Thesis advisor: Shanta Pandey / Children in conflict with the law are a significant global concern. Although the actual number of children in conflict with the law globally is unknown, on any day in 2020, approximately 261,200 children were in detention (UNICEF, 2021). HRW (2019) estimates that about 1.5 million children worldwide are detained annually, often illegally and unnecessarily, and deprived of liberty and basic needs. In seven countries in South Asia, about 44,900 children were in detention in 2020, and children can spend considerable time in pre-trial detention in many countries, e.g., 410,000 children were held in remand centers globally in 2018 (UNICEF, 2021). An earlier report highlighted that 59% of children in detention in South Asia had not been tried and sentenced, and pre-trial detention is regularly used as a sanction, violating the right to be considered innocent until proven guilty (UNICEF, 2006). Furthermore, detention conditions are generally sub-standard, overcrowded, and deny children their rights, such as the right to appropriate health and education standards; also, they regularly house children with adults, which increases the risk for violence, abuse, and exploitation (UNICEF, 2006). Notably, higher-quality service delivery corresponds to positive outcomes for vulnerable youths (Sanders et al., 2017). However, many juvenile justice systems overlook these aspects as they are adult-centered and not adapted to the needs and rights of children. Nepal is also increasingly affected by children coming into conflict with the law. The Act Relating to Children, 2018 defines a child as someone who has not completed the age of eighteen. Nepal saw a 118% increase in the number of children in conflict with the law between 2017/18 and 2018/19 (NCRC, 2020) compared to a 70% increase from 2015/16 to 2016/17 (CCWB, 2017). However, juvenile delinquency in Nepal has received little attention from researchers, administrators, and social workers (CWIN, 2013). Furthermore, existing literature on the juvenile justice system in Nepal disproportionately focuses on describing the legal system (see CeLRRD, 2001; Ghimire, 2013; Khatiwada, 2005; Mainali, 2018; Sangroula, 2004; Silwal, 2006) rather than identifying potential entry points for evidence-based systems strengthening. The increase in the number of children in conflict with the law, the identification of multiple issues within the justice system globally, including deprivation of liberty and inadequate services, and an under-exploration of the service delivery within the Nepalese juvenile justice system warrant scholarly attention. This three-paper dissertation investigated the under-researched areas of the Nepalese juvenile justice system to map a comprehensive picture of the extant services and service delivery from the lived experiences and perspectives of the service providers, i.e., the employees of the juvenile justice system, including the juvenile bench workers, and the service users, i.e., children in conflict with the law residing in correctional facilities. The author conducted in-depth interviews with 14 employees working with major organizations in the Nepalese juvenile justice system, 14 social workers assigned to serve on juvenile benches, and 16 youths from correctional facilities. In addition, 150 youths from correctional facilities completed a structured survey. The results illuminated that the Nepalese juvenile justice system struggles to provide adequate services to children in conflict with the law. It exhibited children's unmet survival, protection, participation, and development needs. Employees of the correctional homes and children within them reported several challenges in meeting the food, shelter, health, and education needs of children; children were beaten, threatened, handcuffed, and even abused or exploited by other children within the system; children and young people could not freely express themselves and were not heard in matters affecting their everyday lives; and children had limited opportunities for skill development. The agency representatives of the juvenile justice system identified inadequate budget and meagre infrastructure and professionals as the major challenges in service delivery. Social workers on the juvenile benches expressed that the benches did not function as provisioned in The Act Relating to Children, 2018 since social workers rarely shared the bench with the judge, child-friendly infrastructures were largely absent and underused when present, the judges were inadequately trained, and social workers were not paid for their services or were underpaid. The findings also revealed serious well-being concerns for children in the Nepalese juvenile justice system, including inappropriate treatment and delayed or denied justice. The respondents’ suggestions to improve service delivery with the Nepalese juvenile justice system included immediately separating the youths from children; setting up standards for operating juvenile correctional homes; expanding and strengthening the homes, including increasing the daily allowances and allocating a separate budget for health; ensuring timely decisions on cases; using legal provisions effectively, including diversion and probation officers; providing adequate opportunities for skill development and income generation within the correctional homes; developing sufficient and appropriate human resources for the juvenile justice system, including social workers and counselors; and identifying and replicating good practices within the system. The dissertation highlights the key areas needing intervention, providing a vantage point to plan and implement the necessary intervention. Thus, it establishes itself as an essential reference document for social work practitioners, researchers, and policymakers concerned about improving services and service delivery for children in conflict with the law in Nepal. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2023. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Social Work. / Discipline: Social Work.

This dissertation concerns an empirical research focused on observing the case law of the Appellate Court of Justice of Minas Gerais, Brazil, about sanctioning young offenders. I identify socially available ideas, senses, and thoughts that become incorporated as standard-settings to the discourse of State Appellate judges. The online empirical data (www.tjmg.jus.br). covers a period from 03.08.2010 until 01.12.2016, composed of approximately one thousand decisions. Keywords connected to the juridical language routinely employed in young offenders' records guided the further process of gathering seventy-seven sampling dossiers. The decisions herein studied typically contain summaries of main reasons and judicially assessed evidence to prove the accusation; and also rationales, reasoning patterns, beliefs, and other motives the judges consider to ruling the concrete case. Therefore, the research places particular emphasis on describing, characterizing, and understanding the influences of many idea systems and, in addition, of the current way of thinking the Adult Criminal Law Justice in the Juvenile Criminal Justice decisions. So, the research question is: "How have Appellate judges mobilized socio-legal semantics and idea systems to make sense of criminal sanctions imposed on young offenders?" This research adopted the theory of Modern Penal Rationality to characterize one of the idea systems identified in this investigation and construct some elements of its knowledge problem that address the epistemological obstacles to the evolution of the juvenile criminal justice subsystem in criminal matters. Due to my professional background and empirical observations of some dossiers, I contend that at least three idea systems influence the Appellate judges' decisions, in the social context of the Juvenile Criminal Law subsystem, as follows: 1) "Modern Penal Rationality" (as described by Pires and conceived for adults in the criminal justice system); 2) "Doctrine of Irregular Situation" (as provided by the revoked Brazilian "Code of Minors"); and 3) "Doctrine of Integral Protection" (as established in the 1988 Brazilian Constitution and in the 1990 Child and Adolescent Statute). Thus, the analysis shows how the decision-making process by the Court of Appeal - trying to proceed with an accommodation account of presumably conflicting values - selects idea systems linked to old theories of punishment to shape the logical structure of juvenile sanctions. I demonstrate that "common legal sense" and "taken for granted" statements apply to induce "severe" sanctions imposed without considering the specificity of the case by the rules of Juvenile Criminal Justice. As a result, I reveal that punitive reasoning prevails in juvenile delinquency judgments rather than child and youth protection, and I also describe the social-legal practice of the language of Juvenile Criminal Law in the Court of Appeal's environment.

Justice-involved youth have been shown to have higher rates of mental health concerns and trauma exposure than youth in the general population (e.g., Wood et al., 2002). An increased understanding of these mental health concerns is crucial as incarcerated youth already have worse long-term health outcomes (Barnert et al., 2017). However, while the mental health needs in terms of specific mental health diagnoses of justice-involved youth are well-documented (e.g., Teplin et al., 2002), there is a lack of research on the mental health services that are provided to justice-involved youth in institutional settings. Further, there is no known research on youth perceptions of the mental health services they received while incarcerated, which could be used to inform future research and practice to improve services. Thus, this study aimed to fill this gap by examining through a mixed-methods approach how justice-involved youth perceive the mental health care they received while incarcerated, as well as by exploring themes of areas of improvement that youth indicate as recommendations for better mental health support in youth justice institutional settings. Two-hundred and one (201) individuals who were formerly incarcerated as youth (age 24 or younger) participated in this study. Overall, participants indicated slightly greater than average satisfaction with the mental health care they received. Kruskal-Wallis tests were used to examine differences in satisfaction between groups. Significant differences in satisfaction among facility types that youth were incarcerated in and among racial groups were found. There were no significant differences based on gender or ethnicity. Multiple regression analyses were performed to examine the relationship between Type-T (risk-taking/thrill-seeking) personality and satisfaction of mental health services while incarcerated, while controlling for covariates (gender, race, ethnicity, facility type, mental health diagnoses, and mental health services). Type-T was not found to be a significant predictor of satisfaction. Some mental health diagnoses (e.g., post-traumatic stress disorder, autism spectrum disorder, schizophrenia/psychotic disorder, substance use disorder), some racial groups (e.g., Arab American/Middle Eastern compared to White), and some facility types (e.g., juvenile detention compared to prisons) were found to be significant predictors of satisfaction. Thematic analysis was also performed on qualitative information obtained from both the surveys and interviews. Themes identified for positive aspects of mental health care experiences include Impact of Services, Relationships, Access, Service Quality, and No Positives. Themes identified for negative aspects of mental health care experiences include Access, Service Quality, Lack of Comfort, Ineffectiveness, Low Social Support, Physical Environment, All Negative, and No Negatives. Themes identified for recommendations include Access, Service Quality, Physical Setting and Environment, and Social Support. Results from this study have the potential to be used to inform experimental evaluations of changes to mental health services for incarcerated youth based on the strengths, identified needs, and recommendations of current mental health care from this study. Such studies could be aimed at improving services for incarcerated youth and developing best practices for mental health services for this population. / Psychological Studies in Education

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