On Good Authority

              – 1 –
An evaluation of the
implementation of juvenile
justice reforms in Illinois
On Good Authority
Vol. 5, No. 5
June 2002
On Good Authority is a periodic
briefing on trends and issues in
criminal justice program evaluation.
This report was written by staff
Research Analyst Timothy Lavery. It is a
summary of an implementation
evaluation of the Juvenile Justice
Reform Provisions of 1998 conducted
by the Authority for the Illinois
Juvenile Justice Commission. Copies
of the evaluation are available from
the Authority’s Research and Analysis
Unit.
The Illinois Criminal Justice
Information Authority is a state
agency dedicated to improving the
administration of criminal justice in
Illinois. The basic functions of the
Authority are criminal justice
research, federal and state grants
administration, and information
systems development and support.
For more information, or for
copies of this or other publications,
contact the Authority at (312) 793-
8550, or visit our Web site at
www.icjia.state.il.us.
The evaluation was supported by contract
#011G0000257 awarded to the Authority by
the Illinois Department of Human Services for
the Illinois Juvenile Justice Commission. Points
of view in this document do not necessarily
represent the official position or policies of the
Illinois Department of Human Services or the
Illinois Juvenile Justice Commission.
Printed by authority of the State of Illinois, June
2002. Printing order #02-280; 6,500 copies.
George H. Ryan
Governor
Peter B. Bensinger
Chairman
Candice M. Kane
Executive Director
ILLINOIS
CRIMINAL JUSTICE
INFORMATION AUTHORITY
By Timothy Lavery
Research Analyst
The Juvenile Justice Reform
Provisions of 1998 (P.A. 90-
590) made a large number of
changes to the Illinois juvenile justice
system and the Illinois Juvenile Court
Act. Most of the provisions took effect
Jan. 1, 1999. One important change
was the addition of a new purpose and
policy statement to the Illinois Juvenile
Court Act, which adopted balanced and
restorative justice (BARJ) as the
guiding philosophy of the Illinois
juvenile justice system.
The Illinois Criminal Justice
Information Authority recently com-pleted
an evaluation of the implementa-tion
of the Juvenile Justice Reform
Provisions throughout the state. A
major component of the evaluation was
a survey of juvenile justice officials
from different parts of the system,
including police, probation officers,
prosecutors, judges, and public
defenders.
This On Good Authority summa-rizes
some of the results of that survey,
focusing particularly on survey
respondents’ knowledge and awareness
of the reform provisions and balanced
and restorative justice. Future editions
of On Good Authority will feature
additional aspects of the evaluation.
Copies of the two-volume evaluation
are available from the Authority.
Balanced and restorative justice
Illinois adopted BARJ in response to
concerns that the juvenile justice
system was failing to meet the needs
of juvenile crime victims and of
communities impacted by juvenile
crime. Traditionally, juvenile courts
have been set up based on the
assumption that juvenile offenders
are misguided youth in need of care
and supervision, and so are less
culpable for criminal behavior than
adults. If juvenile offenders are less
culpable than adult offenders, the
thinking went, then it is the responsi-bility
of the juvenile justice system to
protect minors so that criminal
offenses committed while young
would not ruin the chance of
becoming a productive adult, while at
the same time attempting to address
the factors that caused the criminal
behavior.
BARJ proponents agree that the
juvenile justice system should assist
juvenile offenders by addressing the
factors that cause criminal behavior.
But they also contend that by
strongly emphasizing protection the
traditional juvenile justice system has
tended to exclude victims and the
community from the juvenile justice
system. Because of this exclusion,