Parental involvement in youth court.

• Author: Varma, Kimberly N.
• Position: Canada

Introduction

Over the past few decades, there has been a shift toward the formal inclusion of "new stakeholders" in Canadian youth justice legislation. Victims and community members have been given a more central role in youth justice processing, and schools, families, and other social agencies are now seen as essential for the success of crime prevention, reparation, and offender reintegration into the community. While current youth justice legislation (the Youth Criminal Justice Act) has carved out a more formal role for non-justice participants, representatives of schools, communities, and families have previously been involved at various stages of the youth justice process. Moreover, families, and in particular parents, (1) have been notable participants in Canadian youth justice legislation. For example, parents were important under the former Young Offenders Act (1984-2002) (YOA). Section 3(1)(h) of the YOA declaration of principles, stated that "parents have responsibility for the care and supervision of their children and for that reason, young persons should be removed from parental supervision either partly or entirely only when measures that provide for continuing parental supervision are inappropriate." In addition, 3(1)(f) stated that "rights and freedoms of young persons include a right to the least possible interference with freedom that is consistent with the protection of society, having regard to the needs of young persons and the interests of their families." The role of parents is much more pronounced in the current legislation, the Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA). For example, the YCJA declaration of principles, section (3c)(iii), states that "measures taken against young people should be meaningful for the young person and, where appropriate, involve the parents, the extended family, the community and social or other agencies in the young person's rehabilitation and reintegration." Section (3d)(iv) states that "parents should be informed of measures or proceedings involving their children and encouraged to support them in addressing their offending behaviour." In relation to extrajudicial measures, section (5c) of the YCJA states that "one of the objectives of extrajudicial measures is to include families and extended families (where possible) in the design and implementation of extrajudicial measures."

At the sentencing stage, both the YOA and YCJA are quite similar in regard to parental involvement. For example, in considering sentence, both statutes maintain that the contents of a pre-sentence report should contain the results of an interview with the parents of the young person and with his or her extended family, if possible, and discuss the relationship between the youth and his/her parents (YOA, s. 1412]; YCJA, ss. 4012][a], 40[2][d][vi]). Section 20(1) of the YOA and section 42(1) of the YCJA state that, in considering a sentence, a youth court judge shall take into account representations made by various parties to the proceedings, including the parents of the young person.

Parents and families, under the former YOA and now under the YCJA, are also involved in youth justice proceedings in other, more administrative ways, such as being notified of bail hearings and sentencing hearings (and, in some cases, being obligated to attend bail hearings), receiving copies of reports, and being informed about their child's case before the courts. Also of importance is that, under both pieces of legislation, parents are asked to supervise various orders of the court, such as bail or probation conditions or extrajudicial sanctions.

Clearly, there are many similarities between the YOA and YCJA in respect of the role of parents, the obligations of parents, and the principles of youth justice processing. However, the legislative principles of the YCJA appear to carve out an even greater space for parental participation in sanctioning. Where the YOA discussed the fact that parents should supervise and care for their children and that measures (having regard to public protection) should interfere minimally with young people and their families, the YCJA takes the parental role further by involving parents and families in the design and implementation of sanctions for or consequences of the offending behaviour and asking parents to be informed and be supportive of their children in the youth court process.

The purpose of this article is to explore the involvement of parents in youth court hearings. Despite the importance given to parents in youth court processing, we know very little about their actual participation. One might expect that, if a parent were present in court and participated in the court hearing and the court heard that the parent was able to supervise her/his child, this should have some influence on the outcome of the case. In addition, there is an assumption underlying the notion of parental involvement in court proceedings that parents have the ability, resources, and motivation to assist in remedying the offending behaviour of their offspring.

Understanding what parents are willing and able to do is important for court decision makers, in order to facilitate supervision outside of the criminal justice system.

This research was carried out while the YOA was in force and reports on parental involvement in youth court proceedings at bail and sentencing hearings. Court observation data were collected in order to understand how often parents were present in court, how involved parents were during court proceedings, what the nature of their involvement was, and whether or not parental involvement had any effect on the outcome bail and sentencing cases. (2)

Ambivalence on the role of parents

While parents and families are one of the starting points for criminal justice intervention, the place of parents and families in youth justice processing is rife with conflicting messages.

On the one hand, parents are seen as the source of the youth crime problem, and this has resulted in policies that increase parental responsibility for the crimes of their offspring (Harvell, Rodas, and Hendey 2004; Leschied 2000; McNaught 1998; Schaffner 1997; Davidson 1995). A case in point is laws that allow civil proceedings to be taken against parents who are seen to have contributed to the offending behaviour of their offspring (found in some Canadian provinces (3) and in most American states). In general, the onus is on the parent to show that s/he exercised reasonable supervision of the child to prevent a criminal incident. If found responsible in Ontario, for example, parents can pay up to CAN$10,000 in compensation for the loss, theft, or destruction of property. In adjudicating parental responsibility, judges will consider mitigating factors, such as whether or not the parent has sought out professional help for her/his child or whether the parent has attempted to "improve" her/his parenting skills through training programs (Parental Responsibility Act 2000; McNaught 1998; Hillian and Reitsma-Street 2003). Similarly, "parental training orders," which can be found in the United Kingdom's 1998 Crime and Disorder Act, require parents to fulfil a variety of conditions related to the supervision and "appropriate" rearing of their offspring, such as attending counselling sessions, being required to attend their child's school, ensuring that their child does not visit certain places or people, and monitoring curfews. A failure to fulfil conditions may result in the parent's or caregiver's being charged with a criminal offence. Critics are deeply concerned with the way in which these programs regulate and punish parents and their children within the rhetoric of family and community involvement and with little regard for the structural barriers facing parents and the inadequacy of resources provided to families (Harvell et al. 2004; Osher and Hunt 2002; Henricson, Coleman, and Roker 2000; Hil 1998; Davidson 1995; James and James 2001; Standing 1999). As Hil remarks, "[T]he family is seen as the 'natural' or 'proper' site of crime control, as well as the target for punitive actions when things go wrong" (Hil 1998: 102).

On the other hand, parents are seen as the solution to the problem and this has led to an ever-expanding number of programs, such as family-group conferences, community panels, and community crime-prevention strategies involving parents and other family members. At the level of the courts, parents and other caregivers are routinely asked to supervise curfews and other court-mandated restrictions on bail and probation orders made by judicial decision makers. The assumption is that parents have the desire, resources, and time to be able to monitor the behaviour of their offspring.

Previous research on parents in court

While strategies involving parents (including restorative justice and parental training approaches) have expanded in scope over the past few decades, we know very little about how they can help parents or youth in conflict with the law or whether or not they are effective in reducing youth crime (Karp, Sweet, Kirschenbaum, and Bazemore 2004; Henricson et al. 2000; Schaffner 1997). What we do know is that, despite the importance attached to parents in the legislative framework, they are extremely underutilized in the youth justice process. In order to understand practices of parental involvement in youth courts, Davies and Davidson (2001) carried out a large-scale study in juvenile courts in the United States. The authors surveyed probation departments, court personnel, and parental education workers using a variety of different methods (mail surveys to court and probation workers, a follow-up telephone survey with a selected group of respondents from the mail survey, on-site data collection in six youth courts, and personal interviews with judges and court staff from juvenile drug courts). The authors found that there were no unique or special efforts made to...