A new study commissioned by the Department of Justice has raised concern at "unacceptable" delays of up to two years in dealing with cases of young people appearing before the Children's Court.
It says lengthy delays in dealing with children's cases are likely to lead to "harsher" sanctions for repeat offenders whose full history of charges are taken into account in a single court sitting.
The research project, seen by The Irish Times, is due to be published this evening.
It involved detailed examination of court files relating to 50 young people.
It says: "This constitutes an unacceptable delay in the administration of justice for young people, and works against the possibility of changing the young person's offending behaviour."
The research show that such young people were much more likely to face detention. For example, of 14 young people in the study with more than 10 charges, 12 were committed to detention.
It also found that children appearing before the court tended to come from the most deprived parts of the city and from difficult family backgrounds.
Of the children for whom information on family background was available, the most common address was in Dublin 24 (25 per cent), which includes Tallaght, and Dublin 1 (20 per cent), which includes the north inner city.
Significant number of children tended to come from a family background where there had been a breakdown in the relationship between parents, where there were no parents, or where there was a criminal record in the family.
Educational disadvantage was also a significant problem. Twenty-eight of 34 young people left school before the legal age of 16 without completing their Leaving Certificate, while 13 young people had literacy problems.
Many children in the study sample first came into contact with the Garda at an early age, with 20 of the children having been referred to the Garda before the age of 12.
Of the children who went on to be sent to detention, all experienced problems in relation to their family, background, education, alcohol or drugs.
Theft and robbery offences accounted for almost one-third of the 551 charges examined in the report, followed by public order offences (23 per cent), traffic offences (18 per cent) and criminal damage (10 per cent).
The study was compiled by researcher Sinéad McPhillips for the Irish Association for the Study of Delinquency, which seeks to promote reform, development and effective operation of the criminal justice system. It is funded mainly through State grants.
The report says further research is needed to get a clearer picture of the total number of young people in the youth justice system, their backgrounds, the success or failure of interventions with them, and their outcomes as they enter adulthood.
