Families, Crime and Juvenile Justice

Traditionally, studies on juvenile crime have remained largely silent on the lived experiences of family members. Amid all the public condemnation of «neglectful» parents and «irresponsible» offenders, little or no space has been given to the voices of those actually caught up in the workings of the criminal justice system. Families, Crime, and Juvenile Justice by Richard Hil and Anthony McMahon addresses this omission. By focusing on the families of a small group of juvenile offenders in a northern Australian city, this book highlights the many and varied attempts by parents and others to grapple with their son or daughter’s offending. It also demonstrates the effects of such offending on the family as a whole and the often less-than-positive outcomes of state intervention. The accounts of parents and others are set in the context of recent family-oriented developments in juvenile justice.

The Authors: Richard Hil is Lecturer in Justice Studies at Queensland University of Technology (Australia). His research interests include informal crime control, crime and urban renewal, and juvenile crime and state wards. He has taught previously at the University of York (England), James Cook University (Australia), and University of the Sunshine Coast (Australia). Anthony McMahon is Senior Lecturer at the School of Social Work and Community Welfare of James Cook University (Australia). He has extensive experience in community work and child welfare and is the author of Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don’t: Working in Child Welfare (1998) and co-editor of Understanding the Australian Welfare State: Key Documents and Themes (2000).