Juvenile Justice is Not Just Kid Stuff: The Forgotten Side of Fairness and Due Process

Philip Houle

Abstract

Juvenile justice is not just kid stuff. Rather, it is the forgotten and ignored side of fairness and due process which as often as not scars juveniles and deprives them of what they see as basic fairness, placing many of them on a road to anti-social and marginalized adulthood. Technical niceties on which much, perhaps too much, of adult criminal justices turns, are even less suited in juvenile proceedings. Firm, clear, and unequivocal tests for waiver of important rights by juveniles of important procedural and substantive rights are necessary if a juvenile's day in court is to have any real meaning, especially in the area of false-confessions where juveniles are particularly susceptible to pressure from the authorities. Lastly, the article proposes how the juvenile justice system could and should be reformed.