As juvenile justice attempts to find one effective intervention strategy, the justice sysem continues to ignore the idea of non-intervention. Over 150 years of juvenile institutions, courts, and programs have failed to prevent, deter, or control juvenile misbehaviour. In place of eliminating the ineffective programs, the justice system has initiated new and different programs to supplement those programs already in existence. Non-intervention argues that the juvenile justice system should "leave kids alone whenever possible" based on ineffectiveness and latent functions of the existing system, labeling effects of system contact, minor risk to society, and relief of an overburdened system of social control. Non-interventionists advocate doing nothing until an effective method of intervention is available. Perhaps the major reason non-intervention remains an idle suggestion is a lack of research. In order to implement a non-interventionist strategy the system must identify those juveniles who are proper candidates for non-intervention. The wide variety of delinquent and criminal typologies are of little use for selecting juveniles for non-intervention. The present study attempts to identify patterns of offenses useful in determining which juveniles to leave alone. The study groups are three birth cohorts from Racine, Wisconsin for 1942, 1949, and 1955. The data come from the Police Department and Juvenile Bureau and provide a complete enumeration of all police-juvenile contacts from age six to seventeen. The research submits categories of status, victimless, minor property, major property, and personal offenses to Markov analysis and finds most individuals confining their behaviour to minor offenses. Few subjects venture into major property or personal crimes and two-thirds desist before committing four offenses. A cohort analysis reveals an increasing / offense rate both within and between cohorts which is attributable to predominant period effects. These results support the implementation of non-intervention with minor offenders. The age, period, and cohort analysis points to the advantages of cohort techniques for criminological research and prompts the call for increased use of the approach. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 43-07, Section: A, page: 2457. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1982.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_74876 |
| Contributors | LAB, STEVEN PAUL., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 266 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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