Week 6 - INDIGENOUS YOUNG PEOPLE

Question 1

What are the facts of Aboriginal youth in YJ system?

Answer 1

– Indigenous people only represent around 2-2.5 percent of
the Australian population.
– But studies have shown that young Indigenous people:
• 29 times more likely to be sent to detention than nonIndigenous youth (circa 2009)
• 42 times more likely to be punished with youth detention
than a non-Indigenous youth in Western Australia
• come into contact with juvenile justice agencies much
earlier and more frequently than young non-Indigenous
people
• 40 percent of all young people held in police custody
were Indigenous (circa 2002)

Question 2

Why do Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young have high levels of contact with juvenile justice agencies?

Answer 2

– History of colonisation;
– Links between welfare intervention and
criminalisation;
– Effects of social and economic
marginalisation; and
– Racism and discrimination, if any, within
the juvenile justice system

Question 3

Why are these young people over-represented in the official crime statistics?

Answer 3

– Committing crime? Committing more serious crime?
– Police discretion?
– Certain types of crimes are very difficult to solve, so similar crimes
that have been solved may be re-defined?
– Specific environmental opportunities and pressures influencing the
type of crimes committed?
– As a form of culturally embedded resistance against perceived
colonial/postcolonial authoritative oppression?
• D’Souza, N. (1990). Aboriginal children and the juvenile justice
system. Aboriginal Law Bulletin, 2(44), 4-5
– Being economically and socially disadvantaged?
– Being constantly surveilled and social controlled?

Question 4

How does our society respond to these figures?

Answer 4

– Evaluation:
• Focus on recidivism rates
– Children’s Koori Court
– Murri Court
– Nunga Courts

Question 5

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Answer 5

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