Part One of this article reports the findings of quantitative analyses of official records of cases processed through the Florida juvenile justice system. Part Two contains in-depth interviews with juvenile judges, state's attorneys, public defenders and social service personnel. Part Three uses those interviews as a basis for an exploration of the social and organizational processes underlying the findings reported in Part One. The research reported here focuses on differences between the processing of delinquency and status offense (dependency) cases, rather than simply the juvenile justice system in general. It supplements statistical analyses with qualitative data. Although the findings presented here are tentative, they show clear indications of race differentials in justice processing and much evidence of institutional racism. Findings support the need for a closer look at the climate of organizations that do delinquency work versus dependency work. Notes, tables, appendix