Adolescent Drug Users: The Justice System is Missing an Important Opportunity

Abstract

A significant number of youth and young adults who use drugs have fallen through the cracks of our juvenile and adult justice systems in terms of receiving any meaningful services. The situation is due to a number of factors, including the reliance on adolescent self-reporting utilized by most of the research, the failure of justice and other systems to routinely assess youth, including young adults, for either current drug use or indicia of drug use (e.g., “resiliency” or “protective” factors), and confidentiality and other restrictions pertaining to access to juvenile justice system information. Yet, retrospective reviews of drug use patterns for adults in the criminal justice system make it clear that drug use is beginning for most of these offenders during adolescence or before. Without adequate and developmentally appropriate treatment and support services for adolescents who are both “juveniles” and “adults” in terms of the jurisdiction of the courts overseeing their cases, many of these individuals may likely end up in prison and/or with the collateral consequences imposed as a result of criminal justice system involvement. The situation is all the more urgent with the recent research findings regarding the lack of correlation between chronological age for determining “adult” status for criminal justice purposes vs the much later age for adult brain development. This article urges (1) juvenile courts to develop mechanisms for systematically screening youth who come into the system for drug use and/or propensities for drug use and (2) adult courts to embark on similar strategies, and to develop adolescent tracks that would be geared to providing the services these youth (despite their chronological age) need and would otherwise not receive in the adult system and to continue these services beyond traditional timeframes for juvenile and/or “youthful offender” jurisdiction.

Keywords: juvenile; resiliency factors; adolescent; drug court; drug use, collateral consequences