Infants Behind Bars

Infants Behind Bars

In today's society, crime has become a major factor. A crime is an act that is intentionally done to violate the law (The New American Webster 1995). The majority of people believe that no crime should go unpunished. There is a serious controversy, in the United States, on whether or not minors should be treated and tried as adults. By the 1920's, most states in the United States had separate juvenile justice systems. The juvenile system provides separate courtrooms, developed different procedures, and opened separate institutions for housing youthful offenders. Lawmakers felt that even though juveniles have their own system, adult time for adult crimes. The juvenile justice system was developed on the principle that youth are less developed mentally than adults and are more susceptible to intervention so they should be dealt with in a different way.

In recent years, most states have amended their juvenile laws doing away with the minimum age requirements on transferring to adult court. Twenty-three states currently have no minimum age while Kansas and Vermont can try ten year olds as adults (www.cbsnews.com). In a report done by CBS News, they reported around twenty-five thousand children a year have their cases sent to adult court (www.cbsnew.com). In 1990 five boys, ranging in ages from fourteen to seventeen, were charged and convicted for kidnapping, raping, and murdering a woman in one of Wichita's local parks. They all were apprehended and tried as adults, receiving the hard forty. That means each youngster must do at least forty years before seeing their freedom in reach. The youngest offender will be fifty-four when he completes his sentence. Do you agree with the Justice system trying these youth as adults? Some would agree, based solely on the fact that juveniles are committing more heinous crimes and need to be held responsible. Others disagree, believing that juveniles have not fully developed to their full potential due to the fact that they have not lived, learned, and matured fully. Juvenile advocates believe youth should be punished but also rehabilitated and given a second chance at life.

Supporters of trying youth as adults argue that youth who commit heinous crimes like murder, rape, aggravated assault, robbery, and arson should continue to be tried as adults because it deters other youth offenders. Other youth pay attention to the punishment and think twice about committing a crime themselves. Supporters could use a study conducted by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency prevention that show a vast decline in violent crimes committed by juveniles from 1992 to 1997 to show a need for trying youth as adults (www.silverchips.com). Those against trying juveniles as adults, including myself, believe that it does not deter crime but adds to it. When a youth is sentenced as an adult and subjected to being around hardened criminals, they come out worse then when they went in. This only creates a younger better criminal. According to Alan Fox, a professor of criminal justice at Northwestern University and a juvenile crime expert, "The evidence on kids tried in the adult systems versus kids tried in the juvenile systems shows that putting them through that (adult prosecution) does more damage than good. "While in prison, they learn lots of hard lessons from professional, adult criminals as opposed to the helpful, therapeutic environment of the juvenile systems."(www.courttv.com). The adult systems' focus is on punishment and the youthful