Charging Juveniles as Adults: Direct File and Juvenile Justice in Washington, D.C.

Spring 2026

Giovanni Sandoval

Edited by: Patrick Fabi

In the United States criminal justice system, serious juvenile cases have long rested on the presumption that children are different from adults and should therefore be treated differently by the law. Juvenile courts were originally designed to emphasize rehabilitation, supervision, and development rather than criminal punishment alone. The first juvenile court, established in Chicago in 1899, reflected the idea that young people required a separate system built around rehabilitation rather than punishment[1]. As youth crime increased in the late twentieth century, especially during a rise in juvenile violent crime arrests that began in the late 1980s and peaked in 1994, many jurisdictions adopted laws that made it easier to prosecute certain juveniles in adult criminal court[2].

One of the most controversial of these mechanisms is “direct file,” in which prosecutors, rather than judges, decide whether to charge a juvenile as an adult. Today, direct file is not the dominant national model. The Sentencing Project reports that prosecutorial discretion laws exist in only eleven states and Washington, D.C.[3] D.C. is therefore not the only jurisdiction that permits direct file, but it is a useful and unusually clear case study of the broader problem. D.C. law generally defines a “child” as a person under eighteen, and defines a “delinquent act” as an act that would constitute an offense under D.C., state, or federal law[4]. Yet the same code excludes certain sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds from the definition of “child” when the United States Attorney charges them with specified serious offenses, including murder, first-degree sexual abuse, first-degree burglary, robbery while armed, or assault with intent to commit those crimes[5]. In practice, this means one of the most consequential decisions in a juvenile’s case can occur at the very beginning of the process, without a judicial hearing focused on age, maturity, family circumstances, or potential for rehabilitation[6].

That charging decision matters. Once charged as an adult, a juvenile may face harsher penalties, greater plea bargaining pressure, public criminal records, adult detention exposure, and the long-term stigma associated with adult prosecution[7]. These consequences begin before sentencing, which means later sentencing flexibility cannot fully repair the harm caused by an early transfer decision. This structure sits uneasily beside modern Supreme Court doctrine concerning juveniles. In Roper v. Simmons (2005), Graham v. Florida (2010), and Miller v. Alabama (2012), the Court emphasized that juveniles have diminished culpability, greater vulnerability to outside pressures, and a greater capacity for change[8]. Although those cases primarily concern sentencing, their reasoning raises a broader procedural question: if youth matters when punishment is imposed, should it also matter when the state decides whether a child enters the adult system at all? This article argues that direct file systems create tension with modern juvenile justice principles by allowing prosecutors to move children into adult court without individualized judicial review. Washington, D.C. illustrates that tension especially well because its law preserves rehabilitative language while giving prosecutors substantial power to bypass the juvenile system. Meaningful reform should not necessarily eliminate adult prosecution in every serious juvenile case, but it should require a youth-centered judicial hearing before adult charges may proceed.

For the most serious offenses, a legal system may reasonably preserve adult court as an option. The central problem with direct file is not simply that some juveniles may face adult prosecution; the deeper problem is procedural. A direct file system gives prosecutors the power to decide, at the charging stage, whether a juvenile’s case will begin in juvenile court or adult criminal court. That decision occurs before a judge has evaluated the child’s maturity, role in the alleged offense, mental condition, family circumstances, prior history, or potential for rehabilitation[9]. In Washington, D.C., this problem is especially clear. D.C. law generally defines a “child” as an individual under eighteen and defines a “delinquent act” as conduct that would constitute an offense under D.C., state, or federal law[10]. But when the United States Attorney charges a sixteen- or seventeen-year-old with one of several listed serious offenses, the code excludes that youth from the definition of “child”[11]. The charge itself can therefore determine the forum[12].

That structure creates a gap between the rehabilitative logic of juvenile law and the punitive consequences of adult prosecution. Juvenile law assumes that youth should be treated as developmentally unfinished and potentially responsive to care, supervision, and rehabilitation[13]. Direct file disrupts that logic by allowing a prosecutor’s charging decision to move a child into the adult criminal system before any judge decides whether the youth is beyond the reach of juvenile court[14]. The Supreme Court’s modern juvenile cases reinforce why that matters. In Miller v. Alabama (2012), the Court stated that “children are constitutionally different from adults for purposes of sentencing” because juveniles have “diminished culpability and greater prospects for reform”[15]. Technically, Miller v. Alabama addressed sentencing, not charging. Still, its reasoning exposes the weakness of direct file. If youth matters because children differ developmentally from adults, the legal system should not ignore youth when deciding whether the case is routed into juvenile or adult court. Judicial review can shape the entire trajectory of a juvenile’s case: the forum, the available penalties, the pressure to plead, the public meaning of the accusation, and the possibility of rehabilitation[16].

D.C. law itself demonstrates why individualized review matters. Under D.C. Code § 16-2307, which governs transfer for criminal prosecution through the ordinary judicial waiver process, the Family Court must hold a hearing before transferring the child for adult prosecution[17]. The statute requires the court to decide whether transfer serves the public welfare and public security and whether there are reasonable prospects for rehabilitation[18]. It also directs the court to consider factors such as the child’s age, the nature of the offense, prior delinquency record, mental condition, response to past treatment, available rehabilitative resources, and the possible rehabilitative effect of family counseling or parenting classes[19]. These factors reflect a basic principle: the decision to remove a youth from juvenile court should require individualized judgment. Direct file bypasses that principle. It treats the prosecutor’s charge as sufficient, even though the same offense can involve very different levels of culpability, coercion, impulsivity, trauma, and rehabilitative potential[20].

The strongest argument for direct file is public safety. Prosecutors may argue that serious violent offenses require speed, flexibility, and a credible threat of adult punishment. Communities have a legitimate interest in safety, and victims have a legitimate interest in accountability. A reform proposal that ignores those concerns would be unrealistic. But judicial review does not eliminate adult prosecution. It only requires the government to justify it. That distinction matters. Prosecutors already hold enormous power through charging decisions and plea bargaining, and legal scholarship has recognized that prosecutorial charging discretion often “translates into power in the plea bargaining context”[21]. Giving prosecutors near-final authority over the forum of prosecution adds another layer of leverage to a system already tilted toward the state.

The public-safety argument also rests on uncertain empirical ground. A major review published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that transfer to the adult criminal justice system typically increases, rather than decreases, rates of violence among transferred youth[22]. That finding does not prove that every transferred youth would succeed in juvenile court, but it does challenge the assumption that adult prosecution automatically makes communities safer. If the goal is long-term public safety, the system should ask whether adult court actually reduces future harm or merely satisfies an immediate demand for severity.

The better solution is to require judicial review before any juvenile may be prosecuted as an adult. A judge should decide whether adult prosecution is justified after considering the seriousness of the offense, public safety, and relevant mitigating circumstances. This reform would preserve adult prosecution for exceptional cases while preventing the prosecutor’s charging decision from becoming the final word on a child’s legal identity. Similar reform proposals have emphasized limiting prosecutorial direct file, expanding judicial oversight, and adopting child-focused transfer criteria[23].

This solution has several advantages. First, it aligns charging procedure with the Supreme Court’s reasoning in Roper v. Simmons (2005), Graham v. Florida (2010), and Miller v. Alabama (2012), which recognize that youth changes how culpability and punishment should be understood[24]. Second, it creates accountability by requiring reasons, evidence, and judicial findings before a child enters adult court. D.C.’s judicial waiver statute already reflects this model by requiring a transfer hearing, a reasoned decision, and findings tied to statutory factors[25]. Third, judicial review better serves public safety than automatic severity because it distinguishes between youths who pose an ongoing danger and youths whose conduct, while serious, may be addressed through rehabilitation[26]. Finally, it responds to D.C.’s particular weakness: The Sentencing Project reports that D.C. does not provide a reverse waiver, meaning a youth directly charged in adult court cannot later ask a judge to return the case to juvenile court[27].

The point is not that juveniles should never face serious consequences. The point is that serious consequences should follow a serious process. If the law accepts that youth matters at sentencing, it should also accept that youth matters at charging, where the path of the case is often decided before any public courtroom proceeding begins. D.C.’s direct file system fails because it places that decision in the hands of the prosecutor without meaningful judicial review at the moment when the youth most needs procedural protection[28].

Washington, D.C.’s direct file system reveals a deeper contradiction in juvenile justice. The law speaks in the language of rehabilitation, development, and individualized treatment, yet it allows prosecutors to make a threshold decision that can remove a child from that system altogether. Forum determines leverage, which in turn shapes plea negotiations, punishment exposure, detention conditions, public stigma, and the practical possibility of rehabilitation[29]. By the time sentencing occurs, much of the damage has already been done.

A fair juvenile system does not have to deny the seriousness of violent crime. It does not have to assume that every young person can safely remain in juvenile court. But it should require the government to prove, before a judge, that adult prosecution is necessary in a particular case. That requirement would not excuse harm or erase accountability. It would simply bring the process into line with the principle the Supreme Court has repeatedly recognized: children are different, and the law must treat that difference as meaningful[30].

Direct file gives the state its greatest power at the moment when the child has the least protection. That is exactly backward. If adult prosecution is truly justified, it should survive judicial review. If it cannot, then the law should not allow a prosecutor’s charging decision to decide, on its own, when a child stops being treated as a child.

References

[1] Off. of Juv. Just. & Delinq. Prevention, U.S. Dep’t of Just., Facts About Youth Crime, Juvenile Justice 101 (noting that the first youth court was established in Chicago in 1899 “on the premise of rehabilitation instead of punishment”).

[2] Howard N. Snyder, Juvenile Arrests 2001, Off. of Juv. Just. & Delinq. Prevention, U.S. Dep’t of Just. 1 (Dec. 2003).

[3] Joshua Rovner, The Sentencing Project, D.C. Youth in Adult Courts (Sept. 16, 2025).

[4] D.C. Code § 16-2301(3), (7) (2026).

[5] D.C. Code § 16-2301(3)(A) (2026).

[6] V. Noah Gimbel, There Are No Children Here: D.C. Youth in the Criminal Justice System, 104 Geo. L.J. 1653, 1654–55 (2016).

[7] Liz Ryan, Youth in the Adult Criminal Justice System, 35 Cardozo L. Rev. 1167, 1175–76 (2014).

[8] Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. 551, 569–70 (2005); Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48, 68 (2010); Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460, 471–72 (2012).

[9] Gimbel, supra note 6, at 1654–55.

[10] D.C. Code § 16-2301(3), (7) (2026).

[11] D.C. Code § 16-2301(3)(A) (2026).

[12] Gimbel, supra note 6, at 1654–55.

[13] Off. of Juv. Just. & Delinq. Prevention, supra note 1; Nat’l Research Council, Reforming Juvenile Justice: A Developmental Approach 1–3 (Richard J. Bonnie et al. eds., 2013).

[14] Gimbel, supra note 6, at 1654–55.

[15] Miller, 567 U.S. at 471.

[16] Ryan, supra note 7, at 1175–76; Andrew Manuel Crespo, The Hidden Law of Plea Bargaining, 118 Colum. L. Rev. 1303, 1315–16 (2018).

[17] D.C. Code § 16-2307(d)(1)(A) (2026).

[18] D.C. Code § 16-2307(d)(2)(A) (2026).

[19] D.C. Code § 16-2307(e) (2026).

[20] Miller, 567 U.S. at 471–72; Nat’l Research Council, supra note 13, at 1–3.

[21] Crespo, supra note 16, at 1315–16.

[22] Robert Hahn et al., Effects on Violence of Laws and Policies Facilitating the Transfer of Youth from the Juvenile to the Adult Justice System: A Report on Recommendations of the Task Force on Community Preventive Services, 56 Morbidity & Mortality Wkly. Rep. RR-9, 1, 1–2 (2007).

[23] Juvenile Sentencing Project, Quinnipiac Univ. Sch. of Law, Limiting Transfer to Adult Court: Enhancing Judicial Oversight 1–2 (Jan. 2020).

[24] Roper, 543 U.S. at 569–70; Graham, 560 U.S. at 68; Miller, 567 U.S. at 471–72.

[25] D.C. Code § 16-2307(d)–(e) (2026).

[26] Hahn et al., supra note 22, at 1–2; Nat’l Research Council, supra note 13, at 134.

[27] Rovner, supra note 3.

[28] Gimbel, supra note 6, at 1654–55; Rovner, supra note 3.

[29] Ryan, supra note 7, at 1175–76; Crespo, supra note 16, at 1315–16.

[30] Roper, 543 U.S. at 569–70; Graham, 560 U.S. at 68; Miller, 567 U.S. at 471–72.