Government Should Establish Program To Reduce Juvenile Crime
Juvenile crime is increasing rapidly and is a problem that plagues
America. The murder rate by 18 year olds has increased 467% since 1965! The current policy maintained for the last number of decades is clearly not effective. An increase of 207% in the number of murder cases committed by 15 year olds from 1985 to 1993 is not a sign that current policy is effective.
Changes must be made. The best way to address the problem is through government funded preventative programs. The affirmative intends to prove, and stands resolved, that the federal government should establish a program to substantially reduce juvenile crime.
This, by definition, means that the federal government would benefit the country by taking action and making government programs that will decrease the number of crimes committed by minors. Contention I: The status quo is only harming the people of the united states by remaining. Subpoint A: It has become clear that the state and local governments have failed in correcting the nation wide epidemic of juvenile crime, since juvenile crime rates are rising so rapidly. Subpoint 1:An example of an ineffective state plan is that many states are attempting to incarcerate juveniles along with adults. Putting juvenile offenders in with adults increases their chances offending again when they are released by 65%. Subpoint 2: SHOCAP, a local crime reduction plan, was shut down because it was ineffective. Subpoint B: Local plans are too diverse and lack uniformity. Subpoint 1: A plan that can lift up the entire country are far superior to those that can only effect small parts.. Iowa may indeed have smaller problems than New York but Juvenile crime exists everywhere.
Subpoint 2:In the hands of the federal government, a more effective, tax worthy and moral shaping plan can be spread throughout the entire united states and benefit the country as a whole. Utilizing this information from the faults and few successes of the states, will help correctly fund and perfect an active plan which will indeed begin to substantially reduce juvenile crime, before it happens...through the methods of prevention.
The plan that we the affirmative propose is one that institutes a combination of different preventative programs which the federal government will entirely set up, fund, and work with these community efforts.
Plank I: This preventative program will be funded through the organization of juvenile justice and delinquency prevention program, a federal agency which consists of 17 separate groups involved in delinquency prevention.
They are equipped with 144 million dollars with which they can assist the communities to create these life saving programs.
In the United States, jury trials are an important part of our court system. We rely heavily on the jury to decide the fate of the accused. We don’t give a second thought to having a jury trial now, but they were not always the ‘norm’.
A growing number of probation officers, judges, prosecutors as well as other juvenile professionals are advocating for a juvenile justice system which is greatly based on restorative justice. These groups of people have been frustrated by the policy uncertainty between retribution and treatment as well as unrealistic and unclear public expectations. As a primary mission, the balanced approach or policy allows juvenile justice systems together with its agencies to improve in their capacity of protecting the community and ensuring accountability of the system and the offenders . It enables the youths to become productive and competent citizens. This guiding philosophical framework for this policy is restorative justice as it promotes the maximum involvement of the community, victim, and the offender in the justice process. Restorative justice also presents a viable alternative to sanctions as well as interventions that are based on traditional or retributive treatment assumptions. In the policy proposal for restorative justice, the balanced approach mission assists juvenile justice system in becoming more responsive to the needs of the community, victims, and the offenders . Therefore, this paper considers how restorative justice reduces referrals of juveniles to criminal and juvenile justice systems and gives a proposal on the implementation of restorative justice in the community together with a number of recommendations. For instance, preliminary research reveals that application of restorative justice in schools significantly reduces school expulsions, suspensions, and referrals to the criminal justice systems. Restorative justice programs are an alternative for zero-tolerance policies for juveniles or youths .
The first American jury system began with the Pilgrims as early as 1620. In fact, the first jury trial was held in Massachusetts in 1630 (History of the Jury System in Massachusetts 1). In this trial, John Billington was on trial for the murder of John Newcomin. John Billington was found guilty and sent to the gallows. In 1641, Massachusetts determined that all “free men could serve on two juries in a year” (History of the Jury System in Massachusetts 2). Anyone who refused to serve on jury duty would be fined. This continues to be the consequence even today. It is important to note that “fre...
A jury is a panel of citizens, selected randomly from the electoral role, whose job it is to determine guilt or innocence based on the evidence presented. The Jury Act 1977 (NSW) stipulates the purpose of juries and some of the legal aspects, such as verdicts and the right of the defence and prosecution to challenge jurors. The jury system is able to reflect the moral and ethical standards of society as members of the community ultimately decide whether the person is guilty or innocent. The creation of the Jury Amendment Act 2006 (NSW) enabled the criminal trial process to better represent the standards of society as it allowed majority verdicts of 11-1 or 10-2, which also allowed the courts to be more resource efficient. Majority verdicts still ensure that a just outcome is reached as they are only used if there is a hung jury and there has been considerable deliberation. However, the role of the media is often criticized in relation to ensuring that the jurors remain unbiased as highlighted in the media article “Independent Juries” (SMH, 2001), and the wide reporting of R v Gittany 2013 supports the arguments raised in the media article. Hence, the jury system is moderately effective in reflecting the moral and ethical standards of society, as it resource efficient and achieves just outcomes, but the influence of the media reduces the effectiveness.
The right to a trial by jury is one of the most fundamental concepts on which the American justice system rests. It had been in the English common law practice for several centuries and the American founders deemed in necessary to continue the practice and draft it into the United States Constitution. Prior to the Sixth Amendment, the Constitution guaranteed trial by jury for all crimes except impeachment. In 1968 the Supreme Court solidified this right in Duncan v. Louisiana stating that juries are a necessary check to g...
Our current trial by jury system was originally adopted from Anglo-Saxon English common law. Prior to juries, the United States had much more rudimentary methods that were in affect, such as bench trials. A bench trial consists of solely the judge determining the final verdict, versus a jury possessing that responsibility. Proceeding with a trial by jury assures that there will be a margin of error, simply due to the fact that the jurors are human, and are susceptible to human fallibility. Whether the jury is cognizant of it or not, emotions such as pre-determined bias and favoritism can impede or bring the case to a halt all together. According to Andy Leipold, a professor emeritus at the University of Illinois College of Law, the number of jury trial conviction rates have increased from 75 percent in 1946 to 84 percent from 1989 to 2002 (Krause). This sudden anomaly can be attributed to the influx of uneducated jurors, the increased cost of proceeding to trial, and improper juror selection.
Gun control is a really good idea. Not only does it prevent all of the above but it also prevents a lot of accidents. Accidents from innocent people and especially children. As Norman L. Lunger explains in his book Big Bang: The Loud Debate over Gun Control. He writes, “Saving Lives With Gun Control. It's a common item on the evening news: A child picks up a loaded gun and it suddenly goes off, killing the child or a bystander. In Florida, two young boys found a shotgun under a bed in their grandparents' home. A six year old pulled the trigger, and a five year old fell dead. In Illinois, two teens found a handgun in their grandmother's apartment. The gun went off in the hands of a sixteen-year-old boy, killing his fifteen-year-old cousin. In Michigan, a six-year-old boy found a handgun in a shoebox at the house where he was staying with an uncle. He took the gun to school, pulled it out of his pocket, and shot a girl in his first-grade class. She died on the way to the hospital.” (Lunger, Big Bang: The Loud Debate over Gun Control) As he shows innocent children are being killed by other innocent children just because a gun was lying around. There is no way to go around it. Innocent children killed because there is no gun control. Not convincing enough? Lunger also says, “They note that firearms take the lives of some 30,000 people in the United States each year. About six hundred of the victims are under age fifteen, and about thirty-five hundred are aged fifteen to nineteen. According to the Centers for Disease Control, a federal agency, firearms take the lives of a far greater proportion of children in the United States than in other industr...
arguments pro and con will be much the same as they always have been. In 1977,
Introduction: Recidivism or, habitual relapses into crime, has time and time again proven to be an issue among delinquents, which thereby increases the overall juvenile prison population. This issue has become more prevalent than what we realize. Unless a unit for measuring a juvenile’s risk of recidivism is enacted and used to determine a system to promote effective prevention, than the juvenile prison population will continue to increase. Our court system should not only focus on punishing the said juvenile but also enforce a program or policy that will allow for prevention of recidivism. So the question remains, how can recidivism in the juvenile prison population be prevented so that it is no longer the central cause for increased juvenile delinquency? Simply put, we must create a means of measuring juvenile’s level of risk and in turn, form an effective rehabilitation program that will decrease their risk level for future recidivism.
Hundreds of youth under the age of 16 are incarcerated at the Department of Juvenile Justice in New York City. The majority of these young people locked up do not pose a threat to society because they are convicted of non-violent, low-level offenses. If these are low-level offenses, why are these young individuals being sent to juvenile centers? Well, rather than employing traditional disciplinary measures for minor discretions such as detention or counseling, faculty members are instead using drastic methods such as suspension, expulsion and law enforcement to punish the youth. This funneling of students out of school and into the streets and the juvenile correction system is known as the “School-to-Prison-Pipeline.” This cycle deprives the youth who are in poverty, of meaningful opportunities such as an education and a future.
Juvenile crime in the United States is ballooning out of control along with adult crimes, and politicians and law enforcement officials don’t seem to be able to do anything about it. Despite tougher sentencing laws, longer probation terms, and all other efforts of lawmakers, the crime and recidivism rates in our country can’t be reduced. The failure of these recent measures along with new research and studies by county juvenile delinquency programs point to the only real cure to the U.S.’s crime problem: prevention programs. The rising crime rates in the United States are of much worry to most of the U.S.’s citizens, and seems to be gaining a sense of urgency. Crime ranks highest in nationwide polls as Americans’ biggest concern (Daltry 22). For good reason- twice as many people have been victims of crimes in the 1990s as in the 1970s (Betts 36). Four times as many people under the age of eighteen were arrested for homicide with a handgun in 1993 than in 1983 (Schiraldi 11A). These problems don’t have a quick fix solution, or even an answer that everyone can agree on. A study by the Campaign for an Effective Crime Policy has found no deterrent effects of the “Three Strikes and You’re Out” law recently put into effect by politicians (Feinsilber 1A). It has been agreed however that there is not much hope of rehabilitating criminals once started on a life of crime. Criminologist David Kuzmeski sums up this feeling by saying, “If society wants to protect itself from violent criminals, the best way it can do it is lock them up until they are over thirty years of age.... I am not aware of any treatment that has been particularly successful.” The problem with his plan is that our country simply doesn’t have the jail space, or money to ...
Anxiety can often be viewed as a fear that someone experiences when they feel something terrible is about to happen and seeing no way out of the situation, whether thinking in the past, present, or future. Their are many different ways to cope with anxiety through methods like psychotherapeutic medication and psychotherapy. Anxiety often causes more trouble to a situation or thought and furthers anxiety so it is important to realize that anxiety can often be treated as long as we are willing to understand it’s effect human beings. Ghinassi, Winning, Starcevic, and Vladan discuss what anxiety is, where it comes from, and various methods of coping with anxiety through their books.
Juvenile delinquency is committing criminal acts or offenses by a young person, generally involving people under the age of eighteen. That is what this research proposal is about. For my research proposal my research question is what can cause or deter juvenile delinquency in first time offenders? I feel that this is an important question to be asking, because in our society there is too much juvenile delinquency and if we can use this research to figure out what can cause and deter this phenomenon then we could sincerely help a lot of adolescents.
A major ethical concern that has been under speculation for many of years is focused around animal ethics, and whether or not certain animal practices are just or inhuman. There are many questions that focus around fundamental issues concerning the moral status of animals. It is critical to understand the difference between a concern for animal welfare and a concern for animal rights. A current issue that is important to understand and analyze is animal experimentation, and although many consider it to be an unethical practice, there are many pros and cons to the controversial topic. Although animal experimentation has been very beneficial medically, the argument can be made that using animals to experiment is not always necessary.
...ning a driver’s license they have worked hard for. Deciding to raise the age does not seem like a prime choice, because not only does the argument include age as a factor, but it greatly affects the lives of everyday people.