In short, while the system demands accountability from youth who break the law, it also must afford them the opportunity to learn from their mistakes and grow into healthy, law-abiding, and independent adulthood.
Kevin’s story exposes the gap that still exists between these lofty goals and the lived experiences of court-involved youth. Not only are New Jersey’s children sentenced to lengthy terms of incarceration or probation, but their names and crimes often are made public, posing insurmountable barriers to employment.
Similarly, the court’s actions can lead to a young person’s exclusion or eviction from both public and privately-owned housing, leaving young people and, sometimes, their families without a home.
The young person could also have their driver’s license or eligibility to obtain a license suspended, have them suspended or expelled from school, barred from military enlistment and prevented from receiving federal student financial aid. For immigrant youth, it also could serve as the basis for deportation, often to a country they have no memories of or connection to.
In short, a system that was created over a century ago to shield young people from the ripple effects of criminal convictions now levies many of those same collateral consequences against our most vulnerable youth.
Making matters worse, New Jersey, unlike our cohort states, has no minimum age for juvenile court prosecution, rendering even our youngest children at risk of incurring consequences that could change the course of their lives.
And, because Black children in New Jersey are almost 18 times more likely than white children to be committed despite similar rates of law-breaking for most offenses, they disproportionately suffer the social and economic harms that Kevin and others have described so urgently.
What can the governor and Legislature do to finish the essential work they have begun? First, they can repeal laws requiring or permitting disclosure of juvenile court records. They can take aim at those collateral consequences controlled by state law, such as drivers’ license suspensions and exclusion from school.
They can enact statutes prohibiting housing and employment exclusion based on delinquency adjudications, to the extent that these are not governed by federal law.
They can amend the state expungement law to automatically expunge delinquency records when youth have finished serving their sentences. They can extend the repeal of fines and fees to youth prosecuted in the adult system.
They can, and must, enact a minimum jurisdictional age for juvenile court prosecution that is consistent with international law to protect our youngest children from these life-altering consequences.
And finally, they must radically transform the entire broken youth justice system by closing our antiquated and cruel youth prisons and investing in community services like expanded restorative justice hubs.
Kevin Reeves is determined to do the things all 21-year-olds want to do: get his driver’s license. Find a good job. Have a stable home. We owe him, and all of our state’s young people, that chance.
Laura Cohen is a distinguished Clinical Professor of Law, Justice Virginia Long Scholar, and director of the Criminal and Youth Justice Clinic and Center on Criminal Justice, Youth Rights, and Race at Rutgers Law School.
Emilie Stewart is a transformative justice advocate and youth advocacy educator.
