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Juvenile Crime And Criminal Justice: Resolving Border Disputes, Jeffrey Fagan
Juvenile Crime And Criminal Justice: Resolving Border Disputes, Jeffrey Fagan
Faculty Scholarship
Rising juvenile crime rates during the 1970s and 1980s spurred state legislatures across the country to exclude or transfer a significant share of offenders under the age of eighteen to the jurisdiction of the criminal court, essentially redrawing the boundary between the juvenile and adult justice systems. Jeffrey Fagan examines the legal architecture of the new boundary-drawing regime and how effective it has been in reducing crime.
The juvenile court, Fagan emphasizes, has always had the power to transfer juveniles to the criminal court. Transfer decisions were made individually by judges who weighed the competing interests of public safety and …