In 1993, at the height of national concern over the perceived epidemic of violent and criminal behavior among juveniles, Colorado’s Governor Roy Romer called upon state officials and juvenile and criminal justice experts to study the various phenomena that were increasing the need for juveniles to access the social and justice systems of the state (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 1).
In particular, Governor Romer was responding to some local concerns that had Coloradans deeply preoccupied about juvenile crime, especially of a violent nature, in their state (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 4). Prior to the Governor’s call for an investigative task force to study juvenile crime and justice, Denver residents had been shocked by a series of violent acts that the local media had sensationalized by calling the summer of 1993 a “summer of violence” (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 4). Governor Romer, then, was responding to constituents’ pressure to respond to this rash of violent crimes and new breed of criminal, which left residents feeling vulnerable and concerned about the health and future of their community. Like most politicians, Governor Romer did not want to appear “soft on crime” (Norton 36). A diverse array of stakeholders were appointed to the task force panel, representing various aspects of society and of the criminal justice system itself.
Governor Romer’s request resulted in a three year evaluation of the state’s juvenile justice system. Among its other responsibilities, the task force was charged with the work of reviewing the state’s Children’s Code to determine whether any revisions or expansions were needed (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 10). The other part of their process was to conduct interviews with citizens across the state for the purpose of collective qualitative data about attitudes and impressions regarding violent crime perpetrated by juveniles (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 11). This evaluative process, in turn, resulted in a report and a set of recommendations for system reform, which was published and presented to legislators, policy makers, and the public in 1996 (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 1). The overall goal of the proposed reforms was to acknowledge and address the increase—whether perceived or actual—in violent crime among Colorado’s youth by setting guidelines and standards that would make it clear what crimes crossed the line between being adolescent and being adult in nature in terms of their criminal status (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 2).
At the same time, however, the panel that issued the reform recommendations called for a balanced treatment of juvenile offenders and crimina perpetrators to the greatest extent possible. In short, the panel urged the state to find a way “to balance youth accountability for delinquent and violent behavior with the best and most appropriate services to help youth become contributing members of society” (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 2). This strategy was recommended in response to consistent feedback from interviewees’, many of whom reported that they felt deeply concerned about the risks of crime perpetrated by young people, and for these reasons, they advocated a higher priority placed on public safety, which they hoped would be achieved through the imposition of “consequences for criminal behavior… more rapidly and more meaningfully (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 16). The specific outcome of the task force’s work was a list of 20 recommendations for revisions to the Children’s Code; most of these recommendations involved redefining what constituted a juvenile crime and what constituted an adult offense (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 19). The recommendations were broad-based, meaning that they were to be applied at every level of the juvenile justice system, beginning at the moment of interrogation, or “arrest and entry” (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 21), and proceeding throughout the entire criminal justice process. These recommendations were then reviewed by a Legislative Oversight Committee, comprised of state legislators, who accepted most of the recommendations, and went a step further by adding still more reforms to the juvenile justice agenda. When feasible, the Committee called for judges to be required to mandate juvenile offenders to alternative-to-incarceration programs. Such programs include community-based rehabilitation services provided by social work agencies, as well as the controversial boot-camp, or Regimented Juvenile Training Program, which is intended to provide structure, discipline, and stability without the negative effects of incarceration (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention para. 29). While the Colorado boot camps are viewed as providing “punishment less severe than long-term institutionalization, but more severe than immediate supervised release” (NIJ Research Report n.p.), they are not an alternative to incarceration used for violent offenders. In addition, the alternatives-to-incarceration programs, especially the boot camps, continue to lack empirical substantiation of their efficacy with respect to preventing recidivist criminal behavior and substituting maladaptive behaviors for adaptive, socially functional ones (NIJ Research Report n.p.).
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