Successful Practices & Strategies Vol. 5 | No. 4 

Fresno Police Department 

Fresno, California 

www.fresno.gov/police 

Community policing element 

Community partnerships, problem solving, and 

organizational transformation 

Problem/issue 

Diverting youth from criminal justice 

Problem description 

Seeking to have long term impacts on crime, the Fresno Police Department and its community partners 

sought to find ways to divert juvenile offenders from criminal justice and into restorative justice 

programs. 

Community policing strategies implemented 

Student and neighborhood resource officers (SNRO) are focused on intervention strategies on their 

campuses that will divert student offenders from the criminal justice system to restorative justice 

programs. One of those programs is the youth court. Youth court systems have proven to be an effective 

restorative justice program with an incredibly low recidivism rate that provides consequences for lowlevel, misdemeanor offenses. The SNROs and their partners (Fresno Unified School District (FUSD), 

Fresno County Probation Department, and Fresno County Superior Court) agreed to expand youth court 

to the FUSD middle schools, beginning with a pilot program for the final months of the 2016–2017 

school year. The pilot program included four middle schools. Since the start of the 2017–2018 school 

year, the program has been expanded to include all Fresno Unified middle schools where an SNRO is 

assigned. 

Youth court sessions are held once per month (September through May) at each of FUSD’s high school 

campuses. Each school has an assigned Fresno County Superior Court judge and a trained student jury. 

When SNROs identify students who have committed qualifying misdemeanor offenses, they can request 

the case be sent to the youth court. In order to qualify for youth court, the offender must be a first-time 

offender, not be a gang member, and agree not to challenge the charges. The offender and a parent first 

meet with a juvenile probation officer to sign a participation contract consenting to the youth court 

process. 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The proceedings begin with the judge swearing in the jury and the involved parties. The judge or a law 

enforcement officer summarizes the report of the incident for the jury. The offender then describes the 

crime in his or her own words. During the proceedings, the judge and the peer jurors ask questions of 

the offender to determine the motivations for their actions and mitigating factors. They also ask 

questions that can help them decide appropriate sentencing punishments. After hearing testimony and 

questioning the involved parties, the student jurors determine the youth offender’s sentence, which 

usually includes community service, essays, letters of apology, and occasionally mediation with the 

victim. 

All offenders who complete their sentence must also serve as a juror on at least one youth court 

proceeding. Making the offender a part of the jury ensures that the offender does not view the jury as 

adversaries and reduces the likelihood of retaliation. When the offender successfully completes their 

sentence, the judge immediately orders their record sealed for that offense. 

The youth court process is just one of the tools that SNROs use to address criminality without placing 

students into the juvenile justice system. In 2017 there were 91 students identified as suspects in crimes 

that occurred on the campus of schools where an SNRO is assigned. Of the 91 offenders, 51 (55.43%) 

were diverted from the juvenile justice system into the youth court or restorative practices or were 

reprimanded and released. This does not even include the dozens of incidents where SNROs prevented 

criminal activity, conducted interventions and counseling sessions to address anticipated criminal 

activity (fights, etc.), or worked with students to correct noncriminal misbehavior. 

Of the offenders not diverted at the school level, even more are referred to the Victim Offender 

Reconciliation Program (VORP) by the juvenile courts. The nine-week program brings the victim and the 

offender together in a mediation to discuss what happened and how to correct it, including paying 

restitution. This program has been very successful and has only a 6% recidivism rate within two years. 

The Fresno Police Department and our partner agencies use many programs and methods to allow our 

youth to positively learn from poor decisions and criminal behavior. Our goal is to have long-term 

impacts on crime by changing current behaviors. We are hopeful that expanding youth court into the 

middle schools will ultimately prove to be another effective way to steer our youth away from the path 

of criminality and toward a path of success. 

Change and/or impact as a result of these community policing efforts 

The youth court program has only recently been implemented in the middle schools, and as a result the 

sample size is still small and of less than one year’s duration. The long term benefits of such early 

intervention cannot yet be extrapolated with any reasonable certainty. 
 

 

 

 

 

Anecdotally, some officers at middle schools with the most interaction with the youth court report real 

world benefits of the program. One officer reported that the students he has referred to the youth court 

have developed relationships with him. The students feel that he gave them a break by not referring 

them to the traditional court process, and they appreciate the second chance. He stated that not only 

are they friendly toward him but they also seek him out for advice and to bring him information about 

problems occurring on campus that he may not be aware of. We are hopeful that in time, this anecdotal 

evidence will be reflected in the empirical data. 

The opinions contained herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of the 

U.S. Department of Justice. References to specific agencies, companies, products, or services should not be considered an 

endorsement by the author(s) or the U.S. Department of Justice. Rather, the references are illustrations to supplement 

discussion of the issues. 

The Internet references cited in this document were valid as of the date of publication. Given that URLs and websites are in 

constant flux, neither the author(s) nor the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services can vouch for their current validity. 

Published 2018