A runaway is defined as persons within the juvenile jurisdictional age limit established by the home state who (1) have voluntarily left their residence without permission of their legal guardian or custodial agency or (2) refuse to return to their residence as directed by their legal guardian or custodial agency, but who may or may not have been adjudicated. The ICJ applies to runaways exclusively in the context of returning them to the state where the legal guardian resides.
In the context of runaways, the distinction between sending state and receiving state is replaced by the more appropriate designation of “home/demanding state” and “holding state,” the former being where the runaway’s legal guardians or custodial agency is located and the latter being the state where the juvenile is located.
Although it generally has been held that a runaway is entitled to a hearing prior to being returned to the custodial state, the hearing does not need to be a full due process hearing.