Treating Today's Juvenile Homicide Offenders

• Author: Kathleen M. Heide,Eldra P. Solomon
• Published date: 01 January 2003
• Date: 01 January 2003
• DOI: 10.1177/1541204002238361
• Subject Matter: Articles

10.1177/1541204002238361articleYouth Violence and Juvenile JusticeHeide, Solomon / JUVENILE HOMICIDE OFFENDERS

TREATING TODAY’S JUVENILE

HOMICIDE OFFENDERS

Kathleen M. Heide

University of South Florida

Eldra P. Solomon

Center for Mental Health, Tampa, Florida

This article discusses 12 components of effective treatment with juvenile homicide

offenders (JHOs). Eleven of these were identified by psychologist Vicki Agee after many

years of treating serious, chronic, and/or violent youth. The authors, both mental health

professionals, add a 12th component to Agee’s list and tailor the discussion of

intervention strategies to juvenile murderers. The authors’ discussion of treatment

strategies is based on years of clinical experience evaluating approximately 100 JHOs

as well as on knowledge of empirically based programs. In preparation for the

discussion, the pertinent literature on treating juvenile offenders, including JHOs, is

reviewed.

The escalation in violent crime, particularly murder, by youths younger than 18,

beginning in the mid-1980s, provoked widespread concern in the United States. The rise,

which continued unabated for 10 years, prompted U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno in

1993 to characterize youth violence as the greatest single problem facing Americans. The

dramatic increase also resulted in legislatures across the county passing laws in the late

1980s and through the 1990s to “get tough” with juveniles by treating them as adults (Heide,

1999c).

Transferring violent juvenile offenders to the adult criminal justice system for

processing and sentencing them to long terms of incarceration in adult prisons following

conviction has become commonplace in the 21st century. The increase in the imposition of

adult sanctions has continued to occur despite decreases in violent juvenile offending

beginning in 1994 and extending through 2000 (King, 2000). Uppermost in the minds of

many judges today is the need to protect members of a society who are frustrated over the

perceived escalation in juvenile violence and who increasingly report fearing their young

(Annin, 1996). In the recent spate of school shootings, Nathaniel Brazil, a boy with no

previous juvenile delinquent history, for example, was sentenced in July 2001 to 28 years in

adult prison at age 14 following his conviction of second-degree murder. He was 13 years

old when he killed one of his teachers, Barry Grunow, a man whom he reportedly liked and

of whom he spoke highly (“Florida Suspect’s Dad Grieves,” 2000).

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Authors’ Note: This article revises the material originally presented in a chapter titled “Treating Young Killers”

coauthored by Heide and Solomon (1999) and published in Heide (1999c).

Youth Violence and Junenile Justice: An Interdisciplinary Journal (YVJJ), Vol. 1 No. 1, January 2003 5-31

DOI: 10.1177/1541204002238361

© 2003 Sage Publications

In addition to being responsive to public sentiments, judges are also restricted in some

states by recent legislation that prescribes mandatory sentences for certain crimes. In March

2001, the sentencing of 13-year-old Lionel Tate to life in prison in Florida following his

conviction of murder in the first degree made national news (“Corrections,” 2001). Unless

the law is changed or he is granted clemency at some point, Lionel will spend the rest of his

natural life in prison for killing a 6-year old girl when he was 12 years old. Lionel

maintained that he fatally injured the girl while he was engaged in imitating wrestling

moves that he had watched on television.

Dispositional philosophies and policies to punish violent children and to incapacitate

them for long periods in adult prisons have collided with a century’s tradition of pursuing

treatment goals and rehabilitative efforts through the juvenile justice system (Heide &

Pardue, 1986). The prison literature, which now spans more than 40 years, indicates

widespread abuses in the adult correctional system and very little rehabilitation of prisoners

(see, e.g., Silverman, 2001; Sykes, 1958; Toch, 1977). The position to get tough with young

offenders, even juvenile homicide offenders (JHOs), is short sighted in many respects.

Although more adolescent murderers today are being transferred to stand trial in adult court

than in the past, very few youths who are found guilty of homicide in the adult criminal

justice system are sentenced to life in prison without parole, and even fewer are sentenced to

death (Streib, 1983, 1987, 1992, 1994, 1995, 1997; Streib & Sametz, 1989). The reality is,

whether juvenile or adult sanctions are imposed, many adolescent murderers will be eligible

for release back into society (see, e.g., Bonnie, 1989; Cornell, Staresina, & Benedek, 1989;

Ewing, 1990; Hagan, 1997; Myers, Burgess, & Nelson, 1998; Myers, Scott, Burgess, &

Burgess, 1995). Will these individuals be better equipped to handle life stressors and to

resolve conflicts peacefully when they return to the community months or years later? Or

will they pose an even greater risk to the public upon re-entry?

Follow-up data collected on 59 juveniles who were committed to the adult

Department of Corrections in Florida for murder or attempted murder or, in a few cases, of

manslaughter during the period January 1982 through January 1984 (Heide, 1984) are

telling in this regard. Although many of these adolescents received lengthy prison

sentences, 43 (73%) had been released from prison at the time of the 15- to 17-year follow-

up . Results indicated that 58% of the sample released from prison were returned to prison,

and most of those who failed did so within the first 3 years of release (Heide, Spencer,

Thompson, & Soloman, 2001).

This article first highlights the empirical research on rehabilitative efforts with

juvenile offenders. Thereafter, it synthesizes the available literature on the treatment of

young killers. The article then focuses in depth on treating today’s adolescent homicide

offender. The need for differential treatment of offenders is addressed in light of decades of

research verifying that not all offenders are alike. The article discusses 12 components of

effective treatment with JHOs. Eleven of these components were initially identified by

psychologist Vicki Agee (1995) after many years of treating serious, chronic, and/or violent

youth. The senior author, a licensed mental health counselor, and the second author, a

licensed psychologist, add a 12th component to Agee’s list and tailor the discussion of

intervention strategies to juvenile murderers. The authors’ discussion of treatment

strategies for young killers is based on years of clinical experience evaluating

approximately 100 JHOs as well as on knowledge of empirically based programs that work

and those that do not. In taking the position that JHOs can and should be treated, we are

mindful of the words of Susan Bailey, a British psychiatrist, who has successfully treated

juvenile murderers in England (Bailey, 1994, 1995, 1996a, 2000).

6Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice