Sexuality Issues and the Female Delinquent (From Working With Young Women in the Juvenile Justice System, P 1-5, 1987 -- See NCJ-109539)

• NCJ Number: 109540
• Author(s): R Goodfriend
• Date Published: 1987
• Length: 5 pages
• Sale Source: National Institute of Justice/; NCJRS Photocopy Services
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: For microfiche, see NCJ-109539.

Annotation

The juvenile justice system tends to overreact to female juveniles who are independent and aggressive and underreact to them as sexual abuse victims in the home.

Abstract

Seventy-five percent of young women arrested or incarcerated are referred for status offenses, compared to 23 percent of male juveniles referred for such offenses. This is due to the double standard in the socialization of males and females. Females juveniles are expected to display conservative behavior and remain dependent upon and submissive to their parents through adolescence. Violations of this stereotype for female socialization alarm both parents and juvenile justice officials, such that they use radical, negative intervention. On the other hand, the juvenile justice system is not sufficiently sympathetic to the prevalence and consequences of the sexual abuse of female juveniles in the home, a circumstance that prompts many female juveniles to run away from home to a life on the streets. Status offenders should be removed from the court's jurisdiction and entrusted to their families, schools, and youth agencies for the resources required to guide their development. Juveniles, however, should not be returned to abusive families. The juvenile and the family must first be helped through counseling and shelters.