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Complete 2 pages APA formatted article: Juvenile Courts

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Complete 2 pages APA formatted article: Juvenile Courts. Why Juvenile courts should be abolished al Affiliation: Why Juvenile courts should be abolished Background Juvenile court is an institution that was created by the American reformers to monitor and guide cases of juvenile offenses. According to the article, the first juvenile court was established in the 19th century with the aim of rehabilitating naughty youths in line with parens patriae doctrine (Soulier & Charles, 2010.This doctrine required the juvenile courts to assume full responsibility of a parent to rehabilitated juvenile youth. American reformers suggested the establishment of juvenile courts to separate adult cases from juvenile youth ruling based on the level of brain maturity. Some juveniles lacked the cognitive capacity to judge between the “good” and “bad” calling for proper counselling and rehabilitation for a given duration. According to the article, the intent of juvenile court establishment has changed with time. Juvenile courts were not meant to punish juvenile offenders but to give guidance through rehabilitation and counselling programs (Soulier & Charles, 2010). Juveniles, as mentioned in the article, lack the cognitive capacity to commit an offense intentionally. This is because they are still in the developmental stage and through rehabilitation and counselling, they get to realise their mistakes or offenses.

Today, some juvenile offenses are channelled to the adult courts and this is contrary to the initial juvenile court act as depicted by the article (Soulier & Charles, 2010). In the adult courts, criminals or offenders are subjected to harsh and weighty punishments that tend to be unbearable to the juvenile. A juvenile being in the developmental stage, should be advised and engaged in activities that boost their cognitive stamina or capacity. Many juveniles who have been incarcerated tend to repeat similar offenses due to lack of proper guidance. Some juveniles may also commit an offense due to psychological or mental problems. This makes it necessary to conduct medical examination on a juvenile and administer possible psychological or mental therapies. All these activities should be within the jurisdiction of a juvenile court.

Strengths and weaknesses

According to the author’s notion, abolishing juvenile courts is ideal and important to the society. Juveniles in the contemporary world are treated as adults and this makes it difficult to reduce juvenile delinquency. Jailing of juveniles destroy their future because of the stigma and lack of cognitive stamina growth to differentiate good and bad (Soulier & Charles, 2010). Counselling and rehabilitation creates both psychological and mental awareness of bad and good and activities in the rehabilitation centres and to the outside world. A juvenile delinquent should be kept away from parents and adults to help them develop good cognitive behaviour. The only weakness attached to the author’s notion of juvenile court abolition is lack of punishment to the young offenders. There are some juvenile youths that prove stubborn to counselling and punishments remain as the last option. When a juvenile delinquent is punished he or she is not set to repeat a similar offense.

Contributions:- This article has greatly contributed to the field of juvenile justice through highlighting and explaining certain concepts that need to be put into consideration. It has also pointed out hash juvenile punishments citing real experiences. The information depicted in the article mainly touched on the abolition of juvenile court with the aim of realizing juvenile justice.

Implication, Juvenile court reform process is perceived positively in the society based on the suggestions given by various law experts in the article. According to the law experts cited in the article, the reform can bring a big change in the societal youth behaviour.

Conclusion, The whole article majored on the abolition of juvenile justice citing experiences making it an ideal process. Abolishment of juvenile courts can really help in reducing cases of juvenile delinquency. Rehabilitation and counselling of juvenile offenders help in knowing their problems hence making it an ideal process. All the ideas given by the author supported juvenile justice and suggestions that can help reform the juvenile courts.