The Juvenile Justice System - Research Paper Example

Section# An Analysis of the Juvenile Justice System through the Eyes of Five Historical Supreme Court Rulings and the Precedents They Portend This brief analysis will focus on five Supreme Court cases that helped to further define the scope and extent of juvenile justice laws within the United States. Secondly, an analysis of the given constructs of law exhibited within these cases will be discussed. Furthermore, the ways in which these cases affected juvenile justice will be broken down into whether they helped expand or contract prior jurisprudence on the given topic. Because many commonalities are shared by the juvenile and adult criminal justice systems, it is often easy to confuse the overall goals and mechanisms which drive them. The most notable contrast between the juvenile justice system and the adult criminal justice system is the fact that the juvenile justice system has it its core the goal and desire to rehabilitate the offender rather than merely punish him/her for the crime. Because of the varying degrees of compatibility and comparison between the two systems, this analysis will examine Supreme Court rulings in order to show a pattern of differentiation and evolution of juvenile justice over time. 1 In re Winship 397 U.S. 358, 90 S.Ct. 1068 (1970) The first case in question is case 397 U.S. 358 (In re Winship). The case revolved around a 12 year old who was charged with stealing money from a woman’s purse inside a store. Although the defendant was seen running from the scene, the Supreme Court determined that the preponderance of evidence alone was not sufficient to convict the juvenile of the crime; instead, the court ruling upheld that juvenile justice cases must be held to the same rigor that traditional criminal justice cases are in that it must be proved beyond “reasonable doubt” that the accused was guilty. Effectually, the court was asked to determine, “If proof beyond reasonable doubt is among the essentials of due process and fair treatment required during the adjudicatory stage when a juvenile is charged with an act which would constitute a crime if committed by an adult”1. The Supreme Court threw out lower court rulings that insinuated that juvenile court cases need not operate under the same standards of law that applied to adult courts because the juvenile justice system was intended to save rather than to punish. Rather, the Supreme Court sided with the defense and ruled that proof beyond reasonable doubt as well as the existence of a preponderance of evidence was necessary to adjudicate cases within the juvenile justice system. To an extent, this case further restricted the existing juvenile justice system. Prior to this precedent, the juvenile justice system was not beholden to many of the guiding standards that affected traditional criminal cases. As a result, the juvenile justice system encouraged an judicial atmosphere of “make it up as you go along”. Unfortunately, this type of attitude did not lend itself to the appropriate dispensation of justice. Judges were taking liberties with the notion that they were responsible for saving the accused youth; thereby encouraging the judges to err on the side of caution when handing down sentences in the hopes that they might reform an errant youth. Although the Supreme Court upheld the right of the juvenile justice courts to correct the youth as well as punish them, the constraints of how the judges were to go about “correcting” the youth was significantly altered. 2 McKeiver v. Pennsylvania 403 U.S. 528, 91 S.Ct. 1976 (1971) In much the same vein, 403 U.S. 528 worked to create further delineations of due process within the juvenile justice system. The case regarded a 16 year old boy who was charged with robbery, larceny, and the receipt of stolen property. The case hinged upon the fact that the youth was only provided with a few moments to meet with his attorney prior to going before the judge. Because of the overall lack of legal defense preparedness, the attorney’s request for a jury trial was ignored and the case was adjudicated by the judge2. In this way, the defendant’s right to legal counsel as well as due process were violated. In this case the Supreme Court was forced to balance a difficult set of principles. The court ruled that due process was not followed in this case and further elements of the traditional criminal justice system must be incorporated into the juvenile justice system; however, this must be done without “eroding the traditional character of juvenile court proceedings”. Additionally, the court ruled that the due process clause of the 14th amendment does not require jury trials in juvenile court. Regardless of the age of the accused, the court specified that the accused should have adequate time and allowances to meet with legal counsel before the case was allowed to proceed before a judge. 3 Schall v. Martin 467 U.S. 253, 104 S.Ct. 2403 (1984) According to 463 U.S. 253, the Supreme Court upheld the decision of the original court order with reference to the precedent of preventative detention. The juvenile in question was accused of armed robbery and assault. As such, during the pretrial period, the judge found indication that there was “serious risk” that the accused would commit further crime if allowed back into the general public. In effect, what the judge performed was a type of pre-trial preventative detention. Not surprisingly, the defendant’s lawyer challenged this preventative detention as a clear abrogation to the right of habeas corpus. On appeal, subsequent courts overruled the judge’s ruling and sided with the defense on the basis that juvenile preventative detention violated the writ of habeas corpus especially given the fact that the accused had not even been tried/sentenced yet. What was unique about the way in which the Supreme Court sided in this case is not only the fact that they deemed pretrial detention a fair and legitimate but that they indicated that pretrial detention served a legitimate objective by protecting the defendant and society from pretrial crime3. Furthermore, the court noted that there were enough protections in place already so as not to unlawfully deprive the accused of liberty. The ruling in the case was a definite type of expansion of the previous understanding of the juvenile justice system by the Supreme Court of the United States. 4 Breed v. Jones 421 U.S. 519, 95 S.Ct. 1779 (1975) Supreme Court case 421 U.S. 519 involved the fifth amendment and the double jeopardy clause. In short, a 17 year old was adjudicated before a judge at a dispositional hearing. The judge waived jurisdiction, choosing instead to have the case referred to a criminal court. Upon this request, the defense attorney filed a writ of habeas corpus claiming that this jurisdictional change at this point in the process equated to double jeopardy as the teen would then go on to face the same charges in a different court with even stiffer penalties. Subsequently, the court denied this motion and on appeals the case eventually arrived at the Supreme Court. Upon review, the Supreme Court ruled that the jurisdictional change did indeed violate the double jeopardy clause of the 5th amendment and therefore overruled the prior determinations made by the lower courts4. Most importantly, the court found that, ” Contrary to petitioner's contention, respondent's trial in Superior Court for the same offense as that for which he had been tried in Juvenile Court, violated the policies of the Double Jeopardy Clause, even if respondent ‘never faced the risk of more than one punishment’ ”5. This clearer categorization towards the differentials between adult criminal process and juvenile criminal process helped further classify juvenile justice within the broader framework of criminal justice. Furthermore, the court ruled that jeopardy first arises when the juvenile is adjudicated with evidence; as such, any further jurisdictional change thereafter will invoke unlawful double jeopardy. 5 Smith v. Daily Mail Publishing Company 443 U.S. 97, 99 S.Ct. 2667 (1979) The final case that this analysis will weigh is that of 443 U.S. 97, also known as Smith v. Daily Mail Publishing Company. In this case, the court was challenged to yield a determination on the legality of news services reporting the name of an accused juvenile offender. Prior to this case, it had been assumed by the authorities and media alike that it was illegal to attribute names to suspecting juvenile offenders; even if the information in question was obtained through legal channels. When West Virginia media were able to determine the suspects name by interviewing eyewitnesses of the crime as well as picking up traffic on the police scanners as the event was in progress, they were able to positively identify the suspect. The name was then subsequently published and the fallout of this action shortly ensued. Local and state litigation was then filed against Daily Mail Company and the case made its way through the various steps of the legal process. Eventually, the case was brought to the attention of the Supreme Court to make a determination as to whether Daily Mail Company had 1st amendment rights to the information (obtained legally) and if so, did those 1st amendment rights transcend the rights to the accused of protecting his/her identity from the public. The Supreme Court overturned the rulings of the lower courts and indicated that as long as the information was legally obtained by the relevant entity, the state could not prohibit the entity from transmitting the information to the public. In effect, this somewhat weakened the protection that juveniles had previously enjoyed under the existing juvenile justice system; now their identity was no longer absolutely guaranteed anonymity. Furthermore, it does not take a great deal of investigative reporting on the part of news entities to correctly identify the accused in various juvenile justice cases. As such, the court noted that it is not in keeping within the rubric of the 1st amendment to prohibit the publication of such information6. It is worth noting however that even though this case provided a legal precedent for the dissemination of information, most entities still uphold the unspoken rule that juvenile information is not disseminated to the public in all but the most extreme/rare of cases. The court further re-iterated that the press and interested bodies were not allowed access to juvenile justice files under any circumstances. Conclusion Finally, these five Supreme Court cases helped mould and shape the juvenile justice system in ways that both mirror and serve as a contrasting entity to its counterpart – the adult criminal justice system. Through these cases discussed, the reader may clearly see the progression that has taken place within the juvenile justice system as it has sought a slightly different role in crime prevention from that of the adult criminal justice system. As such, the determinations, both the expansion and contraction of jurisprudence, have served to provide the current juvenile justice system with the tools it requires to both sentence as well as attempt to rehabilitate youths. Read More