Impacts of Custody and Detention on Young People

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Young people involved in the criminal justice system are widely recognised as ‘among the most disadvantaged’. These circumstances – which include health and social inequalities and ‘pre-existing neurodevelopmental disabilities and mental ill-health’ – make young people more likely to become justice-involved.

A growing body of Australian and international research suggests that incarceration during adolescence can have profound immediate and ongoing adverse health effects throughout adulthood. This is particularly the case where young people are incarcerated in adult prisons and with adult offenders. Exposure to custody can increase the risk of stigmatisation, disrupt development and exacerbate mental and physical health conditions.

Because young people are ‘still undergoing neurological development’, they are ‘more prone to increased risk-taking, poor consequential thinking and a lack of impulse control’ as well as having ‘difficulty regulating their moods’. Their psychosocial immaturity also makes them more vulnerable to ‘peer influence, coercion, provocation and immature decision making’.

McCausland and Baldry (2023) undertook a meta-analysis of a linked administrative databank of a cohort of people who have been incarcerated in NSW. They explored justice trajectories and outcomes and the way they are determined by systemic and structural factors – what they term the ‘social determinants of justice’. These include early abuse, violence and trauma, systemic racism and discrimination, poverty and unequal access to resources, and the operation of the criminal legal system itself. These realities mean that people from certain communities are proportionally more likely to end up in the criminal justice system. These include Indigenous people, people experiencing poverty and/or OOHC.

Social, economic, and geographic factors that influence a person’s involvement in the criminal justice system include:

• poor schooling experiences and rates of educational attainment

• early contact with police

• unsupported mental health and cognitive disabilities

• problematic use of alcohol and other drugs

• experiencing homelessness and unstable housing.

Various inquiries have documented the experiences of young people in detention17 and found that experiences of incarceration are often characterised by restricted access to food, fresh air and exercise, prolonged periods of isolation, placement in adult custodial settings, and physical and/or sexual assault.

Given their vulnerability and often complex needs, and the ‘lack social and therapeutic care and support’ in youth detention contexts, youth detention centres can ‘serve as sites of ongoing trauma and violence’ and are of limited rehabilitative value for young people. Moreover, a wide body of research has established links between a young person’s incarceration and poor health and other adverse outcomes over their life-course including:

• increased likelihood of becoming entrenched in the criminal justice system

• increased risk of death after release

• poorer physical health outcomes and homelessness

• fragmented education and poorer educational outcomes.

Importantly, the neurological underdevelopment of young people, which may cause a young person to engage in criminal activity, may also improve their prospect of rehabilitation. This, along with the complex needs of such young people, highlights the importance of both early intervention and diversion of young people away from the formal criminal justice system. Not only has the use of diversions for young people corresponded with reducing rates of recidivism but they are also more likely to be successful if the intervention is made at the earliest opportunity.

However, research has shown that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people are less likely to receive diversions: ‘Only 10% of First Nations youth were diverted compared to 30% for non-Indigenous youth in the ACT in 2023.’

Importantly, some programs described as diversionary can in reality have a net-widening and criminogenic effect – for example, for young people with cognitive disability – if not systematically focused and appropriately designed.

A report by Klauzner et al (2022) that evaluated of Youth on Track, an early intervention program for young people at risk of becoming entrenched in the criminal justice system, highlighted importance of  [c]ulturally appropriate youth interventions … given that Aboriginal young people continue to be grossly overrepresented in the youth justice system, with nearly half of all young people in custody identifying as Aboriginal.

Evaluations of such interventions (e.g. Maranguka, the Aboriginal community-led and placebased justice reinvestment program) have recorded promising outcomes, including a 23% ‘reduction in police recorded incidence of domestic violence and comparable drops in rates of re-offending’. These results have been shown to flow on to education, with a 31% ‘increase in year 12 student retention rates’.