florida/statutes/florida_statutes_985-12). The Florida statute is designed to give law enforcement the discretion to issue a citation rather than filing a formal complaint. Only first-time misdemeanor offenders are eligible for the civil citation. Law enforcement officers who issue a civil citation may follow one of the two procedures: 1) transport an eligible juvenile to the Juvenile Assessment Center for booking as an arrestee; or 2) issue a civil citation in the field and release the youth to a parent, relative, guardian, or other responsible adult. The four goals of Civil Citation are to divert the youth at the time of arrest, hold the youth accountable for delinquent behavior, involve the parents in sanctioning and correcting the youth, and prevent the youth’s further involvement in the juvenile justice system. Civil Citation providers oversee youth who are required to receive an assessment of needs, perform community service hours and complete various sanctions which may include reparations and treatment services. Nearly 9,000 youth were served in the program in FY 2014-15 (Florida Department of Juvenile Justice, 2018). The low recidivism rate (5%) reported by the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice for youth who participate in Civil Citation is a key indicator of the success of this approach, and a recent study found that the Civil Citation program largely avoided the net-widening outcome that has historically plagued diversion programming (Nadal, Pesta, Blomberg et al., in press).
Recommendation 4: Youth/Teen/Student/Peer Court and Peer Jury Diversion Programs are a promising alternative for most low-risk offenders (Global Youth Justice, Inc, 2018). More than 1,800 youth court programs were in operation at the end of 2018, and Youth Courts, which receive more than 100,000 referrals a year, operate in 49 states and the District of Columbia (https://www.youthcourt.net/about/facts-and-stats). In a rigorous and comprehensive review, four studies found statistically significant results favoring the use of Youth Courts (Case, Schooley, DeFossett, et al., 2016). In sum, well implemented Youth/Teen/Student/Peer Court and Peer Jury Diversion Programs can provide an immediate intervention that holds participants accountable and promotes age-appropriate sanctions and reparation to victims and the community as a whole, while avoiding an official court record for the child or adolescent.
Recommendation 5: For children with mental health issues—and thus at elevated risk of becoming serious and violent offenders—the Stop Now and Plan (SNAP®) model (initially designed for boys) is recognized as the most extensively developed, longest sustained, empirically based intervention specifically for pre-offender youth under the age of 12 (Augimeri et al., 2017a, 2017b; Howell et al., 2014). The target population served by these programs include children who are clinically assessed as engaging in above-average levels of aggressive, destructive, or other antisocial behaviors. SNAP® Girls is a gender-sensitive cognitive-behavioral program for young aggressive girls and their parents. A recent cost–benefit analysis revealed that SNAP reduced the criminal justice system costs associated with detected and undetected offenses by between 18% and 33%, depending on the level of risk the child possessed. Extrapolating these data shows that up to $31.77 is saved for every $1.00 spent on the SNAP program (Augimeri et al., 2017a).
References
Augimeri, L.K., Pepler, D., Walsh, M., & Kivlenieks, M. (2017a). Addressing Children’s Disruptive Behavior Problems: A Thirty-Year Journey with SNAP (Stop Now and Plan). In P. Sturmey (Ed.), Handbook of Violence and Aggression, Volume 2: Assessment, Prevention, and Treatment of Individuals. Wiley Publishing.
Augimeri, L. K., Walsh, M., Levene, K., & Slater, N. (2017b). Scaling Deeper: SNAP® Model and Implementation Frameworks. In Raymond Corrado and Alan Leschied (Eds). Serious and violent young offenders and youth criminal justice: A Canadian perspective. Burnaby, BC: Simon Fraser University Press.
Case, L.N., Schooley, T.; DeFossett, A.; Stoll, M.A.; & Kuo, T. (2016). The impact of teen courts on youth outcomes: A systematic review. Adolescent Research Review, 1, 51-67.
Florida Department of Juvenile Justice. (2018).
http://centerforchildwelfare.fmhi.usf.edu/Training/2016cpsummit/Civil%20Citations.pdf
Global Youth Justice, Inc. (2018). https://www.globalyouthjustice.org/
Howell, J. C., Lipsey, M. W., & Wilson, J. J. (2014). A Handbook for Evidence-Based Juvenile Justice Systems. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.
Howell, M. Q., & Bullock, J. (2013). Juvenile Diversion in North Carolina. Raleigh, NC: North Carolina Department of Public Safety, Rehabilitative Programs and Support Services.
Loeber, R., Slott, N. W., Van Der Laan, P. H., & Hoeve, M. (2008). Tomorrow’s criminals: The development of child delinquency and effective interventions. Burlington, VT: Ashgate.
Nadel, M. R., Pesta, G., Blomberg, T., Bales, W. J., & Greenwald, M. (In press). Civil citation: Diversion or net widening. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency.
The Honorable Steven C. Teske, Chief Judge, Clayton County Juvenile Court, Georgia,
Testimony before the Senate Subcommittee on The Constitution, Civil Rights, and Human Rights Subcommittee Hearing on “Ending the School to Prison Pipeline,” December 12, 2012.
Teske, S. C., & Huff, J. B. (2011). When did making adults mad become a crime? The court’s role in dismantling the school-to-prison pipeline. Juvenile and Family Justice Today, Winter, 14-17.
Wilson, J. J., & Howell, J. C. (1993). A Comprehensive Strategy for Serious, Violent and Chronic Juvenile Offenders. Washington, DC: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.