Juvenile Probation

Probation Officers watch over and work with people who have been convicted of crimes, but were not sentenced to jail time. Instead of going to jail, the criminals/offenders are given a probationary time where they must obey everything set forth by the judge. If you wish to become a Probation Officer there are many things you must do to achieve your goal.

Probation services were first established in 1927. Since then, the system has changed tremendously with developing both centralized and decentralized models. Centralized probation is designed to give authority to the state for probation activities using a state wide administrative body whereas the decentralized model uses agencies administrated by a city or county thereby making it more flexible and better able to respond to incidents. In my opinion, I believe that the decentralized model would work best due to the fact that it would be a lot easier with probation being run by local officials who have a better understanding of the needs of the community and who may be better at assisting people on probation with turning their lives around. Centralized probation from my understanding has too many people involved in the court system to adequately monitor them therefore making it easier for the person on probation to repeat criminal behavior. Although people in favor of centralized probation argue that decentralizing probation has its flaws such as local probation following outdated practices, I believe with the proper training given to local law enforcement they will be better able to train staff with the updated procedures and possibly make a change in a person’s

Mark, age 17, is serving 13 years in the L.A. County Men’s Jail and when asked about how he felt about the situation he said, “little kid, he should be put in a program. When you send them to the pen all you making is a better criminal.” What Mark said is right criminal youth would be better off being placed in programs that help them get their life back on track, not placed into prison with a bunch of adults who have been criminals for years. A teen placed in a prison rather that a juvenile facility faces much more risk of repeating their criminal behavior and continuing down a dangerous path.

Teens shouldn’t be tried as adults due to the mental and emotional harm that can be caused. This harm will negatively affect their lives post-jail as memories of the imprisonment will still be retained and will change how one perceives the world. After finishing serving time, the teenager will likely act as a different person due to the harsh environment of jail. This can include negativity and hostility caused by what could happen to and around the teen’s still-developing and changing mind. These harmful traits may make the lives of the affected due to the possible lack of socialization. It is very possible that this will affect others also, due to the actions done by the affected teen. Not only this, but imprisonment can also desensitize

There are times when almost everyone asks what is the purpose of a juvenile probation officer; what role juvenile probation officers have, and what happens when you are on probation under the age of 18 and how a juvenile probation officer works with you. If you or you know someone who is in trouble, knowing how probation works isn’t always a bad thing.

The American juvenile justice system was designed over a hundred years ago to reform kids who were found guilty of minor crimes such as petty theft and truancy. Today, the system is becoming overwhelmed by crimes of violence. Stealing and skipping school have been replaced by violent crimes, such as rape and murder. The juvenile justice system is not meant to deal with these kinds of problems. In the past, the juvenile justice system sought to rehabilitate youthful offenders by taking a protective stance over juvenile delinquents. However, the protect instead of punish philosophy does not work for today’s society. Today, as juvenile crime has become more common and violent, our system will be forced to change. The justice

There are differences between a juvenile court and criminal court in the United States. The focus of the juvenile justice system is on rehabilitation, in hope of deterring the minor away from a life of crime so they will not commit a crime again as an adult. In contrast, the criminal justice system focuses on the punishment and often bases the sentencing outcome on the criminal history of the youth. In a study conducted, Butler (2011) showed that the participants’ experience with adult jails and prisons show that those facilities may instill fear but are otherwise emotionally—and often physically—dangerous for youth. Many of the adult prisoners, who were minors when they enter the adult institution, felt they were forced to “grow

The United States has a larger percent of its population incarcerated than any other country. America is responsible for a quarter of the world’s inmates, and its incarceration rate is growing exponentially. The expense generated by these overcrowded prisons cost the country a substantial amount of money every year. While people are incarcerated for several reasons, the country’s prisons are focused on punishment rather than reform, and the result is a misguided system that fails to rehabilitate criminals or discourage crime. This literature review will discuss the ineffectiveness of the United States’ criminal justice system and how mass incarceration of non-violent offenders, racial profiling, and a high rate of recidivism has become a problem.

Day, S. (2014). Runaway Man: A Journey Back to Hope. New York: Library of Congress.

According to Learningpath.org (n.d.), some of the methods used by Juvenile Probation Officers to help prevent youths from reoffending include

We have seen today in society of how crime rates have been rampant and how statistics show that most of the crimes were being made by minors. I believe that when most of them look at the bottom of these young offenders come disproportionately from impoverished single-parent homes that are located in the neighbourhoods desinvertido and have high rates of learning disabilities, mental health, and substance abuse and problems with the help of the system of juvenile justice that can make a great return on a successful transition to adulthood. Their ages ranged from 20 and under, most are under fifteen years of age.

Teen court also known as youth courts is a juvenile justice system program that permits teens to try and sentence their fellow peers for committing minor and status offenses. The main purpose of the teen court is to make young offenders accountable for their wrong doing by paying the price for their offences. However this system keeps first time offenders away from the Juvenile system and gives them a chance to change. In order for a youth to be considered to serve on a teen court, the young individual must be 8th to 12th grade with good academic standing, the teen must be nominated by teacher, parent or him or herself, an application must be filled up and signed with the parent’s approval.

This model provides insight for a myriad of aspects within a juvenile drug court. The activities that are involved in this model are, the goals; short-term and long-term, influences, concerns, etc. and are all taken into account. While not every juvenile drug court comprises these exact factors, most have some sort of close variation in their program framework. To comprehend these ideals, Figure 2. Juvenile Drug Court Logic Model Diagram, shows important key concepts and topics that need to be addressed. Furthermore, the creation of an actual model for juvenile drug courts served as a dynamic development that aided this type of rehabilitative ideal to be superior compared to incarceration. When adapting to a model such as Figure 2, it allows the juvenile court to produce stimulating discussion on how to even further improve the model to maintain a higher success levels for the juvenile, and an overall satisfaction from the criminal justice system that this is a viable option for these young offenders. A tremendous aspect of the framework of these types of models is that the time-frame for the program is roughly a year. While this may seem like a significant period of time for the juvenile, this is considered optimal to not only correct the issues relating to substance abuse, but also issues that are possibly related to the home life of the juvenile. These

The juvenile system is a ¨far cry¨ from justice (Estudillo). There have been many cases where minors are getting away with crimes that if they were tried as adults then they would pay the consequences for their crime. No amount of rehabilitation will help the minors, they will continue to do crimes as soon as they get out of the juvenile system. People should be worried about this issue because people of this world cannot let crimes go without the proper punishment. The victim's family will feel that they were treated the way that they should have been. They will feel as though there was no justice

Roxanne, L. (1994). JUVENILE OFFENDERS: WHAT WORKS? A Summary of Research Findings. The Evergreen State College.