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An American Travesty

Legal Responses to Adolescent Sexual Offending

An American Travesty

Legal Responses to Adolescent Sexual Offending

An American Travesty is the first scholarly book in half a century to analyze the justice system’s response to sexual misconduct by children and adolescents in the United States. Writing with a refreshing dose of common sense, Franklin E. Zimring discusses our society’s failure to consider the developmental status of adolescent sex offenders. Too often, he argues, the American legal system ignores age and developmental status when adjudicating young sexual offenders, in many cases responding as they would to an adult.

“An opinionated, articulate, and forceful critique of current politics and practices. . . . I would recommend this book for anyone interested in rethinking the fundamental questions of how our courts and systems should respond to these cases.”—Law and Politics Book Review

“One of the most important new books in the field of juvenile justice. . . . Zimring offers a thoughtful, research-based analysis of what went wrong with legal policy development.”—Barry Krisberg, President, National Council on Crime and Delinquency

Table of Contents

Foreword
Acknowledgments
Introdution
Part I - The Juvenile Sex Offender
1. Three Case Studies
2. Continuity and Change in American Sex-Crime Policy
3. The Juvenile Sex Offender
4. The Emergence of Juvenile Sex-Offender Treatment
Part II - Principles and Policies
5. The Sex Offender in Juvenile Court
6. Reform in Juvenile Court
7. Registration, Community Notification, and Juvenile Sex Offenders: Resolving Policy Conflicts
Appendix A Statutory Provisions Concering Indecent Sexual Contact with Minors
Appendix B Topics in Sex-Offender Treatment
Appendix C Research on Sex-Offender Recidivism
References
Index

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