Essay On Juvenile Probation

When probation first started, it was to help a person get back into the community to the point where they could contribute to society again. It was for situations when a correctional institution was too harsh of a punishment, but the crime could not go unnoticed. According to the Oxford Dictionary, probation is defined as “the release of an offender from detention, subject to a period of good behavior under supervision.” (18) Probation started in the 1800’s with one man wanting to make a difference in the correctional society in a small town and has grown across the states today.
In April 1840, half of a dozen of hard drinkers formed a club. A well-known temperance speaker, Reverend Matthew Hale Smith was speaking in a local church. The club of six sent two men to listen to the reverend. (4) The two men brought back positive reviews and found his doctrine highly favorable. Between the doctrine and the positive reviews, a conversation developed between the six men. Within the conversation, a joke
(15) In the 1980’s and 1990’s juvenile crimes were at an all-time high. “The number of juvenile arrests for Violent Index Offenses grew 64 percent between1980-1994. Juvenile’s arrests for murder jumped 99 percent during that time. The juvenile arrest rate for murder shot up 167 percent between 1984 and 1993 alone, from a rate of 5 arrest per 100,000 juveniles to 14 per 100,000.” (16) This growth of juvenile crime during this era brought probation statistics up. By Government officials using probation in a law enforcement perspective, they were able to put juveniles on probation and crack down on them. Officers were able to some of the laws form the “Get Tough on Crime.” These laws were developed to crack down on juvenile violence as it reached its peak. These laws helped provided more strict laws for sentencing juveniles and probation.