Making Time for Youth: Delay and Timely Case Processing in the Juvenile Court

Abstract

It is through timely case processing that the juvenile court is better primed to achieve its goals, whether these goals pertain to crime-control, treatment, legal or restorative justice, or some combination thereof. Drawing a random sample of cases (N=394) from a large Midwestern juvenile court filed between 2012 and 2016, the present study identifies factors that influence timeliness in the juvenile court. Controlling for diagnostic evaluations, failure to appear, offense severity, prior involvement, and judge idiosyncrasies, statistically significant relationships were observed between timely case processing and factors measuring caseload, judge placements, lawyer placements, pleading guilty, detention, and method of filing.