Proposition 57

Several California district attorneys have launched an effort to roll back a landmark juvenile justice reform in California, a fight that both sides expect will ultimately be decided by the Supreme Court of California.

The California Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that a recent ballot initiative aimed at preventing the transfer of juveniles into the adult justice system could be applied retroactively to pending court cases.

Advocates in California say that for too long the hazardous health consequences of incarcerating juveniles in the state’s justice system have been obscured by overly punitive rhetoric around public safety. A report released last week by Oakland-based nonprofit Human Impact Partners uses an emerging research tool to make visible the health impacts of juvenile incarceration, especially for youth under the age of 18 who are sent to adult court and adult correctional facilities.

On Tuesday, California voters signed off on a ballot measure that will reform some of its criminal sentencing policies, including overturning a law that has led to the prosecution of thousands of youth in adult courts since 2003.

In California, young people increasingly are being treated as adults by the justice system. I was one of them. When I was 14, my friends and I got into a fight with a man in my hometown of Watsonville, California.

In the lead-up to a Nov. 8 election proposition that will determine the future of the direct file process in California, a new report points to the increasing prosecution of youth as adults in the state.

In 1995, when Frankie Guzman was 15, living in the impoverished community of La Colonia in the city of Oxnard, California, his older friend came to his house to ask for a favor.