Dealing With Radicalised Youth Offenders: The Development and Implementation of a Youth-Specific Framework

Background: In 2018 in the Australian State of New South Wales, a specialist Countering Violent Extremism Unit was established in the youth criminal justice system. This was in direct response to a number of youth below the age of 18 who have been charged for terrorism offences and identified as involved in violent extremist acts. This youth-specific framework was the first of its kind in Australia. It was designed to provide multidisciplinary practitioner-based approaches for the early-identification, diversion, and disengagement of at-risk and radicalised youth offenders.Aims: This paper will explore the experiences and lessons learned by the Youth Justice New South Wales Countering Violent Extremism Unit. It will discuss the relevance of youth radicalisation within Australia's evolving national security climate. This includes emerging trends in relation to youth radicalisation to varied violent extremist ideologies. This paper will explore the specialist approach adopted for preventing and countering violent extremism through the identification, assessment, and case management of at-risk and radicalised youth offenders.Implications: The Youth Justice New South Wales experience indicates that youth criminal justice settings can be designed to tackle the challenges posed by at-risk and radicalised youth. The practitioner experience canvassed in this paper highlights that a pluralistic and non-punitive approach to supervision, client-focused assessment and case management processes, and widespread resourcing of multidisciplinary practitioners and programs can be used to account for developmental and psychosocial vulnerabilities in addition to violent extremism risk factors amongst youth offenders. These approaches should be supplemented by youth-specific countering violent extremism practitioner expertise, and a range of violent extremism case management and risk assessment measures.

Contextualising Youth Justice Interventions: Making the Case for Realist Synthesis

This article examines the problematic reductionism and decontextualising nature of hegemonic youth justice intervention evaluation and offers a way ahead for a realistic, context-sensitive approach to intervention evaluation in the youth justice field. It opens by considering how the development of risk-based youth justice interventions in England and Wales flowed from and fed into the modernisation and resultant partiality of the ‘evidence-base’, which shaped youth justice practice. It then moves to a critical review of the emergence and continued influence of risk-based interventions and the ‘What Works’ intervention evaluation framework in youth justice. In the closing discussion, this article envisages the potential of taking a realist approach to the evaluation of youth justice interventions to mitigate the limitations of current approaches to intervention selection and the evaluation of their ‘effectiveness’.

Child-Friendly Legal Aid and Individual Assessment of Children in Conflict with the Law: Building the Basis for Effective Participation

This article focuses on the importance of the right to effective participation of children in conflict with the law in criminal (youth justice) proceedings. In particular, it explores two procedural aspects which are closely related to the right to child-friendly legal aid and the role of individual assessment. The authors claim that qualitatively identifying the needs of the child (through the instrument of individual assessment) and establishing a relationship of trust with a specifically trained legal aid lawyer is critical in raising the child’s status to that of an active participant in the proceedings and ensuring that the best interests of the child are observed. The authors also suggest that such an initial encounter within the justice system forms an attitude (of either confidence or rejection) of the child towards public institutions and, accordingly, directly affects the effectiveness of further interventions. To support their position, the authors of the paper bring several examples from the comparative research carried out in two European projects, noting, regretfully, that the initial interventions often suffer from formal implementation and lack a systemic approach.

Will You Run? The Development of a Risk Assessment Tool to Predict Absconding from Secure Youth Justice Residences

<p>Absconding, or escaping, from usually state-based custody is a growing problem in different settings across the world, including New Zealand’s secure youth justice residences. This thesis provides an in-depth review of absconding from Oranga Tamariki’s secure youth justice residences in New Zealand, providing important insight that will be useful in preventing absconding in the future. A review of the international and New Zealand absconding literature was conducted looking at the risk and protective factors associated with absconding risk. From this, a coding framework of absconding related factors was developed, and then applied to historic absconding incident reports and interviews with Oranga Tamariki staff members. These were analysed to confirm potential absconding risk or protective factors and identify any new factors. Results fell into four key categories: individual (e.g. previous absconding history), relational (e.g. avoidance goals), contextual risk factors (e.g. significant life stressors), and protective factors (e.g. positive staff relationships). Several implications and conclusions were drawn from the findings. Absconding factors identified in international research were also present in the current research adding weight to these as potential risk and protective factors in a New Zealand context (Martin et al., 2018; Powers et al., 2018; Pyrooz, 2012). Novel absconding related factors were identified which were not found in the extant literature, such as planning indications, ringleaders, and hope. The reasons young people abscond are complex and individual, however, they abscond for reasons that make sense—often as a coping strategy—and thus are identifiable. By identifying these underlying reasons, it is possible to intervene and reduce their absconding motivations. A preliminary risk assessment tool aimed at doing this, was created for Oranga Tamariki use, incorporating factors drawn from the current research and the wider literature.</p>

Will You Run? The Development of a Risk Assessment Tool to Predict Absconding from Secure Youth Justice Residences

<p>Absconding, or escaping, from usually state-based custody is a growing problem in different settings across the world, including New Zealand’s secure youth justice residences. This thesis provides an in-depth review of absconding from Oranga Tamariki’s secure youth justice residences in New Zealand, providing important insight that will be useful in preventing absconding in the future. A review of the international and New Zealand absconding literature was conducted looking at the risk and protective factors associated with absconding risk. From this, a coding framework of absconding related factors was developed, and then applied to historic absconding incident reports and interviews with Oranga Tamariki staff members. These were analysed to confirm potential absconding risk or protective factors and identify any new factors. Results fell into four key categories: individual (e.g. previous absconding history), relational (e.g. avoidance goals), contextual risk factors (e.g. significant life stressors), and protective factors (e.g. positive staff relationships). Several implications and conclusions were drawn from the findings. Absconding factors identified in international research were also present in the current research adding weight to these as potential risk and protective factors in a New Zealand context (Martin et al., 2018; Powers et al., 2018; Pyrooz, 2012). Novel absconding related factors were identified which were not found in the extant literature, such as planning indications, ringleaders, and hope. The reasons young people abscond are complex and individual, however, they abscond for reasons that make sense—often as a coping strategy—and thus are identifiable. By identifying these underlying reasons, it is possible to intervene and reduce their absconding motivations. A preliminary risk assessment tool aimed at doing this, was created for Oranga Tamariki use, incorporating factors drawn from the current research and the wider literature.</p>

Mauri Tu, Mauri Ora: A Process Evaluation

<p>Rates of violent reoffending amongst young offenders has been a cause of concern for those involved in the youth justice (YJ) system in New Zealand (NZ), and across the world. Although, the rates of youth offending in NZ appear to be declining, there is a trend of increasing violent youth offending (Ministry of Justice; MOJ, 2010, 2012). Therefore, the search for effective and generalisable treatment programmes for violent young offenders has been a focus for those involved in juvenile offending research (Caldwell & Van Rybroek, 2013). The Mauri Tu Mauri Ora programme (MTMO; Kilgour & Borg, 2016), was developed in 2014 to provide an “intensive rehabilitation option for youth between 16 and 20 years of age who are deemed to be at a high risk of re-offending” (p. 27). However, since its implementation, there has been no systematic evaluation of its effectiveness. This process evaluation investigated how the MTMO programme was operating so its strengths and areas of improvement could be better understood. This was achieved by detailing the characteristics of the programme; the extent to which it met the needs of key stakeholders; evaluating the specific components of the programme; the working relationship between staff; how well the programme was delivered; and identifying possible areas of improvement. The perspectives of participants resulting in 28 subthemes associated with: initial engagement and assessment; treatment delivery and engagement; the transition phase; unit environment; and staff services. Along with a discussion, these findings identify areas the MTMO programme can build on its strengths and areas it can make improvements.</p>

Young People’s Knowledge and Understanding of the Youth Justice System in New Zealand: A Community Sample

<p>New Zealand (NZ) has a separate youth justice system that is designed to be responsive towards the developmental needs of young people that have engaged in antisocial behaviour. It is therefore essential that young people are ‘Fit to Stand Trial’ when legal proceedings are brought against them. A young person can be found legally unfit on the basis of ‘mental impairment’, and whilst this is undefined it largely overlooks the impact a young person's developmental level may have on their engagement with court processes. No research has examined young people’s understanding of the justice system in NZ. However, international research has demonstrated that those 13 years and younger are almost exclusively found unfit to stand trial due to their developmental level, whereas those 16 years and older tend to be found fit to stand trial. The legal capabilities of those aged 14 to 15 years are difficult to predict given the extensive developmental changes occurring around that age. The current research aimed to address three research questions: 1) is there a relationship between age and fitness to stand trial, 2) is there a relationship between IQ and fitness to stand trial, and 3) how does NZ research compare to international literature. Participants aged 13 to 18 were recruited from six schools around NZ (n = 89). They were interviewed using a semi-structured interview tool that was designed for this study to assess young people’s understanding of the justice process and fitness-related abilities. A brief measure of participant IQ was also taken. It was found that fitness-related abilities, such as knowledge and understanding, were positively associated with age and IQ, such that older participants and those with higher IQ scores performed better on this semi-structured interview. Attending a high decile school, and being female was also predictive of better performance. These findings indicate that developmental level—as indicated by age and IQ—impacts young people’s understanding and participation in the justice system. Therefore, the current legislative response to young people who offend does not sufficiently recognise the impact of a young person’s developmental capabilities.</p>