“Do you understand these charges?”: How procedural communication in youth criminal justice court violates the rights of young offenders in Canada

Tara Suri

doi:10.1515/sem-2019-0005

Article

“Do you understand these charges?”: How procedural communication in youth criminal justice court violates the rights of young offenders in Canada

Tara Suri

Published/Copyright: April 11, 2019

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From the journal Semiotica Volume 2019 Issue 229

Abstract

This paper considers Canada’s young offenders in the context from which they enter the youth criminal courtroom. To determine how youth criminal justice courts violate the Canadian Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA), this analysis relates said context to several phenomena, including legal linguistics, oral language competency, literacy, communicative competency, non-verbal communication, the physical structure of youth courtrooms, and legal translation (Government of Canada eds. 2018. Youth criminal justice act. Ottawa: Government of Canada.). As a result of the standards of procedural communication upheld by the Canadian criminal justice system, young people’s rights, including the right to be respected regardless of cultural, ethnic, or linguistic differences, the right to be heard and to participate in proceedings, the right to be sentenced meaningfully, the right to privacy, and the right to be tried in a timely manner are abused in the youth criminal courtroom. Although insufficient structures of procedural communication cause these issues and are beyond the control of counsel, defense counsel are often blamed for their effects. Legal professionals must make important adjustments such as altering the formal speech required in youth criminal courtrooms, employing legal professionals with the role of translating legal jargon to young people in the courtroom, and closing youth courtrooms off from the public to reduce the YCJA violations occurring in youth criminal justice court. These adjustments are ultimately the responsibility of the Canadian criminal justice system.

Keywords: legal semiotics; linguistics

Appendix: Youth Criminal Justice Act (Government of Canada 2018)

Declaration of Principle Policy for Canada with respect to young persons 3 (1) The following principles apply in this Act:

The criminal justice system is intended to protect the public by
1. holding young persons accountable through measures that are proportionate to the seriousness of the offence and the degree of responsibility of the young person,
2. promoting the rehabilitation and rehabilitation of young persons who have committed offences, and
3. supporting the prevention of crime by referring young persons to programs or agencies in the community to address the circumstances underlying their offending behaviour;
the criminal justice system for young persons must be separate from that of adults, must be based on the principle of diminished moral blameworthiness or culpability and must emphasize the following:
1. rehabilitation and reintegration,
2. fair and proportionate accountability that is consistent with the greater dependency of young persons and their reduced level of maturity,
3. enhanced procedural protection to ensure that young persons are treated fairly and that their rights, including their right to privacy, are protected,
4. timely intervention that reinforces the link between the offending behaviour and its consequences, and
5. The promptness and speed with which persons responsible for enforcing this Act must act, given young persons’ perception of time;
within the limits of fair and proportionate accountability, the measures taken against young persons who commit offences should
1. reinforce respect for societal values,
2. encourage the repair of harm done to victims in the community,
3. be meaningful for the individual young person given his or her needs and level of development and, where appropriate, involve the parents, the extended family, the community and social or other agencies in the young person’s rehabilitation and reintegration, and
4. respect gender, ethnic, cultural and linguistic differences and respond to the needs of aboriginal young persons and of young persons with special requirements; and
special considerations apply in respect of proceedings against young persons and, in particular,
1. young persons have rights and freedoms in their own right, such as a right to be heard in the course of and to participate in the processes, other than the decision to prosecute, that lead to decisions that affect them, and young persons have special guarantees of their rights and freedoms,
2. victims should be treated with courtesy, compassion, and respect for their dignity and privacy and should suffer the minimum degree of inconvenience as a result of their involvement with the youth criminal justice system,
3. victims should be provided with information about the proceedings and given an opportunity to participate and be heard, and
4. parents should be informed of measures or proceedings involving their children and encouraged to support them in addressing their offending behaviour. (Government of Canada 2018)

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Published Online: 2019-04-11

Published in Print: 2019-07-26

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Articles in the same Issue

https://doi.org/10.1515/sem-2019-0005

Keywords for this article

legal semiotics; linguistics