By Alana Glover, \u00a0CFCC Student Fellow (2018-2019)<\/p>\n
As a Student Fellow in \u00a0the University of Baltimore School of Law\u2019s Sayra and Neil Meyerhoff Center for Families, Children and the Courts\u2019 (CFCC) Student Fellows Program, we think critically about how families are affected by the legal system. We think in depth about therapeutic jurisprudence and the role that it plays in problem-solving courts, as well as the effects that problem-solving courts have on the community. There are many different problem-solving courts, including teen courts, veteran\u2019s courts, mental health courts, domestic violence courts, and drug \u00a0treatment courts. On October 4th,\u00a0 I observed Teen Court, which is a problem-solving court specifically geared towards juvenile offenders.<\/p>\n
The Maryland Youth & the Law (MYLAW) initiative operates the Baltimore City Teen Court.\u00a0 MYLAW was established in 1975 to teach Maryland youth about the law and legal system, and to provide youth in the community greater access to justice. The Teen Court program is unique because it allows teenagers to be judged by a group of their peers and offers them an opportunity to participate in the justice system as defendants and prosecutors. Youth in the community serve as the jury and fact finders in cases where \u00a0juveniles are being tried for misdemeanor offenses.<\/p>\n
The Baltimore City Teen Court receives most of its cases from the Baltimore City Police Department and Baltimore City School Police. Participation in Teen Court is completely voluntary. \u00a0By agreeing to participate, a youth\u2019s case is diverted from the Department of Juvenile Services (DJS).\u00a0 While participating in Teen Court, a case is\u00a0 placed “on hold,” pending completion of any teen court requirements.\u00a0 It is important to note that in order for a youth to participate in Teen Court, he\/she must admit to his\/her involvement and accept responsibility for the offense which led to the arrest or referral. Additionally, after the youth attends the hearing, he\/she must complete all of the sanctions imposed by the Teen Court jury and judge. If the youth complies with all of his\/her obligations, the case will be considered closed by DJS.\u00a0 Teen Court offers juveniles the opportunity to participate in a court that is focused on therapeutic jurisprudence rather than simple punishment that can lead to the youth becoming engulfed by the criminal justice system at an early age.<\/p>\n
According to an article by Professors Barbara A. Babb and David B. Wexler, \u201cTherapeutic jurisprudence is the study of the role of law as a therapeutic agent by serving as a lens that focuses on the law ‘s impact on an individual’s emotional and psychological well-being<\/em>.\u201d Barbara A. Babb & David B. Wexler, Encyclopedia of Criminology and Criminal Behavior (Gerben Bruinsma & David Weisburd, 2014). The article explains how the law can act as a healing or therapeutic agent, which is what I witnessed during my observation of \u00a0a Teen Court. In the case I observed a youth who had been charged with a minor offense presented his argument to a jury of his peers. What I found most \u00a0interesting about the process was the teenage jury deliberations on the matter. Similar to a traditional court, the Teen Court has a minimum number of community service hours that can be imposed as a sentence, depending on the offense committed. However, in the case I observed, the jury decided not to add additional community service hours after considering factors such as the youth being a junior in high school who already had to complete service hours\u00a0 for graduation and the youth\u2019s lack of support at home. The teen jury also decided that what would be most helpful to the youthful offender would be to provide him with a mentor. The teens in the jury considered factors that a judge, who might be three times older than the offender, may not have considered.<\/p>\n The opportunity to observe a system that works in a meaningful way to provide justice while stopping the school-to-prison pipeline was an amazing experience. The only issue I could see with Teen Court would be the lack of funding.\u00a0 With greater funding, the court could increase its capacity. Teen Court is an exemplary problem-solving court that changes juveniles\u2019 lives in a positive way in comparison to the traditional court system, that simply focuses on punishment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Alana Glover, \u00a0CFCC Student Fellow (2018-2019) As a Student Fellow in \u00a0the University of Baltimore School of Law\u2019s Sayra and Neil Meyerhoff Center for Families, Children and the Courts\u2019 (CFCC) Student Fellows Program, we think critically about how families are affected by the legal system. We think in depth about therapeutic jurisprudence and the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4169,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/cfcc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/806"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/cfcc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/cfcc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/cfcc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4169"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/cfcc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=806"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/cfcc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/806\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1046,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/cfcc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/806\/revisions\/1046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/cfcc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/cfcc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=806"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/cfcc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}