Michigan Opened Juvenile Diversion Records to Researchers. The Fine Print Decides How Private They Stay.

What happens when the state wants to study whether juvenile diversion works, but the evidence sits inside records the law has promised to keep confidential?

In diversion, officials handle a minor's case through a supervised program outside the formal court process. That program creates records about the child, the screening, and the decision to use diversion.

Michigan answered that question with House Bill 4396. The law keeps the confidentiality rule in place and allows researchers to request access through the State Court Administrative Office or an individual court.

Access depends on a written data-use agreement. The agreement must protect personally identifiable information from public disclosure, misuse, and unauthorized release. The court system may charge the researcher for processing the request. It must also record when requests arrive, whether they are granted, and what information was released.

Those protections matter. They also place a great deal of trust in how the agreement is written and enforced.

Before this law, a juvenile diversion record could be used only to decide whether a minor should enter diversion. Public Act 71 adds a research exception.

Picture a university or policy organization asking for records from hundreds of diversion cases. The request may serve a legitimate purpose. Michigan should know whether its programs reduce repeat offenses and help children avoid the court system.

The risk sits in the details. The statute does not define who qualifies as a researcher or what kind of project qualifies as research. The State Court Administrative Office creates the agreement and decides whether the request moves forward. Once the records are released under that agreement, the data is exempt from public-records requests.

The public can know that a request was made and that information was released. The public cannot inspect the released dataset through the Freedom of Information Act.

That makes the request log more than paperwork. It becomes the public record of how often this authority is used and what kinds of information are released.

Anything a minor says during a risk screening, mental-health screening, or participation in diversion, including an admission or confession, cannot be used against that child in an adjudicatory hearing. It also cannot be subpoenaed for another proceeding.

That protection supports the purpose of diversion. A child cannot participate honestly in screening if every answer may later return as evidence in court.

The existing penalty for violating the confidentiality rule remains in place: up to 180 days in jail and a $1,000 fine.

Public Act 71 protects a child's screening statements while giving researchers controlled access to confidential records. The balance will depend on administration.

Michigan authorized the research. Now the paperwork has to protect the child whose life became the data.

This is our read of the law. We encourage you to read it yourself and reach your own conclusions.