Society confronts the hard-core youthful offender - The Young Desperadoes - Cover Story

USA Today (Society for the Advancement of Education), Jan, 1994 by Russell Eisenman

WHAT constitutes youthful offenses? There are two basic definitions: crime and status offenses by a person labeled as not yet being an adult. The legal age of adulthood varies from state to state, but usually is 17 or 18. A crime is anything the laws define as illegal. Status offenses are behaviors the state holds a youth responsible for, although they would not be illegal if that individual were an adult. Examples include not attending school, staying out too late at night, or defiance of parents. Youngsters can be sent to a juvenile prison for a status offense violation, although they typically are put on probation in custody of their parents and threatened by the court with more dire consequences (incarceration) if they are disobedient.

Status offenders are regarded as precriminal. The idea is that they are on the road to crime if they are not turned around and made to be more conforming. The concept of status offense is a controversial one, since the youth has not done anything criminal, and many question controlling youngsters with the powers of the state and the threat of imprisonment.

Most people, when they hear the term "youthful offender," think of the criminal and not of the status offender. There also is concern that, at times, girls may be seen as status offenders more readily than boys, due to society's having stricter and more confining standards for females. Some say this reflects gender prejudice.

Youthful offenders can do just as much violence or commit as many thefts as adults, but society's concept is that they deserve more sympathy since they still are forming, and thus should not be held totally responsible for their behavior. When they are held accountable, they often receive a much lesser sentence than an adult would. In recent years, this issue has been addressed by some courts having the right to certify juveniles as adults for the sake of trial. Thus, they are tried as adults and suffer adult penalties. In effect, they legally have lost their juvenile status as far as the court is concerned. Even if convicted, though, they may be sent to juvenile, rather than adult, facilities. When juveniles are sent to adult prisons, they often have been raped and exploited by some of the adult inmates.

Dysfunctional families frequently are found when the backgrounds of youthful offenders are investigated. The youngster typically comes from an impoverished household with either an absent father or one who is cold and physically punitive. Or, the mother may be a drug user and unable to cope with being a parent. These findings are more likely to occur for lower socioeconomic-status youth who are delinquent, but sometimes occur with middle- and upper-class youngsters, too. The vast majority of youthful offenders in prison are from lower-class backgrounds. Either they commit most of the crimes or the system prosecutes and imprisons them, but not higher-status youth.

Teens who murder often have been physically and psychologically abused by their parents. As a result of beatings or other physical trauma, many murderers have brain damage, although this frequently is not known or ignored by the legal system. The youth do not want to admit to being deformed and thus conceal their brain damage or mental retardation, even though it might help get them a lesser sentence. The parents either are ignorant or not willing to talk about their child's problems because they are responsible for beatings, using drugs while pregnant, etc.

Youthful offenders often have suffered physical, sexual, or psychological abuse when growing up. Due to rage or confusion as a result of such abuse, the youngster may wind up committing crimes. Either the juvenile is angry at the abuse and powerless, and acts out with anti-social behavior, or learns from the victimizer and does the same things to others. The latter especially is the case for juvenile sex offenders, who often first were victims themselves.

While most abused children do not go on to abuse others, many do. Early intervention with parents may help prevent crimes from happening by deterring the abuse before it occurs. A number of parents abuse their children because the adults are immature, confused, or under stress. Many are not equipped to be parents and treat their offspring with abuse or indifference.

There is another way in which parents help their offspring to become criminals. There may be little or no physical, sexual, or psychological abuse leading to juvenile criminality, but the parents themselves are anti-social. Thus, in a sense, the child grows up following normal rules of socialization, but, in these cases, he or she is socialized to an anti-social standard. The parents may be criminals or violate certain laws, often in a flagrant fashion, such as by using drugs in their child's presence. The youngster learns that this is the normal, approved way within his or her household and adapts the same values. Thus, the road is paved for juvenile crime.

For instance, one of the inmates I worked with in a prison treatment program for youthful offenders was born into a family where the parents were members of an antisocial motorcycle gang. To him, crime was a normal way of life. He simply was following the rules laid down by his father and mother, just as most kids do. However, whereas the rules of most families call for conformity to social norms, those of his parents called for defiance.