Hendricks County introduces teen court to address youth delinquency

Leaders in Hendricks County are embarking on a new path to address misconduct among teenagers struggling with behavior that otherwise might not be effectively addressed in juvenile court.

Last month, the Hendricks County Probation Department hosted its first teen court session, a jury experience that lets kids be the judge on how their peers move forward after breaking the rules. Hendricks County’s program is in collaboration with Reach for Youth Inc., an Indianapolis-based nonprofit offering mental health and treatment resources for kids and families in difficult situations.

For several decades, teen courts across the United States have proposed alternative ways to deal with juvenile misconduct.

“Instead of, whether it be going to detention or you have an adult judge make this determination … what if we can have youth, their peers, listen to what they’re saying and listen to what occurred, and listen to them take ownership of what happened and then give them some reparative activities that they can do?” said Mark Sattler, chief operating officer of Reach for Youth.

With one session under their belt, leaders in Hendricks County are looking forward to how this program can support the county’s youth on their path to a brighter future.

Supporting an alternate approach

Teen court is not original to Reach for Youth or Hendricks County. In fact, 45 states across the country have adopted youth court programs as an alternative to traditional delinquency proceedings, according to the National Association of Youth Courts.

The concept itself can be traced as far back as the 1940s, according to the National Center for State Courts.

The mission of teen court is dual-sided: On one hand, the program directly impacts juvenile offenders whose offenses require punishment in the form of community service, peer involvement or treatment programs. On the other hand, the program helps juveniles, both those on the stand and those in the jury box, understand the importance of civic involvement, according to the National Association of Youth Courts.

Juvenile offenders who are eligible to participate in teen courts are typically those who’ve committed nonviolent crimes such as vandalism, theft and status offenses, such as running away from home. Often, these are their first offenses.

Program leaders, such as Sattler and members of the Hendricks County Probation Department, select the cases that are heard in front of a jury. Usually three to four cases are heard in one court session, Sattler said.

Most states who implement teen courts follow an “adult judge model,” according to the National Center for State Courts. Teenage volunteers make up the court’s jury, prosecutor and public defender roles, and a trained member of the community acts as the judge.

In Hendricks County, everyone who volunteers for a court role is trained to judge the cases, which includes assessing a list of acceptable reparations based on the offenders’ wrongdoing, said Chad Boruff, chief of probation for the Hendricks County Probation Department.

The reparations vary depending on the type of misconduct but include painting over graffiti, repaying someone for theft, or attending counseling for substance use.

“Sometimes a reparative activity could even be like, you need some healthy pro-social activities,” Sattler said. “You need to play flag football…. you need to take up guitar lessons or something like that. Those are things to obviously divert them from making some bad choices for a variety of reasons, and to making some healthier choices that are really helpful for them developmentally.”

Those who volunteer to be prosecutors or public defenders receive additional training for those roles. While the volunteers’ titles are the same as in adult court, their roles don’t necessarily match.

“The goal isn’t to determine innocence or guilt,” Boruff said, explaining that a juvenile offender must admit their guilt to be on the stand in teen court.

The job of the jury, prosecution and defense, then, is to advocate for the solution that is in the best interest of the offender.

But the decision isn’t ultimately left in the hands of the juror: The adult judge will make the final call as to which path is best, though the judge typically ends up agreeing with the jury, Boruff said.

Hendricks County’s teen court program is run in collaboration with the county and Reach for Youth thanks in part to a grant from the Indiana Criminal Justice Institute. Around the state and country, the programs are run by a variety of organizations and jurisdictions.

Teen court programs in Whitley and Huntington counties, for example, are led by the Youth Services Bureau serving those counties. Teen court programs are offered in 15 counties across Indiana.

Many states who’ve implemented the teen court program have enacted laws addressing the concept. Of the 45 states who have programs, 25 have passed legislation specifically addressing these courts, according to the National Association of Youth Courts.

States that don’t have statutes addressing youth courts typically run the programs under state law that allows law enforcement, juvenile courts or probation departments to dismiss or suspend formal proceedings if the defendant successfully completes a diversion program, according to the association.

In Indiana, Indiana Code § 31-37-8.5 allows prosecutors to refer juvenile defendants to diversion programming.

Balancing rehabilitation and accountability

Bringing teen court to Hendricks County was an all-hands-on-deck effort, with members of the county probation department, defense counsel, juvenile court and Reach for Youth coming together to discuss how the teen court program could address the needs of the county’s youth, said Hendricks Superior Court Juvenile Judge Travis L. Crane, who leads the program.

He explained that many schools in the county vocalized their struggle with a lack of accountability in students for misbehavior that doesn’t quite warrant traditional punishment in juvenile court. Together, Crane and the team came up with a list of several infractions that teen court would best address, such as students getting into fights and vaping in school.

Leaders like Crane and Boruff agree with teen court’s mission that often the most effective way to help juveniles change their ways is through their peers.

“Most teenagers don’t care what adults have to say, but when it’s people your own age saying like, ‘Hey, no, we’re going to hold you accountable for what you did, and there’s going to be a consequence for that,’ kids tend to adhere to that a little bit more,” Crane said.

The overall juvenile recidivism rate in Indiana is about 32%, according to 2024 data from the Indiana Department of Correction, which defines recidivism as a return to incarceration within three years of an offender’s release. Under Reach for Youth’s teen court program, the recidivism rate lands between 13-15% each year, according to Mark Sattler.

Juveniles need more than just accountability to address the underlying reasons for committing offenses at school and in their communities, Boruff said.

“We can punish kids and people all day, but until we teach them how to do different and be different, we haven’t accomplished anything,” he said.

“I believe in the balance system of rehabilitation and accountability,” Crane added. “Both of those things have to be mixed together, and they have to be equally sought after in order to get the lasting results that we want.”

After two years of work, Hendricks County hosted its first teen court session on July 30, with Boruff serving as judge. Even before the session happened, leaders were already getting feedback from community members on how much they were looking forward to seeing how this could help juveniles forge better paths for their lives.

And despite being the first session, Boruff said it was a success overall and he was impressed with how the jury prepared for court and worked together to find solutions for their peers.

Boruff said one defendant was in court after committing theft while her parents were out celebrating their anniversary. Her parents had to leave dinner during dessert to pick her up from the police. The jury decided that as part of her reparations, the defendant would take her parents out for an anniversary re-do. She was ordered to use some of the money she earned to pay for their dessert.

“It’s the whole point of restorative justice,” Boruff said. “It’s about, I made wrong. I did something wrong. How can I right that wrong with the people that I hurt? And I think that was a beautiful illustration of exactly what we were trying to accomplish, and it was really cool to be a part of it.”

Both Crane and Boruff believe the program will reap benefits, with Boruff emphasizing that the program will run indefinitely “if and when” something more effective comes along. For now, leaders plan to hold court once a month and are looking forward to collaborating with Reach for Youth even more to connect juveniles with the resources they need to thrive.

“Anything that we can do from the very first point of contact to divert a kid away from this and give them a chance to change their behavior, give them the support that they need to divert them and to get them away, we’re going to take every opportunity and chance that we can at that, and that’s what this program does,” Boruff said.•