The juvenile justice system as originally conceived was based on the idea that young people who came into conflict with the law should be given the opportunity for reflection and reform. The earliest places of juvenile confinement were intended to rehabilitate young people, and help them become productive members of society.
Over time, particularly in the 1990s, juvenile justice came to focus more on retribution and punishment. Kids were placed out of home for longer periods in increasingly restrictive settings, and catch phrases like: “Do an adult crime, serve adult time” became the norm among policymakers who wanted to be responsive to communities fearful of these new young so-called “superpredators.”
[For more of this story, written by Marie Williams, go to http://jjie.org/2017/05/22/we-...d-in-justice-system/]
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