Abstract
In 1995, the Utah Legislature adopted the Serious Youth Offender statute ("SYOS"), a new statutory scheme for transferring jurisdiction over juvenile delinquency cases to district court. This legislative effort to identify the most serious juvenile offenders and subject these youth to the severe specter of adult criminal sanctions ultimately aimed to improve public safety in Utah. Two years later, the Utah Court of Appeals, in State ex reL AB., upheld the SYOS in the face of five separate state and federal constitutional challenges. In both passing and upholding the SYOS, the legislature and the judiciary failed to recognize that legislative waiver statutes like the SYOS do not reduce juvenile crime or improve public safety. Specifically, the SYOS does not differentiate successfully between those youths amenable to the rehabilitative regime of the juvenile system and those that would not benefit from juvenile treatment and thus should be cast into the harsh world of adult criminal justice. In addition, the SYOS bears the scars of other constitutional and policy-based defects.
Recommended Citation
Rudof, Paul R.
(1998)
"Throwing out the Baby with the
Bathwater Utah's Serious Youth
Offender Statute,"
Utah Law Review: Vol. 1998:
No.
3, Article 6.
Available at:
https://dc.law.utah.edu/ulr/vol1998/iss3/6