The term juvenile delinquency refers to the age group of criminals who are not adults. The overwhelming majority of legal systems in the world have special rules and regulations to deal with this group. The few exceptions are in the Middle East and in a few African countries, where kids are often tried as adults.
Some of the measures taken by most states to deal with juvenile delinquents include special detention centers and different sentences for the same crimes. The theory here is that the mind is not really developed until a person reaches at least 18, and so it is not fair to owe the rest of your life to jail time if you made a terrible decision when you were 11 years old. There are numerous theories on the causes of crime, and many of these can also be applied to the underage spectrum.
In the media, youth crime plays a special role as the interest seems to be quite universal for even mild crimes. For the violent type, though, the coverage is insurmountable on an otherwise slow news day, and you will probably know what I’m talking about if you read your local papers and watch the TV during news hour. Politicians also often weigh in on reported youth crimes, and those of violent nature often are almost required to be addressed in an election year. That is how important this issue is for the political world.
Since the 1950s, crime has risen in general, but the biggest spike has been in crimes by younger people. Nobody is quite sure of the reasons for this relatively high increase compared to the rest of the field, but a few people have some guesses. Within criminology, the causes of youth crime are a topic of constant discussion, as Dallas criminal defense lawyer will tell you.
A juvenile delinquent will likely commit the same crime multiple times habitually. This is the nature of delinquents. It is a sad, never-ending cycle unless intervention is staged by the police or other groups. It all starts with the parents, and some are simply too scared to report what they need to report, thinking that their kids will be worse off with state intervention, but the exact opposite could not be more true.
I’ve outlined some of the issues concerning the delinquency of young people. The studies into this area of criminal law are never ending so check this site regularly.