Youth Justice (YJ)

Performance Indicators

Specialized Intervention and Youth Justice (YJ) provide community supervision and custody programs for youth aged 12 to 17 at the time of their offence, as well as mental health assessment and treatment services to youth who are in custody or under community YJ supervision.

Working in multi-disciplinary offices throughout B.C., youth probation officers provide community supervision and case management of youth in conflict with the law and are assisted through a range of community-based support and rehabilitative resources.

Youth Custody Centres provide a safe, secure, healthy and supportive environment - promoting lawful behaviour and contributing to public safety - with a range of services that respond to the needs of youth. The centres accommodate youth serving a custodial sentence, as well as young people detained in custody pending trial or sentencing.

Youth Receiving Formal Diversion Services Who Did Not Commit a New Offence

Rationale

Objectives of formal diversion include avoiding official labelling and processing, and providing services that help prevent a youth from reoffending.

¹ As a result of a system update in 2018, Crown Caution Letters, which are a type of formal diversion, were added to the YJ data set. Historic numbers for previous years have been updated to reflect this change. Note that data after 2017 is not yet available.

Youth Receiving First Community Sentence Services Who Did Not Commit a New Offence

Rationale

One objective of a community sentence is to provide services that help prevent a youth from reoffending.

¹ 2017 is the latest data as the rate includes clients from 2017 who did not commit a new offence in the following 5 years or 2022. As well, an additional year is required to allow for criminal justice (e.g., court) processing time; therefore, 2018 data will not be available until late 2024.

Youth Receiving First Custody Sentence Services Who Did Not Commit a New Offence

Rationale

Recognizing that custody holds the highest risk population, one objective of custody services is to provide services that help prevent a youth from reoffending.

Youth in Custody

¹ Rates are calculated per 10,000 youth in the general population, ages 12 to 17 years inclusive.

² Note that rates for Canada are not uniformly comparable from year to year due to the unavailability of data for some large jurisdictions (e.g. Ontario, Quebec) in some years. However, BC rates relative to the remainder of the country are comparable.

Source: Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics, Statistics Canada.

Youth Crime Rates - Criminal Code Offences

¹ Rates are calculated per 10,000 youth in the general population, ages 12 to 17 years inclusive.