Adjudication: Judicial determination (judgment) that a juvenile is responsible for the delinquent or status offense that is charged in a petition.

Age: Juvenile's age at the time the case was referred to juvenile court.

Case rate: Number of cases disposed per 1,000 juveniles in the population. The population base used to calculate the case rate varies. For example, the population base for the male case rate is the total number of male youth age 10 or older who are under the jurisdiction of the juvenile courts. (See juvenile population.)

Delinquent act: An act committed by a juvenile which, if committed by an adult, would be a criminal act. The juvenile court has jurisdiction over delinquent acts. Delinquent acts include crimes against persons, crimes against property, drug offenses, and crimes against public order when such acts are committed by juveniles.

Detention: The placement of a youth in a secure facility under court authority at some point between the time of referral to court intake and disposition. This Bulletin does not include detention decisions made by law enforcement officials prior to court referral or those occurring after the disposition of the case.

Disposition: Sanction ordered or treatment plan decided upon or initiated in a particular case. Case dispositions are coded into the following categories:

• Waiver to criminal court: Cases that were transferred to a criminal court as the result of a judicial waiver hearing in the juvenile court.

• Placement: Cases in which youth were placed out of the home in a residential facility for delinquents or status offenders, or cases in which youth were removed from their homes and placed elsewhere.

• Probation: Cases in which youth were placed on informal/voluntary or formal/court-ordered probation or supervision.

• Dismissed/released: Cases dismissed or otherwise released, including those warned and counseled, with no further sanction or consequence anticipated. Among cases handled informally, some may be dismissed by the juvenile court because the matter is being handled in another court or agency. (See manner of handling.)

• Other sanction: Miscellaneous dispositions not included above, which may include fines, restitution, community service, referrals outside the court for services with minimal or no further court involvement anticipated, and dispositions coded as "other" in a jurisdiction's original data.

Juvenile: Youth at or below the upper age of original juvenile court jurisdiction. (See juvenile population and upper age of jurisdiction.)

Juvenile court: Any court that has jurisdiction over matters involving juveniles.

Juvenile population: For the purpose of calculating case rates for delinquency and status offense matters, this term refers to the number of children from age 10 through the upper age of jurisdiction. In all States, the upper age of jurisdiction is defined by statute. Because most States consider individuals to be adults on their 18th birthday, the juvenile population in these States equals the number of children ages 10 through 17 living within the geographical area serviced by the court. (See upper age of jurisdiction.)

Manner of handling: A general classification of case processing within the court system.

• Petitioned: Formally handled cases that appear on the official court calendar in response to the filing of a petition or other legal instrument requesting the court to adjudicate the youth a delinquent, status offender, or dependent child or to waive jurisdiction and transfer the youth to criminal court for processing as a criminal offender.

• Nonpetitioned: Informally handled cases in which duly authorized court personnel, having screened the case, decide not to file a formal petition. Such personnel include judges, referees, probation officers, other officers of the court, and/or staff of an agency statutorily designated to conduct petition screening for the juvenile court.

Petition: A document filed in juvenile court alleging that a juvenile is a delinquent or a status offender and asking that the court assume jurisdiction over the juvenile or that an alleged delinquent be transferred to criminal court for prosecution as an adult.

Race: The race of the youth referred, as determined by the youth or by court personnel.

• White: A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, North Africa, or the Middle East. (In both the population and court data, nearly all youth of Hispanic ethnicity were included in the white racial category.)

• Black: A person having origins in any of the black racial groups of Africa.

• Other: A person having origins in any of the original peoples of North America, the Far East, Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent, or the Pacific Islands.

Unit of count: The unit of count is a case disposed by a court with juvenile jurisdiction during the calendar year. Each case represents a youth referred to the juvenile court for a new referral for one or more offenses. The term "disposed" means that during the year, some action was taken or some treatment plan was decided upon or initiated. Within this definition, it is possible for a youth to be involved in more than one case during a calendar year.

Upper age of jurisdiction: The oldest age at which a juvenile court has original jurisdiction over an individual for law-violating behavior. For the time period covered by Juvenile Court Statistics 1996, the upper age of jurisdiction was 15 in three States (Connecticut, New York, and North Carolina) and 16 in 10 States (Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Texas, and Wisconsin). In the remaining 37 States and the District of Columbia, the upper age of juvenile court jurisdiction was 17. It must be noted that within most States, there are exceptions in which youth at or below the State's upper age of jurisdiction can be placed under the original jurisdiction of the adult criminal court. For example, in most States, if a youth of a certain age is charged with an offense from a defined list of "excluded offenses," the case must originate in the adult criminal court. In addition, in a number of States, the district attorney is given the discretion of filing certain cases either in the juvenile or in the criminal court. Therefore, although the upper age of jurisdiction is commonly recognized in all States, there are numerous exceptions to this age criterion.