Models for Change Publications

Juvenile Justice Guide Book for Legislators

04/11/2012 02:20 PM

Dec 5, 2011 | National Conference of State Legislators | PUBLICATIONS

Under a partnership with the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, NCSL has published a juvenile justice guidebook addressing the most important juvenile justice policy issues of the day. This juvenile justice primer highlights significant research, program approaches and gives examples of state legislation.

Preventing and addressing juvenile crime and delinquency remain perennial issues in state legislatures today. Juvenile justice policies require balancing the interests of rehabilitation, accountability and public safety, while also preserving the rights of juveniles. State lawmakers now more than ever are challenged with making informed choices on ways to cut costs and reduce crime and still meet the needs of youth who commit delinquent acts.

The introduction to the guidebook can be downloaded via the link above. Below are PDFs containing different sections from the guidebook. Check back soon to download the full guidebook.

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Addressing the Needs of Multi-System Youth: Strengthening the Connection between Child Welfare and Juvenile Justice

04/11/2012 02:17 PM

Mar 1, 2012 | Center for Juvenile Justice Reform at Georgetown University and Robert F. Kennedy Children’s Action Corps | PUBLICATIONS

It has been known for quite some time that children involved in the child welfare system are at risk of “crossing over” to the juvenile justice system and, inversely, that many juvenile justice–involved youth later become involved in the child welfare system. These youth are commonly referred to as crossover youth. The accumulation of research on this population has given us greater understanding of their characteristics, of the pathway they took to become crossover youth, and of the practices professionals can employ to improve their outcomes. Despite these advances in our knowledge, jurisdictions around the United States, and arguably around the world, continue to face challenges in adequately meeting the needs of this difficult-to-serve population. As a result, several reform efforts have been developed to guide jurisdictions in their efforts to improve the way they serve crossover youth.

The purpose of this paper is to provide communities with a consolidated framework for serving crossover youth that incorporates the most up-to-date research, lessons from ongoing reform efforts, and an innovative collaborative management structure. To accomplish this task, the paper begins with a summary of the research on crossover youth, including their characteristics and system experiences. The paper then explores the systemic factors that contribute to ineffective service delivery for this population, followed by a review of two major crossover youth reform initiatives in the United States—the Systems Integration Initiative (SII) and the Crossover Youth Practice Model (CYPM). The final section presents the next frontier of this work by providing a comprehensive array of the best practices needed to improve outcomes for this population and describing Results-Based Accountability™ (RBA), an innovative management structure that can be used to align the work of a variety of stakeholders around a common, community-wide effort for crossover youth.

This introduction serves to briefly orient the reader to what we know about crossover youth, the challenges in serving this population, the current reform efforts underway, and the Results-Based Accountability™ framework. These topics are elaborated upon further in subsequent sections. The stage is then set for the presentation of a new frontier of this work—a more cohesive and robust framework regarding how systems can undertake reforms to improve the lives of crossover youth.

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Developing Statutes for Competence to Stand Trial in Juvenile Delinquency Proceedings: A Guide for Lawmakers

03/30/2012 12:19 PM

Apr 2, 2012 | Kimberly Larson, Ph.D., J.D.; Thomas Grisso, Ph.D.; National Youth Screening & Assessment Project | PUBLICATIONS

The purpose of this guide is to assist states in developing legislation that will provide clear assistance for juvenile courts when applying competence to stand trial to juvenile court proceedings. Toward this end, the guide seeks to clarify the decision process for policymakers and legislators. However, while the main intent is to provide guidance to drafting committees, the guide may also be useful to advisory rules committees that are developing recommended court rules or legislative committees that are reviewing a bill that has already been introduced.

The legislative process typically begins with meetings of juvenile justice administrators, judges, attorneys, clinicians — and often legislators — with the intention of developing draft legislation. With many perspectives at the table, these meetings often involve collaboration, negotiation, and compromise in working through the many issues that must be addressed. This manual provides a framework to guide those discussions regarding juveniles’ competence to stand trial. It is our hope that the provision of an outline of important issues and possible resolutions of issues that policy-makers must consider in the creation of a statute will clarify and structure the issues that need to be addressed, thus saving a great deal of time in “locating” the issues. We anticipate that our outlines of optional resolutions for each issue will clarify conversations and debates regarding these key issues.

To download a short factsheet describing the Guide, click here.

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DMC eNews-New Collaboration Extends DMC Action Network’s Impact

03/30/2012 10:26 AM

Mar 29, 2012 | DMC Action Network | PUBLICATIONS

This month, Rock County, Wisconsin, a DMC Action Network site, describes a new partnership that is spreading effective strategies to reduce racial and ethnic disparities to Wisconsin’s largest county:

When you get results, people tend to take notice. So it’s not all that surprising that a 35% reduction in youth of color detained for probation violations and an 88% drop in youth placed in state juvenile correctional facilities would turn heads.

These results and others from Rock County have sparked a partnership to share effective DMC reduction strategies with Wisconsin’s largest county, Milwaukee County. Milwaukee County is home to approximately 250,000 youth under the age of 18, approximately 60% of whom are youth of color....

Click the download link to read the rest of this story, as well the articles on:

SAMHSA, MacArthur Collaborate to Improve How Juvenile System Responds to Youth with Behavioral Health Needs
Pew Center on the States Seeks Applicants for Juvenile Justice Positions
The Newest DMC and Juvenile Justice Information

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Screening and Assessment in Juvenile Justice Systems: Identifying Mental Health Needs and Risk of Reoffending

03/09/2012 10:36 AM

Jan 18, 2012 | Gina M. Vincent, Ph.D. Associate Professor Co-Director, National Youth Screening & Assessment Project | PUBLICATIONS

Each year, more than 2 million children, youth, and young adults formally come into contact with the juvenile justice system, while millions more are at risk of involvement with the system for myriad reasons (Puzzanchera, 2009; Puzzanchera & Kang, 2010). Of those children, youth, and young adults, a large number (65–70 percent) have at least one diagnosable mental health need, and 20–25 percent have serious emotional issues (Shufelt & Cocozza, 2006; Teplin, Abram, McClelland, Dulcan, & Mericle, 2002; Wasserman, McReynolds, Lucas, Fisher, & Santos, 2002). System of care communities focusing on meeting the mental health and related needs of this population through comprehensive community-based services and supports have the opportunity to not only develop an understanding around the unique challenges this population presents, but also to decide how best to overcome those challenges through planned and thoughtful programs, strong interagency collaboration, and sustained funding.

The Technical Assistance Partnership for Child and Family Mental Health (TA Partnership) recognizes the many challenges system of care communities face in working to better meet the needs of all of the children, youth, and young adults they serve. In an effort to help these communities meet the unique needs of young people involved or at risk of involvement with the juvenile justice system, the TA Partnership is releasing a resource series focused on this population. The TA Partnership has contracted with the National Center for Mental Health and Juvenile Justice (NCMHJJ) and other experts in the field to produce this resource series. Each brief examines a unique aspect of serving this population, from policy to practice, within system of care communities.

We hope that this resource series will support the planning and implementation of effective services, policies, and practices that improve outcomes for children, youth, and young adults involved or at risk of involvement with the juvenile justice system as well as their families.

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Men in Motion in the Community and the Philadelphia Latino Juvenile Justice Network: Reducing Disproportionate Minority Contact, Strengthening Reentry, and Building Community

03/08/2012 02:34 PM

Dec 8, 2011 | National Council of La Raza | PUBLICATIONS

In Philadelphia and across the nation, Latino youth are disproportionately overrepresented in the juvenile justice system. Over the past five years, MIMIC and the Latino Juvenile Justice Network (LJJN) of the National Council of La Raza have worked together to address this problem in West Kensington and Philadelphia. As an independent organization, MIMIC has worked in partnership with the LJJN to effectively reduce the contact that Hispanic youth have with the system while also supporting adults and communities. The work described in this report offers important insights and lessons about effective program and policy work from which other organizations and communities and across the country can benefit.

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Probation Review Guidebook

02/21/2012 04:02 PM

Dec 9, 2011 | Janet K. Wiig and John A. Tuell, Robert F. Kennedy Children’s Action Corps | PUBLICATIONS

The genesis for this guidebook was the probation review work undertaken in Jefferson Parish, LA as part of the work in the four core states associated with Models for Change: System Reform in Juvenile Justice and in Los Angeles County, CA under a Child Welfare League of America contract with the Los Angeles County Auditor-Controller’s Office. In both of those jurisdictions, over a period of several months, there was a review of programs and operations to support the goals of the probation departments, culminating in reports of findings and recommendations for improvements to the respective departments. A carefully tailored work plan was used to direct the reviews in each instance but the core elements of the plan were essentially the same and included:

A. Program Planning and Implementation
B. Best Practices and Benchmarking
C. Performance Measurement and Client Outcomes
D. Intra- and Interagency Work Processes

As the review work progressed in Jefferson Parish, the Model For Change lead entity for Louisiana, the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center, School of Public Health,and the MacArthur Foundation endorsed the development of a guidebook to assist other jurisdictions that were considering whether to undertake a probation review. They asked the principals who conducted the reviews in Jefferson Parish and Los Angeles County, Janet Wiig and John Tuell, to prepare this guidebook for that purpose.

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Adding Up Models for Change: Initial Findings from the Models for Change Database

02/21/2012 03:53 PM

Dec 9, 2011 | Patrick Griffin, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation | PUBLICATIONS

Models for Change was deliberately designed to be wide-ranging—to support state and local reformers in a variety of settings, working in variety of issue areas, and taking a variety of approaches. By funding reform efforts that acknowledged and reflected the complex variations in the nation’s juvenile justice systems, Models for Change sought to generate a broad and flexible range of system reform models. But this strategy makes it challenging even to document the activities of the initiative’s network of partners, let alone to track and quantify all that they have accomplished.

In 2009, the Foundation engaged a management consulting firm, Bennett Midland LLC, to design a new kind of management tool for Models for Change: a database that could serve as a comprehensive inventory of the initiative’s investments and activities, a record of progress for grants initiative-wide, and a source for analytical data to inform ongoing management decisions as the initiative progresses.This management tool would combine and relate data on the characteristics of all Models for Change grants and grantees with detailed information on the varieties of reform work the grants supported and the concrete changes they helped produce. In effect, it would classify, sort, and aggregate Models for Change—the whole array of its investments, activities and accomplishments—so that the Foundation and its partners could better assess and understand the ways it has contributed to juvenile justice systems reform.

The Models for Change Database that resulted is an experimental prototype, with the usual bugs and inconsistencies. It is also a work in progress, with information from multiple sources continually being entered and edited, cleaned and analyzed. But it has now been in use long enough, and is sufficiently populated with data, to yield some useful preliminary insights into Models for Change.

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DMC e-News-By the Numbers: Signs of Progress from Rapides Parish, Louisiana

02/10/2012 01:36 PM

Feb 7, 2012 | DMC Action Network | PUBLICATIONS

In this issue, we highlight work in Rapides Parish, Louisiana, where officials have reduced probation revocations by over 50% for youth of color. This edition also describes CCLP's search for jurisdictions to engage in a new effort to create fairer and more effective juvenile justice systems, funded by the MacArthur Foundation and OJJDP.

Download the PDF to read this installment of the DMC Action Newtwork eNews.

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DMC e-News: Mark Masterson of Sedgwick County, KS Named Champion for Change

01/05/2012 10:32 AM

Jan 4, 2012 | DMC Action Network | PUBLICATIONS

The November/December issue features news from the Models for Change 6th Annual Working Conference and the presentation of the Champions for Change award to Mark Masterson of Sedgewick County, KS:

"Sedgwick County Department of Corrections Director Mark Masterson is no stranger to work to reduce racial and ethnic disparities. Before joining the DMC Action Network in 2007, officials in his jurisdiction were already hard at work on improving data capacity and developing community based-alternatives to detention.

However, Mark wanted Sedgwick County to do more. As a DMC Action Network site, Sedgwick County seized the opportunities available through the Network to reduce school-based arrests and arrests for low-level offenses, create alternatives to detention for youth of color, and leverage funding to explore the needs of youth involved in both the juvenile justice and child welfare systems."

Download the PDF to read more.

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Counting Latino Youth in the Illinois Juvenile Justice System

12/16/2011 11:00 AM

Dec 9, 2011 | National Council of La Raza | PUBLICATIONS

The report details the inadequacy of information on Hispanic youth, who constitute one of the fastest-growing segments of the population, and highlights this lack of data as a major barrier to developing strategies and policies that can effectively prevent young Latinos from becoming caught up in the justice system.

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An Executive Summary: Rethinking Juvenile Justice

12/01/2011 01:49 PM

Dec 1, 2011 | Models for Change Research Initiative | PUBLICATIONS

Elizabeth S. Scott and Laurence Steinberg, leading figures in juvenile law and adolescentdevelopmental psychology, have brought their disciplines together to define a newapproach to juvenile crime. In their book, Rethinking Juvenile Justice (Harvard UniversityPress, 2008), they argue that advances in science, evolving public attitudes, andskyrocketing costs make this a prime moment for reform of the juvenile justice system. They outline a new developmental model that is complex, nuanced, and grounded inscientific evidence. It recognizes adolescents’ immaturity but also holds them accountablefor their actions, and it offers solutions that allow them to grow into responsible adults.In the end, the authors contend, this approach would better serve the interests of justiceand public safety, and be less wasteful of money and lives, than either the traditionalrehabilitation model or the punitive policies of the past generation.

This brief is one in a series describing new knowledge and innovations emerging from Models for Change, a multi-state juvenile justice initiative. Models for Change is accelerating movement toward a more effective, fair, and developmentally sound juvenile justice system by creating replicable models that protect community safety, use resources wisely, and improve outcomes for youths. The briefs are intended to inform professionals in juvenile justice and related fields, and to contribute to a new national wave of juvenile justice reform.

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Knowledge Brief: How Can We Know If Juvenile Justice Reforms Are Worth the Cost?

12/01/2011 01:45 PM

Dec 1, 2011 | Models for Change Research Initiative | PUBLICATIONS

With governments at every level facing grim budget forecasts, policymakers need to knowas much as possible about what juvenile justice activities yield the greatest social good fora given level of spending. This is the very question benefit-cost analysis seeks to answer.This policy brief summarizes the benefit-cost analysis of a set of reforms intended tomake juvenile detention more developmentally productive: residential centers that provideyouths with group-based cognitive behavior therapy. The researchers found preliminaryevidence that this program may decrease recidivism rates in the 15 months followingrelease, and that the minimal costs of the program (a few hundred dollars per youth perdetention spell) may be outweighed by the monetized benefits of reduced crime andpunishment. Their hunch is that progress is most likely to come from the cumulative effectof relatively inexpensive changes like this one, each generating benefits in excess of costsand reducing recidivism incrementally.

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Knowledge Brief: Harnessing the Capacity for Change

12/01/2011 01:42 PM

Dec 1, 2011 | Models for Change Research Initiative | PUBLICATIONS

Organizational change requires more than good ideas. Organizations must also have thecapacity and resources necessary to reach the desired goals. In this project, the researchersinterviewed and surveyed organizations involved in Models for Change to assess theircapacity to implement and sustain change. They sought to understand what resourcescontribute to having capacity, how capacity is used, and the ways in which differentdimensions of capacity work together. From the study they identified five major dimensionsof capacity—finances, human resources, technology, stakeholder commitment, andcollaboration—and developed a model of how these dimensions interact, build on oneanother, and ultimately contribute to change. The more concrete capacities such as finances,human resources, and technology, the researchers found, can predict an organization’s abilityto collaborate with others to effect change.

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Knowledge Brief: How Well Is the Child Welfare System Serving Youths with Behavioral Problems?

12/01/2011 01:38 PM

Dec 1, 2011 | Models for Change Research Initiative | PUBLICATIONS

Child welfare systems were designed with a focus on ensuring the safety and stability of abused and neglected children. Today, though, these systems also serve as an alternative to secure confinement for juvenile offenders, who generally require behavioral health and rehabilitation services. The researchers view this as a potential mismatch between individual youth needs and professional capacity, and in this study they looked at the effects of the mismatch. They found that youths with behavioral problems experience more changes in placement and are placed in more restrictive settings, such as group homes and residential centers, rather than with foster families. They also found that youths placed entirely or in part because of behavior problems are at greater risk of subsequent arrest when compared with youths placed only for abuse or neglect. Since child welfare is often the only resource available to vulnerable families struggling with behavioral issues, they suggest improving the collaboration between child welfare and juvenile justice systems.

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Knowledge Brief: Is There a Link between Child Welfare and Disproportionate Minority Contact in Juvenile Justice?

12/01/2011 01:33 PM

Dec 1, 2011 | Models for Change Research Initiative | PUBLICATIONS

African-American children are represented in foster care and other child welfare placements at a rate more than twice their representation in the U.S. child population. Like others in the child welfare system they tend to be victims of physical abuse and neglect—the very children who are at increased risk of juvenile delinquency. What implications does this have for disproportionate minority contact (DMC) in juvenile justice? This study looked at whether the population of youth moving between child welfare and juvenile justice contributes to DMC in juvenile justice. The researchers also looked at whether a child’s status as a “foster care youth” influences judicial dispositions, thereby increasing the over representation of African Americans at deeper ends of the juvenile justice system. The findings suggest that the child welfare system is a significant pathway for African-American youths involved with the juvenile justice system.

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Knowledge Brief: Does Mental Health Screening Fulfill Its Promise?

12/01/2011 01:30 PM

Dec 1, 2011 | Models for Change Research Initiative | PUBLICATIONS

As many as two-thirds of youths in pre-trial detention exhibit behaviors serious enough to qualify them for a mental disorder. Under the stress of detention, these youths can act out in ways that are harmful to themselves, to other youths around them, and to detention center staff. In this study, researchers implemented a validated screening procedure (MAYSI-2) that allows staff to identify a youth who is in crisis and may need immediate attention. But would staff in fact use the tool to get youths the help they need? Findings indicate that inmost centers staff did increase their efforts to obtain services and to take suicide precautions where needed. In addition, when services were not available, the ability to identify youths was sometimes helpful in finding or creating the needed services. Screening did not reduce the number of disruptive incidents; that may require additional training.

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Knowledge Brief: Mental Health Services in Juvenile Justice: Who pays? What gets paid for? And who gets to decide?

12/01/2011 01:24 PM

Dec 1, 2011 | Models for Change Research Initiative | PUBLICATIONS

Providing effective mental health services for youths in the juvenile justice system raisescomplex policy questions, including: Who pays? What services get paid for? And who getsto decide? The answers to these questions are changing rapidly, as financing shifts fromspecialized programs to broad-based insurance such as Medicaid. This brief provides anoverview of the changing financing streams and federal health care reform, and exploresthe opportunities and challenges facing mental health and social service providers, juvenilejustice practitioners, and others who want to have a seat at the policy table.

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Knowledge Brief: Are Minority Youths Treated Differently in Juvenile Probation?

12/01/2011 01:21 PM

Dec 1, 2011 | Models for Change Research Initiative | PUBLICATIONS

While many studies have examined disproportionate minority contact at the front endof the juvenile justice system, few have examined disparities deep within the system—in particular, differences in how minority youths are treated while on probation. Thisstudy examined juvenile probation at three sites with different mixes of white, Hispanic,and black youths. The researchers explored whether judges set different conditions ofprobation and ordered different services for youths of different racial or ethnic groups,and whether probation officers treated youths differently according to their race orethnicity. They found varying answers, with no systematic pattern of discrimination.One possible explanation is the constraints, both real and perceived, on the responsesof probation officers, who may feel their only option in many situations is detention.The findings also underline the importance of collecting data throughout the system,to try to understand the reasons for the differences across different sites.

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Knowledge Brief: Can Risk Assessment Improve Juvenile Justice Practices?

12/01/2011 01:18 PM

Dec 1, 2011 | Models for Change Research Initiative | PUBLICATIONS

A growing number of juvenile justice experts are suggesting a new, potentially more effective approach to reducing recidivism: first identify a youth’s risk of re-offending; then match services to his or her specific risk factors and responsiveness to specific types of interventions. This study examined the implementation of risk/needs assessment tools in six juvenile probation offices in two states, and what effects it had on the practices of the probation officers. The researchers found that probations officers using these tools did take risk factors into account in their recommendations for individual youths, leading them to seek the least restrictive but still appropriate disposition for each youth. In most of the sites, this led to lower levels of supervision for low-risk youths and more intensive services for high-risk youths. Thus far, the decreased use of resources has not resulted in increased re-offending.

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Innovation Brief: Raising the Standards of Juvenile Indigent Defense

12/01/2011 12:48 PM

Dec 1, 2011 | Juvenile Law Center | PUBLICATIONS

Pennsylvania’s county-based approach to juvenile defense created a patchwork system in which children in some counties received excellent representation while those in other locations did not, often resulting in inappropriate dispositions and harmful outcomes. The Juvenile Defenders Association of Pennsylvania was established to promote improvements in indigent juvenile defense, and made several important innovations. The organization developed a set of recommendations for reform (some of which have been adopted as new Rules of Juvenile Court Procedure and recommended legislation), produced guidelines and a training manual for juvenile defense attorneys, expanded training programs to reach defenders across the state, created a model expungement protocol, and is helping to develop model juvenile defense units in diverse counties.

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Innovation Brief: Using Diversion Fairly, Consistently, and Effectively

12/01/2011 12:09 PM

Dec 1, 2011 | Juvenile Law Center | PUBLICATIONS

Juvenile justice leaders in Pennsylvania wanted to create a model system to channel youths away from formal processing. The idea was to hold young offenders accountable withless costly and more effective programs, while avoiding the negative consequences of adelinquency adjudication or conviction and a court record. The group began with a focus on youths with mental and behavioral health problems, but soon expanded to include a much broader population. By involving a diverse array of stakeholders and working collaboratively to gain consensus, the group was able to draw up a set of diversion principles, write a statewide guide, and fund pilot projects to divert youths at critical justice system points. Building on this momentum, thirteen additional projects were launched in 2011. Diversion programs are now part of the fabric of juvenile justice reform in the state.

This brief is one in a series describing new knowledge and innovations emerging from Models for Change, a multi-state juvenile justice initiative. Models for Change is accelerating movement toward a more effective, fair, and developmentally sound juvenile justice system by creating replicable models that protect community safety, use resources wisely, and improve outcomes for youths. The briefs are intended to inform professionals in juvenile justice and related fields, and to contribute to a new national wave of juvenile justice reform.

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Assessment of Access to Counsel and Quality of Representation in Delinquency Proceedings in Pennsylvania

12/01/2011 11:21 AM

Oct 1, 2003 | Juvenile Law Center and American Bar Association Juvenile Justice Center | PUBLICATIONS

This report is an assessment of children’s access to counsel and the quality of representation they receive in Pennsylvania’s juvenile justice system. The report's findings are based on an 18-month assessment, including responses to a 70-question written survey and site visits to juvenile courts across the state. Pennsylvania practices were measured against those required by the IJA/ABA Juvenile Justice Standards. With overwhelming caseloads, little access to investigators and limited time for preparation, Pennsylvania juvenile public defenders are failing the poor children they are expected to defend. According to this report, the quality and effectiveness of legal representation for indigent youth in the Pennsylvania juvenile justice system varies dramatically from county to county. The report’s conclusion: youth are better or worse off, depending on where they live.

This report can also be found at: http://jlc.org/publications/pennsylvania_counsel/

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Guide to Developing Pre-Adjudication Diversion Policy and Practice in Pennsylvania

12/01/2011 10:55 AM

Sep 1, 2010 | Diversion Subcommittee of the Mental Health/Juvenile Justice state work group of the Models for Change Initiative in Pennsylvania | PUBLICATIONS

In 2006, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania issued a Mental Health/Juvenile Justice Joint Policy Statement (the “Joint Policy Statement”)1 as a blueprint for creating a model system that responds appropriately to youth with mental health needs who may or do become involved in the juvenile court. The Joint Policy Statement, promulgated as part of Pennsylvania’s participation in the Models for Change systems reform initiative, sets out a vision of a comprehensive model system that: (1) prevents the unnecessary involvement of youth who are in need of mental health treatment, including those with co-occurring substance abuse disorders, in the juvenile justice system; (2) allows for the early identification of youth in the system with mental health needs and co-occurring disorders; and (3) provides for timely access by identified youth in the system to appropriate treatment within the least restrictive setting that is consistent with public safety needs.

A key component of the Joint Policy Statement’s vision of a model system is pre-adjudication diversion2 – providing opportunities for youth who would otherwise face formal processing in the court system to avoid an adjudication of delinquency or conviction for a summary offense and instead directing them into an alternative program, including treatment when appropriate. The Diversion Subcommittee of the state Mental Health/Juvenile Justice work group for the Models for Change initiative in Pennsylvania was formed with the mandate of implementing the Joint Policy Statement’s vision with respect to diversion. The Diversion Subcommittee developed a set of fundamental principles or values that should underpin any pre-adjudication diversion policy and protocol developed in Pennsylvania, whether at the state or county level. The Principles have been endorsed by many key stakeholders in the Commonwealth. (See Principles of Pre-Adjudication Diversion in Pennsylvania, Appendix A.) The Diversion Subcommittee also developed this "Guide to Developing Pre-Adjudication Diversion Policy and Practice" to assist counties in crafting county-specific pre-adjudication diversion policies and protocols to guide local practice.

The Principles and Guide were developed in direct response to two key findings of a survey conducted in 2007 of county juvenile justice stakeholders, including judges, prosecutors, defense attorneys and juvenile probation officers. First, although Pennsylvania’s Juvenile Act provides a statutory basis for diversion, most Pennsylvania counties currently do not have a formal written policy on diversion. Second, there is a need for statewide standards regarding diversion in order to ensure that diversion is made available to all eligible youth throughout the Commonwealth and is fairly administered. The Principles and Guide are provided as resources to assist counties in developing local policies and protocols that are consistent with the mandates of current law and best practice standards.

Diversion is both a process (i.e., providing alternatives to adjudications for alleged juvenile offenders) and a program (i.e., the services the youth receives in place of a formal adjudication). This Guide addresses both aspects of diversion, and stakeholders similarly should address both aspects as they craft their own diversion policies and protocols.

This document can also be found at: http://www.jlc.org/publications/guide_to_developing_pre-adjudication_diversion_policy_and_practice/

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Interbranch Commission on Juvenile Justice Report on Luzerne County

12/01/2011 10:08 AM

May 1, 2010 | Pennsylvania Interbranch Commission on Juvenile Justice | PUBLICATIONS

The Interbranch Commission on Juvenile Justice was created in 2009 by an act of the General Assembly with the support of the Governor and the Supreme Court. Its purpose was to investigate circumstances that led to corruption in the juvenile court of Luzerne County resulting in federal criminal charges against two judges; to restore public confidence in the administration of justice, and to prevent similar events from occurring there or elsewhere in the Commonwealth.

This report can also be found at: http://www.pacourts.us/Links/Public/InterbranchCommissionJuvenileJustice.htm

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