NCJ Number
175025
Journal
Journal of Offender Rehabilitation Volume: 28 Issue: 1/2 Dated: 1998 Pages: 1-28
Date Published
1998
Length
28 pages
Annotation
This paper argues for the prevention of juvenile violence through proactive responses based on modern biological and neurological knowledge, rather than after-the-fact legal responses based on a doctrine of free will, moral responsibility, and revenge and punishment.
Abstract
Prevention programs are of two types: interdisciplinary and social-developmental. Interdisciplinary approaches are based on biology, psychology, sociology, law, and urban planning and focus on the 5-7 percent of the delinquent cohort population who go on to serious violent careers and the 3-5 percent of the urban areas with high crime rates. Individual differences are as crucial as environmental differences, since the emerging model is one of individuals interacting with the environment. Hence, urban planning and the new ecology are to be used in crime prevention. The social-developmental model is based on the manipulation of such social variables as family, school, neighborhood, and peer groups; however, the research shows that such interventions are effective for no more than 2-3 years and that the 5 percent headed for serious offenses are not identified by concentrating solely on environmental variables. Finally, the judicial-legal approach to violence is discussed, with a focus on U.S. Supreme Court decisions in which, because of a 5-4 split, one justice determines major policy issues. On the basis of conservative appointments, the U.S. Supreme Court has supported the death penalty. 4 references and appended summary of the report of the Panel in NIH (National Institutes of Health) Research on Antisocial, Aggressive, and Violence-related Behaviors and Their Consequences, April 1994