Designing An Effective Juvenile Delinquents Rehabilitation Center

The vision is to design a secure state of the art rehabilitation center. To eliminate and decrease the juvenile delinquency in society by helping juveniles in restoring their sense of self worth so that they can become a productive individuals of the social order and to get them rid of the feeling of remorse because of the offense they have committed. The aim is to design a center which would provide them such opportunities of living a normal disciplined life and a chance of learning technical education, in order to reduce crime as a whole in the society leading to social and human development. The goal with juvenile detention is often rehabilitation rather than punishment.

Who is a juvenile?

A young person, a child who is not fully grown or developed. Marked by immature behavior.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/juvenile

DISTINCTION BETWEEN A CRIMINAL AND A JUVENILE DELINQUENT:

If children commit crime in their younger age of life, deviate from their normal behavior of patterns, they are called delinquent not criminals.

Criminals are those who violate the common law of society, beyond the age handled by juvenile courts.

Kaurser perveen, offense among youth in urban population and its impact on family, 2007

WHAT IS JUVENILE DETENTION?

When people who are not old enough to be held in jail or prison, they often go to a juvenile detention center. This is a prison like atmosphere for people under the age of 18. A juvenile detention facility must be safe and secure for the occupants of the facility.

PRESENT SCENARIO:

Throughout Pakistan, thousands of children are locked inside police cells or overcrowded jails, victims of a justice system that treats the very young much the same as adults. Kids as young as seven can spend years behind bars before the courts have even decided if they are innocent or guilty. And despite the fact that around half Pakistan’s population is under 18, the country has only one juvenile court. Elsewhere, children are trialed in adult courts (BBC NEWS | South Asia | Tragedy of Pakistan’s prison children). Most imprisoned children are held in company with adult prisoners, where they can get easily involved in illegal activities, drug dealing, drug addiction, sexual harassment, sexual assault, rape and physical abuse etc. These youthful offenders later on become adult criminals, if otherwise they are left uncontrolled and unlooked for.

Kaurser perveen, offense amoung youth in urban population and its impact on family, 2007

Children spend years of their lives in miserable conditions in cells filled with the stench of human feces – eating unhealthy and unhygienic food and being forced to do labor. In 1st July 2000, a better legal system was hoped for children when Pakistan introduced the “Juvenile Justice System Ordinance (JJSO)” for the protection of children who come into conflict with the law. Amongst other things, it defined the age of a child as someone under the age of 18, it set out guidelines for granting of bails, for the establishment of special juvenile courts, set out guidelines for the arrest and legal representation for children and it prohibited certain forms of cruel treatment and the death penalty on children. But once again, the rights of children in Pakistan suffered a major setback when in December 2004 a Lahore High Court judgment revoked the Juvenile Justice System Ordinance (JJSO), because it found it to be “impractical”, “unreasonable” and “unconstitutional”. Juvenile courts that were set up under the JJSO were to be abolished and children were now to be tried once again under the same system as adults.

http://www.ansarburney.org/childrens_rights-prisons.html

need of the project:

Economical factors involve promoting crime in Pakistan such as rising poverty, increasing inflation, broken families, Religious discrimination, poor schooling, Drug addiction, Child abuse and neglect etc. Children cannot make their own decisions; they are usually influenced by the people and environment around them. These factors make them involve in illegal activities. The youngsters in this age have a delicate mind. They are indecisive and are mostly governed by emotions and sentiments. Their mind, aptitudes and thoughts have no perfection and endurance. That is why they are supposed immature and inexperienced and so they are probably not to be called criminals but as delinquents.

According to Holy Prophet “Three categories of persons are immune from the operation of law:

a sleeping person until he is awake

a minor until he/she is major

A lunatic until he is sane.

Islam terms the minors as innocents. They are not supposed to commit a crime. If innocents have committed a crime it is treated as an offense not a crime, so they should be treated mildly by a separate court of juvenile’s cases.

In overcrowded Pakistani jails juveniles lodged in the company of hard core criminals, where they might become adult criminals. There is a need to provide a separate juvenile rehabilitation center instead of keeping them in adult prisons. In this way offenders may be controlled rehabilitated and reformed as the early stage to prove a useful member of the society instead of being a potential criminal.

Kaurser perveen, offense amoung youth in urban population and its impact on family, 2007

It is the mind of the child being affected by sociological issues which determines his behavior. In order to change this behavior there is a need to bring back their self confidence and reduce the negative delinquent’s behavior. Creating a constructive change in there thinking, activities and over all life.

OBJECTIVES:

The aim is to propose such a platform that would recommend something constructive for delinquents to do or learn and be capable to fight for better lives. Illiteracy and lack of technical education is also one of the big issues within our society. These issues would be addressed through architectural design. In prison there is a necessity to motivate them where delinquents learned such technical skills and to be the part of crime free society. That can empower them to lead productive, crime free lives when they return to their communities.

According to U.S. Bureau of Justice Assistance, these kinds of services should be present to make them productive member of society.

Balanced Education

Character building through religious support

Vocational/Technical Education

Counseling Programs

Psychological/Psychiatric Counseling

Family Counseling

Employment Counseling

Health and Nutrition

AIDS Prevention Counseling

Youth Alcohol and Drug Treatment

Youth Violent Offender Treatment

To accommodate these services spaces would be designed in rehabilitation center with the provision of relevant architectural design for crime prevention.

ISSUES TO BE ADDRESSED:

During research the issues found in exiting juvenile cells are that

They are over crowded and congested.

Occupants are filled up more than space available.

Poor ventilation.

Bad hygiene and sanitation facilities.

The cells are usually small and confided with poor facilities for lodging and dining.

All these issues would be addressed through design, developing healthy, social and living spaces for juveniles.

Explore best possible architectural solutions for rehabilitation center that will lead to a positive society.

Provide sustainable and economical solutions for all above mentioned spaces, creating a juvenile rehabilitation prototype for future implementations.

Security measures

metholody:

The research methodology would be done by case studies of existing juvenile detention facilities e. g. Adyala jail Rawalpindi, interviewing people associated like researchers on juvenile delinquency, non government organization working for child prisoner’s child psychologist, child physiatrist, juvenile delinquents, parents, jail management, studying and observing requirements for the juveniles. The literature that would be helpful in the research of the project will be mainly focused on the issue of juvenile delinquency, judiciary system of juvenile courts, juvenile justice system ordinance, child psychology and development, sociology, human behavior and psychological impact of detention on juvenile.

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As an individual, architect cannot resolve this kind of critical social factor but being a part of the society one can contribute for the betterment of the society. Society is not all about building sky scrapers, market complex and Convention centers while our little children are imprisoned like animals. The space planning, orientation, color, texture, room sizes and landscapes go beyond than just being beautiful.