Young offenders let down, ■ says priest

Press, 26 October 1982, Page 29

Young offenders let down, ■ says priest

PA q.Auckland New Zealand's young offenders are "manipulated, let down, and often cheated bv family, institutions, and society at large," says the Rev. Felix Donnelly, a Catholic priest. He told the annual meeting of the Movement for Alternatives to Prison held at the McLaurin Chapel in Auckland that young New Zealanders had no voice and “basically few rights." He said that when he first opened a home for socially and emotionally needy youth in 1971. the average age of referral was 19 years. "Now over a decade later the same home has an average age referral of 15 years. The same problems are’manifesting themselves at a much earlier age and in many ways in more distressing behaviour," he said. The typical young offender invariably suffered from low-self-esteem and a considerable degree of self-hatred, deep and unresolved parental conflicts, was a non-achiever. and had appeared before innumerable institional and helping agencies in the community. Father Donnellv said. He appeared indifferent about his fate, was "antiauthority." felt powerless

and without rights, and was usually repressing deepseated angers and resentments. Father Donnelly said his sketch portrait of the average offender was not a socalled "bleeding heart" plea for tolerance. "Rather it is a statement of reality of the factors that go to make up our average young offender in New Zealand." he said. Solutions to youth offending lay in everything from reparehting to the removal of freedom. There was a need for intervention at an early age to break the sequential pattern of criminal-type behaviour, he said. The application of remedial resources at an earlv stage might help. That would include special education programmes, full medical and psychological assessment. a possible environmental change while youth and family readjusted, and a change in schooling. The scandal was that while recognising the common factors which showed up in the lives of young offenders. New Zeala’nd persisted in denying training that would mitigate against the worst aspects of their problems, said Father Donnellv.