Aug 14th, 2008
Posted by Ian Thompson, ACLU at 1:14pm	Keep America Safe & Free

New Report Shows Pitfalls of Trying Kids as Adults

Things are usually pretty slow here in D.C. during the month of August, but we got some exciting news yesterday from the Department of Justice of all places. Can you believe it? Yeah, me neither.

Nevertheless, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) released a report that showed the pitfalls of trying children as adults. The report entitled Juvenile Transfer Laws: An Effective Deterrent to Delinquency? (PDF) concluded:

• Laws to make it easier to transfer youth to the adult criminal court system have little or no general deterrent effect, meaning they do not prevent youth from engaging in criminal behavior;
• Youth transferred to the adult system are more likely to be rearrested and to reoffend than youth who committed similar crimes, but were retained in the juvenile justice system;

It would seem the reflexive “get tough” approach that many elected officials favor for addressing juvenile crime actually only creates the kind of career criminals that cause society problems for years down the road. Simply put, the adult system is not equipped to deal with the needs of children, which, if addressed, actually help to prevent recidivism. That would seem like the win-win everyone can support no? As the NY Times presciently stated today:

Young people who commit serious, violent crimes deserve severe punishment. But reflexively transferring juvenile offenders — many of whom are accused of nonviolent crimes — into the adult system is not making anyone safer. When they are locked up with adults, young people learn criminal behaviors. They are also deprived of the counseling and family support that they would likely get in the juvenile system, which is more focused on rehabilitation. And once they are released, their felony convictions make it hard for them to find a job and rebuild their lives.

Juvenile Transfer Laws will hopefully provide our elected officials and those all-knowing shapers of public policy with the necessary information to stop creating career criminals out of children when better, more appropriate avenues are available. Next up, we need to move to end the pariah practice of sentencing children to life in prison with no possibility of parole.

Permalink |	Keep America Safe & Free

1. John Says:
   Aug 14th, 2008 at 7:31pm

   "Next up, we need to move to end the pariah practice of sentencing children to life in prison with no possibility of parole. "
   Exlain something to me, why is it alright to murder someone at 14 but not at 25. Does being young mean that it is alright to commit murder.
   Letting a murder or violent offender free is a slap in the face of the victim of the criminals crime.

2. Andy Says:
   Aug 15th, 2008 at 3:17pm

   'Exlain something to me, why is it alright to murder someone at 14 but not at 25. Does being young mean that it is alright to commit murder.'

   Dear John,
   Nobody is saying that murderers should go free. Why is it that when anyone advocates prison reform people start saying 'oh, you think the criminals should go free do you?' NOBODY THINKS THAT.

3. Avendora Says:
   Aug 19th, 2008 at 12:00am

   The intent of the Juvenile Judicial System is to protect the juveniles who don't know better (or as much as an adult should) from the adult punishments that go along with the crime committed. That doesn't mean that the juvenile shouldn't be punished, just not as severely as an adult because they don't know the same things an adult does. The are still in most cases seen as innocents.

   Legally, it's call "Age of Culpability." It's very important, yet it is widely forgoten in todays Judicial System.

4. SexOffenderIssues Says:
   Aug 19th, 2008 at 12:32am

   See all these children, some as young as 4, being ruined for life:

   http://sexoffenderissues.blogspot.com/2007/12/child-sex-o ffenders.html

5. Hats Says:
   Aug 19th, 2008 at 9:47pm

   I'd love to see online chatting with young men looked at by the ACLU. My son is in prison now for chatting. He was 22, she was 15. Now his life is ruined instead of counseling for both parties involved (internet addiction and social behaviors). I don't see this as criminal intent or behavior between two people who knew each other online only for 2+ years - stupid yes, criminal? Don't think so. He never met her, just chat. Louisiana is so bad and stomps all over the Constitution. 25 years now of his life, gone.

6. dell richards Says:
   Dec 30th, 2008 at 10:50am

   One thing I do know and that is the ACLU stands for the American Communist League Union and is not for free speech at all, but to bring down the US and make it a 3rd worl country just likek all the other good for nothing countries in the world