USQ Law Society Law Review
Eddie Fraser
I
Winter 2021
INTRODUCTION
Research has provided clear indications that obtaining a criminal record significantly impacts the ability for ex-offenders in general to reintegrate into society, particularly as it relates to employment outcomes.1 Research also demonstrates that most young offenders ‘grow out’ of crime as they transition into adulthood.2 Nevertheless, for young offenders who eventually desist from crime, the association between having a criminal record and limited employment outcomes may well persist, given the demonstrated propensity for this as it relates to exoffenders in general. For this reason, alternative responses to juvenile offending should be explored and geared towards strategies aimed at preventing punitive sanctions and the imposition of criminal records upon young offenders. The 1997 Australian Law Reform Commission report3 indicates that during the inquiry it examined the processes that are associated with sentencing and outlined recommendations to make sentencing options consistent with the basic rights of juveniles.4 These recommendations promoted the need for national standards on sentencing, a wider range of options based on rehabilitation, and minimum intervention in the formal justice system. In addition, this report emphasised ‘the desirability of promoting the child’s reintegration and the child’s assuming a constructive role in society’.5Furthermore, the report outlines that children must be given a voice in any decision that may affect them. As well, that most jurisdictions’ accept that rehabilitation should be the goal for juvenile justice and detention is not preferred as such.6 As it currently stands the Youth Justice Act 1992 (Qld) allows for/compels punitive sanctions to be imposed upon young offenders, as well as the imposition of criminal records for particular offences. In this paper the author addresses this component of the law as it relates to young offenders with regards to the potential social implications of serving a detention sentence or receiving a criminal record, as it relates to employment outcomes. As such, the author will employ a social scientific theoretical approach to examining these legal issues. Two theoretical perspectives govern the approach in this paper to examining the benefit of alternative options for responding to young offenders. The first draws from a life course theory of offending. According to this perspective, there are three types of offenders – “life-course persistent” offenders; “adolescent-limited” offenders; and “non-offenders”. This paper centres on the propositions relating to the adolescent-limited offenders, which suggests that offending behaviour or delinquency is a feature of a young person’s adolescent years. As well, most young offenders are characterised as adolescence-limited offenders and eventually grow out of crime as they transition into adulthood and take on adult responsibilities, such as employment. The second, labelling theory, suggests that by applying the label “deviant” or 1
Devah Pager, Lincoln Quillian ‘Walking the walk? What Employers Say Versus What They Do’ (2005) 70(3) American Sociological Review 335-380. 2 John Laub, Robert Sampson ‘Understanding Desistance from Crime’ (2001) 28 Crime and Justice 1, 5. 3 Australian Law Reform Commission, Seen and herd: priority for children in the legal process (1997) 84. 4 Ibid. 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid.
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