Juveniles possess less maturity, intelligence, and competence than adults, heightening their vulnerability in the justice system. For this reason, states try juveniles in separate courts and use different sentencing standards than for adults. Yet, when police bring kids in for questioning, they use the same interrogation tactics they use for adults, including trickery, deception, and lying to elicit confessions or to produce incriminating evidence against the defendants. In Kids, Cops, and Confessions, Barry Feld offers the first report of what actually happens when police question juveniles. Drawing on remarkable data, Feld analyzes interrogation tapes and transcripts, police reports, juvenile court filings and sentences, and probation and sentencing reports, describing in rich detail what actually happens in the interrogation room. Contrasting routine interrogation and false confessions enables police, lawyers, and judges to identify interrogations that require enhanced scrutiny, to adopt policies to protect citizens, and to assure reliability and integrity of the justice system. Feld has produced an invaluable look at how the justice system really works.

Winner, 2020 ACJS Outstanding Book Award, given by the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences A major statement on the juvenile justice system by one of America's leading experts The juvenile court lies at the intersection of youth policy and crime policy. Its institutional practices reflect our changing ideas about children and crime control. The Evolution of the Juvenile Court provides a sweeping overview of the American juvenile justice system's development and change over the past century. Noted law professor and criminologist Barry C. Feld places special emphasis on changes over the last 25 years-the ascendance of get tough crime policies and the more recent Supreme Court recognition that "children are different." Feld's comprehensive historical analyses trace juvenile courts' evolution though four periods-the original Progressive Era, the Due Process Revolution in the 1960s, the Get Tough Era of the 1980s and 1990s, and today's Kids Are Different era. In each period, changes in the economy, cities, families, race and ethnicity, and politics have shaped juvenile courts' policies and practices. Changes in juvenile courts' ends and means-substance and procedure-reflect shifting notions of children's culpability and competence. The Evolution of the Juvenile Court examines how conservative politicians used coded racial appeals to advocate get tough policies that equated children with adults and more recent Supreme Court decisions that draw on developmental psychology and neuroscience research to bolster its conclusions about youths' reduced criminal responsibility and diminished competence. Feld draws on lessons from the past to envision a new, developmentally appropriate justice system for children. Ultimately, providing justice for children requires structural changes to reduce social and economic inequality-concentrated poverty in segregated urban areas-that disproportionately expose children of color to juvenile courts' punitive policies. Historical, prescriptive, and analytical, The Evolution of the Juvenile Court evaluates the author's past recommendations to abolish juvenile courts in light of this new evidence, and concludes that separate, but reformed, juvenile courts are necessary to protect children who commit crimes and facilitate their successful transition to adulthood.

This Nutshell focuses on the criminal and non-criminal misconduct of children that bring them within the jurisdiction of juvenile courts. It examines how police, parents, schools, courts, and other agencies respond to that misconduct. It addresses children's rights during the investigation and prosecution of youths for delinquency and status-offenses. Like all Nutshells, it provides a succinct exposition of the law for students studying juvenile justice, for lawyers who do not regularly practice in juvenile court, and for legislators and policy officials involved in juvenile justice law reform efforts.

Winner, 2020 ACJS Outstanding Book Award, given by the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences A major statement on the juvenile justice system by one of America’s leading experts The juvenile court lies at the intersection of youth policy and crime policy. Its institutional practices reflect our changing ideas about children and crime control. The Evolution of the Juvenile Court provides a sweeping overview of the American juvenile justice system’s development and change over the past century. Noted law professor and criminologist Barry C. Feld places special emphasis on changes over the last 25 years—the ascendance of get tough crime policies and the more recent Supreme Court recognition that “children are different.” Feld’s comprehensive historical analyses trace juvenile courts’ evolution though four periods—the original Progressive Era, the Due Process Revolution in the 1960s, the Get Tough Era of the 1980s and 1990s, and today’s Kids Are Different era. In each period, changes in the economy, cities, families, race and ethnicity, and politics have shaped juvenile courts’ policies and practices. Changes in juvenile courts’ ends and means—substance and procedure—reflect shifting notions of children’s culpability and competence. The Evolution of the Juvenile Court examines how conservative politicians used coded racial appeals to advocate get tough policies that equated children with adults and more recent Supreme Court decisions that draw on developmental psychology and neuroscience research to bolster its conclusions about youths’ reduced criminal responsibility and diminished competence. Feld draws on lessons from the past to envision a new, developmentally appropriate justice system for children. Ultimately, providing justice for children requires structural changes to reduce social and economic inequality—concentrated poverty in segregated urban areas—that disproportionately expose children of color to juvenile courts’ punitive policies. Historical, prescriptive, and analytical, The Evolution of the Juvenile Court evaluates the author’s past recommendations to abolish juvenile courts in light of this new evidence, and concludes that separate, but reformed, juvenile courts are necessary to protect children who commit crimes and facilitate their successful transition to adulthood.

Over the last two decades, researchers have made significant discoveries about the causes and origins of delinquency. Specifically, we have learned a great deal about adolescent development and its relationship to decision-making, about multiple factors that contribute to delinquency, and about the processes and contexts associated with the course of delinquent careers. Over the same period, public officials have made sweeping jurisprudential, jurisdictional, and procedural changes in our juvenile justice systems. The Oxford Handbook of Juvenile Crime and Juvenile Justice presents a timely compilation of state-of-the-art critical reviews of knowledge about causes of delinquency and their significance for justice policy, and about developments in the juvenile justice system to prevent and control youth crime. The first half of the handbook focuses on juvenile crime and examines trends and patterns in delinquency and victimization, explores causes of delinquency-at the individual, micro-social, and macro-social levels, and from natural and social science perspectives-and their implications for structuring a youth justice system. The second half of the handbook concentrates on juvenile justice and examines a range of issues-including the historical origins and re-invention of the juvenile court; juvenile offenders' mental health status and considerations of trial competence and culpability; intake, diversion, detention, and juvenile courts; and transfer/waiver strategies-and considers how the juvenile justice system itself influences delinquency. The Oxford Handbook of Juvenile Crime and Juvenile Justice provides a comprehensive overview of juvenile crime and juvenile justice administration by authors who are all leading scholars involved in cutting-edge research, and is an essential resource for scholars, students, and justice officials. "Many volumes of this sort aspire to such balance, but this one succeeds. For those looking for a one-stop approach to the primary debates in this important subfield, this is the place to start shopping."-CHOICE

Juveniles possess less maturity, intelligence, and competence than adults, heightening their vulnerability in the justice system. For this reason, states try juveniles in separate courts and use different sentencing standards than for adults. Yet, when police bring kids in for questioning, they use the same interrogation tactics they use for adults, including trickery, deception, and lying to elicit confessions or to produce incriminating evidence against the defendants. In Kids, Cops, and Confessions, Barry Feld offers the first report of what actually happens when police question juveniles. Drawing on remarkable data, Feld analyzes interrogation tapes and transcripts, police reports, juvenile court filings and sentences, and probation and sentencing reports, describing in rich detail what actually happens in the interrogation room. Contrasting routine interrogation and false confessions enables police, lawyers, and judges to identify interrogations that require enhanced scrutiny, to adopt policies to protect citizens, and to assure reliability and integrity of the justice system. Feld has produced an invaluable look at how the justice system really works.

Over the last two decades, researchers have made significant discoveries about the causes and origins of delinquency. Specifically, we have learned a great deal about adolescent development and its relationship to decision-making, about multiple factors that contribute to delinquency, and about the processes and contexts associated with the course of delinquent careers. Over the same period, public officials have made sweeping jurisprudential, jurisdictional, and procedural changes in our juvenile justice systems.
The Oxford Handbook of Juvenile Crime and Juvenile Justice presents a timely compilation of state-of-the-art critical reviews of knowledge about causes of delinquency and their significance for justice policy, and about developments in the juvenile justice system to prevent and control youth crime. The first half of the handbook focuses on juvenile crime and examines trends and patterns in delinquency and victimization, explores causes of delinquency-at the individual, micro-social, and macro-social levels, and from natural and social science perspectives-and their implications for structuring a youth justice system. The second half of the handbook concentrates on juvenile justice and examines a range of issues-including the historical origins and re-invention of the juvenile court; juvenile offenders' mental health status and considerations of trial competence and culpability; intake, diversion, detention, and juvenile courts; and transfer/waiver strategies-and considers how the juvenile justice system itself influences delinquency.
The Oxford Handbook of Juvenile Crime and Juvenile Justice provides a comprehensive overview of juvenile crime and juvenile justice administration by authors who are all leading scholars involved in cutting-edge research, and is an essential resource for scholars, students, and justice officials.

Written by a leading scholar of juvenile justice, this book explores the social and legal changes that have transformed the juvenile court in the last three decades from a nominally rehabilitative welfare agency into a scaled-down criminal court for young offenders. It explores the complex relationship between race and youth crime to explain both the Supreme Court decision to provide delinquents with procedural justice and the more recent political impetus to "get tough" on young offenders. This provocative book will be necessary reading for criminal and juvenile justice scholars, sociologists, legislators, and juvenile justice personnel.

Within the past three decades, judicial decisions and legal changes have transformed the juvenile court from a nominally rehabilitative welfare agency into a scaled-down criminal court for young offenders. Barry Feld's Bad Kids explores the complex relationships between race and youth crime to explain both the Supreme Court decision to provide delinquents with procedural justice and the more recent political impetus to "get tough" and "crack down" on young offenders.