The History:

• 1908-1984: Juvenile Delinquents Act
• 1984-2003: The Young Offenders Act
• 2003-present: The Youth Criminal Justice Act

Goal of the YCJA

To be more effective and to promote accountability, the YCJA focuses on three goals:

• make youth more accountable and responsible for their actions and make it clear that criminal behaviour will lead to meaningful consequences;
• make a distinction between violent and non-violent crimes; this will insure that the proportionate consequences will suit the crime; and
• make every effort possible to prevent youth crime and help young people involved in criminal activities turn their lives around.

To be successful, it is imperative that the consequences are meaningful to the youth who committed the crime. This insures that the harm done to the victim and the community as a whole is felt by the perpetrator.

Furthermore, these consequences must respond to the circumstances and needs of each youth in particular. It must be recognized that there are multiple motivators for committing crimes, such as poverty or living in an environment where the law is frequently broken. These factors need to be taken into consideration when making a youth accountable for his or her actions.

One of the concerns with the Young Offenders Act was the overuse of custody. A key objective of the YCJA is to decrease the use of custody as it is no longer seen as a meaningful consequence for youth that would aid in prevention and rehabilitation. The YCJA does not recommend a young person be sentenced to custody unless a serious crime is committed, the individual didn’t comply with a previous sentence, the individual committed a crime that an adult would get more then two years prison time for committing, and/or the individual has a pattern of breaking the law.

In rare circumstances, custody is given if an indictable offence has been committed and not having the sentence include custody would go against the purpose and principles of the YCJA. The Criminal Code of Canada has two major categories of offences: summary conviction offences and indictable offences. Summary conviction offences are the less serious, minor offences. Those found guilty of summary conviction offences can receive a maximum of six months imprisonment and/or a fine of up to $2000. No warrant is necessary for the police officers to arrest the suspected individual provided they witness the criminal offence. Indictable offences are much more serious criminal acts. The individual can receive a long term of imprisonment or a much steeper fine. Officers need a warrant to arrest those charged with indictable offences. The accused also gets to have a choice of having a jury or not. Many crimes can be considered in either category – the Prosecutor will make the decision on how to proceed by examining whether the individual has a past criminal record and the severity of the crime committed (Ministry of Justice Canada).

How it affect young people

The YCJA has changed certain aspects of the legal process for youth:

1. Staying Outside of Court: If a youth commits a minor offence, there is an effort made to deal with it outside of court. This focuses on the youth’s accountability. The YCJA supports actions outside of court, such as a police officer taking no further action, a police officer administering a caution (under certain provisions), or a police officer giving a referral to a program or agency in the community that may help the young person deal with the root causes of his or her offending and hopefully prevent future offences from being committed. It can also include community service or compensation to the victim.

2. Conferences: These are meetings to assist a decision-maker, such as a police officer, in deciding what step to take next. The purpose is to take other parties into consideration and get input from them before deciding on appropriate action. The structure of such conferences varies and include community justice forums (in which youth, the youth’s family, the victim(s), and anyone else affected address the problems that occurred), youth justice committees (a group specializing in youth finding solutions to the crime), community accountability panels (in which community members, victim(s) and family work together to find a solution that works for all parties involved), and school mediation programs (in which police officers, school officials, parents and parties involved work together to find solutions to the problem).

3. Names and Publication: Under the Young Offenders Act, the youth’s name was not published unless he or she was tried in adult court. The YCJA prohibits any publication of names or information that could lead to identifying a young person who has been dealt with under the YCJA. The exceptions to this rule are youth who receive an adult sentence or are presently missing and considered dangerous and “unlawfully at large.” If a youth has been found guilty of a presumptive offence, as defined in the Act as a violent crime committed by a youth of at least 14 years of age and a crime in which an adult would serve longer then two years, his or her name can be published. In these causes, the Attorney General or the youth can make an application for a ban on publication at the sentence hearing.

4. Sentencing: Custody, as a general rule, is reserved for violent and repeat offenders. The court has the power to use adult sentences in certain cases if the youth is above the age of 14 and the crime is too awful to be redeemed with only two years of custody (the maximum for youth crimes). The legal system is encouraged to use community-based sentencing such as community service, victim compensation and probation. The sentence can now include plans for treatment and supervision for high-risk, violent offenders.

New sentences in the YCJA:

• Reprimand.
• Intensive support and supervision order.
• Attendance order: where a youth must attend a non-residential program that could help the young person with the specific problems underlying his or her criminal behaviours.
• Custody and Supervision order.
• Intensive rehabilitative custody and supervision order: an individualized treatment plan developed for youth who commit violent crimes and suffer from mental illness or disorder, a psychological disorder or an emotional disturbance.

5. Custody and Release:

• The YCJA requires that, while in custody, young people are not in the same institution as adults serving custodial sentences.
• Provinces can keep a young person in a youth custody facility until the individual turns 20 years old. In certain exception circumstances, it is appropriate to keep the individual in one of these facilities for longer.
• The YCJA requires provinces to designate at least two levels of custody (known under the YOA as “open custody” and “closed custody”).
• While in custody, youth will work with a provincially assigned youth worker and will develop a plan to follow when he or she is released from custody. Together the social worker and the youth will work out a rehabilitation and reintegration plan including programs that will start while in custody and continue once under supervision in the community.
• Every custody period is followed by a period under supervision in the community – the length of that period is usually equivalent to one half of the period in custody.

There are conditions the youth has to follow during their community supervision. Some are mandatory, others are optional. There are many different conditions that have been established to support reintegration into the community.

Links

Department of Justice Canada’s: “Youth Justice Renewal.”
Law Courts Education Society of BC: Explore the YCJA
J4Y: Justice for Youth
Canada’s Youth Criminal Justice Act
Ministry of Justice Canada