Looking Back: An initiative that changed the face of juvenile justice in North Carolina

By: Caroline Hoover

I campaigned and was appointed as one of two youth representatives for the western section of the North Carolina Juvenile Crime Prevention Council in 2019. Juvenile Crime Prevention Councils (“JCPCs”) are a division of the North Carolina Department of Public Safety. On August 29, 2019, I received my first official email affiliated with the position, entitled ““Teen Court and More” Strategic Planning Session”. As I read through, I learned that a teen court is a problem-solving court within the juvenile justice system where teens charged with certain types of offenses can be sentenced by a jury of same-aged peers. I was taken aback, a verified legal mechanism created for the protection of minors? I had never heard of something simultaneously so outlandish and also based in the pursuit of legal justice. I thought: sign me up.  

This initiative particularly made sense to me as in my community of Watauga County, clocking in at the second most impoverished in the state of North Carolina, I often bore witness to the pitfalls of a legal system that time after time disproportionately impacted poorer North Carolinians. One main issue I observed was that it frequently failed to identify a main side effect of severe poverty for many youth, being that of a removal of choice. If a parent required life-saving medicine but the family was unable to afford it, a way by which to acquire enough money to buy it, even illegally through drug-dealing, may seem as if it is the only option. If forced to witness a sibling silently battle child hunger, food theft would appear to be the right and only answer. The oftentimes “solutions” to these tragedies came in the form of adult trials and integration into the criminal system. These real stories that I witnessed day in and out, did not reduce my neighbors to criminals but rather awakened me to the socioeconomic barrier that kept those around me from real justice. Teen courts and the initiative behind them offered a way for these individuals to have an actual chance at sensible retribution that did not cycle them into the convoluted criminal system at the ripe ages of 17 or even 16.

I attended the “Teen Court and More” planning session mentioned in the email, and was introduced to a set of policies called the Juvenile Justice Reinvestment Act, more commonly referred to as the “Raise the Age Initiative”. This policy sought to revolutionize the legal system, keep those under 18 out of jail for minor crimes by raising the age of adult-trial to 18, and institute a state-wide standard for teen courts. The potential impact of such legislation was simply immeasurable.

From there I threw myself into my role, investigating the different forms teen courts take, what makes them most effective, and advocating for the passage of “Raise the Age”. I learned that in addition to benefiting the fairness of the legal system overall, teen courts taught youth the inherent value of civic engagement, not only for the sake of education but fo defense, of themselves and others. 

On December 1, 2019, the Juvenile Justice Reinvestment Act was signed into law. In the year following its enactment, over 5,000 kids were kept out of the adult system. Remaining in the Juvenile system has meant more than a designation as “non-adult”. It has meant a focus on rehabilitation rather than punishment through age-appropriate services. It has meant a reduction by half in recidivism. It has meant the ever-widening institution of teen courts throughout the state with majoritively positive results. In the words of Kimberly Quintus, director of the Juvenile Justice Reinvestment Act Office, “To put it plainly, it was the right thing to do.”