CHILDREN INCARCERATED:
EXPLORING DIVERSION AS A
HEALTHY ALTERNATIVE TO
FORMAL PROCESSING
Kayla Riley
ABSTRACT
The annual cost of incarceration-related recidivism in the U.S. is over seven billion dollars
(Justice Policy Institute, 2014). Around 200,000 juveniles are released from a residential facility
every year and more than half will be back within the same year (Youth, accessed 2018). This
paper conducted a comparative analysis of juvenile diversion programs and commitment across
social factors, program effectiveness [recidivism], and cost to prove that public safety and
lower recidivism for juvenile offenders can best be reached through diversion programming for
nonviolent felony offenses, instead of commitment dispositions. Research was conducted using
peer-reviewed journals for socioeconomic and public safety data and a cost comparison was
made using government websites for data across the state of Florida, including the State
Attorney’s Office, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, and the Department
of Juvenile Justice. In the 2016-17 fiscal year, Florida commitment had an average recidivism rate
of 35.6%, while diversion had only 11% (OJJDP, 2018). The cost of commitment per child per day
in the state of Florida is $151.80, yet only $9.33 for diversion. Annually this is $55,407 per child
per year for commitment and $3,405.45 on average for diversion programs in the state of
Florida. This shows that shifting the focus from punishment to the individual needs of the
juvenile by expanding diversion programming to support non-violent felonies including felony
vandalism, felony drug, auto-theft, and burglary charges is in the best interest of everyone, while
ensuring children don’t have criminal records before even reaching adulthood.
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