Less Law, More Justice: Rethinking Sentencing in the Youth Criminal Justice Act

Although Indigenous youth make up 8% of Canada’s population, they are over-represented in the youth correctional system – comprising 46% of admissions in the 2016/17 fiscal year. The Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA) of 2003 calls for attention to the unique needs of Indigenous youth at all points of justice system contact, yet despite these special considerations and emphasis on fair treatment, overrepresentation has grown steadily in recent years. Examination of the number of correctional admissions for Indigenous and non-Indigenous youth, as well as the percentage of Indigenous admissions, across the provinces and territories provides insight into this unexpected trend. By incorporating regional population data, this research uncovers the areas that report the greatest levels of over-representation and those which have successfully reduced the percentage of system-involved Indigenous youth or maintained proportionate representation. This information provides a starting point for future research to uncover the systemic causes of the over-representation problem. These findings also draw attention to issues with recording and reporting practices – a problem that must be addressed in order to act on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s call to reduce criminal justice disparities among Indigenous youth.

Recently, in Canada, there was a push to replace existing youth legislation, entitled the Young Offenders Act (YOA). This push was a result of several perceived failures of the YOA and has culminated in a new piece of youth legislation, Bill C‐7: The Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA). The Department of Justice has stressed that the YCJA will rectify the substantive problems of the YOA. This policy paper provides an analysis of the claims of the Canadian government by focusing on the substantive sections of the YCJA, comparing the YCJA with the YOA, and incorporating social science research dealing with the probable effects of the innovations. Specifically, this analysis focuses on the use of extrajudicial sanctions, adult transfers and the decreased emphasis on due process rights in the YCJA. The analysis shows that the YCJA potentially embodies a much more punitive model of youth justice in Canada, evidenced by its focus on the protection of society. Two of the major deficiencies of both acts are that they lack clarity in their respective Declarations of Principle due to a mixed model of justice and the insufficient use (probable in the case of the YCJA) of informal court measures. Lastly, this analysis uncovers that aside from the increased potential punitiveness of the YCJA, there is very little substantive difference between the YOA and YCJA. Thus, the YCJA is likely to suffer from the same deficiencies as the YOA.

Canada has no standards, procedural guidelines, or protocols for best practices in the care of youths in custody. This paper argues that clear, enforceable standards are important in defining a benchmark of acceptable practice. It argues that without standards, issues may arise which can create further difficulty for youths who are under the care of the state. It suggests that the current legal framework for standards is insufficient in its enforceability and its clarity. The new Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA) provides the Canadian government with a timely and much-needed opportunity to establish standards of care for youths in custody. Indeed, the YCJA contains specific, comprehensive, and relevant provisions that can be seen as laying a firm foundation for standards of care.

The authors provide an analysis of the complicated sentencing regime found in Canada's Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA) and compare the new Act to the previous Young Offenders Act In comparison to the provisions of the Criminal Code that govern adult sentencing, the YCJA makes no reference to deterrence, has more focus on rehabilitation, and calls for lesser penalties than for adults. The authors point out that proportionality is a key principle for both sentencing youths and adults, but the aggravating elements enumerated in the YCJA are not the same as those in the Criminal Code. They further note that situations in which youth custody may be used are limited and that judges are directed to treat custody as a last resort and consider all alternatives. The authors conclude that the YCJA facilitates a more uniform treatment of young offenders, though the courts will continue to exercise considerable discretion. While it is clear that the use of custodial sanctions will decrease even without more community resources, in some places the coming into force of the new Act was accompanied by increased community resources which will also affect sentencing practices. The article concludes with a survey of some of the first cases decided under the YCJA, which reveal that custodial sanctions were avoided and rehabilitative principles played a major role in sentencing decisions.

Many juvenile justice systems are characterized by an amalgam of different principles and ideologies, which have been incorporated into laws and policies regarding youth crime. This study examines the perceptions of youth probation officers (YPOs) concerning the 2003 Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA) in Canada, which is one recent case example of a mixed model of juvenile justice. For instance, although the Act emphasizes diversion and community-based sanctions for first time and minor offenders, it also allows for adult-length custody sentences for the most serious and violent youth. This study asked YPOs about their understanding of the YCJA and their ability to apply the Act in their daily work as well as their access to community programs in 2004 and 2007. The results as well as previous research on the YCJA and policy implications are discussed.

This study investigates whether judges attempt to craft proportionate probation sentences under the Young Offenders Act (YOA) and the Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA). Using two samples of probation cases - one disposed of under the YOA and the other disposed of under the YCJA - the effect of the offence on probation sentence length was investigated. The results suggest that youth court judges are more influenced by the nature of the most serious offence in the case under the YCJA than they were under the YOA. This could be seen as preliminary evidence of the effect of s. 38(2)(c) of the YCJA, which directs judges to craft sentences that are proportionate to the seriousness of the offence and the degree of responsibility of the offender.

The Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA) came into effect in 2003 as a response to the overincarceration of youth that occurred under its predecessor, the Young Offender’s Act (YOA). Parliament’s intention was clear in repealing and replacing the YOA in favour of the more restorative YCJA: no longer would custody be considered an appropriate response to youth crime. More than a decade has passed since the introduction of the YCJA, and statistics reveal that it has had incredible success in reducing the rate of overall youth incarceration. What remains problematic, however, is the persistent and prevailing issue of the overincarceration of Indigenous youth.
 The purpose of this article is to unpack the complexity of this issue, identify its causes, and to ultimately propose different strategies to help reduce a custodial response to Indigenous youth crime. In achieving this goal, the article will begin with an overview of the YCJA and an exploration of its restorative provisions to argue that the legislation itself is not at fault. The article will then provide current statistics on the overincarceration of Indigenous youth, and subsequently, examine some of the most popular explanations as to why the issue continues to persist. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the article will conclude by proposing several strategies – such as the implementation of more Aboriginal Youth Courts – to better address the overincarceration of Indigenous youth moving forward.

There is an increasing recognition of the necessity to establish the predictive validity of risk assessment scores within specific population subgroups, particularly those (including Indigenous peoples) who are overrepresented in the criminal justice system. I compared measures of discrimination and calibration of the Youth Level of Service/Case Management Inventory (YLS/CMI) in Indigenous and non-Indigenous youth probationers in Ontario, Canada. Compared with non-Indigenous youth, Indigenous youth would have higher risk scores and reoffense rates. The YLS/CMI would predict reoffending and time to reoffense significantly and comparably for Indigenous and non-Indigenous youth, but there would be group difference discrimination (sensitivity, specificity) and calibration (positive predictive value, negative predictive value). Justice ministry-supplied data on 400 Indigenous and non-Indigenous youth (330 male, 70 female) individually matched on key background variables were analyzed to provide measures of discrimination and calibration of the YLS/CMI, with 3-year recidivism as the primary outcome. Indigenous youth were assessed at significantly higher risk than non-Indigenous youth (d = .60); 70% of Indigenous youth and 46% of non-Indigenous youth reoffended (ϕ = .24). Overall measures of discrimination (area under the curve) and calibration (logistic regression) were significant and did not differ across groups. Cross-area under the curve results indicated that the YLS/CMI discriminated Indigenous recidivists from non-Indigenous nonrecidivists but differentiated Indigenous nonrecidivists from non-Indigenous recidivists at chance level. In addition, recidivism was underestimated for low-risk Indigenous youth compared with non-Indigenous youth, but specificity was also low; only 28% of Indigenous youth who did not reoffend were assessed as low risk. Results were largely consistent across male and female youth. Examining subgroup predictive validity using multiple indices provides important information that should inform policy and practice discussions regarding fair use of risk assessment tools. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

The crisis of Aboriginal over-incarceration in Canada is one of the most well-documented features of our Criminal Justice System. This crisis is especially profound in the youth context. While the Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA) has reduced Canada’s overall youth incarceration rate in recent years, the relative proportion of detained Aboriginal youth has actually increased. This article explores Aboriginal youth overrepresentation in correctional services under the YCJA in an attempt to discern why it has been less effective at reducing custody rates for Aboriginal youth compared to their non-Aboriginal peers. This article suggests that the YCJA has failed to remedy Aboriginal youth overrepresentation because it has focused too heavily on sentencing principles and judicial discretion. It is argued that more attention must be paid to the earlier stages of the criminal justice process during which Police, Crown Attorneys, and Probation Officers exercise low-visibility discretion in ways that disproportionately circumscribe the eventual range of sentencing options available to Aboriginal youth offenders.

Even though risk assessments are routinely conducted in the criminal justice system to inform sentencing and case management, their cross-cultural applicability remains contested. This study investigated the generalizability of the Youth Level of Service/Case Management Inventory (YLS/CMI), a widely implemented youth forensic risk assessment instrument, using an Item Response Theory framework, in a sample of Indigenous ( n = 205) and non-Indigenous ( n = 193) youth. Differential item functioning analyses demonstrated similar discrimination across groups. However, despite similar latent risk levels, non-Indigenous youth were more likely to have items from the Education domain endorsed, while Indigenous youth were more likely to have items from the Substance Abuse domain endorsed. Predictive accuracy analyses indicated that total YLS/CMI scores significantly predicted general recidivism (without administration of justice convictions) for non-Indigenous youth, but not for Indigenous youth. There is an urgent need for more research investigating the applicability of the YLS/CMI to diverse groups of Indigenous youth.

The subject of this thesis is Canadian youth justice philosophy, and the paradigms and paradoxes within the youth criminal justice system. It focuses on the historical, socioeconomic, political and intellectual elements of the changes in Canadian youth justice philosophy. I will explore the reason behind the federal government's recent political initiative, the Youth Criminal Justice Act, and look into the question of whether the government's youth justice strategy will accomplish its objectives and make significant changes to the existing legislation and justice system in the context of young offenders. The purpose of the thesis is to delineate the development of Canadian youth justice philosophy and outline the changes in the developing process from a historical, political and intellectual perspective in order to understand the current regulatory framework. I describe and analyze the changes in youth justice philosophy using Thomas Kuhn's model of change in order to determine whether a paradigm shift has happened with the progression from the Juvenile Delinquents Act, to the Young Offenders Act to the Youth Criminal Justice Act. I go on to describe the principles and theories behind retributive and restorative justice philosophy, as it seems restorative principles might become more influential than they have been hitherto. I explore existing alternative measures within the restorative framework in Canada, such as mediation, family group conferences and circle sentencing. I argue that the federal government's intention to implement the new Act could be a step from retributive to restorative justice because of the government's promise of additional funding for restorative programs. My thesis is that the intended renewal of the youth justice system in Canada is a political response to a polarized public debate about youth crime. I argue that the Youth Criminal Justice Act is not a complete transformation of youth justice philosophy. My conclusion is that historical, political, intellectual and scientific changes in youth justice philosophy might have occurred in 1984 with the Young Offenders Act, but that the Youth Criminal Justice Act does not constitute a further advance.

In the wake of the killing of George Floyd in 2020, global protests generated public scrutiny about policing in our communities. Between 2020 and 2022, many school boards in Canada began to re-evaluate the value of having police in schools, as school resource officers or school liaison officers, with many boards eventually electing to end these programs altogether. Interactions with police in and through schools can facilitate a process by which youth are pushed out of the school system and into the criminal justice system, commonly known as the school to prison pipeline. The Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA), which governs youth in conflict with the law, specifically in their interactions with the justice system and information that is permitted to be shared with other entities like schools. In part, these protections are provided to prevent stigmatization and promote rehabilitation. However, the YCJA had been amended to allow more information disclosures between police and school administrations. This article looks at the legislative history of the YCJA to provide context to these amendments. This article also explores how the court has interpreted privacy for youth under the Act, and how the privacy provisions operate in practice. Finally, it provides empirical research that relies upon interviews with key informants that shed light on the impacts of information sharing between police and schools on youth.

The relationship between maltreatment in childhood and delinquency in adolescence is recognized. However, the data available do not reveal what proportion of children under the supervision of child protection services (CPS) later transfer to youth legal services, nor the sequence of services provided by these two systems. This study sketches a preliminary portrait of Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA) incidence among Quebec children and adolescents as a consequence of a first crime after initial CPS case closure (N = 14,252). It quantifies the scope of the phenomenon and identifies the best predictors of YCJA incidence from among the administrative data available. Survival analysis revealed a 15.4% YCJA incidence for the entire cohort in the five and a half years following termination of initial intervention; boys between 12 and 17 years old when their initial CPS cases were closed were at the greatest risk (27.2%).

In Canada, the practical application of youth diversion is rooted in an understanding of federal youth justice legislation and requires the consideration of police discretion. Yet, policing in Newfoundland and Labrador is shaped by localized practices, policies, and decisions. In the current article, we draw on online survey data to explore how Royal Newfoundland Constabulary (RNC) officers understand and apply Canada’s current federal youth legislation — the Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA) — and identify what factors, if any, influence the YCJA’s application. To unpack police officer attitudes towards youth and the YCJA and the actions police choose when handling matters involving youth, we draw from data collected from non-commissioned officers working in one of the three RNC detachments in 2016. Findings show that officers perceive a lack of YCJA resources available to front-line police officers in urban centres and a need for further training for officers who interact with youth. A desire for youth diversion services was evident among participants; however, the lack of availability of police-accessible pre-charge diversion options in Newfoundland and Labra-dor, including specific programs for youth, as well as police-specific training, are primary influencing factors affecting the understanding, implementation, and success of youth diversion in the province.

In the current article, we document the changing roles and responsibilities related to the implementation of the Canadian Youth Criminal Justice Act ( YCJA). Police officers’ experiences and responses to the implementation of the YCJA reveal a disparity between the officers’ idealised role and their actual tasks involving youth. Drawing on Bourdieu’s theory of the habitus and field, we consider the field of youth justice and its effects on rural policing strategies in Canada. We consider the shifting standard for police behaviours from data gathered through interviews and focus groups with police officers. We find standards in the field of policing shift to reflect new realities enacted with the YCJA.