law and juvenile justice for people of color in elementary and secondary schools, The

Journal of Negro Education, The, Summer 2002 by Brown, Frank, Russo, Charles J, Hunter, Richard C

A powerless person accused of a crime is helpless against the power of the state via the police; and many powerless minority juveniles have been imprisoned by the state with the insistence that they testify against themselves and their friends. Further, accused minority juveniles could spend many weeks and months in jail waiting for a trial and miss time away from school. The sole purpose of law enforcement is to maintain control over juvenile behavior as viewed and defined by the hegemonic group; and the question remains, how the powerless or marginalized groups can gain power or in this case get fair treatment from society's behavioral control agencies.

School Crime

For most children, school occupies their lives for six or seven hours a day, 180 days a year for 13 years. Schools are in a position to help mediate the criminal behavior of students (Johnson, 1996). Johnson (1996) in her analysis of crime in school cites several factors influencing juvenile delinquency:

Education-more youth who drop out of school commit crimes than those who remain in school and graduate;

Gender-males exhibit more delinquent behavior than females;

Race and ethnicity-racial and ethnic minority youths exhibit more delinquent behavior than majority youths; and

Drugs-more juveniles who use drugs are confined to youth correctional institutions throughout the country.

In addition to these factors, there is a strong correlation between a child's family income level and his/her school behavior Johnson, 1996). It is within the family as a social unit that children learn nurturing, morals, and basic social values. The social economic status of the family also strongly influences a child's behavior in school. A child of color from a poor family generally resides in an unsafe neighborhood, receives a poor education, has possible gang influence, and receives poor parenting.

Recent juvenile crime in public schools reported by the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of Justice provides an overview of crimes committed in schools by students (Kaufman, Phillip, & Associates, 2001).

The percentage of students in grades 9-12 threatened or injured with a weapon on school property has not changed significantly in recent years, ranging from about 7-8% of students reported being threatened with a weapon in school.

In 1999, 12-18 year old students living in urban and suburban locales were equally vulnerable to serious violent crime at school. Away from school, however, urban students were more vulnerable to serious violent crime than were suburban students and suburban students were more likely to experience serious violent victimization than were rural students. Yet, student vulnerability to theft at school and away from school in 1999 was similar in urban, suburban, and rural areas.

Young students (ages 12-14) were more likely than older students (ages 15-18) to be victims of crime at school. However, older students were more likely than young students to be victimized away from school.