Washington, D.C.’s juvenile justice system contains structural gaps and outdated statutes that legal and policy experts say shield many violent teenagers from accountability and allow repeat offenders to cycle through the courts with minimal consequences.

From strict limits on when minors can be prosecuted as adults, to local statutes that favor leniency and a judicial appointment process some say is unconstitutional, critics argue the system is structurally tilted toward rehabilitative efforts despite frequent repeat offenders. That presents an onerous problem for President Donald Trump and his efforts to clean up crime in the nation’s Capital, after moving to take control of the D.C. police department and deploy National Guard troops to quell lawlessness that has plagued the city for years.

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The Aug. 3 attack on Edward Coristine, a former DOGE staffer and Elon Musk protégé, brought those weaknesses into sharper focus. Police arrested two 15-year-olds from Maryland in connection with the attempted carjacking and beating, which was caught on video and widely shared online.

Hours after Trump announced he would federalize the Metropolitan Police Department and deploy the National Guard to city streets on Monday, a D.C. judge ruled Coristine’s alleged attackers would remain in custody at the city’s Youth Services Center, a rare move for a juvenile justice system that often resorts to more lenient punishments, such as a flawed ankle monitoring system.

While the decision to keep the young suspects off the streets marked a step toward restoring law and order, hurdles remain ahead with D.C’s justice system and District Attorney General Brian Schwalb, a Democrat with a history of shrugging off calls to bring harsher penalties against juvenile offenders.

Narrow authority for adult charges against minors

In D.C., criminal offenders younger than 15 can be prosecuted only by the D.C. Attorney General, even for crimes such as rape, armed robbery, or murder. Those 15 to 17 can only be transferred to adult court if the attorney general requests it.

But Schwalb has made clear he will not use that power, saying at a 2023 community event that “kids are kids” and teenagers are biologically prone to mistakes. His office, he added, has a duty to “treat kids like kids” and give them a chance at rehabilitation.

Schwalb’s office did not return a request for comment when asked by the Washington Examiner whether he has changed his views in the two years since these public remarks.

Amid resistance by the District’s main local prosecutor, there is some leeway for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, a position held by Trump-appointee Jeanine Pirro, who can prosecute 16- or 17-year-olds as adults without local approval only for a handful of offenses, including murder, first-degree sexual abuse, and armed robbery.

But that still leaves many violent assaults outside federal reach unless the victim dies.

Zack Smith, a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told the Washington Examiner the arrangement in D.C. is “virtually unheard of” in other states and puts most serious cases in the hands of a local prosecutor who will not pursue adult charges against minors.

“Plenary authority to prosecute juveniles below 15 rests with the D.C. Attorney General,” Smith noted, adding that even for older teenagers, “the U.S. attorney can reach down and prosecute you, but only for a few specified, enumerated offenses.”

Repeat offenses and rising arrests

Metropolitan Police Department data show the number of juveniles arrested in D.C. has increased yearly since 2020, surpassing 2,000 in both 2023 and 2024. More than half of all robbery arrests last year involved minors, and about 60% of this year’s carjacking arrests to date are juveniles. Nearly 200 youths charged with violent crimes in 2024 had prior violent crime arrests.

Smith tied the trend to years of reduced police resources, blaming the D.C. Council for passing a criminal code overhaul in 2023 that was so radical that Congress and former President Joe Biden rejected it. The Metropolitan Police Department, he said, is now in a “historic staffing crisis” that could take a decade to reverse.

Leniency in law and court

Critics also fault the District’s Youth Rehabilitation Act, which allows offenders under 25 to receive probation regardless of crime severity, and the Incarceration Reduction Act, which permits release at age 25 after serving part of a sentence. Title 16 of the D.C. Code limits the U.S. attorney’s jurisdiction over violent juvenile crimes unless the victim dies.

Pirro said Tuesday the limits for her office are glaring, noting that under current law, she can seek adult charges for 16- and 17-year-olds only for offenses such as murder, rape, first-degree robbery, or burglary.

“If you shoot someone and don’t kill them, I don’t have jurisdiction,” she said, describing family court as a place of “yoga and ice cream socials” rather than punishment.

She cited a case in which a 19-year-old convicted of shooting someone in the chest walked free with probation to attend college, calling it proof that current statutes are “nonsense” and need to change.

Unreliable ankle monitor policy replacing detention

A Washington Post investigation found that the District’s juvenile court system increasingly relies on GPS ankle monitors instead of secure detention, even for repeat violent offenders. The daily number of monitored youths has tripled since the mid-2000s, now averaging between 125 and 150, with judges ordering the devices for four out of five court-supervised juveniles.

The system depends on youths as young as 12 to keep the devices charged, a task many ignore. Some devices went dead for weeks without enforcement action, allowing teenagers to disappear or commit new crimes. One juvenile told the Washington Post he committed robberies while wearing a charged monitor because there was “no point” in complying.

In just two months last year, five youths died while wearing monitors, including a 16-year-old who had not charged his device for over two weeks before being shot and killed. Court officials have since switched to a longer-battery model but admitted the technology still contains many pitfalls for deterring dangerous behavior.

The DC courts make the problem even more strenuous

Smith also criticized the way D.C. Superior Court judges are chosen. A nominating commission, not the president alone, determines who can be a judge.

“There’s the federal court system, and then there’s the local court system in D.C., which is really a federal court system as well,” Smith said. “But there are real problems with the judges there — either letting those accused of violent crimes with lengthy rap sheets back out onto the street pending their trials, or imposing inappropriately light sentences in many cases.”

A major hurdle the Trump administration faces with the local D.C. courts is that the president doesn’t get to pick whoever he wants to nominate, like in any other federal court. The mayor gets to name two seats for the nominating commission, the city council gets one seat, the D.C. Bar gets two seats, local federal judges get to name one seat, and the president gets one seat. 

“To my mind, that’s unconstitutional,” Smith contended.

Push for congressional action

Smith also said Congress needs to revise D.C. law to give the U.S. attorney broader authority to prosecute violent juvenile offenders, overhaul the court appointment process, and roll back local statutes that prevent juveniles committing crimes from obtaining more lenient penalties.

Meanwhile, Pirro said Tuesday she wants the public to understand the urgency. She noted that D.C. ranks among the top four U.S. cities for such crimes and that every juvenile homicide she has reviewed involved an illegal gun.

“I guarantee you that every one of these individuals was shot and killed by someone who felt that they were never going to be caught,” she said. 

THIS DC NEIGHBORHOOD IS AS DANGEROUS AS JUÁREZ. OTHERS AREN’T MUCH BETTER

“We are going to catch you, we are going to change the laws, and if you’re 14, 15, 16, 17, we’re going to bring you into the justice system — no more of this,” Pirro added.

The Washington Examiner contacted representatives for the D.C. Council and Schwalb’s office.