What Happens When Teenagers Are Arrested – A Brief Guide for Parents

Parents who have teenage children who are charged with a crime they didn’t commit must be wondering about what happens when their teenage kids are arrested. This guide can help you when and if the enforcement situation happens and when your child is encountered by the police.

Read on to learn more.

Understand That This Can Happen

Now, the thing is that minors getting arrested for crimes happen a lot. If you were to ask juvenile lawyers, they would tell you about how they get approached by worried parents every week, if not every day.

For instance, parents get to know that their child is at school, and the police want to talk to their child. They might wonder about how the police can do so without them being there with their children. Now, as parents, you should know that the police have every right to do this.

The police can interview your child without you being there, which can be unfair for many reasons. The truth is that the police are trained, and your children are not trained.

The Police Can Question Your Teenager

If you are in a scenario where the police just arrested your teenager and took them to the police department – what is going to happen now? As a parent, you should know that the police have power and rights when this happens.

The police can decide after interviewing your teenager whether or not they will charge them with the crime and release them to your care – pending the court hearing – or they can detain your teenager. If this happens, your teenage won’t go home to you but to juvenile hall, where they remain for a few court days until they are called to court for a detention hearing.

The Importance of Hiring A Juvenile Lawyer

Now, if this happens, as a parent, you should know that this is a good time for you to hire a lawyer to represent your teenager or child. Why, you might ask? This is because the lawyer is a professional who has been defending juveniles who have been accused of crimes.

The juvenile lawyer is also someone who has been protecting the rights of the accused juveniles and fighting to get them out of custody. At the hearing, the judge will decide whether your teenager stays in jail – pending the future court hearings and the trial or whether they return home to you pending the trial, which is an important day in the case.

If your teenager is in custody throughout the entire case, it can be several months that they are in jail.

Things the Court Considers to Reach A Decision

The important question is: what does the court consider in deciding whether to release your teenager or you? The court will consider the following:

• Does the parent have a plan to supervise their child 24/7 – pending the trial?

Suppose you and your spouse both work – who will be supervising your child? Your teenager will be virtually free to roam around in the community. In this case, the judge is not going to release your teenager to you.

This aspect indicates that as a parent, you need to have a plan that the lawyer can represent to the judge in court. This way, the court will be assured that your teenager will be supervised so they cannot get into any more alleged trouble.

Know Your Child is Presumed Innocent

Of course, your child or teenager – is presumed innocent for the entire case – except for the decision that the judge will make as to whether to detain your teenager or not. The next thing that is of incredible importance is whether or not your child is tried as a juvenile or an adult.

This aspect is incredibly important for the future of your child. If your child is tried as an adult, it means that they will face the same consequences as if they were an adult when they committed the crime.

Understand the System

As a parent, you should know that the entire purpose of the juvenile court system is to rehabilitate and help minors. On the other hand, the essential purpose of an adult court is to hold people accountable for committing crimes by punishing them.

Now, this aspect is perfectly self-explanatory as to why you don’t want your child or teenager in the system where the purpose is to punish and not rehabilitate.

Ideally, you want your child to be treated as a juvenile, and the juvenile court will try to rehabilitate them.

The Point of Fitness Hearing

The question is, how is it decided whether your teenager or child will be treated as a juvenile or an adult? The answer is that this decision is to be held by a judge, where the judge will hold what is referred to as a “fitness hearing.”

Again, by this point, you must have a juvenile hearing representing your child in court at the time of the fitness hearing. The judge has the final say as the judge looks at different criteria to decide whether or not your child should be tried as an adult or a juvenile.

If the court looks at its criteria and decides whether or not your son or daughter should be staying in the juvenile court – it will certainly be a relief to you as the parent.

What Does the Court Look For?

The court looks at the level of sophistication of the crime. The court also assesses the child’s previous experience in the juvenile court. The court will assess whether your child has any previous crimes that they have been convicted of.

The court will also look at your child’s entire social background as well as many other factors to make the decision.

If your teenager is tried as an adult, everything is worse – except for one thing: If your teenager is tried as an adult, they avail of the right to a jury trial. This aspect indicates that all jurors will have to agree on your child’s guilt, which is not so easy in most cases.

On the other hand, if your teenager is tried as a juvenile – they don’t have the right to a jury trial as they will be tried by a judge. The judge is the final authority to decide whether or not your child is guilty.