Youth Crime briefing - Nacro

Some facts about children and young people who offend – 2004more likely to be remanded in secure conditions. Anydiscrimination at those earlier points will necessarilybe reflected in an over-representation at later stages.Recent research has also suggested that black youngpeople’s experiences of crime and the criminal justicesystem can lead them to have little confidence in thepolice. The report author argues that black youngpeople perceive their treatment by the police to beinformed by racist stereotyping. As a consequencethey display a lack of trust that any offences whichthey reported would be investigated appropriately. 38At the same time, black people and those fromminority ethnic groups bear higher risks ofvictimisation. In 2002/03, those from ethnic minoritybackgrounds were more likely to be victims of crimethan the white majority population. Much, but by nomeans all, of this difference is explained by theyounger demographic profile of the black andminority population since those aged 16 – 24 are atgreatest risk. 39be accounted for in a similar manner. Girls, it hasbeen argued, have traditionally benefited from a more‘welfarist’ approach to their offending, resulting in agreater use of informal responses than generallyafforded to boys. On this account, a shift towards a‘less gendered’ treatment led, up until recently, to thesharper falls in pre-court diversion for girls, notedabove, although the rate of diversion remainssignificantly higher than for boys. 42 One might expecttherefore that the target to increase the number ofoffences brought to justice would impactdifferentially on females, leading to an expansion inthe numbers brought within the parameters of theyouth justice system, particularly at the pre-courtstage. The major part of the rise in recorded girls’offending during 2003 – 2004 does indeed relate tothose who received a reprimand or final warning.Rate of Diversion 1992 – 20004Pre-court diversionFollowing an arrest, if the police consider that there issufficient evidence to proceed with the case, theoptions available to them are to reprimand, warn orcharge the young person. The system of reprimandsand final warnings, introduced by the Crime andDisorder Act 1998, replaced police cautioning foryoung people from June 2000. 40 The new scheme wasintended to reduce inconsistent and multiplecautioning by restricting the number of pre-courtdisposals that any individual young person couldreceive to one reprimand and (in most cases) one finalwarning.Given this context, the reform of the pre-court systemmight have been expected to produce a reduction inthe proportion of cases diverted from court. Thepicture is however more complicated since the rate ofdiversion had begun to decline much earlier. 41 Theintroduction of the final warning scheme did notaccordingly mark a new departure but served ratherto reinforce a trend which was dominant throughoutthe 1990s during which there were consistentreductions in the cautioning rate from 73% in 1992 to56% in 2000. The first two years following theintroduction of the final warning schemeunsurprisingly saw further reductions in diversion.There were, however, rises in both 2003 and 2004 asindicated in the chart below.One possible explanation for the recent rise wouldhighlight the effect of attempts to ‘narrow the justicegap’. If, as suggested earlier in the briefing, theimpact of that target has been to reduce further theuse of informal responses to minor offending, onewould expect any consequent increase in recordedyouth crime to be weighted towards the front end ofthe system, since those children with a previousoffending history would in all likelihood havepreviously received a formal disposal in any event.The picture of a combination of an increase in thediversion and an expansion in recorded youth crimeis thus consistent with such an explanation. Therecent increase in the number of girls entering theyouth justice system over the same period might alsoPercentYearsA further criticism levelled at police cautioning wasthat it was inconsistently applied. The final warningscheme was intended to address this issue byregulating the number of pre-court disposals and bypromoting police decision-making informed by asystem of nationally endorsed gravity factors. 43 Afterfour years of operation, however, it seems clear thatthe reformed scheme has effected little change in thelevel of variation in practice between police serviceareas. Thus in 1999, the last year before theimplementation of the new system, the rate ofcautioning for 15 – 17 year old males, for indictableoffences, varied from 63% in both Gloucestershire andSurrey to 22% in Durham. During 2004, the rate ofdiversion ranged from 71% in Surrey to 34% inDurham and Greater Manchester. 44 The persistence ofsuch inconsistencies might be explained, in part, bythe finding that in some areas, young people whoplead guilty to relatively minor offences areprosecuted even where they have not previouslyreceived a reprimand or final warning. 45Diversion from prosecution has consistently provedto be a relatively effective mechanism for dealing withyouth offending. In 1994, for instance, 81% ofchildren and young people who were cautioned didnot reoffend within two years. During 2003, thereconviction rate for reprimands and final warnings,within a one year period, was 19.7%. 46 The AuditCommission, in its 2004 review of youth justice, hassuggested that there might be scope for dealing withlarger numbers of young people whose offending isrelatively minor outside of the court arena. 47page