Better Monitoring and Recordkeeping Systems Needed To Accurately Account for Juvenile Justice Practices

In response to a congressional request, GAO reported on the manner in which the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention of the Department of Justice is implementing the Juvenile Justice and Prevention Act by discussing the Office's program to evaluate State monitoring reports and making observations concerning progress made under 10 of the act's objectives.

On March 7, 1984, GAO testified that State monitoring reports cannot be considered as sufficiently valid and reliable to measure overall progress in meeting the act's objectives and that some progress has been made under 10 of the act's objectives. After completing a more detailed analysis of the questionnaire, responses from juvenile justice officials, and other data which GAO collected, its observations remained the same.