Determinants of the Judicial Response to Juvenile Delinquency

The article identifies the determinants of the judicial response to juvenile delinquency which is a subject of interest to practitioners and theoreticians of law, criminology and other academic disciplines. Special attention is given to two of the harshest custodial measures for juveniles in the Polish legal system, viz. placement in a youth educational centre or in a correctional centre. The analysis was conducted on the basis of material collected during the course of research made at the Institute of Justice in 2015-2016 on a sample of 370 court case files on 457 juveniles. It attempts to determine which factors influence judicial decisions on juveniles, and whether judicial practice is consistent with the procedural rules adopted for dealing with this category of offender. The article is divided into three parts: the distinctive features of the Polish framework for dealing with juveniles, a review of the studies conducted to date and a description of the results of the authors’ own studies.