Youth Justice Service

The POWER project is a targeted early intervention project working across Southend, Essex and Thurrock (SET). POWER practitioners offer direct support to children aged 8-13 and their families. This support helps them develop ways of coping with challenging situations at home, school and in their local communities.

The Turnaround programme offers support to children aged 10 - 17 who have come to Police attention as a suspect. It offers voluntary support for the young person, and their family. It aims to improve outcomes for young people on the cusp of entering the formal criminal justice system.

Out of Court Disposals (OOCD’s) are for children aged 10 to 17. They are a way of responding to low to medium offending, without the need to attend Youth Court. The aim is to prevent further offending by the child. OOCD’s are most suited to young people who have committed a low-medium level offence and have no established offending history.

The Police may decide to prosecute in Court if the child:

• commits a more serious offence
• has committed several offences before

Most children will appear at Youth Court with some of the more serious offences going to Crown Court.

We support children attending Court. We also provide Magistrates and Judges with information about the child and their circumstances. This helps them to decide appropriate outcomes.

There are several Community Orders available to the Court (up to 3 years duration). There are also Custodial sentences (between 4 months and 2 years in Youth Court, longer at Crown Court). Community orders available include:

• Referral Orders
• Youth Rehabilitation Orders
• Youth Rehabilitation Orders with Intensive Supervision and Surveillance (ISS)

The aim of Community Orders is to co-produce plans with children, families and partners. It takes a strengths-based approach to reduce the likelihood of further offending and harm to all.

Essex is strongly committed to reducing the unnecessary use of Youth Detention. We do this through the provision of robust Bail packages. These may include daily reporting and/or electronically monitored curfew.

We can advocate for Remand to Local Authority Accommodation if a Court decides that it is not appropriate to offer bail. Where the Court feels there is no alternative then the child will be placed in a youth detention accommodation. This is usually until at least the next court hearing.

A child can be remanded until they are sentenced but further applications for bail can be made during this time.

The child will be held overnight in secure accommodation if:

• a child is arrested and charged, and it is not possible to appear in court on the same day (for example during a weekend)
• the police feel it is not safe to bail the child

The child would then appear in court the next morning (or Monday following arrest on a Saturday night).

Where the Court considers that an offence is so serious that the only appropriate outcome is one of custody, a child will be sentenced to YDA.  This will usually be via a Detention and Training Order. This means that half of the sentence will be served in the YDA and half on licence in the community.  Longer sentences are also available within the Crown Court. The Youth Service maintains contact with the child and facility throughout their time there. This includes involvement in sentence planning and release preparation.

We believe that victims of crime should play an important role in planning and delivering our work. Our Restorative Justice Workers contact victims. They may offer to work with them to help the offender think about how victims are affected by crime.

If all parties agree, the Restorative Justice workers may support direct or indirect contact between the child and victim. This would be after much preparation and only where everyone is in agreement.

We understand that children who commit offences have sometimes been victims themselves. We can offer support to talk about their experiences.