Post #5
Juveniles are seen in the public light to be children with “issues” that can be rehabilitated with group therapy and counseling. The problem at hand is whether juveniles may be seen in different light once the word “sex offender” is brought to their attention. Is that same juvenile now a horrible, nasty, pedophile? Some argue the juvenile is still a child who has “problems” that can be fixed with the proper clinical care.
Recent matters concerning sex crimes has brought attention to the government who is cracking down on registered sex offenders and updating the sex offender registry in the United States. The main topic of discussion arising in the field of psychology and criminal justice is if juvenile sex offenders should be added to the adult sex offender registry. Juveniles account for about one-quarter of the sex offenses in the U.S. (Jones). That means that some juveniles are not the innocent and angelic folks the public views but instead awful, disgusting, and horrid people much like adult sex offenders.
The justice system has stepped up to the matter at hand and handed down longer sentences to juveniles for sex offenses, while some states have created tougher probation requirements and, most significant, lumped adolescents with adults in sex-offender legislation, (Jones). Some may argue that by lumping the juvenile sex offenders with the adult sex offenders there is cause for concern in the child’s safety along with public scrutiny because sex offenders are looked down upon in society.
Gale Burford, a professor in social work, co-wrote a legislative report used by the Vermont State Legislature to keep 11 year-olds off of the state sex offender registry, stating that they found no evidence that public registration and public notification requirements for juveniles, and especially young children, are associated with positive treatment outcomes or with greater safeguarding of other children,” (Reidel). Burford also researched juvenile sex offender rehabilitation programs and treating dissociative kids in group settings. According to his research, these patients may react negatively to peers who discuss the details of more serious crimes and victimization in a group setting. In his Forensic Nursing article he addressed implications for nurses who are doing forensic risk assessment, and the importance of understanding the variables related to sexual aggression among juveniles, which should help drive assessment and treatment recommendations.
In 2006, President Bush signed into legislation a federal Internet registry that allows law enforcement and the public to more effectively track convicted sex offenders — including juveniles 14 and older who engage in genital, anal or oral-genital contact with children younger than 12, (Jones). The Dru Sjodin National Sex Offender Public Website (NSOPW), coordinated by the U.S. Department of Justice, is a cooperative effort between Jurisdictions hosting public sex offender registries (“Jurisdictions”) and the federal government. These Jurisdictions include the 50 states, Puerto Rico, Guam, the District of Columbia, and participating tribes, (Department of Justice).
The government is trying to protect its citizens and get the word out as to who is living in their neighborhoods. They fail to protect the sex offenders, whether they are juvenile or adult sex offenders. Yes, they did a horrible act towards society as a whole but they are still human beings. By exploiting a juvenile’s sex crime past, where they live and what they look like may hurt them in the long run. In one instance an eighth grade boy was ridiculed at his school because one of his peers’ mothers looked on the sex offender registry in her neighborhood and found his picture in the mix of sex offenders. She then told her child and the news spread about the boys’ past like wildfire. The juvenile sex offender had put his hand on his 4-year-old half-sister’s vagina over her underwear. Several months later, he told her to perform oral sex on him, which she did. When Johnnie’s mother found out, she called the police. She may have felt she could no longer control Johnnie, (Jones). He was then sentenced to a residential juvenile-sex-offender program, where he spent 16 months. According to his therapist, when Johnnie was released he was considered a role model in his program.
Therapists, lawyers, teenagers and their parents told similar stories of juveniles who, after being discovered on a sex-offender registry, have been ostracized by their peers and neighbors, kicked out of extracurricular activities or physically threatened by classmates. Experts worry that these experiences stigmatize adolescents and undermine the goals of rehabilitation, (Jones). “The whole world knows you did this bad thing,” notes Elizabeth Letourneau, an associate psychology professor at the Medical University of South Carolina and an expert on juveniles with sex offenses. “You could go to treatment for five years; you could be as straight as an arrow; but the message continues to be: You are a bad person. How does that affect your self-image? How does that affect your ability to improve your behaviors?” (Jones).
No one denies a sex offender is a sex offender but what about juvenile sex offenders? Are they still people with issues concerning sex or are they just children trying to grow up in a sex-sized world full of love and lust. What can be done to give juvenile sex offenders the ‘help’ they need while setting an example to other juvenile sex offenders who commit the same crime? Should a juvenile sex offender be put into the prison system or rehabilitation programs, such as the one with Johnnie? That is the question still unanswered today by many justice officials and the public themselves.
Dru Sjodin National Sex Offender Public Website. http://www.nsopw.gov/Core/Conditions.aspx?AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1
Jones, Maggie. (2007). “How Can You Distinguish a Budding Pedophile From a Kid With Real Boundary Problems?” New York Times.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/22/magazine/22juvenile-t.html
Reidel, Jon. (2009). “Research Sheds Light on Juvenile Sexual Offenders.” University Communications. University of Vermont.
