The governor of New York (Andrew Cuomo, pictured) yesterday announced a major reform programme in the way that young people are managed by the CJS there.

The headline is that the age of adulthood will move from 16 to 18 in increments over the next 3 years, to bring New York in line with 48 out of 49 other US states.

Of particular pertinence on the young adult agenda is the proposal to “Prohibit the confinement of youth in any adult jail or prison setting and allow youth to remain in juvenile settings until age 21.”

The governor will now propose the full set of recommendations as a legislative package to the State Assembly. The package would ultimately have to be passed and signed into law to become effective.

The full report is here:

https://www.governor.ny.gov/sites/governor.ny.gov/files/atoms/files/ReportofCommissiononYouthPublicSafetyandJustice.pdf

Within it is a fascinating section on maturity and brain development, and it is compelling in how close it is to T2A’s work, using mostly US sources (pp. 17-19):

ADOLESCENTS ARE DIFFERENT FROM ADULTS: BRAIN SCIENCE AND CULPABILITY

Over the last 15 years, an uncontroverted body of research has emerged demonstrating that the brain does not reach maturation until early adulthood, with certain types of adult cognitive abilities not fully developed until the mid-20s. The differences between adolescents and adults can be categorized into three important areas:

self-regulation, particularly in emotionally charged contexts; sensitivity to peer influence and immediate rewards; and ability to make decisions that require an orientation toward the future.

 The distinction between these aspects of adult reasoning or decision making and basic cognitive ability is critical. Research shows that even by early adolescence, some cognitive abilities in young people mirror those of adults. However, although cognitive ability guides the process of decision making, other elements of reasoning determine the decision outcomes.

 The basic structure of the brain and the order in which each part develops offer clues that may help describe the origin of these differences. A comprehensive report published by the National Academy of Sciences summarizes the imbalance in these systems:

“Evidence of significant changes in brain structure and function during adolescence strongly suggests that these cognitive tendencies characteristic of adolescents are associated with biological immaturity of the brain and with an imbalance among developing brain systems.

” This imbalance model implies dual systems: one involved in cognitive and behavioral control and one involved in socioemotional processes. Accordingly, adolescents lack mature capacity for self-regulation because the brain system that influences pleasure-seeking and emotional reactivity develops more rapidly than the brain system that supports self-control.”

More colloquially, the pediatrician and developmental psychologist Ronald Dahl has quipped that “adolescents develop an accelerator a long time before they can steer and brake.”

Self-regulation, or the ability to control one’s emotions and behavior in the moment in order to achieve longer term gains, has been shown to increase throughout adolescence and into young adulthood. These skills are especially weak for adolescents when the situation requires them to suppress a response to an emotional cue, especially for adolescent boys. This inability to delay gratification has been proposed by some theorists as an organizing principle related to criminal behavior for people of all ages, and adolescents may be particularly, and developmentally, vulnerable.

Research also reveals that, in addition to delays in the capacity to self-regulate, adolescents have impaired ability to appreciate the long-term consequences of their actions and are highly influenced by the potential for immediate reward. This can be interpreted as an adolescent lack of identification of, or even a tendency actively to seek out, risk. However, studies show that adolescents and adults are similar in their ability to understand a situation’s risks; the distinction lies in how they evaluate risks and rewards. In a decisionmaking situation, adolescents tend to be more sensitive than adults in valuing what the potential reward may be, and less sensitive to any potential costs.

 A particularly compelling reward for adolescents is the approval of their peers: adolescents are more likely to have their behavior influenced by peers than are adults. Research in brain development now documents what has long been conventional wisdom: that adolescents inherently value peer approval above many other rewards, and their “consequent fear of rejection” influences their choices. In fact, the influence of the group is strong for adolescents even in instances when their peers are not overtly suggesting they should engage in a certain action. It has been shown that mere “peer presence” rather than “peer pressure” can create changes in their behavior. As a result, it is perhaps not surprising that adolescents often commit crimes in groups.

Though peers may greatly influence adolescents’ behavior while they are young, as they mature and transition to adulthood, they begin to develop a greater sense of autonomy, and the influence of the peer group wanes.

These two differences, immature self-control abilities and sensitivity to immediate reward, converge in the third difference: the impaired ability to make judgments that require future orientation. The ability to appreciate the long-term consequences of a decision, postpone gratification by immediate reward, and resist influences like emotion and peers, develops throughout adolescence and into young adulthood. As

Dr. Edward Mulvey stated in his testimony before the Commission, this sound body of substantial research is proving what every parent knows about adolescents: immature decision making persists throughout adolescence. The brain research provides a strong developmental explanation for this phenomenon.

A few of the highlights among the 38 recommendations include:

• Raise the age of juvenile jurisdiction to 17 by January, 2017 and to 18 by January 2018, moving all 16 and 17 year olds charged with non-violent felonies, misdemeanors and violation to Family Court.
• Raise the lower age of juvenile jurisdiction from 7 to 12 except for homicide, where the age would be set at 10.
• Reform criminal court processing for violent and JO felonies of 16-17 yr olds, including a new presumption for removal to family court for violent felonies that are not JO cases.
• Create dedicated Youth Parts for all higher level offenses that remain in criminal court, complete with extensive judicial training, access to age appropriate resources and a youth-centered approach.
• Grant concurrent jurisdictional for criminal court judges overseeing the Youth Parts so they may retain cases removed to family court and handle the cases under the Family Court Act, where appropriate.
• Provide juvenile probation services and case management for juvenile cases pending in criminal court Youth Parts.
• Expand the criteria for adjustment to include some felonies and JO cases.
• Mandate diversion/adjustment attempts for most low risk misdemeanor cases.
• Prohibit the confinement of youth in any adult jail or prison setting and allow youth to remain in juvenile settings until age 21.
• Reduce all unnecessary detention of youth including prohibition of detention and placement of low risk youth adjudicated for first and/or second time non-violent misdemeanors, and prohibition of placement for most technical probation violations alone.
• Create community based family support centers for improved PINS-related service coordination.
• Create new specialized residential placement services for older teenagers with special needs, including expanded RTF capacity.
• Expand and improve reentry efforts to reduce recidivism for juveniles in a host of ways.
• Improve Youthful Offender protections be establishing new presumptions for YO status if there is no prior felony,   among other procedural changes and improvements.
• Create a new capacity to seal one JO conviction under certain conditions.
• Improve digital communication systems and procedures to ensure that juvenile records are sealed consistently.