Future of the Juvenile Justice System

Future of the Juvenile Justice System

Future of the Juvenile Justice System

Introduction

There is an old expression which holds that each child that is born holds within him or her the future of the human race . If that idea is true , based on nothing else , it is essential for the Juvenile Justice System to continue into the future . Even more compelling , however , are facts which justify the continuation of the system . This research will prove the necessity for the system , as well as a discussion of funding Ultimately , what will

be seen is that the Juvenile Justice System is as necessary as any part of a civilized society

Justification for the System

Ironically , the justification for the Juvenile Justice System can be interpreted also as the reasons that some would feel it is not working : since the year 2000 , over 2 million juvenile offenders have been arrested annually in the United States , with some sources citing that the amount of offenders who committed crimes but were never brought to justice could number in the tens of millions . However , the other statistic that opponents of the continuation of the system fail to acknowledge is the fact that the existence of the system does in fact prevent the number of criminal offenses by juveniles from exploding exponentially from where the current numbers of offenses lie (Roberts 2004

Studying the true intentions of the Juvenile Justice System and why it needs to exist provides justification for the system not necessarily based on the many statistics which can be seen as supporting or rejecting the system but because of the reasons that the system was first implemented and what it is now accomplishing albeit slowly Simply put , the Juvenile Justice System was first put into place to not only reduce the overall crime rate by apprehending youthful offenders but also to attempt to rehabilitate those offenders so that they could at some point , in most cases , be reintroduced into society as productive , law abiding citizens (Geraghty , 2004 . This , in turn likewise lowers the overall crime rate and protects the general public Therefore , the Juvenile Justice System is necessary because what it does is remove the career criminal ' from society without the costs and burden of imprisoning this individual as an adult criminal years later because they have been rehabilitated in their youth . This is a smart investment from a financial viewpoint as well as from that of public safety . However , the financial aspect deserves a closer examination

Funding Based on History , Trends , and Causation Theories

In a time when budget cuts in every area of public services seem to be the rule , it is essential that at the very least , the Juvenile Justice System continue to be funded at a steady level if the previously mentioned benefits to the general public are to be realized

First , the history of the system . While admitting that no system is perfect , it has been established earlier that the system does play a vital role in keeping...