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JUVENILE COURT INTAKE An Analysis of Discretionary Decision‐Making
Author(s) -
THOMAS CHARLES W.,
SIEVERDES CHRISTOPHER M.
Publication year - 1975
Publication title -
criminology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.467
H-Index - 139
eISSN - 1745-9125
pISSN - 0011-1384
DOI - 10.1111/j.1745-9125.1975.tb00647.x
Subject(s) - juvenile , juvenile court , psychology , juvenile delinquency , explanatory power , power (physics) , relevance (law) , unintended consequences , function (biology) , compliance (psychology) , criminology , social psychology , law , political science , biology , philosophy , genetics , physics , epistemology , quantum mechanics , evolutionary biology
An increasing amount of pressure has been directed toward juvenile court operations, much of which has focused on the hypothesized abuse of the broad discretionary decision‐making power that has traditionally been vested in the court. In this paper, we attempt to examine the extent to which factors not directly associated with the nature of the alleged offense may alter the probability that a juvenile w.11 be referred for a formal hearing in the juvenile court, a step which many analysts feel may have the unintended function of promoting rather than inhibiting subsequent involvement in delinquent behavior. Based on an analysis of 346 cases, our findings show that a number of variables that are not of direct legal relevance do exert a significant influence on the dispositional process, but the magnitude of this influence is not as great as many have been led to expect given the orientation of some explanatory models, particularly those based on the propositions of the labeling school .