Sex

Intake Decision
Juvenile courts were less likely to use formal processing in delinquency cases involving females (45%) than in cases involving males (58%) (figure 10). Between 1986 and 1995, the likelihood of formal handling increased for both males and females in all offense categories (table 34). There was offense variation for both males and females in the proportion of cases petitioned for formal processing. For females, cases involving public order offenses were most likely to be petitioned in 1995 (54%), while for males cases involving drug law violations were petitioned most often (63%).