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Alliance Urges Commission to Adopt Comprehensive Youth Justice Reforms As Part of Plan to Raise the Age of Criminal Responsibility

The Alliance for Youth Justice and Safety, of which Center for Community Alternatives is an executive steering committee member, commends Governor Andrew Cuomo for responding to the concerns of New Yorkers by establishing a statewide Commission to create a road map to raise the age of criminal responsibility and develop concrete and actionable recommendations for improving youth justice statewide. Currently, New York and North Carolina are the only two states in the nation that automatically treat all 16- and 17-year-olds as adults in the criminal justice system.

Raising New York’s age of criminal responsibility will have significant and lasting public safety benefits for our state. Studies show consistently show that treating young people as young people rather than as adults substantially reduces crime and recidivism.  For example, a study that compared 15- and 16-year-olds who were prosecuted in the adult system with similar New Jersey youth prosecuted in the juvenile justice system found that New York youth were twice as likely to re-arrested for a violent offense. National studies have similarly found that transferring youth to adult criminal justice systems increases recidivism rates.[br]
The Governor’s Commission can help propel New York to the forefront of criminal justice and juvenile justice reform by ensuring the following principles are included in its ultimate recommendations:

1) Ensure that all young people are treated appropriately for their age by raising the age of criminal responsibility for all youth regardless of charge. This includes 16- and 17-year-olds charged with violent offenses and 13- to 15-year-olds charged under the Juvenile Offender Law.

2) Guarantee that no youth are held in adult jails and prisons. Young people in adult jails and prisons are more likely to be deprived of education and other services, to be victims of physical or sexual assault and to commit suicide behind bars. In addition, youth released from adult facilities are much more likely to commit new crimes than youth release from juvenile facilities.

3) Right-size the justice system by increasing opportunities for youth to be diverted from the courts and expanding the continuum of preventive and community-based services. Community-based programs are significantly cheaper and produce better public safety outcomes.

4) Reduce racial and ethnic disparities in the system. All criminal justice agencies should analyze and publically report data disaggregated by race, ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, geography and offense for all youth at each stage of the system. Agencies should also partner with communities to develop strategies to combat the overrepresentation of young people of color in the justice system.

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