Female Youth Convicted of Sex Offenses: Public Opinion on Public Notification

• Author: Shannon Johnston,Kristen M. Budd
• Published date: 01 August 2021
• Date: 01 August 2021
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/0887403421991902
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/0887403421991902

Criminal Justice Policy Review

2021, Vol. 32(7) 675 –692

© The Author(s) 2021

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DOI: 10.1177/0887403421991902

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Article

Female Youth Convicted of

Sex Offenses: Public Opinion

on Public Notification

Kristen M. Budd1 and Shannon Johnston1

Abstract

Throughout the United States, sex offender registration laws in many states and the

federal government have expanded to include juveniles. Once juveniles are registrants,

they can potentially be subjected to required or discretionary public notification (PN).

Given the documented detrimental effects of PN on juveniles and the prevalence of

sexual offending by juvenile females, this study investigated public opinion on applying

PN to juvenile females who were convicted of a sexual offense. Participants were

947 individuals recruited using Amazon’s Mechanical Turk who completed an online

survey. Multivariate logistic regression found support for PN increased when the

public felt law enforcement was effective in investigating these crimes and there

were increased public safety concerns. Support for PN decreased when the public

supported plea bargaining and supported the law distinguishing between adults and

juveniles who commit sex crimes. Implications of these results are discussed.

Keywords

females, juveniles, public notification, public opinion, sex offender laws

In the United States, the 2006 Adam Walsh Act (AWA) changed the legal landscape for

juveniles adjudicated for sex offenses. Although the ultimate goal of the AWA (2006),

particularly Title I of the AWA, the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act

(SORNA), was to bring uniformity to the patchwork of state-level sex offender reg-

istration and notification laws (SORN), this federal legislation expanded SORN

requirements to include juveniles aged 14 or older who were adjudicated delinquent

for certain sex offenses. Originally, SORNA not only required certain juveniles to

1Miami University, Oxford, OH, USA

Corresponding Author:

Kristen M. Budd, Miami University, 375 Upham Hall, 100 Bishop Circle, Oxford, OH 45056, USA.

Email: buddkm@miamioh.edu

991902CJPXXX10.1177/0887403421991902Criminal Justice Policy ReviewBudd and Johnston

research-article2021

676 Criminal Justice Policy Review 32(7)

register but also to be subjected to community or public notification (hereafter, PN;

Harris & Lobanov-Rostovsky, 2010). As of 2011, states were granted discretion by

the Department of Justice as to whether they posted juveniles information on their

publicly accessible sex offender registry websites, one form of PN (Office of Sex

Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking, n.d.).

Contemporarily, at least 41 states require juveniles to register with law enforcement

(Lobanov-Rostovsky, 2015b). Thirty of those states either make discretionary or

require PN of these juvenile’s registry information (Lobanov-Rostovsky, 2015b).

According to Pittman and Nguyen (2011), juveniles convicted in an adult court are

most likely subject to PN regardless of their age.

Although the body of literature on public perceptions of the extension of regis-

tration and/or PN to juveniles has slowly grown over time (see, for example,

Campregher & Jeglic, 2016; Comartin et al., 2013; Harris & Socia, 2016; Kernsmith

et al., 2009; Salerno et al., 2010; Stevenson et al., 2009, 2013), investigation into

juvenile PN needs to continue due to the serious ramifications of PN itself (e.g.,

psychological harm, harassment, physical violence; Human Rights Watch, 2013).

The public does inform public policy, whether directly or indirectly, which would

be particularly pertinent for states operating under a discretionary PN system for

juveniles (Enns, 2016).

Second, evidence shows investigating the “generic” juvenile typically enhances

public support for SORN (Harris & Socia, 2016; Salerno et al., 2010). Therefore, this

research takes a gendered lens and investigates public perceptions of PN in relation to

juvenile females who are convicted of committing a sex crime. To date, only one pub-

lic opinion study has focused on females who commit sex crimes in relation to apply-

ing PN, but this research focused on adult females (Cain et al., 2017). Public perceptions

of PN for juvenile females matters, because evidence shows the prevalence of sexual

offending by juvenile females is greater than that of adult females who sexually offend

which potentially puts juvenile females at more risk to come into contact with the

criminal justice system (Cortoni et al., 2017; Puzzanchera, 2014; Williams & Bierie,

2015). In addition, because research has found females who commit sex crimes have

been treated more leniently in other areas of the criminal justice process, the public

may be less likely to support PN of juvenile females (CSOM, 2007; Shields & Cochran,

2019; Socia et al., 2019; Vandiver & Walker, 2002). This may be in part because

females who commit sex crimes have been seen as less harmful and less dangerous

compared with their male counterparts (CSOM, 2007; Denov, 2001, 2003, 2004). The

public may not feel juvenile females who have committed a sex crime require this

level of social control.

The Application of PN to Females Convicted of Sex

Offenses

Cain et al. (2017) assessed public opinion on PN for adult females convicted of sex

crimes using the 2012 Nebraska Annual Social Indicators Survey. Of respondents who

answered the following question, “Should communities be notified of convicted female