About Detention

What is Detention?

PCN Courts and Corrections Special

Original air date: September 2011

Part 1

Part 2

The Detention Center provides temporary safe and secure care for alleged and adjudicated delinquent juveniles waiting for adjudication or disposition by the Courts. The Detention Center ensures community protection from the alleged or adjudicated offender. The program serves male and female juveniles between the ages of ten and eighteen. The facility has seventy-two secure detention beds, and works to stabilize the residents by structuring their stay with educational and psycho-educational programs, while instilling self-discipline and structure into their lives.

The school program teaches the basic academic curriculum, while fostering a positive attitude towards school and learning. The psycho-educational programming includes lessons in anger management and self-control, dealing with drug and alcohol issues, making good decisions, victimization awareness, and individual responsibility.

The Center also relies on over forty diverse volunteer groups to share their areas of experience and expertise with our juveniles. Educational, mental health, and drug and alcohol assessments are integral in helping to develop reports to the Courts. Residents are held to high standards of appropriate conduct while being detained at the Youth Intervention Center.

According to the board of directors of the National Juvenile Detention Association (NJDA), the definition of juvenile detention is:

Juvenile detention is the temporary and safe custody of juveniles who are accused of conduct subject to the jurisdiction of the court who require a restricted environment for their own, or the community’s protection, while pending legal action.

Further, juvenile detention provides a wide range of helpful services that support the juvenile’s physical, emotional, and social development.

Helpful services minimally include: education; visitation; communication; counseling; continuous supervision; medical and health care services; nutrition; recreation; and reading.

Juvenile detention includes or provides for a system of clinical observation and assessment that compliments the helpful services and reports findings.

According to the American Correctional Association (ACA) Juvenile Detention Committee there are seven essential characteristics to juvenile detention. They are:

Temporary custody. Of all the methods of incarceration within the criminal justice system, only juvenile detention stresses its temporary nature. Detention should be as short as possible.

Safe custody. This concept implies freedom from fear and freedom from harm for both the juvenile and the community. This definitional theme refers to a safe and humane environment with programming and staffing to ensure the physical and psychological safety of detained juveniles.

Restricted environment. The nature or degree of restrictiveness of the environment is generally associated with the traditional classifications of maximum, medium, or minimum security or custody.

Community protection. In addition to the factors listed above, the court has a legitimate right to detain juveniles for the purpose of preventing further serious and/or violent delinquent behavior.

Pending legal action. This theme includes the time spent awaiting a hearing, disposition, a placement, or a return to a previous placement.

Helpful services. Programs are available to detain juveniles to help resolve a host of problems commonly facing detained juveniles. Because detention has the potential of creating a tremendously negative impact on some juveniles, it is important that programming have the depth of services required to meet the needs of a wide range of juvenile problems.

Clinical observation and assessment. Most juvenile codes specifically refer to this theme as a purpose for detention. The controlled environment of juvenile detention often provides the opportunity for intense observation and assessment to enhance decision-making capabilities. Competent clinical services are provided by properly credentialed individuals who coordinate and conduct the observation and assessment process. (This service may be provided by staff or through contract).

This definition of juvenile detention was provided by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s (OJJDP) Desktop Guide to Good Juvenile Detention Practice (1996; pg. 33).

What is a Delinquent Child?

According to the Juvenile Act, composed by the Juvenile Court Judges’ Commission (JCJC), a delinquent child is a child ten years of age or older whom the court has found to have committed a delinquent act and is in need of treatment, supervision, or rehabilitation.

What is a Delinquent Act?

According to the Juvenile Act, composed by the Juvenile Court Judges’ Commission (JCJC), a delinquent act is defined as follows:

The term means an act designated a crime under the law of this Commonwealth, or of another state if the act occurred in that state, or under Federal law, or under local ordinances.

The term shall not include:
1. The crime of murder.
2. Any of the following prohibited conduct where the child was 15 years of age or older at the time of the alleged conduct, and a deadly weapon as defined in 18 Pa.C.S. § 2301 (relating to definitions) was used during the commission of the offense, which, if committed by an adult, would be classified as:
  1. Rape
  2. Involuntary deviate sexual intercourse
  3. Aggravated assault
  4. Robbery
  5. Robbery of motor vehicle
  6. Aggravated indecent assault
  7. Kidnapping
  8. Voluntary manslaughter
  9. An attempt, conspiracy, or solicitation to commit murder or any of these crimes
3. Any of the following prohibited conduct where the child was 15 years of age or older at the time of the alleged conduct, and has been previously adjudicated delinquent of any of the following prohibited conduct, which, if committed by an adult would be classified as:
  1. Rape
  2. Involuntary deviate sexual intercourse
  3. Robbery
  4. Robbery of motor vehicle
  5. Aggravated indecent assault
  6. Kidnapping
  7. Voluntary manslaughter
  8. An attempt, conspiracy, or solicitation to commit murder or any of these crimes
4. Summary offenses, unless the child fails to comply with a lawful sentence imposed there under, in which event notice of such fact shall be certified to the court.
5. A crime committed by a child who has been found guilty in a criminal proceeding for other than a summary offense.