As the new Chief of Police for the city of Memphis, I would implement various strategies in order to combat the juvenile delinquent problem in the city. The first strategy would include maintaining data-driven policing through mapping and analysis of statistical information gathered through a variety of sources including an integrated approach of surveillance in targeted crime hot spots. My next strategy would be to help all branches of local law enforcement facilitate appropriate referrals to prevention and intervention programs for juveniles. I would also implement a mentoring program for those in my police department to become mentors for youth in the community to help encourage them to leave the gang lifestyle. I would also have monthly meetings with citizens in my community to get their input on various approaches that could be taken to help reduce gangs and juvenile affiliation with gangs.
I would implement these strategies because Memphis is a city with a history of having some of the highest crime and youth violence rates in the country. Both public and private community leaders understand how this distinction hampers our community goals, including maintaining vibrant businesses and tourism industry and attracting new families and companies to the area. Violence destroys quality of life and diminishes the freedom, health, and prosperity of individuals, families, and communities. Lack of public safety is not a standalone problem; it is linked to a city’s economic health, quality of education, and other community goals. Accordingly, lower rates of crime are essential to the increased economic growth and prosperity of our city.
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(2011). An initiative of operation: Safe Community. Retrieved from
In addition, the success that has come from the implementation of the Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy only shows that in the future it will become more successful. This program has helped improve the residents’ confidence that the police are there to help combat crime, to ensure the community is a safe place to live as well as a reduction in major crimes. “Evaluations of the alternative policing strategy in Chicago show that from 1993 to 2002, the fear of crime went down by 20% among groups most fearful of crime and
(oxford dictionaries) so being assertive with the children who act this way to try to make them refrain from the behavior, that may result in earlier curfews, or making these offenders go to boot camp.
Operation Ceasefire is a problem-oriented policing intervention aimed at reducing youth homicide and youth firearms violence in Boston. Project design began in 1995 and it was implemented in 1996. It is based on the “pulling levers” deterrence strategy that focuses criminal justice attention on a small number of chronically offending gang-involved youth responsible for much of Boston’s youth homicide problem. This paper will explore the problem Operation Ceasefire is trying to solve and examine the effectiveness of its implementation through the assessment of the 7 stages of the model.
In 2006, Memphis had the second highest violent crime rate in the country. The mayor of Shelby county at the time collaborated with the District Attorney, the Sheriff’s dept, Memphis Police Director and business leaders to try to address the issue (Goggans, 2014). Collectively they created a 15 point research based crime reduction plan. Due to Memphis’ data driven policing initiative, their safe community strategy has helped with the decline in serious crime in Memphis by more than 26.6 percent. In January of 2011, Memphis saw its lowest murder rate in 30 years. Nevertheless, despite the success, violence among their youth is still on the rise (Goggans, 2014).
Should convicted youth gang members be treated like other juvenile delinquents, including status offenders and why do you feel the way you do?
First there should exist a non custodial alternative to pre-trial as to free up space in prison for people who are not yet convicted. This will free up valueble prison space as well as avoid mishaps to people awaiting trial. The existence of a pre-trial lock up policy means that many times trials will be delayed and takes away precious time and resource from both suspects and government (PenalReform). Second, some minor cases should be taken out of the criminal justice system altogether. This policy now exist in many countries, where the police not only arrest but try to help parties who are involved in the incident to come together to form a peaceful agreement so to avoid making arrest for minor issues. This is not only a compassionate way to address many problems, but help to build a society of trust and understanding, also helps to reform the image of law enforcement so that people do not view them with such hostility as most do now days. Lastly, began developing ways to prevent crimes instead of merely responding to crimes. Politicians needs to find ways to turn bad neighborhoods into good ones instead of just ignoring some streets. In order to truly deter crime and lower crime rates, the root of the problem must be found and solved. Crime rate will not truly drop until the source of the crime is gone. If people have access to good education, food, and opportunity,
It is guided by six principles. These include strengthening the family in its primary responsibilities to instill moral values and provide support and guidance to children, supporting core social institutions, such as schools, churches, and community organizations, to help develop capable, mature, and responsible minors, promoting crime prevention as the most cost-effective approach to reducing juvenile lawlessness, intervening immediately and effectively when delinquent behavior first emerges to prevent it from becoming worse, establishing a system of graduated sanctions that holds each juvenile offender accountable, protects public safety, and provides programs and services that meet treatment needs, and identifying and controlling the small percentage of serious, violent, and chronic juvenile offenders who commit the majority of felony
The Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act (JJDPA) is the principal federal program through which the federal government sets standards for juvenile justice systems at the state and local levels. It provides direct funding for states, research, training, and technical assistance, and evaluation. The JJDPA was originally enacted in 1974 and even though the JJDPA has been revised several times over the past 30 years, its basic composition has remained the same. Since the act was passed in 1974, the JJDPA focused solitary on preventing juvenile delinquency and on rehabilitating juvenile offenders.
Having control of guns would stop a lot of violence in many communities. Enforce better gun laws and requirements would change how many people have access to illegal weapons. Early disciplinary actions in the youth would show the youth that committing crimes will not get them far in life. Showing youth other activates and opportunities that would be beneficial to their lives would stop youth crimes. If communities trusted law enforcement more they would look to resolve issues and not take it into their own hands. Building a bond between communities and law enforcement can reduce a lot of crimes. Law enforcement has to let their communities know they support and help them. Rebuilding the bond with law enforcement would make it easy for the
It is a common believe that adolescents require a special system thru which be processed because they are “youth who are in a transitional stage of development…young offenders that are neither innocent children nor mature adults…” (Nelson, 2012). Because juveniles are in a process of constant development sociologically, psychologically and physiologically, the juvenile court system focuses on alternative sentences and the creation of programs that will offer them rehabilitation instead of incarceration. However, in cases of extraordinary circumstances, the juvenile system shifts from looking at rehabilitation as a first choice to accountability and punishment (Read, n.d). All levels of society are collectively involved in delinquency
This assignment will illustrate that by understanding the fundamentals of combatting juvenile delinquency and applying the theories to command practice will enhance the overall knowledge of the material. This document will demonstrate the juvenile delinquency reduction efforts and programs currently in operation in the Tampa area community. In addition, I will propose ways to improve the Tampa area community’s juvenile delinquency prevention efforts. Next, this paper will attempt to apply the main sociological theories that underlie these interventions that shape the community’s public policy for delinquency prevention. Finally, this paper will identify an appropriate strategy geared toward preventing delinquency that in consistent with the Behavioral theory.
Juvenile offending is a concern in society today. Juveniles account for approximately 19% of the population but are responsible for 29% of criminal arrests (Cottle, Lee, & Heilbrun, 2001). Crime overall has been found to be decreasing throughout the last two decades. The issue is that the rate in which adult crime is decreasing is significantly greater than the rate in which juvenile crime is decreasing. Since the rate of juvenile crime is so high, juvenile delinquents are seen as predators and many believe they lack morals. The way in which media of today’s society constructs juvenile delinquency impacts the views of a community towards their youth and youth offenders. Media presents an inaccurate image of youth offenders as violent predators (Rhineberger-Dunn, 2013). This inaccurate image significantly promotes the myths that juvenile crime is rising, juveniles commit crimes that are primarily violent, and that juveniles are highly effected by recidivism and continue committing crimes into adulthood (Bohm, & Walker, 2013). It has already been stated though that crime rates have been decreasing over the last two decades so the first myth is refuted. The myth that juveniles primarily commit violent crimes is also very off. In most cases, juveniles are involved in property crimes and although there are some violent crime cases, they are very rare. When these rare violent crimes do occur, youth can be tried in adult court. The
What is a Juvenile? A juvenile is a person who has not reached his or her 18th birthday. Juvenile delinquency is the violation of a law of the United States committed by a person prior to reaching 18 years of age, which would have been a crime committed by an adult (office). There are many residential programs put in place all over the country to help these youths that are coming in and out of the Criminal Justice system. Once these Juveniles come out of jail, or get released on bond, they sometimes do not have a stable place to go to and live. As these youths are leaving the jail facility there are a wide variety of residential programs to help them get back on their feet. These residential programs include Out of home placement in an institutional or camp like setting, or they might be eligible for an alternative placement, such a community confinement. (programs)
The social environment of teens holds an enormous influence on how the teens act and behave. Teens are easily influenced by their surroundings and they look to others for guidance. Their behavior results from that of the parent and peer influences. Parents play a particularly influential role in their child’s life and it is up to them to make sure that they are leading their sons or daughters in the right directions. A teen’s peers also play a large role in how the teen behaves when the parents are not around. A teen’s social environment, consisting of family and peers, plays a vital role in their life, therefore becoming the ultimate cause of juvenile delinquency.
Juvenile Delinquency has been an active issue in the criminal justice system that is considered as an evil by the society. It is believed to be a social and psychological problem faced by the youth and the society, which violates the legal system. The violation of the legal system makes it important to overcome the problem. The need to prevent the juvenile delinquency is important to help the youth cope with the society as well as the criminal justice system. The prevention of the delinquency is only possible if the results can be gathered for the causes of this behaviour. The causes can be gathered by examining a group of youth who can become possible offenders by knowing that what causes the delinquency and at what stages of the life does it trigger. The paper will be focus on the problem of juvenile delinquency, and the factors that contribute towards the onset of delinquency in youth. The research proposal would be based upon the previous research’s done and the data collected by those research’s that depicted some of the possible factors of delinquency found in youth that could be childhood maltreatment, negative relationship between the parents and the delinquent youth, emotional disturbance faced in the adolescent, genetics and the geographical factors. The factors would be further investigated by using them as independent variables in the research to find out how these factors can be removed to make the community aware of the negative impacts the