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Policy Process Capstone Paper Assignment

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Institutional Affiliation

Course Name and Number

Instructor's Name

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Policy Process Capstone Paper Assignment

Introduction

This paper integrates theory, research, policy, and practice to address a contemporary

problem or issue in criminal justice and provide corrective action. Then, the paper explains the

criminal justice policy-making process and analyzes criminal justice policies and their impact on

stakeholders and society.

Criminal Justice Problem

Maintaining Public safety in the juvenile system is my selected criminal justice issue or

problem. According to Farn (2018), a different juvenile justice system was established in

America around a hundred years ago to divert juvenile lawbreakers from the criminal courts’

negative castigations and encourage rehabilitation founded on the individual youthful

requirements. As the author notes, this system was separate from the adult court in different

ways since it concentrated on the juvenile as an individual requiring help. As Farn (2018) notes,

the proceedings were casual, with many options left to the youthful law court magistrate. Since

the magistrate was to act in juveniles’ favor, procedural safety measures accessible to grown-ups

comprising the right to a lawyer, informed of the accusations brought against one, challenged

one's accuser, and tried by judges, were believed to be useless. After the juvenile system closed

Juvenile court proceedings to the public, youthful accounts were to remain private to avoid

compromising the juveniles’ capability to be rehabilitated and reintegrated into the community.

Maintaining Public safety in the juvenile system is an issue since strict “juvenile justice

system interventions” can lead to substantial negative impacts (Farn, 2018). Besides, juvenile

crimes’ persistence and occurrence frequently adhere to an “age-crime curve,” in which non-

violent felonies commence to amplify throughout late babyhood, go high throughout fifteen to
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nineteen ages and then go down in the early twenties (Farn, 2018). Additionally, a large number

of teenagers were confined because of non-violent crimes. In 2015, as Farn (2018) argues, of the

47,305 incarcerated teens, about 65% of commitments were for public order, technical

violations, status, and property crimes. Although juveniles who engage in serious offenses and

have an increased risk of re-offense might need an increased medication dosage within a safe

placement, “low-risk” teens who participate in non-violent crimes frequently age out of juvenile

antisocial deeds on their own. According to the author, they are more possibly to enjoy “poor

dosage, community-grounded services."

An Infographic on Maintaining Public Safety in The Juvenile System

A Policy That Addresses Maintaining Public Safety in The Juvenile System Issue

Expanding community-based interventions’ convenience and use is a policy that

addresses maintaining public safety in the juvenile system issue. This policy will be effective
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since, according to Durnan, Olsen & Harvell (2018), evidence-based as well as community-

based interventions generate more constructive public and juvenile safety consequences than

imprisonment. One of the vital aspects of having suitable community-based and evidence-based

choices for mending juvenile conduct is increasing convenient services via community-grounded

providers. The other is refining the relations between juveniles and people overseeing the teens

on trial or parole. According to Durnan, Olsen & Harvell (2018), evidence-based initiatives,

including “multisystemic and functional family therapy," significantly lower the re-offending

probability for many juveniles.

However, this policy's unintended consequences are that, even though community-based

interventions generate more constructive public and juvenile safety consequences than

imprisonment, many youths are likely to re-offense. When juveniles understand that they will no

longer be incarcerated, they are likely going to re-engage in criminal activities. On the other

hand, evidence-based initiatives comprising functional family therapy” may worsen things

because some children may be difficult to counsel. For that reason, in addressing these

unintended consequences, the government should integrate both evidence-based and community-

based interventions and, when things fail to work out, incarcerate things that cannot change. Em

imprisonment will play a pivotal role in transforming those youths unable to change for the

better. Nevertheless, community-based and evidence-based interventions aimed at lowering the

recidivism possibility among juveniles who have a connection to the juvenile justice systems

deserve to concentrate on offering skills to teenagers to empower them in many areas of life.

Evidence-Based and Community-Based Interventions Will Positively Impact the

Community
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As Ali, Benjamin & Fondacaro (2022) note, interventions founded in the social-

ecological context play a vital part in pinpointing the multisystemic aspects which donate to an

individual’s conduct and use of evidence-based programs in producing change and lowering re-

offending. “Multidimensional Treatment Foster Care; Functional Family and Multisystemic

Therapy” are positive secondary deterrence initiatives for treating youthful criminals,

emphasizing the juvenile criminal behavior social framework (Ali, Benjamin & Fondacaro,

2022). These interventions and the rest, which concentrate on behavior change social framework,

generate optimistic results in treating young lawbreakers on different grounds, such as drug and

substance abuse syndromes and psychological sickness, family functioning, and re-offending.

Therefore, evidence-based and community-based interventions will positively impact the

community since they will help the youth change from criminal behaviors such as drug and

substance abuse and psychological sickness because they prevent any re-offending possibility.

The benefits of this policy are that it will reduce juvenile crimes in society while giving juvenile

offenders a chance to abandon crimes and engage in activities that can positively impact their

lives. When youths engage in crimes at a tender age, their future is negatively affected since they

can die or waste their lives in prison. Thus, this policy will be helpful because it will avoid such

repercussions by aiding young offenders in amending their crooked ways.

Discuss The Impact of This Policy on A Larger Scale for The Whole State and Nation

Evidence-based and community-based interventions in addressing Maintaining Public

safety in the juvenile system issue will impact the whole state and nation on a larger scale. After

this policy is successfully implemented, it will aid the youths in avoiding re-offending and stop

juvenile-related crimes in society. The government will not be required to donate grants for use
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in juvenile criminal courts, prisons, and rehabilitation centers. Such funds will be channeled to

other valuable uses for the nation's development.

As Bullock (2020) notes, juvenile justice systems have implemented evidence-based and

community-based interventions during the past ten years to examine the most harmless and cost-

effective means of curbing juvenile offenders from recidivism. The law courts, which emphasize

evidence-based and community-based interventions, endorse programs that might provide the

prospect for young wrongdoers to become valuable people. For that reason, the implementation

of community-based and evidence-based evaluations and treatment interventions will advance

the lives of endangered juveniles and general society's security while decreasing “the cost for

which the taxpayers are accountable” (Bullock, 2020).

Thus, community-based and evidence-based interventions for youthful lawbreakers rather than

punitive measures will reduce the arrest and incarceration of juvenile offenders who are later

housed in safe infantile imprisonment facilities. This action will save the state and nation money

used to ensure that the detained kids are taught basic skills and sustain them while in prison.

Besides, the state's time, energy, and capital to arrest and arraign in court and the legal

procedures' costs will be saved, whereby the energy and the money used in all these processes

can be used in other states or national undertakings.

The Impact Upon Professionals Working in Criminal Justice Specifically

According to Henggeler & Schoenwald (2011), juvenile courts process more than one

million American teenagers every year, and around 170,000 are taken to residential placements.

Besides, as the authors assert, police arrested more than two million adolescents in 2008, and of

the juveniles fit for processing within the juvenile justice system because of their arrest, sixty-six

percent were sent to juvenile court while ten percent were taken to criminal (adult) law court
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(Henggeler & Schoenwald, 2011). According to the authors, residential placement is "the most

serious as well as costly” consequence of a court of law referral after arrest.

Therefore, community-based and evidence-based interventions for youthful lawbreakers

will negatively impact the professionals working in criminal justice, specifically lawyers and

magistrates who handle juvenile-related cases. This policy has been shown to reduce the arrest of

juvenile offenders since they are not likely to re-offend, meaning that the lawyers and

magistrates will have limited cases of juvenile offenders. Some of these professionals might lose

or have limited jobs because this policy will play a pivotal role in helping adolescents amend

their crooked ways. Thus, although community-based and evidence-based programs have

positive consequences in addressing the arrest, legal processing, and the placement of juveniles

in reformatory facilities since they curb any possibility of the youths re-offending, it negatively

affects lawyers and magistrates.

Conclusion

Maintaining Public safety in the juvenile system is my selected criminal justice issue or

problem. a different juvenile justice system was established in America around a hundred years

ago to divert juvenile lawbreakers from the criminal courts’ negative castigations and encourage

rehabilitation founded on the individual youthful requirements. Maintaining Public safety in the

juvenile system is an issue since strict “juvenile justice system interventions” can lead to

substantial negative impacts. Expanding community-based interventions’ convenience and use is

a policy that addresses maintaining public safety in the juvenile system issue. This policy will be

effective since evidence-based as well as community-based interventions generate more

constructive public and juvenile safety consequences than imprisonment.

References

Ali, Y., Benjamin, A. C., & Fondacaro, M. R. (2022). Treatment of Juvenile Offenders: Toward

Multisystemic Risk and Resource Management. In Handbook of Issues in Criminal

Justice Reform in the United States (pp. 517-540). Springer, Cham.

https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-77565-0_26

Bullock, E. R. (2020). The Need for a Balanced System and More Community-Based Programs

and Interventions in Juvenile Justice Reform in Georgia (Doctoral dissertation, Walden

University).

https://scholarworks.waldenu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=10811&context=dissertations

Durnan, J., Olsen, R., & Harvell, S. (2018). State-Led Juvenile Justice Systems

Improvement. Washington, DC: Urban Institute.

https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/98321/state-

led_juvenile_justice_systems_improvement_3.pdf

Farn, A. (2018). Improving outcomes for justice-involved youth through structured decision-

making and diversion. Washington, DC: Center for Juvenile Justice Reform, Georgetown

University McCourt School of Public Policy. Available from

http://cjjr.georgetown.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/ImprovingYouth-Outcomes-at-

Referral.pdf.

Henggeler, S. W., & Schoenwald, S. K. (2011). Evidence-Based Interventions for Juvenile

Offenders and Juvenile Justice Policies that Support Them. Social Policy Report. Volume

25, Number 1. Society for Research in Child Development.

https://theathenaforum.org/sites/default/files/Evidence-based%20Inteventions%20for

%20Juvenile%20Offenders.pdf