Offending Girls Young Women and Youth Justice

'At last an intelligent, up to date and comprehensive exposure of the myths surrounding the 'new offending girl' and their impact on youth justice practice. Offending Girls: Young Women and Youth Justice is essential reading for all those who are prepared to make the effort to look beyond the headlines of the 'ladettes' and the 'violent girl gangs' who are now 'worse than the boys', Through extensive original research with girls and practitioners, Sharpe uncovers the realities of 'growing up good' in the 21st century.' - John Muncie, Professor of Criminology, The Open University 'This book offers a fascinating insight into the lives of girls who have offended and provides an edgy alternative to the usual accounts of female crime that all too frequently ignore the voices of the women themselves. The reader is provided with a background to the offending behaviour of these women and the author attempts to offer some explanation for their offending rather than the relying on the usual account which explains girls' criminal behaviour by likening them to boys. In this way, the book offers these women some agency and allows them to take responsibility for their actions instead of repeatedly classifying criminal women as victims of crime themselves or as helpless individuals that are not aware of the actions they are committing. This academic analysis of the lives of criminal young women is an important contribution to the growing body of research focused on women and their propensity to engage in offending behaviour and could help criminal justice agencies to look at the way they manage these women. Specifically it could inform their decision-making processes based on real life histories of offending women rather than relying on anecdotal and often androcentric work. The text offers useful insights into working with these girls in the 21st century to those who work or study in the criminal justice field, and indeed is relevant for anyone who is interested in the place of young women in the criminal system.' -Katy Page, University of Leicester and London Probation Trust, in Probation Journal vol 59 no 4