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U.S. Department of Justice
Office of Justice Programs
Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention
Shay Bilchik, Administrator
 
From the Administrator
Serious and violent juvenile offendershave precipitated unprecedentedchange in the juvenile justice system.In 1996, the Office of Juvenile Justiceand Delinquency Prevention pub-lished
State Responses to Serious and Violent Juvenile Crime.
TheReport summarized changes in jurisdictional authority, sentencing,corrections programming, confidenti-ality of records and court hearings,and victim involvement in juvenileproceedings, undertaken by Statesfrom 1992 through 1995.Initially, these changes focused onthe small percentage of serious andviolent juvenile offenders. In recentyears, however, States have revisedpolicies and procedures that impactthe juvenile justice system as awhole and the full range of offenders.During the past 2 years, additionalStates have passed reforms and theirforerunners have refined pastreforms in light of their experiences.
State Legislative Responses to Violent Juvenile Crime: 1996–97 Update 
summarizes those changes.It is my hope that by documentingthese changes and beginning toanalyze their results, we will helpStates to learn from each other aboutthe most effective reforms takingplace across the country—reformswhich both serve the public’s safetyand enhance the rehabilitation of our juvenile offenders.Shay BilchikAdministrator
November 1998
State Legislative Responsesto Violent Juvenile Crime:1996–97 Update
Patricia Torbet and Linda Szymanski
Extensive media coverage of violentcrimes by juveniles—especially homicideswith firearms—fueled perceptions of a ju-venile crime epidemic in the early 1990’s.This, in turn, led to a response by gover-nors and legislators to“get tough” on juvenilecrime. While there isgood news to report—1996 was the second yearin a row that the juvenileviolent crime arrest ratedeclined—violence by juveniles is still too pre-valent and remains anissue of great concern forthe public, legislators, gov-ernors, and juvenile andcriminal justice practitio-ners. This Bulletin presentsfindings from an analysis of laws enacted in 1996 and1997 to target serious and violent juvenilecrime. Highlights of this analysis includethe following:
x
Jurisdictional Authority: States con-tinue to modify age/offense transfercriteria; some are beginning to studythe impact of new transfer laws.
x
Judicial Disposition/Sentencing Author-ity: States continue to experiment withblended and other sentencing options,while changes in purpose clauses im-pact juvenile court dispositions.
x
Corrections Programming: Statessupplement continued emphasisonsecure corrections pro-gramming withcommunity-based interventions thatstress public safety andoffender accountability.
x
Confidentiality: Statescontinue to deemphasizetraditional confidentialityconcerns while empha-sizing informationsharing.
x
Juvenile Crime Victims:Victims and victimsorganizations increasevisibility and active par-ticipation in the juvenile justice process.
The Research
In 1996, the Office of Juvenile Justiceand Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP)released the Research Report
State Responses to Serious and Violent JuvenileCrime (State Responses)
prepared by theNational Center for Juvenile Justice (NCJJ).That report documented the extensivechanges States made during their 1992 to
 
2
1995 legislative sessions to target in-creases in serious violent juvenile crime.The magnitude of change States undertook during the first half of the decade createda need to gauge the impact of those newlaws, policies, and programs on juvenileoffenders and the justice system and tocontinue monitoring new laws enacted inthe mid-1990’s. NCJJ used a four-prongedapproach in conducting this update:
x
An analysis of laws enacted in 1996 and1997 that addressed serious and violent juvenile offenders.
x
An indepth statutory analysis of currenttransfer provisions.
x
A phone survey of key contacts in eachState to identify substantive and proce-dural changes and the impact of thosechanges.
x
Selection of three sites for indepthcase studies to document the impactof changes at the State and local levels.Legislative changes were identifiedbysearching the LEGIS data bases onWestlaw
®
for those years. These databases contain bills passed by the legisla-tive bodies of the States; in the majorityof cases, the Governor signs the billsinto law. As a double-check, telephonesurvey respondents verified changes inaState and sent summaries of individualState legislation.
JurisdictionalAuthority
Trend:
 
States continue to modify age/ offense transfer criteria, allowing moreserious and violent juvenile offenders tobetried as criminals; some are beginningto study the impact of new transfer laws.
All States allow juveniles under cer-tain conditions to be tried as if they wereadults in criminal court by way of one ormore transfer mechanisms (e.g., judicialwaiver, prosecutorial direct filing, orlegislative exclusion). The previous
State Responses
report documented that, from1992 through 1995, all but 10 Statesmodified their statutes, making it easierto prosecute juveniles in criminal court.Changes occurred because legislaturesadded significantly to the list of offenseseligible for criminal prosecution and/orlowered the age at which certain juve-niles could be tried in criminal court.The underlying intent of such consistentchange across the Nation was to easeand support the State’s decision to pun-ish and hold accountable those juvenileswho had, by instant offense or history,passed a threshold of tolerated “juve-nile” criminal behavior. Proponents of criminal court processing of juvenileoffenders argue that the juvenile justicesystem is not punitive enough to protectsociety or hold juveniles accountable.Whether by intent or default, broaderdirect file and exclusion provisions alsochanged decisionmaking roles. Juvenilecourt judges have significantly less au-thority to make decisions regarding thevenue for cases involving violent orother serious crime than they had priorto the 1990’s. Either directly throughprosecutorial direct filing or indirectly,by virtue of the charging process inexclusion cases, prosecutors clearlyemerged with an expanded role in justicesystem responses to violent juvenilecrime. In 1996–97, 25 States madechanges to their transfer statutes.This Bulletin expands or relabels theclassifications used in the previous reportto describe the variety of transfer mecha-nisms available for trying juveniles incriminal court. With increased knowledgeabout transfer statutes, the authorswanted the classifications to portray theessence of each provision and identifywho has the authority for making thetransfer decision. This was particularlyimportant with respect to judicial waiverprovisions that differ in the degree of decisionmaking flexibility they allow juvenile courts. Some make the waiverdecision entirely discretionary; others setup a presumption in favor of waiver; andstill others specify circumstances underwhich waiver is mandatory. Under allwaiver provisions, a case against a juve-nile must at least originate in juvenilecourt. As a result, the “judicial waiver”classification has been relabeled “discre-tionary waiver” and a “mandatory waiver”category has been added to refer to asituation in which the juvenile court
Juvenile Violence: The Facts of the Matter
The juvenile violent crime arrest rate remained relatively constant from the early1970’s to the late 1980’s, increased 64% between 1988 and 1994, and dropped12% from 1994 to 1996. Similarly, the number of juveniles arrested for murdermore than doubled between the mid-1980’s and the peak in 1993, representinga percentage change far greater than the increase in adult murder arrests. Thesefacts, and the publicity that surrounded them, focused national attention on the juvenile violent crime problem.Three points are worth considering:
x
Juveniles are not responsible for most violent crimes: Based on FBI clearancedata, in 1986 juveniles were responsible for 9% of all violent crimes (5% of allmurders) and in 1996 they accounted for 13% of all violent crimes (8% of allmurders). Although these statistics represent an increased share for juveniles,even in 1996 adults were responsible for 7 out of every 8 violent crimes.
x
Juvenile violence is declining but is still at much higher levels than a decadeago: 1996 was the second year in a row the juvenile violent crime arrest ratedeclined (9% from the 1995 level). However, even with this decline, the numberof juvenile violent crime arrests in 1996 was 60% above the 1987 level.
x
Today’s juveniles do not commit more acts of violence than did members ofthe previous generation, but more juveniles are violent. Research by NCJJinvestigated whether there is a new breed of violent juveniles, or “superpredators.”Study findings imply that recent increases in juvenile violent crime were notdue to a new breed of juveniles who commit violent crimes with greaterregularity, but to the fact that more of the juvenile population was beingbrought into the justice system for violent acts.
Sources:
Snyder, H. 1997 (November).
Juvenile Arrests 1996 
. Bulletin. Washington,DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Office of JuvenileJustice and Delinquency Prevention; Snyder, H. 1998. Serious, violent and chronic juvenile offenders: An assessment of the extent of and trends in officially-recognizedserious criminal behavior in a delinquent population. In
Serious and Violent Juvenile Offenders: Risk Factors and Successful Intervention,
edited by RolfLoeber and David Farrington. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc.
 
3
 judge makes a decision in a case that
must 
be waived. Previously, this provision wasincluded in the “exclusion” classificationbecause of its “shall” waive requirement(see table 1 for definitions of transferclassifications).
Judicial Waiver
Discretionary waiver.
At the end of the 1997 legislative session, all but fiveStates (Connecticut, Massachusetts,Nebraska, New Mexico, and New York)provided for discretionary waiver of certain juveniles to criminal court (seetable 2). During 1996–97, four States low-ered their discretionary waiver age limit,seven States added crimes, and fourStates added or modified prior recordprovisions (see table 3). The significantnews is that Massachusetts removed itswaiver provision in 1996 in favor of newdirect file and exclusion provisions.
Mandatory waiver.
At the end of 1997,14 States had a mandatory waiver statutein which the juvenile court judge, afterfinding probable cause, must waive juris-diction. None of these States modifiedtheir mandatory waiver provisions be-tween 1996 and 1997. (Note: Seven Stateswith mandatory waiver provisions—Connecticut, Kentucky, North Carolina,North Dakota, Ohio, Rhode Island, andWest Virginia—were previously classifiedunder statutory exclusion.)
Presumptive waiver.
As of the end of the 1997 legislative session, 14 States andthe District of Columbia (hereafter in-cluded with States in this Bulletin) hadpresumptive waiver provisions that des-ignate a category of offenders in whichwaiver to criminal court is rebuttably pre-sumed to be appropriate. In other words,the burden of proof shifts from the Stateto the juvenile to show amenability to juvenile justice system processing. In1996–97, two States (Kansas and Utah)enacted new laws establishing presump-tive waiver for certain cases.
Direct File
Direct file provisions (also known asconcurrent jurisdiction) give the pros-ecutor the discretion to file charges ineither the juvenile or criminal court.Atthe end of 1997, 15 States had directfile statutes. In 1996–97, five States modi-fied existing provisions and three States(Arkansas, Massachusetts, and Montana)enacted new laws permitting direct filing.
Table 1:Definitions of Transfer Classifications
Transfer ClassificationsDefinition
Discretionary WaiverA juvenile court judge may waive jurisdictionand transfer the case to criminal court typicallybased on factors outlined in the
Kent 
v.
United States
[383 U.S. 541 (1996): 566–67]
 
decision.Mandatory WaiverA juvenile court judge must waive jurisdictionif probable cause exists that the juvenilecommitted the alleged offense.Presumptive WaiverThe burden of proof concerning a transferdecision is shifted from the State to the juvenile.Requires that certain juveniles be waived tocriminal court unless they can prove they aresuited to juvenile rehabilitation.Direct FileThe prosecutor decides which court will have jurisdiction over a case when both the juvenileand criminal courts have concurrent jurisdiction.Also known as prosecutor discretion or concur-rent jurisdiction.Statutory ExclusionCertain juvenile offenders are automaticallyexcluded from the juvenile court’s original jurisdiction. Also known as legislative exclusionor automatic transfer.Reverse WaiverA criminal court judge is allowed to transfer“excluded” or “direct filed” cases from criminalcourt to juvenile court for adjudication.Once an Adult/Once a juvenile is convicted in criminal court,Always an Adultall subsequent cases involving that juvenile willbe under criminal court jurisdiction.
Georgia’s Senate Bill 440 Project Tracks Outcomes
The Georgia Indigent Defense Council is working with the Governor’s Childrenand Youth Coordinating Council and the Georgia Department of Juvenile Justiceto track court process outcomes for juveniles arrested as adults under the State’srecent exclusion law. The project is named after Senate bill 440, which becameeffective May 1, 1994.The most recent reports of the project provide offense detail and race, age, andgender information for 2,400 juveniles arrested for “excluded” crimes. The reportsdocument that the new law has primarily impacted African-American youth thatmake up about 80% of the arrests but only 34% of the juvenile population at riskofexclusion (13- to 17-year-olds). Other findings indicate that most offenders weremale (97%) and about half (44%) were 16 years old at the time of arrest. The mostcommon offense for minorities was armed robbery, whereas for whites it wasaggravated child molestation. Work is pending on a report that will analyze courtdisposition information.
Source:
Georgia Indigent Defense Council, Juvenile Advocacy Division. Winter1998 and Spring 1998.
Juveniles Arrested as Adults Under SB440.
Atlanta, GA:Georgia Indigent Defense Council.
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