Juveniles on trial

This article describes common forensic evaluations requested of juvenile court mental health evaluators. There has been a legal shift toward criminalization of juvenile court, with a greater emphasis on rights, abandonment of the rehabilitative model, and greater movement of adolescents into the adult criminal court. A resulting shift has been the redefinition of juvenile court forensic evaluations toward the specificity of adult forensic work. The challenge for evaluators is to refine their knowledge of the forensic standards and bring knowledge of development, assessment, and diagnosis in juveniles and interview techniques appropriate to juveniles to improve the evaluation and forensic reports.