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Over the last several decades, legislative changes have opened the boundary between the juvenile and criminal justice systems by increasing the population of juveniles eligible to be treated as adults and shifting power from judges to prosecutors for making decisions to treat juveniles as adults. Using a mixed methods design, this study analyzes the impact of this legislation in Wayne County, Michigan by examining decisions to label and process juveniles as adults. Data collected include quantitative case and outcome data on youth eligible to be tried as adults over a 6-year period; in-depth interviews with 38 judges, prosecutors, defense attorneys, and other court actors; and ethnographic observations of court hearings. At the state level, a key effect of these changes has been an increase in the number of juveniles going into the adult system despite dramatic declines in juvenile crime. With regard to the decision-making process, a key effect has been the reshaping and reorganization of this process, where decisions to label juveniles as adults are isolated in the prosecutor's office, the direct role of other actors in these decisions is almost eliminated, and prosecutors have greater control over whether a juvenile is ultimately sentenced as an adult. In making these decisions, prosecutors focus largely on the juvenile's age and offense, rather than on individual background characteristics and experiences. They are also influenced by the range of alternatives available, including a middle option to designate youth to be tried as adults in the juvenile court and existing resources for treating youth in the juvenile system. However, prosecutors' decisions are also shaped by other sources of meaning created through competition with other court actors over values, ideology, resources, and power. Thus, this dissertation highlights the importance of context in shaping the application of the power to treat juveniles as adults. Further, it shows how contextual characteristics have different influences at the various decision-making points. Through the use of multiple methods and inclusion of a range of individual and contextual factors, this dissertation presents a conceptual framework that can be useful in guiding the examination of transfer decision making in other courts.