Parental Responsibility Legislation In Some States example essay topic

Parents Need to Take Responsibility Should parents be held responsible for the actions of their children? I think they should. This subject has been debated on for many years now but has become increasingly popular in the last ten to fifteen years. The public has become more and more concerned with juvenile crime and how to reduce it. They have tried tougher laws and punishments for the child offenders and even created special police units to fight youth crime and nothing seems to be helping. The government has tried to avoid holding parents responsible, but it may be the only way youth crime rates will decline.

Growing concern about juvenile crime and the state of America's families has prompted states to enact parental responsibility laws. Parental responsibility laws are part of the general push by the political establishment for greater criminal prosecution in the wake of a number of highly publicized violent crimes committed by youth. While all states allow parents to be sued for the various actions of their children, criminal legislation is a relatively new phenomenon. Such measures are separate from traditional civil liability and contributing to delinquency laws.

Recent enactments make parents responsible for the delinquent acts of their children by imposing new sanctions and involving them in juvenile court dispositions. More recent measures require parents to attend juvenile court hearings. In civil cases, parents are automatically liable for their children's damages from intentional acts up to a certain dollar amount which varies anywhere from $250 in Vermont to $25000 in California. In most states, parents are held responsible for their children's actions until they are 18, but in some states parents are responsible until their child is 21. What we are talking about is parental responsibility. Parental responsibility as defined in the Children act of 1989 is all the rights, duties, powers, responsibilities and authority, which by law a parent of a child has in relation to the child and his property.

These responsibilities would include the following: safeguarding and promoting a child's health, development and welfare financially supporting the child providing direction and guidance to the child maintaining direct and regular contact with the child acting as a legal representative until the child is 16 if required ensuring that the child is suitably educated. If all of these responsibilities are taken care of, I feel the child is less likely to get involved in criminal or destructive acts. When a child is left alone or is allowed to come and go as they please, the problems will begin to exist. With out parental liability, I think the parents get away with not being involved in their child's life. Passing more strict laws would seemingly get more parents involved and concerned about what their child is doing. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures in Denver, 42 states have enacted laws making parents responsible in one form or another for their children's crime.

Of those states, 17 make parents criminally liable, sometimes with the threat of hefty fines and jail time. California has been the leader in enacting additional more punitive parental liability legislation. Their Parental Responsibility Act makes parents liable for inadequate supervision with penalties of up to a year in jail and $2,500 in fines. In 1995, Arizona, Louisiana, and Wyoming enacted comparable laws creating a crime of "improper" or "negligent" parental supervision, with misdemeanor sanctions similar to the law in California. California has also introduced the Street Terrorism Enforcement and Prevention Act. The legislation holds parents and legal guardians criminally liable when they have not exercised "reasonable care, supervision, protection, and control over the minor child".

Punishments range form misdemeanors and fines to imprisonment for a year or probation for five years. At least nine other states have passed similar legislation and roughly half of the states in the U.S. have passed or tightened parental responsibility / liability ordinances. New legislation in New Jersey will make parents criminally responsible for the actions of their children. A series of bills passing through the state Senate will allow for the prosecution of adults for "neglectful" parenting. A bill passed by the New Jersey State Senate on March 23 will automatically hold parents financially responsible for all expenses associated with a second false bomb threat or 911 call made by a child. It is estimated that each associated evacuation costs the city upward of $7,000.

Additionally, the parents would be required to make lifetime payments to the families of any police officers or firemen injured or killed during the evacuation process. The Parental Responsibility Act currently being considered by the Senate would make "parents' or guardians' inadequate supervision of their children a criminal offense". If the child commits a serious crime, the parent could be incarcerated for up to 18 months and face a $10,000 fine plus restitution to any victims. The passage of another bill currently being processed would allow for similar sentences to be meted out to "neglectful" parents whose child uses a gun owned by the parent to commit a crime, while another bill generalizes this, stipulating that the parents of a child who uses any gun to commit a crime can be held criminally responsible.

Under pending legislation, lesser criminal charges (including time behind bars) could be handed out to parents whose children fail to attend school or skip school more than 10 times in a year. I feel that similar legislation should be passes in all states. Parental delinquency should be prosecuted just as aggressively as juvenile delinquency. To stop a problem we must attack the issue at the origin and in most situations that is with the parents. To say that all youth crime is bad parenting would be naive, however getting involved in your own child's life is necessary.

Even though some parents are forced to work long hours and multiple jobs in order to provide for their families, they need to find some time to see how their children are doing in school and in life. The first parents tired and convicted of violating a St. Claire Shores ordinance were Susan and Anthony Provenzino. This Michigan couple knew their 16-year-old son was troubled. His first arrest was in 1995 and in the year to follow he continued his delinquent behavior by committing burglary, drinking alcohol, and using and selling marijuana. He was troubled at home verbally and physically attacking his parents. However they supported his release form juvenile custody, fearing he would be mistreated in the youth facility where he was detained.

The Parental Responsibility Ordinance was passed in 1994, which allowed parents to be fined up to $100 for failure to control their children's actions or seek professional assistance. The Ordinance requires parents to exercise reasonable control over their children. A jury convicted the Provenzino in 15 minutes of violating the parental accountability ordinance. They were each fined the maximum $100 and ordered to pay the $1000 court fees. The Provenzino case brought national attention to a growing trend at both State and local levels to combat youth crime: the enactment of parental responsibility laws imposing liability on parents for the delinquent behavior of their children. Caught somewhere between prevention and punishment for both children and parents, these laws attempt to involve parents in the lives of their children by holding them civilly and / or criminally liable for their children's actions.

Penalties for violation of these laws include increased participation by parents in juvenile proceedings; financial responsibility for restitution payments and court costs; financial responsibility for detention, treatment, and supervisory costs; participation in treatment, counseling, or other diversion programs; and criminal responsibility and possible jail time for parents found negligent in their supervision. Although the effectiveness of these laws has not been evaluated in a systematic way, the notion of parental responsibility has attracted broad support. Tort liability for damages caused by delinquent youth is yet another way States traditionally have held parents accountable for the misdeeds of their children. Typically, tort law varies from State to State regarding the monetary thresholds on damages collected, the age limit of the child, and the inclusion of personal injury in the tort claim. Hawaii was the first State to enact such legislation in 1846, and its law remains one of the most broadly applied in that it does not limit the financial bounds of recovery and imposes liability for both negligent and intentional torts by underage persons. Florida, Louisiana, Massachusetts, and New Jersey also do not place a limit on the amount of recovery.

Today, all States but New Hampshire and New York have provisions holding parents civilly responsible for youth crime, with an average maximum recovery amount of $4,100. While some States impose criminal liability on parents of delinquent youth, many more have enacted less stringent types of parental responsibility laws in the past 2 years. For example, some accountability initiatives require increased parental involvement in juvenile proceedings. Recent initiatives in Kansas, Michigan, and Texas require parents to attend the hearings of children adjudicated delinquent or face contempt charges. New legislation in Alabama, Kansas, Kentucky, and West Virginia amends existing laws to require parents to pay the court costs associated with these proceedings.

Some States impose financial responsibility on parents for the costs incurred by the State when youth are processed through the juvenile justice system. New laws from Florida, Idaho, Indiana, North Carolina, and Virginia require parents to reimburse the State for the costs associated with the care, support, detention, or treatment of their children while under the supervision of State agencies. Further, measures from Idaho, Maryland, Missouri, and Oklahoma require parents to undertake restitution payments when children are not financially able to compensate their victims. Initiatives to encourage parent and child togetherness are yet another approach incorporated into parental responsibility legislation in some States.

In the past 2 years, Colorado, Florida, Louisiana, Missouri, and Texas have enacted legislation that requires parents and children to participate in community service activities after the youth has been in trouble with the law. In addition, new laws in Arizona, Florida, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, North Carolina, North Dakota, and Oregon require parents to attend counseling or other court-ordered treatment programs. Recent legislation in Arkansas, Colorado, Texas, and Wisconsin requires adult participation in parent training and responsibility courses. Often, involvement in these types of programs is a diversion option, with participation deferring any further punitive sanction from the court.

While many States have embraced the idea of holding parents responsible for the actions of their children -- at least 36 States have mandated some type of responsibility provision beyond civil liability for parents or guardians of delinquent children -- others are critical of the idea, fearing legal challenges and citing a dearth of empirical evidence supporting the efficacy of parental responsibility initiatives.

Bibliography

Cul breath, Adam. Parental Liability Law Upheld in California, Youth Law News, Sept. -Oct. 1993, at 12.
Geis, Gilbert and Arnold Binder. Sins of Their Children: Parental Responsibility for Juvenile Delinquency, 5 Notre Dame J.L. Ethics & Pub. Pol'y 307 (1991).
Meredith, Robin. Michigan Parents Convicted for Youth's Misconduct, N.Y. Times, May 10, 1996.
Parsley, Kathryn. Constitutional Limitations on State Power to Hold Parents Criminally Liable for the Delinquent Acts of Their Children, 44 Vand. L. Rev. 446,453 (1991).
Weinstein. Toni. Visiting the Sins of the Child on the Parent: The Legality of Criminal Parental Responsibility Statutes, 64 S. Cal. L. Rev. 863,878 (1991).