Treatment and Recidivism of Adolescent Sex Offenders

Who Is the Adolescent Sex Offender?

The adolescent sexual offender is defined as a youth, from 12 to 17 years of age, who commits any sexual act with a person of any age, against the victim’s will, without consent, or in an aggressive, exploitative or threatening manner. While this depiction is a concise one, a case in which an adolescent is the perpetrator of sexual offense is seldom as black and white as this description yields.

The Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, registering and Tracking (SMART), abides by the  SORNA, the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act, which is Title 1 of the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006. SORNA provides a comprehensive set of minimum standards for sex offender registration and notification in the United States. While SORNA requires registration of children 14 and older, most states have their own registration requirements. Children as young as eight may be required to register as sex offenders for crimes ranging from rape to consensual sex, public nudity, and public urination.

Children who register as sex offenders must provide extensive personal information to state police, verify this information either in-person or electronically on a regular basis for the duration of their registration requirement. Regularly report changes in their appearance, residence, employment, and other habits. Some states also require community notification, which can mean those children’s names, addresses, and offenses will be listed on publicly accessible websites and the local law enforcement has authority to share information about the children with the public.

Introduction

            It seems to be a common idea that Adolescent/Juvenile sex offenders have the ability to overcome the tendencies of being a repeat offender which is the opposite thought of their adult counterparts. With proper acknowledgement that there is an offense occurring and then proper treatment issued, these individuals have a lower rate of recidivism than if they had never received treatment.

There are significant differences between the adolescent offender and an adult offender, some key points are, they have fewer amount of victims than that of adult offenders, and typically speaking their acts are less aggressive in nature. Adolescents generally do not have the deviant sexual arousal or fantasies that many of the adult offenders often display. Adolescent offenders are also not seen as being long terms perpetrators, whereas adult offenders typically will continues this behavior over long periods of time until they are discovered. Those adolescent offenders who do receive treatment have a low recidivism rate when compared to their adult counterparts, and that this recidivism rate holds lower for these adolescents when compared to other teens with rates of recidivism for other delinquent behavior. (NCSBY Fact Sheet)

Comparison of Adolescent Sex Offenders and Non-Sex Offenders

            The goal of this study was to aim for relationships between psychiatric disorder and specific offense category among young male offenders. It had determined that overall sex offenders made up a distinct group of juvenile delinquents and that developmental disorders were more common among non-violent sex offenders and child molesters. It was seen in the more violent offences that more typical delinquents were from immigrant backgrounds.

The conclusion came to be found that the differences in groups were in the types of psychiatric diagnoses may reflect differences in the study of the reasons for the factors for the various types of sexual and other delinquent behavior, and that this would constitute further study.