Getting tough on young offenders in

the media: A research summary and development

Based on: ‘If we are tough on crime, if we punish crime, then people get the message’ : Constructing and governing the punishable young offender in Canada during the late 1990s,” BRYAN R. HOGEVEEN, Punishment and Society, 2005

Abstract• Media reports and debates

in Parliament over late 1990s construct the category of the ‘punishable young offender’

• This discursive category creates ‘ethic of punishment’

• …replacing existing youth justice legislation with a tougher law premised on ‘accountability’

• Debate was pitted at two levels – pervasiveness of the serious violent offender and valorizing victims

• The Young Offender’s Act was replaced with the Youth Criminal Justice Act

INTRODUCTION• Dissemination of a ‘punishable

young offender’ evident in Canada, late 1990s as politicians, public debated solutions to problem of youth crime

• “Somewhere along the way, through our soft and fuzzy and pat them on the head and ask them not to do it again concept, we have lost the notion that we have to teach our kids the difference between right and wrong . . .. . . If we are tough on crime, if we punish crime, then people get the message.” (Canada, Hansard Debates, 25 September 2000)

• 'The action taken shall, in every case, be that which is in the child's own good and the best interests of the community require' and 'every juvenile delinquent shall be treated, not as a criminal, but as a misdirected and misguided child, and one needing aid, encouragement, help and assistance'

Emphasis on punishable young offender … emphasis on politics

• Politicians, citizens argue more punitive response is panacea to spiraling youth crime rates

• Pervaded media and thus, popular discourse

• … not diversion, probation, or fines, but incarceration, incapacitation

• Unlike the earlier legislation, the JDA

• JDA: emphasis on the ‘reformable young offender’…

• …emphasis on science

…factors

• Omnipresence of serious violent offender in public discourse…

• … with widespread condemnation

• Reena Virk, Jesse Cadman, Garrett Dumont and Jonathan Wamback became focus of demands for more punitive legislation

“problem-defining events”

“agenda-setting”

‘SERIOUS INROADS INTO CRIME ARE BEING MADE’: HARSH PENALTIES, AUSTERE PUNISHMENTS, AND EXCEEDINGLY HIGH RATES OF INCARCERATION

• “the punishable young offender”:• 1. harsher (longer) sentences• 2. calls for harsher punishment, eg. • staff member from Syl Apps

Detention Centre stated that institution, “‘home of some of the most brutal, violent, young murderers and rapists in Canada, is located in Oakville [near Toronto], but is run like a summer camp in Muskoka’”

Modernity and the Denominational Imperative:

The Children’s Aid Society of Halifax, 1905-1925, Lafferty

• 3. incarceration rates continued to climb:• Headline (Alberta Report) bragged “‘the tide of

violence recedes and with a tougher youth policy the next one may be averted’”

• Contrast that to an earlier period

‘TAGGED’: THE MEDIA AND VALORIZING

VICTIMS OF YOUTH CRIME

• “The vicious assault … took place in Oyama, a small community … Rodney Bell was hit in the head with the blunt edge of an axe in front of his wife and children. Eight teenagers showed up to confront Bell at his secluded lakefront home on Friday just before midnight, a day after he chased them when they sped through an intersection, narrowly missing his car. Bell tried to reason with the teens, one of them grabbed an axe from a nearby woodpile and swung it full force at Bell’s head. The gang then fled . . . As Mr. Bell lies in hospital clinging to life, and if he does survive the possibility of some form of paralysis ahead of him, the greatest injustice is the last line of the story. One teen was charged with aggravated assault and remains in custody while the other was charged with assault and released.” (Hansard, 15 April 1999)

• …victims stood in for general public• “‘where does it end? Local parents and other citizens are calling for

vigilante justice. They do not trust our current system of justice, that it lets off criminals with a slap on the wrist while the victims are left in

limbo for the rest of their lives’” (Hansard, 5.2.94)• …in debates there is a valorization of victim’s names• “… the names of Reena Van Kirk, Dawn Shaw, and Trygve

Magnusson represent just a few victims who died at the hands of violent youth. Their senseless deaths demand laws from the government that punish and deter those who commit violent acts and

provide mandatory rehabilitation programs during incarceration” (Hansard, 21 October 1999)

• …victims also became politicians, eg. Chuck Cadman• …family started political campaigns, eg. Joe Wambach,

when youth crime stats down, said: ‘this cowardly [federal] government won’t do anything to stop crime so they decriminalize certain activities to make the numbers better. It’s an unconscionable, deliberate attempt to misrepresent the issues’

Commentary on media coverage

• Media sample• FP Infomart database• National Post, 1995-2003• “young offender”• 134 results• 34 selected for pilot study• 12 excluded, leaving 22

• Brief: Ontario: Teen convicted of animal cruelty after barbecuing dog

ETOBICOKE - A 17-year-old girl was convicted this week of animal cruelty after she beat and then barbecued her family's Pomeranian. The 12-year-old dog, named Peppy, had been a family pet for the past seven years. The young offender could face up to six months in jail, but the horrific case has renewed calls for stiffer penalties.  (57 words)Source: National Post, Page: A7, Edition: Thu Nov 29 2001

•Findings …

One: …editorializing

• Column: A young killer gets kid-glove treatment: Special hearing may set murderer free after just 29 months He may be the luckiest young killer in Canada, and if his luck continues to hold, he could end up serving only 29 months for the vicious murder of an elderly Holocaust survivor he stabbed nine times in the throat in broad daylight....  (1106 words)

• Two: moral outrage: Dead girl's dad says youth's sentence a `joke': Dangerous driving: Teenager gets one year for accident that killed two

Three: …atrocity tales

• Beating victim still comatose: 'Gang-Style attack' Use of charged words…

Four: …serial topicalization … problem defining event?

• Accused killer in adult court: Reena Virk case

• Five: valorization of victims: Bill to give victims of crime more rights: Offenders would pay into fund to help injured party

• Six: agenda settiong, opposition voiced: Brief: Quebec: Province wants exemption from new young offender laws

CONCLUSION

• Valorization of victims, serious violent offender, and calls for tougher legislation symbiotic

• Demand for justice synonym for punishment

• Remaining questions: • --did practice bear out

tough policy?• --does media analysis

support theory?

victims

public

claimsmakers

references