Critically explore the nature and extent of Young People and Crime and the measures that are used to deal with youth offending
The term youth crime is one that we see almost every single day, whether it be on the television or being discussed in parliament, there is no getting away from the hot topic of youth offenders. The stigma that surrounds young people in society has never been more prevalent than it is today, this essay will look at whether crime statistics and figures really reflect the social uproar, it will also look at the measures put in place to not only punish the criminals but also ways of protecting and deterring them from potentially committing crime. It will look briefly at the history of punishment and the measures that
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“Childhood and adolescence were `discovered` around the Victorian era and it is here that `adolescence itself was identified as a cause of delinquency” (Gillis, 1974: 171). Prior to this point children were viewed as young adults and that was reflected in the fact they were still being punished severely, this lead to the introduction of ‘the child savers’ which was a lobby created to protect children from such punishment
1993 proved to be a watershed moment in legal history regarding young offenders; the murder of Jamie Bulger by two 10 year olds was the first of its kind in legal history and created much discussion about whether the perpertrators were too young to be tried as an adult, at the time 14 years old was the age a child could be criminally responsible. 1996-97 was an important year regarding youth offending, the switch in government to Tony Blair’s new Labour played a big part in changing the measures implemented to try and stem the amount of youth crime and tackling the issues surround offending rates. Prior to the general election there were figures released which highlighted the issue of youth criminality, home office statistics showed that 70% of all crimes affecting ordinary members of the public were committed by a small cross section of society, namely young