Do you believe....

[Tempestuous]

When children and youngsters that commit heinous crimes, do you think they should be tried as adults?

Should they be put in a regular penitentiary with adult convicts?
Put in a separate division or solitary confinement separated from the general inmate population?

Should they be put in a juvenile facility?

What is your thoughts on the subject??

[themadscientist]

the door should be open for adult-type prosecution for juvenile offenders but it should be taken on a case by case basis and not easily applied.

[Bones]

I think that the parents of the child, need to be held accountable up to a certain age. Once the child is old enough (you decide when the time is right) to understand the difference between right, or wrong, you lay down the law. If they do something wrong, the punishment needs to fit the crime.

The child needs to be punished in such a way, that it gets his/her attention right away. Loss of computer privileges, taking away an i_pod, isn't going to get their attention. If it's a small thing, and the parents are taken to court, make the child accountable by making him/her, perform the kind of tasks that they would have to do to earn their allowance. Once they've completed those tasks, you can tell them: "Great Job, now you only owe me (this amount) of hard work, before you have paid the court/lawyer fees that we had to pay, to keep you out of jail. Once those bills are paid, I'll start putting money in your pocket again, so that you can hang out with your friends. Until that time you're still grounded, but if you continue to do as well as you've done so far, you might be able to earn some of your other privileges back, under close supervision."

If the child commits a serious offense, then the parents should be held just as accountable, and they need to do some jail-time. If that child has killed someone, using a gun that was carelessly left out, his/her parents need to go to jail, as well as the kid. Parents usually know when something is seriously bothering their kids, and should seek outside help if they do not have the skills to remedy that problem.

The biggest problem is that parents are too busy, or too lazy to seek the required help. But there are avenues that are available to all, if they choose to pursue them.

Just my 1 yen worth.:old:

NBTP

[Mad Hatter]

I agree with NBTP... where were the parents? But could you imagine a 13 year old in the middle of a bunch of 30 year old rapist and other convicts?

"Who want their salad tossed?"

i bet that he cell mate would think that he had die and gone to heaven

[kombu_kid]

Boy, that's so weird. I was just thinking about starting a thread on this subject.

That's because I really don't get where they come up with the idea of trying kids as adults, I really don't. They say boys don't mature as quickly as girls, and boys have that "I gotta prove I'm a man" thing going on as well. Put a 13 year-old boy in a group of older gangbangers, and I'm sure he'll be ready to do just about anything to prove himself.

I can't think of anything more evil than for an older person to lead a child astray like these 'bangers do, encouraging them to kill innocent people to "prove themself" worthy of getting into the gang.

I just don't agree with trying the kid as an adult. To me, it's almost like giving up on him. Not to say that I don't think he should be punished. I think there are a hundred ways to punish a minor without dropping him in the middle of "the system".

BTW, my guess is that a lot of these troubled kids come from broken homes, no dads or dad's in jail. Probably something going on at home. Also, with the need for both parents to work nowadays doesn't help.

The reason I thought about starting a thread about this subject is that I saw another article about a 19 year-old guy who had a 17 year-old girlfriend, and her parents were going to charge him with statutory rape. I thought, how weird is that? That the government can charge a 13 year-old boy as an adult, yet this 17 year old girl has no idea what she's doing with this guy. Not to mention that her parents COULD okay her marriage in many states a lot earlier than 17.

Or that a 17 year-old male can join the military and die for his country. Just seems like a lot of contradictions there.

[dk]

I thought, how weird is that? That the government can charge a 13 year-old boy as an adult, yet this 17 year old girl has no idea what she's doing with this guy. Not to mention that her parents COULD okay her marriage in many states a lot earlier than 17.

Or that a 17 year-old male can join the military and die for his country. Just seems like a lot of contradictions there.
I agree with you. I've always thought this was rediculous.

[Tempestuous]

I agree that there is a major abuse of the statutory rape law.
When a kid is going to school and is dating the same girl throughout high school and then ~Happy Birthday~ he turns 18 and she is not and he gets slammed with rape charges, it's bogus.

I also think it is stupid when people have an outrage in the military when some first term-er (that is 17 or 18 yrs old) is hanging around the high-school crowd and dating some commander's daughter. *gasp* He is IN the military he shouldn't be dating a high-school girl......DUH!!!
Check his age, he is dating his age. There was actually a guy in our squadron that was being investigated for such a "crime".


There was a case where there was a young teenage girl(13) and boy(12) that had consensual sex that resulted in a pregnancy. The state actually charged both of them with rape of a minor or some crap like that.
They are being viewed as both the perpetrator AND the victim in the case. :rolleyes:

~~~~


As for my OP- I was really thinking about these kids that commit heinous crimes.

Like those two boys that were like 11 & 12 that killed their Dad with a baseball bat.

Do you think they deserve to be tried as adults?
Did they make an adult decision?

Did they have the mental ability and capacity to fully grasp the outcome of their actions?

Did they decide to chose their actions because "punishment will only be until I am 18" so it is worth it?

Should we have a section in the penitentiaries set apart for youngsters who are underage and tried as adults?
I mean look at this kid http://www.derekandalexking.org/images/alexking01.jpg and tell me you don't think he would likely be sexually abused & mutilated in prison with the adult population.

Should we look at having maximum security juvenile facility someplace?

[Boost]

Holy crap Temp!!! Whew, think I got my reading requirement knocked out for the day! :)

To keep it short and simple, I do think there are certain cases where a "child" should be tried as an adult based on mental capacity, crime commited, so on and so on.

However, if convicted I do think they should either be seperated from the general prison population or sent to a high security juevie jail until they are 18-21 years of age before moving them into the regular prison population.

[Asshat]

No. Never. The punishment for juvenile crimes should be increased perhaps. Everything about trying a child as an adult smacks of dual standard.

Also, in many cases parents can not control or make an impact on thier child. It would be wrong to hold parents accountable.

Unfortunuately, by my definitions, no one is accountable if a child commits a crime. That is the reason some children are tried as adults. After all, our system of punishment isn't about rehabilition. It's to make those suckers pay.

[Tempestuous]

Holy crap Temp!!! Whew, think I got my reading requirement knocked out for the day! :)


Yeah, I know!!!
I at least put a **Warning** label on there. :o

I guess I could split it up...... Let me see what I can do.

[Tempestuous]

I think that the parents of the child, need to be held accountable up to a certain age. Once the child is old enough (you decide when the time is right) to understand the difference between right, or wrong, you lay down the law. If they do something wrong, the punishment needs to fit the crime.

The child needs to be punished in such a way, that it gets his/her attention right away. Loss of computer privileges, taking away an i_pod, isn't going to get their attention. If it's a small thing, and the parents are taken to court, make the child accountable by making him/her, perform the kind of tasks that they would have to do to earn their allowance. Once they've completed those tasks, you can tell them: "Great Job, now you only owe me (this amount) of hard work, before you have paid the court/lawyer fees that we had to pay, to keep you out of jail. Once those bills are paid, I'll start putting money in your pocket again, so that you can hang out with your friends. Until that time you're still grounded, but if you continue to do as well as you've done so far, you might be able to earn some of your other privileges back, under close supervision."

If the child commits a serious offense, then the parents should be held just as accountable, and they need to do some jail-time. If that child has killed someone, using a gun that was carelessly left out, his/her parents need to go to jail, as well as the kid. Parents usually know when something is seriously bothering their kids, and should seek outside help if they do not have the skills to remedy that problem.

The biggest problem is that parents are too busy, or too lazy to seek the required help. But there are avenues that are available to all, if they choose to pursue them.

Just my 1 yen worth.:old:

NBTP


I don't think the parents in all cases should do jail time if their kid commits a crime. I think there would be the need to look at parental involvement to do that.
No one can control EVERY action, choice or behavior of another person. That's like saying we should go after the weather man and hold him accountable when he said it would be sunny & it actually rains.
There is only so much a person can do.

You can assess each case on a case by case basis and see if there is negligence on the parents part.
But I don't know that the parents are 100% responsible for every action their children take.


My Mom had a troubled kid, she tried her best to do what she could to get them straightened out.
She could see they were heading down a more obstructed path and tried to stop it. She called every state agency she could.

She was told- until they actually commit a crime & get caught nothing can be done. Well, what more is there to do? There was no intervention available, she had tried every avenue she could think of to implement at home with no success.

This child lived 10yrs in a home with physical, emotional and mental abuse- trying to phase them with grounding, spanking, manual labor or other punishments was useless (though she did try).
Unless you went to the extreme where it became abuse- nothing you did was as bad as what they had already endured.

So by saying my Mom needed to pay the restitution when he committed a crime seems odd. She was paying everyday for an upbringing she did not even instill. She was the one loving a child who didn't want to be loved. She was the one trying to get him help when no one wanted to help until after he stepped over the ledge.
She did what she could and it still wasn't enough to stop the behavior.
She even resorted phoning the police on a regular basis.
She ended up with her own detective.

In the end it did work out.
They finally committed a crime (broke into a car & stole it) in which the police caught them IN the vehicle and wha-la they were in the system so now the agencies could look at enrolling the delinquent in a program.

My mom was involved trying to stop things before they happened, before they actually started breaking the law she sought help and found none.
Until the child actually takes an unlawful action there is little intervention available.

So to flat out say "well the parents should be the ones that pay for the the crime their child committed. What about the agencies that failed to help when asked to?

There is more to it than JUST the parental side.
As some one else mentioned, a lot of the criminal kids are in broken homes, there is more help needed than what one full time working parent can provide.