In this week’s examination of the juvenile justice system, we are afforded a clearer look into the experiences of incarcerated youth. Both Aaron Kupchik’s writing, “The Correctional Experiences of Youth in Adult and Juvenile Prisons” and the film Juveniles Locked Up, seem to be getting at one overarching point: that the way we manage youth in our currently ailed system needs to be modified. In this writing, I will offer some points, collectively pulled from Kupchik’s article and the presented film in order to understand some institutional and organizational problems of the juvenile justice system.
Kupchik’s comparative research on youth in adult versus juvenile correctional facilities, though not completely certain, offers some provoking impressions of contemporary methods for managing youth within the justice system. For one, the article offers a trend in sentencing, and a basis for Kupchik’s research; specifically that youth, more and more, are being “prosecuted and punished in criminal rather than juvenile courts” (Kupchik, 2007; Snyder & Sickmund, 1999). This finding is a little troubling; it seems that society has taken an attitude advocating for harsher punishment—previously reserved for adult criminals—and has applied it to youth who have perpetrated crime. As the film expresses: “…our society has come to the point where the age of the defendant is no longer a mitigating factor—… 14-year-olds are being sentenced to life behind bars” (Juveniles Locked Up, 1995). Similarly, the fact that most youth are being tried in criminal court, rather than in juvenile courts, seems to signify a partiality to integrate the adolescent and adult populations into adult prisons, where inmates are assumed to fall through the cracks, and have less of a probability for rehabilitation.
On this framing, Kupchik explores juvenile incarceration and arrives at a couple of appealing findings. Overall, Kupchik found that youth experiences of incarceration differed significantly and complexly when it came to juvenile facilities and adult prison. Concerning youth incarcerated in adult prisons, Kupchik found that his subjects reported higher positive feedback, than in juvenile facilities, for access to institutional services. Still though, staff mentoring and fairness were reported much more positively by youth in juvenile facilities (2007). For the question as to which was better, Kupchik seemed to offer that although juvenile facilities possess their shortfalls, they were much more desirable than adult prison.
“These results do not…suggest that juvenile facilities entirely fail to give rehabilitative services to young adults. On the contrary, if one assumes that fostering a correctional environment in which staff act as mentors toward inmates is more difficult than hiring additional counselors and teachers (which seems like a reasonable assumption), then these results might be a partial—but significant—victory for the juvenile facilities” (Kupchik, 2007).
Still, Kupchik’s article leaves a lot to be desired. We know that juvenile facilities have a great many improvements to make, and that they differ significantly from adult prisons—where do we go now? In this way, the film picks up where Kupchik leaves off. After analyzing a negative picture of the juvenile justice system, it was really refreshing to hear of a program that actually seems to work: Last Chance Ranch. By offering rehabilitative services in an informal manner—without the cuffs, chains and bars, Last Chance Ranch gets it right. Last Chance Ranch shows that smaller facilities, where the staff can better supervise works better for incarcerated youth.
“Prompt, certain, modest punishment” (Juveniles Locked Up, 1995).
What was also interesting about the film’s framing of juvenile justice, was that it seemed to advocate for something completely different than what we see in the contemporary justice system: shorter, definite sentencing. In my opinion, combining such a system with programs like Last Chance Ranch is something that needs to be explored. Like the article and film suggest, it isn't enough anymore to combat or treat juvenile crime with severe punishment—the societal prescription for matching the punishment with the crime just isn't working. We should think twice and three times before sending a sixteen year old boy to adult prison; because, as Kupchik suggests, there is a difference between adult prison and juvenile facilities.
On these points I can agree with the article and film, but as it has been suggested, juvenile justice is dark and unexplored territory. We have explored juvenile justice by looking for commonalities and correlations between youth, between programs of punishment, etc. but I think we also must rely on the divergences and discrepancies—in other words, I don't think just one program will work. We need to research and institute a diversity of treatment and rehabilitative programs, for a diversity of youth. We simply cannot rely on a flat, static painting of the young criminal.
Works Cited
Kupchik, A. (2007). The correctional experiences of youth in adult and juvenile prisons. Justice Quarterly, 24(2), 247-270 .
Films for the Humanities and Sciences."Part 1: Juveniles Locked Up" 1995. Online video clip. Arizona Universities Library Consortium. FMG Video On Demand. Accessed on January 31, 2011. http://digital.films.com/play/
No comments:
Post a Comment