Recriminalizing Delinquency

Recriminalizing Delinquency presents a case study of legislation that redefines previous acts of delinquency as crimes, and delinquents as juvenile offenders. It examines one state’s response to violent juvenile crime through waiver legislation that transfers jurisdiction over juveniles from juvenile court to criminal court. It focuses on the creation, implementation, and effects of waiver legislation that lowered the eligible age of criminal responsibility to thirteen for murder and fourteen for other violent offenses. In the end, recriminalization is seen as an effort to return a part of the juvenile justice system to the conditions that existed prior to the creation of juvenile courts.