All eyes of the jury are on him. The pressure is on for the victim advocate to prove his client’s innocence. Should the jury side against him, he will be sentenced to several hours of community service. He’s already pleaded guilty, but his fate is in their hands.
The format of this courtroom is almost identical to all other courtrooms, except for one thing: Everyone within it, including the jurors, defense, victim advocate, offender and judge, is under the age of 19.
Since 1994, Colonie Youth Court has been meting out justice to first-time youth offenders throughout the community. According to Violet Colydas, director of the Colonie Youth Court, the program began when 40 members of the community decided on a new approach toward first-time offenders. She said the concept of youth court has been around since the late 1970s.
[The community members] had come up with an effective way of dealing with juvenile crime by having them appear before a true jury of people their own age,` she said.
One of the most effective aspects of the program is the `embarrassment factor,` said Colydas, of the fact that the people hearing the case could be the offender’s neighbors or friends. `It’s the fact that someone their age is sending them a message that they have done something wrong and need to atone for it.`
Colydas said Youth Court does not permit the offender to be tried by classmates and other teens who might not get along with him or her, but, for the most part, the members of Youth Court are able to deal with most first-time-offender cases in the Town of Colonie.
This is how it works: High school-aged teens (mostly from Shaker High School and Colonie Central High School, some home-schooled) are able to enter the courtroom as either the judge, prosecutor, defense, foreperson, clerk or victim advocate after completing 80 hours of training. Jurors can be from grades 7 through 12 and do not require training. According to Colydas, the Youth Court has a jury pool of about 300 youths throughout the community.
The offenders range in age between 15 and 18 ` at age 16, according to Colydas, the youth is tried as an adult within the criminal justice system.
The hearing, Colydas said, is modeled after a traditional court hearing, although in Youth Court they do not call it a trial, instead, they call it a `sentencing hearing.` After the case has been heard from both sides, the jurors adjourn and the defense recommends a certain number of community service hours the offender should receive. The jury discusses the recommendation and comes back either accepting the recommendation or submitting a new recommendation for hours that they feel are more appropriate, Colydas said. The judge will then read aloud the sentencing.
What the judge cannot do, however, is sentence the offender to jail time. Every youth offender that enters the Youth Court also must plead guilty, Colydas said.
The community service consists of two parts: one, where the youth completes physical service, including landscaping projects or work at a local food shelter; and second, where the young person attends weekly seminars by guest speakers from the community geared toward that age group, including classes on teens and money management, drinking and driving, and more.
In the end, said Colydas, each youth who passes through the Youth Court system serves the same final two hours.
`Each defendant has to finish out their last two hours as a juror in the court,` she said.
Colydas said the program is designed this way so that youth offenders are given a chance to come `full circle` by the conclusion of their sentencing. According to Colydas, there is a 99 percent completion rate among youth offenders.
For some, the program, which celebrated its 1000th case last August, is a unique learning experience outside of school for Colonie’s youth. For others, it is a doorway into their future.
Seventeen-year-old Kaizad Irani, of Latham, said he has been with the program since ninth grade and took an interest because he knew he wanted to pursue a career in law.
`I ended up going to the Town of Colonie [asking what I could do],` he said, `and they referred me to Youth Court.`
Irani said he was anxious to get through the training period so that he could get in the courtroom, and that his favorite role was defense.
`As defense, you have to present the case to six jurors, and the jurors are actually members of our community,` said Irani, who said that he enjoys, `letting the kids know that the [offender] — he’s just a youth like us who made a mistake.`
Irani said he also enjoys the teamwork that is involved in Youth Court.
`We all work together to make sure that the whole court process is run smoothly,` he said.
Irani said his favorite Youth Court case is one that he was not personally involved with, though `no case can top it.`
The case, he said, involved an offender, who, during an anthrax scare, filled balloons with baking powder as a prank, triggering a major police investigation. The offender, he said, was sentenced to the most community service Youth Court has ever seen. Now, Irani said, he has seen that the offender has come full circle, and teaches others in Youth Court about the program.
Irani plans to attend American University, in Washington, D.C., this fall, majoring in Communications of Law, Economics and Government (CLEG), but he leaves behind him many memories of Youth Court, and advice for those not yet involved.
`If you have an interest in law, or you want to find out what it could be, this program is going to give you the chance to see the insides of what makes our legal system work,` he said. `Being at such a young age, you should really grab this opportunity because it will help you in the future.`
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