A person in need of supervision (PINS) is a term frequently used by social services agencies in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

to describe a juvenile who is not currently in the household of a parent or legal guardian, or is currently not under their control as evidenced by the person's

status offense A status offense is an action that is prohibited only to a certain class of people, and most often applied only to offenses committed by minors. In the United States, the term status offense also refers to an offense such as a traffic violati ...

, who is not an emancipated minor. The term is often abbreviated PINS. Usually, a person in need of supervision is a runaway, an

orphan An orphan (from the el, ορφανός, orphanós) is a child whose parents have died. In common usage, only a child who has lost both parents due to death is called an orphan. When referring to animals, only the mother's condition is usuall ...

, a

truant Truancy is any intentional, unjustified, unauthorised, or illegal absence from compulsory education. It is a deliberate absence by a student's own free will (though sometimes adults or parents will allow and/or ignore it) and usually does not ref ...

, or an unruly child. The term is most commonly used as a term of art in New York in the

, where the term is used in a key statute governing the treatment of juveniles.

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only state ...

also has the term in its statutes.

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

has a similar designation which it calls "child in need of supervision" (CHINS), not to be confused with the broader designation "child in need of services" (also abbreviated "CHINS"), the "services" in which may be disciplinary/supervisory (due to the child's misbehavior) or assistive (due to parental neglect or abuse).

References

American legal terminology Family law {{law-term-stub