Abstract: It is increasingly important to find interventions and programs that successfully intervene with juvenile offenders and their families. Parents are a key piece of successful intervention with juvenile offenders, and not enough is known about their perceptions of how the system is doing in terms of supporting and empowering them and how effective the services provided truly are. This study was designed to explore the perspectives and experiences of parents who had been involved in the juvenile justice system of San Diego County. Areas of exploration included the parents' involvement in services, perceptions of providers of services, and perceptions of how helpful/harmful interventions might have been. Finally, suggestions were gathered from parents as to ways that services could be improved and greater cooperation and involvement from parents could be achieved. This qualitative study employed grounded theory methodology. A loosely structured interview elicited participants' experiences with and perspectives of the juvenile justice system. The interview data were then analyzed through a process of coding that led to theory development. Participants were parents of children currently on probation and who had participated at least minimally in family-based services offered through probation in a mixed suburban/rural area of San Diego County. The core themes that emerged from this study were powerlessness and a blueprint for the future. Powerlessness was explored in terms of parents' perceptions of their own powerlessness, the reinforcement of this sense of powerlessness by the systems in which they were involved, and the system's powerlessness to effect change. A blueprint for the future involves parents' perspectives on what had been helpful, not helpful, and what could be helpful. This category provided a snapshot of how parents evaluated the services with which they had been provided. Clinical implications and applicability of the current study to the literature and practice of the field were explored. Limitations of the study were discussed, as well as directions for future research.