Young Offenders Act Research Paper

There should be no special treatment for convicted young offenders. They should be treaded as adults.

In the year of 1982, Parliament passed the Young Offenders Act (YOA). Effective since 1984, the Young Offenders Act replaced the most recent version of the Juvenile Delinquents Act. The Young Offenders Act's purpose was to shift from a social welfare approach to making youth take responsibility for their actions. It also addressed concerns that the paternalistic treatment of children under the Juvenile Delinquents Act did not conform to Canadian human rights legislation.
The guiding principles of the Young Offenders Act include the following young people who commit offences must take responsibility for their actions. However, young people
Policymakers believed charging adults with this offence conflicted with the idea of making youth take responsibility for their actions
When is a Young Offender an Adult? Maximum Age Limits
Under the Young Offenders Act, the maximum age at which a youth could be prosecuted as a juvenile varied from province to province, and between genders in certain cases (Alberta set the maximum age at sixteen for boys, and eighteen for girls). By contrast, the Young Offenders Act legislated a uniform maximum age of seventeen across Canada. The Young Offenders Act applied to all youth who committed a crime before their eighteenth birthday.
Due to disagreement between individual provinces and the federal government on what the maximum age should be, this section of the Young Offenders Act was not implemented immediately. It came into effect in April 1985, to make the Young Offenders Act comply with the Equality provisions outlined in section 15 of the Charter.
The Young Offenders Act did not change the minimum age for adult court transfers. Fourteen remained the age at which youth charged with more serious offences could be transferred to adult
The rate of recidivism among convicted violent offenders fuelled public belief that Young Offenders Act sentences were too short.
· The Courts were over-used for minor offences that could have been resolved through alternative sentencing. Partly this was due to different perceptions by judges on how to interpret the Act. In addition, lack of facilities limited the alternatives open to the court.
· Public perceptions of youth crime made it more difficult to gain public support for alternatives to detention, such as community based programs.
· The adoption of an "adversarial" court system found in ordinary courts often worked against the rehabilitative needs of the young offender. Under the JDA, a team including the judge, probation officers, and a Youth Committee consisting of volunteers worked together to find the best solution for the juvenile delinquent. Under the Young Offenders Act, the Crown attorney's job was to convict the young offender. It was not his responsibility to examine underlying socioeconomic or other factors that may have contributed to the crime. The young offender was dependent on defense counsel – often appointed by Legal Aid – to defend his