| Best Practices |
 |
|
 |
|
|
Child/Youth Crime Prevention- Essential Components
In general, youth violence prevention programs that work:
- Address the highest-priority problem areas and identify the risk and protective factors to which children in a particular community are exposed
- Focus most strongly on populations exposed to a number of risk factors
- Address multiple risk factors in multiple settings (schools, family, peer groups)
- Offer comprehensive interventions across many systems
- Ensure that programs are intensive and involve multiple contacts weekly or even daily with at-risk juveniles;
- Build on juveniles’ strengths
- Deal with juveniles in the context of their relationships with others rather than focus solely on the individual;
- Begin as early as possible in a child’s life.
Program components that may not work as well or have mixed results:
- Use of scare tactics that show videos or pictures of violent scenes
- Adding a violence-prevention program to a school that is already overwhelmed
- Segregating aggressive or antisocial students into a separate group
- Using instructional programs that are too brief and not supported by a positive school climate. Research in the area of drug-abuse prevention suggests that programs should be at least ten sessions long in the first year, at least five sessions long in the subsequent years and at least three years in duration if programs are to be effective. Programs of longer duration are most successful.
- Implementing programs that focus exclusively on self-esteem development
- Adopting strategies that only provide information 1
Identified Risk Factors
The Center for Disease Control and the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention have clustered risk factors into the following four areas: Individual/Peer, Family, School and Neighborhood/Community. Examples of risk factors in each of these areas are:
- Individual/Peer
- History of early aggression
- Beliefs supportive of violence
- Social cognitive defects
- Rebelliousness
- Friends who engage in the problem behavior
- Early initiation of the problem behavior
- Family
- Poor monitoring or supervision of children
- Exposure to violence
- Parental drug/alcohol abuse
- Poor emotional attachment to caregivers
- Family history of the problem behavior
- Favorable parental attitudes and involvement in the problem behavior
- Family management problems
- School
- Academic failure beginning in elementary school
- Lack of commitment to school
- Early and persistent antisocial behavior
- Neighborhood/Community
- Poverty and diminished economic opportunity
- High levels of transiency and family disruption
- Availability of drugs/firearms
- Low neighborhood attachment and community organization
Personal qualities in youth that are associated with reductions in violence include problem-solving and reasoning skills, social capacities, and productive sense of purpose, independence and power. Lives of youth at risk for criminal behavior are most positively affected by strategies focusing on early intervention, such as parent training, graduation incentives and delinquent supervision. 2 and 3
Crime, Violence and Delinquency Prevention
Longitudinal research has detected two prominent developmental trajectories for the emergence of youth violence: early-onset (children who commit their first serious violent act before puberty) and late-onset (youths who become violent in adolescence). In the early-onset trajectory, problem behavior in childhood gradually escalates to more violent behavior and culminates in serious violence before adolescence. Between 20 and 45 percent of boys who are serious violent offenders by age 16 or 17 initiated their violence in childhood; the percentage is higher for girls (45 to 69 percent). Most violent youths begin their violent behavior during adolescence, yet the youths that commit most of the violent acts, who commit the most serious violent acts, and who continue their violent behavior into adulthood, began in childhood. According to the Surgeon General’s report on youth violence, programs need to address both early- and late-onset violence. Early childhood programs that target at-risk children and families are critical for preventing the onset of a chronic violent career, but programs must also be developed to combat late-onset violence. Thus, a comprehensive community prevention strategy will address both onset patterns and ferret out their respective causes and risk factors. 4
Prevention and Intervention
Primary prevention lessens the likelihood that youths in a treatment or intervention program will initiate violent behavior, are designed to target youths who have not yet become involved in violence or encountered specific risk factors, and target general (universal) populations. Intervention reduces the risk of violence among youth who display one or more risk factors for violence (also known as secondary prevention), or the escalation of violence among youths who are already involved in violent behavior (tertiary prevention). Intervention includes programs that target high-risk (selected) youths or already violent (indicated) youth.
| Effective Strategies |
Ineffective Strategies |
| Primary Prevention: Universal |
- Skills training
- Behavior monitoring and reinforcement
- Behavioral techniques for classroom management
- Building school capacity
- Continuous progress programs
- Cooperative learning
- Positive youth development programs |
- Peer counseling, peer mediation
- Non-promotion to succeeding grades |
| Secondary Prevention: Selected |
- Parent training
- Home visitation
- Compensatory education
- Moral reasoning
- Social problem solving
- Thinking skills |
- Gun buyback programs
- Firearm training
- Mandatory gun ownership
- Redirecting youth behavior
- Shifting peer group norms |
| Tertiary Prevention: Indicated |
- Social perspective taking, role-taking
- Multi-modal interventions
- Behavioral interventions
- Skills training
- Marital and family therapy by clinical staff
- Wraparound services |
- Boot camps
- Residential programs
- Milieu treatment
- Behavioral token programs
- Waivers to adult court
- Social casework
- Individual counseling 1 |
Current Policy and New Treatment Perspectives to Consider
“Some youth are too dangerous to remain out on the streets. Some have no safe and healthy place to go home to. Some have committed crimes so heinous or offended so chronically that society’s moral standards demand serious punishment. These youth require out-of-home placement. Yet for the majority of youthful offenders, including many who are currently locked inside correctional youth facilities, success would be far more likely through supervision, treatment services, and youth development opportunities.”
Less Hype, More Help: Reducing Juvenile Crime, What Works—And What Doesn’t, Richard Mendel
The first juvenile court was established in Illinois in 1899. Over the past century, thinking has changed regarding juvenile justice, and best practices for treatment are often disputed. Although there have been calls to eliminate or greatly curtail the court’s jurisdiction over criminal acts committed by juveniles, there is a wide-spread consensus that a specialized court for some set of child-related matters is necessary. The greatest difference of opinion lies in defining the scope and describing the specifics of the court’s juvenile jurisdiction. 6
Following is an overview of the thinking behind juvenile courts, a short description of current treatment models and the most recent research regarding these practices. We will then briefly describe innovative programs such as graduated/community-based sanctions, teen courts and restorative justice.
Children differ from adults in significant ways and these differences led to the need for a specialized court to handle issues involving children. First, children are dependent on adults in a way that adults are not dependent upon one another. Second, children are developing emotionally and cognitively; they are impressionable and can be influenced positively or negatively. Third, children have different levels of understanding than adults; the procedures in place in adult courts may not be comprehensible to a juvenile. There have been significant changes in the mission and function of juvenile courts in the past century, but these basic differences between children and adults remain and continue to support the need for a specialized court. 7
Since 1899, the juvenile court has had to work closely with an array of public and private agencies both to identify children in need and to provide services to these children and their families. The need for close working relationships between the court and agencies caring for children is greater than ever today.
Current Policy and Practice Issues
Transferring Juveniles to Adult Court. Juveniles can end up in adult court through one of three methods. First, juvenile court judges can transfer cases to adult court following a hearing, a process known as judicial waiver. Second, prosecutors in some states can directly file certain cases in either juvenile or adult court. Finally, some state statutes exclude certain types of crimes or chronic offenders from juvenile court jurisdiction; this is known as statutory exclusion or legislative waiver.
The primary motivation for moving more cases to the adult criminal justice system is getting tough on juvenile crime. Some commentators argue that transferring juveniles to the adult system is worthwhile for its symbolic value alone; others believe that fear of being transferred to adult court will serve as a deterrent to potential juvenile offenders; still others argue that transfer to adult court will provide the additional due process protections required in adult court (such as the right to a jury trial).
Transfer is not being used only to send violent offenders to adult court, however. In 1992, property offenses made up a larger percentage of transfers than crimes committed against a person or a drug offense. Research findings do not substantiate the claim that transfer of increasing numbers of juveniles to adult criminal court reduces the rate of reoffending by this juvenile population. Richard Mendel, in Less Hype, More Help, has this to say about “adult time for adult crime”:
- Transfer does not ensure tougher punishment. Criminal courts do not impose sterner sanctions than juvenile courts on most youthful offenders. In Florida, which transfers more youth than any other state, only 15 percent of transferred juvenile offenders in 1998 were sentenced to prison.
- Transfer to adult court increases the criminality of youthful offenders. Juvenile offenders who are transferred to criminal court recidivate more often, more quickly, and with more serious offenses than those retained under juvenile jurisdiction.
- The threat of adult punishment does not deter youth from crime.
- Confining youthful offenders with adults is dangerous and counter-productive. Compared with youth confined in juvenile institutions, youthful offenders housed in adult jails and prisons are eight times more likely to commit suicide, five times more likely to be sexually assaulted, twice as likely to be beaten by staff, and 50 percent more likely to be attacked with a weapon. Youth housed in adult jails and prisons consequently suffer with elevated rates of anxiety and depression and are more likely to be placed into specialized mental health treatment units.
- Transfer laws routinely target youth who are not chronic or violent offenders.
- Transfers to criminal court disproportionately target minority youth.
- Transfer is expensive and wastes funds needed to implement research-proven intervention programs.
- Aggressive transfer laws are not needed to stiffen punishment for the most egregious young offender. In fact, “blended jurisdiction” has shown to be an effective strategy for the most serious juvenile offenders.
Boot camps. Despite popularity with the public, boot camps have not been shown to be effective. A 1995 evaluation of these programs in eight states found that four had no effect on recidivism, one resulted in higher rates, and three were effective on some recidivism measures. The programs with the best results had therapeutic components, and aftercare upon release.
Residential Programs. Residential programs take place in psychiatric or correctional institutions. Unfortunately, these programs show little promise of reducing subsequent crime and violence in delinquent youths. Although some programs appear to have positive effects on youth during the course of the program, research consistently demonstrates that these effects diminish once the program is completed.
Wilderness Programs. Wilderness programs are similar to residential programs. These programs operate more open programs in isolated wilderness camps, where the remoteness of the location provides the necessary security and overcoming the challenges of the environment becomes an aspect of the program. A 1987 study by Greenwood and Turner examined VisonQuest. Youth from VisionQuest had fewer arrests than youth who served time in a probation camp. However, other studies have not proven conclusively that wilderness camps are effective in preventing recidivism in the long-term. 8 , 9
In regards to boot camps, residential programs and wilderness programs, it seems that intensive and consistent aftercare is an essential component to preventing future delinquency.
New Perspectives 10
Community Supervision and Programming. Jurisdictions serious about working with youths have developed a wide array of programs offering varying degrees of supervision and services. At the low-intensity end of the spectrum are performance contracts and higher-than usual frequencies of contact with a volunteer case manager. At the high-intensity end are dawn-to-dusk education and training programs. These programs provide meals, work with parents, and arrange supplementary recreational or work experience activities on weekends.
Primary evaluations of the early forerunners of these nonresidential programs provided the basis for Lipsey’s finding that noncustodial, nonjuvenile justice programs are more effective than other forms of treatment. Lipsey does not state that one approach is clearly better than the others. In addition to private sponsorship and community settings, the more effective programs all appear to have multiple modes of intervention, high levels of intensity and duration, and greater structure. They are more theoretically rigorous, ambitious, and tightly executed.
Graduated Sanctions. Many juvenile justice scholars agree that prison incarceration should be reserved only for a small number of very chronic or violent offenders, with graduated and community-based dispositions used for all other offenders. A model graduated sanctions system combines treatment and rehabilitation with reasonable, fair, humane and appropriate sanctions and offers a continuum of care consisting of diverse programs. The continuum includes the following:
- Immediate sanctions within the community for first-time nonviolent offenders.
- Intermediate sanctions within the community for more serious offenders.
- Secure care programs for the most violent offenders.
- Aftercare programs that provide high levels of social control and treatment services. 11
Teen Courts. Teen courts are generally used for younger juveniles with no prior arrests who have been charged with minor violations. Teen courts often include many of the same steps as the formal juvenile court; they differ from other juvenile justice programs in that young people, rather than adults, are in charge. Youth in teen courts may act as prosecutors, defense counsel, jurors, court clerks, bailiffs or judges. Adults act as administrators who provide oversight, planning and training. The key feature of teen courts is the substantial role that youth play in the imposition of sanctions on young offenders.
For examples and descriptions of teen court programs in Oregon, see the following:
Oregon Teen/Youth Court Programs – A directory of youth court programs in Oregon
www.youthcourt.net/national_listing/United_States/queryOR.asp
Oregon Youth Court Association
Shari Pressler, President
P.O. Box 6688
Bend, OR 97708-6688
541-388-5566
Restorative Justice. The foundation of restorative juvenile justice practice is a coherent set of values and principles, a guiding vision, and an action-oriented mission. It has been used successfully in many tribes and cultures for centuries, and is beginning to gain recognition as a positive alternative to juvenile corrections. Restorative justice suggests a balanced approach mission: accountability, competency development and community safety. In this model, juvenile justice professionals can:
- Make needed services available for victims of crime.
- Give victims opportunities for involvement and input.
- Actively involve community members, including individual crime victims and offenders, in making decisions and carrying out plans for resolving issues and restoring the community.
- Build connections among community members.
- Give juvenile offenders the opportunity and encouragement to take responsibility for their behavior.
- Actively involve juvenile offenders in repairing the harm they caused.
- Increase juvenile offenders’ skills and abilities. 12
Safe Schools: Preventing School Violence
Violence that occurs at school is a very real concern. Although the risk and protective factors for preventing school violence are essentially the same as those for preventing violence in general, it is crucial that administrators, staff and teachers establish a caring and violence-free environment. Therefore it is important to note the early warning signs for violence that may be perceived at school:
- Social withdrawal
- Excessive feelings of isolation and being alone
- Excessive feelings of rejection
- Being a victim of violence
- Feelings of being picked on and persecuted
- Low interest and poor academic performance
- Expression of violence in writings and drawings
- Uncontrolled anger
- Patterns of impulsive and chronic hitting, intimidating, and bullying behaviors
- History of discipline problems
- Past history of violent and aggressive behavior
- Intolerance for differences and prejudicial attitudes
- Drug use and alcohol abuse
- Affiliation with gangs
- Inappropriate access to, possession of, and use of firearms
- Serious threats of violence
Effective prevention, intervention, and crisis response strategies operate best in school communities that:
- Focus on academic achievement, with adequate programs and support for all children to meet expectations
- Involve families in meaningful ways
- Develop links to the community
- Emphasize positive relationships among students and staff
- Discuss safety issues openly
- Treat students with equal respect
- Create ways for students to share their concerns
- Help children feel safe expressing their feelings
- Have in place a system for referring children who are suspected of being abused or neglected
- Offer extended day programs for children
- Promote good citizenship and character
- Identify problems and assess progress toward solutions
- Support students in making the transition to adult life and the workplace. 13
Bullying
Bullying in its truest form is comprised of a series of repeated intentionally cruel incidents, involving the same children, in the same bully and victim roles. The intention of bullying is to put the victim in distress; bullies seek power. By age 24, up to sixty percent of people who are identified as childhood bullies have at least one criminal conviction. E. Enron at the University of Michigan found that children who were named by their schoolmates, at age eight, as the bullies of the school were often bullies throughout their lives. In this longitudinal study (35 years), many of these children, as adults, required more support from government agencies. For example, these children later had more court convictions, more alcoholism; more antisocial personality disorders and used more of the mental health services than the other children.
Conflict Resolution, Peer Mediation, Peaceable Classrooms
Conflict resolution refers generally to strategies that enable students to handle conflicts peacefully and cooperatively outside the traditional disciplinary procedures. Peer mediation is a specific form of conflict resolution utilizing students as neutral third parties in resolving disputes. A peaceable classroom or school results when the values and skills of cooperation, communication, tolerance, positive emotional expression, and conflict resolution are taught and supported throughout the culture of the school. The recent growth of violence in schools has fueled interest in conflict resolution. However, experienced practitioners view conflict resolution as only one component in preparing youth to find nonviolent responses to conflict, in promoting social justice and in reducing prejudice in school communities. Limited evaluation studies show positive trends related to aggression, student self-image and skills and overall school climate. 14
Gang Prevention and Intervention
Gang prevention and intervention strategies have been studied since the 1920’s. Youth gangs and their activities have been a recurrent indication of disorder in society, and changes in gang structure parallel changes in society. Gangs became more violent as a result of increased violence in society in general. Much of what was learned about gangs in studies from the 1920s to the 1950s hold true today:
- Members are typically young males of similar ethnic or racial backgrounds
- Loyalty and adherence to a strict gang code is mandatory
- Cohesiveness among members increases as recognition from society increases
- Loyalty is solidified by participation in group activities that are often antisocial, illegal, violent and criminal
- The chain of command is hierarchical
- Identification with a local territory is commonplace both in the neighborhood and at school
- Recruitment is an ongoing process
Present days gangs have emerged with the following characteristics, in addition to those listed above:
- Younger active members
- Evidence of ethnic and racial crossover in multiethnic neighborhoods
- An insurgence of female gangs
- Established cliques or sets in suburban communities
- Acquisition of large sums of money from illegal drug markets and prostitution
- Rampant use of drugs and alcohol
- Violent membership
- Use of sophisticated communications devices and automatic weapons
- Employment of guerrilla warfare-like tactics
- Total disregard for life as evidenced by the senseless deaths of innocent victims
Youths who have a propensity toward delinquent behavior are four times more likely to engage in illegal acts and violent crimes as gang members than they would as non-gang members. The likelihood of gang membership increases if youths are exposed to family, community and school risk factors such as:
- Dysfunctional family conditions (e.g., poor parenting skills, continuous violent and abusive practices by adult members, drug and alcohol abuse, and a family history of gang membership)
- Deteriorated environmental conditions (e.g., depressed socioeconomic circumstances and a history of gangs in the neighborhood)
- Poor performance in school (e.g., serious academic and attendance problems and failure to engage in positive peer relationships and/or activities)
There are many programs and strategies to prevent and intervene in youth gangs, but its is generally agreed that solutions must be site-specific, whether school or community based. Gang experts feel that the most effective strategies are likely to be comprehensive, multipronged approaches that incorporate prevention, intervention and suppression activities, such as OJJDP’ s demonstration initiative: the Comprehensive Community-Wide approach to Gang Prevention, Intervention and Suppression Program.
The Comprehensive Community-Wide Approach to Gang Prevention, Intervention and Suppression
This program, currently being demonstrated in two cities, utilizes the “Spergel model” to engage communities in a systematic gang assessment, consensus building and program development process. This model involves delivering the following five core strategies through an integrated and team-oriented problem-solving approach:
- Community mobilization, including citizens, youth, community groups and agencies
- Provision of academic, economic and social opportunities. Special school training and job programs are especially critical for older gang members who are not in school but may be ready to leave the gang,
- Social intervention, using street outreach workers to engage gang-involved youth
- Gang suppression, including formal and informal social control procedures of the juvenile and criminal justice systems and community agencies and groups working in collaboration.
- Organizational change and development, the appropriate organization and integration of the above strategies and potential reallocation of resources among involved agencies.
The Comprehensive Gang Model embraces the concept of effective use of the social controls inherent in various social institutions. Individuals, families, the community as a whole, agencies and organizations are reminded that they have a stake in supporting positive behaviors and in taking a firm stance against illegal activities including gang crime and violence.
For more examples of effective school and comprehensive community based programs, see the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s Youth Gang Programs and Strategies along with other publications, available from the Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse/NCJRS, P.O. Box 6000, Rockville, MD 20849-6000, by calling 1-800-638-8736 or on the web at:
http://www.ncjrs.org/html/ojjdp/publist2000/contents.html
Child/Youth Crime Prevention
1 Bownes, D. and S. Ingersoll. “Mobilizing Communities to Prevent Juvenile Crime.” Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Bulletin, July 1997.
2 Bownes, D. and S. Ingersoll. Ibid.
3 Pew Partnership. “Adolescent Health: Violence Prevention.” (18 December 01). www.ncjrs.org/txtfiles1/165928.txt (14 Jan. 2002).
4 U. S. Department of Health and Human Services. Youth Violence: a Report of the Surgeon General. Rockville, MD: U.S. Department of Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control; Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Center for Mental Health Services; and National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Mental Health (2001).
5 Youth Violence, 106.
6 Stevenson, C, Larson, C, et.al. “The Juvenile Court: Analysis and Recommendations,” Future of Children, 6, 3 ( Winter 1996) 4.
7 Stevenson, et. al, 5-6.
8 Greenwood, P. “Responding to Juvenile Crime: Lessons Learned, “ Future of children, 6, 3 (winter 1996) 80-1
9 Mendel, R. 2000. Less hype, more help: Reducing juvenile crime, what works—and what doesn’t. Washington, DC; American Youth Policy Forum.
10 These new practices are still being studied and so far there is not any empirical evidence to support their efficacy.
11 Howell, J., ed. 1995. Guide for implementing the strategy for serious, violent and chronic juvenile offenders. Washington, DC: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, p 133.
12 Guide for implementing the balanced and restorative justice model. 1998. Washington, DC: office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, p 6.
13 Dwyer, K., Osher, D., and Warger, C. (1998). Early warning, timely response: A guide to safe schools. Washington, DC: U.s. Department of Education.
14 Girard, Kathryn l. 1995. “ Preparing Teachers for Conflict Resolution in the Schools”. http://www.ericdigests.org/1996-2/conflict.html (28 Jan. 2002).
|
|
| |
|
|
