Community Justice and

the Philadelphia Juvenile Justice System –

An Overview

(© Michelle Sahl 1999)

 

What is the history of juvenile justice facilities?[i]  [ii]

 

The early development of residential facilities for juvenile offenders (i.e., those under age 18) began as the justice system’s effort to separate “wayward” youths from convicted adult criminals who were incarcerated in correctional prisons or jails.  The separation was intended to provide a buffer between adolescent misbehavior and adult criminal pathology.  Where young people are concerned, there has at least been the prospect of change and the hope that intervention, and thus future deterrence, can be accomplished.  Historically, juvenile residential facilities, at times referred to as juvenile detention centers, became marked by inadequacy and poor “outcomes” for the residents who were maintained there.  The buildings of the past were either seen as too small, too difficult to manage, to restrictive, or not restrictive enough. 

 

Gradually, during the past twenty years, the juvenile justice system has become more sophisticated.  Beginning in the 1980s, juvenile justice authorities were required to respond to dilemmas such as higher arrest rates for increasingly serious offenses; increases in the number and percentage of cases prosecuted; community voices for “getting tough” with criminal offenders; demands for longer periods of incarceration; increasing waivers with referral of juveniles to adult courts; and demands for enhanced physical security.  In answer to these pressures, larger facilities with more beds, greater restrictive custody, and “training schools” being re-designated as correctional facilities became the norm.  The system grew reliant on facilities as a solution.[iii]