When teenagers are tried as adults

Over the years of watching, reading the news, I noticed that in some serious cases, teenagers who committed a serious crime, are being charged as adults. That is ok with me and I agree with this, but I know a lot of people don’t. That seems to really stir up debates on the internet and lead to a lot of people being offended, by these kids or teenagers that are being charged as adults for their crimes.

The criminal justice system is complex, and many people are unaware of the laws and regulations surrounding it. In particular, the juvenile justice system can be confusing and leave many unanswered questions when a juvenile is charged as an adult. You read in the news that a juvenile was charged as an adult and a lot of people get really upset over this. Typically, these factors usually play a role in these decisions.

1. The age and the court discretion.
2. The seriousness of the crime
3. The juvenile’s criminal history

Doing a bit of research, the judge will use their own discretion as to how the minor is tried based on a few factors. These include: age, seriousness of offence, past criminal activity, and whether a juvenile is amenable to treatment. It really comes down to the question, “Will the juvenile justice system actually ‘treat’ the perpetrator?” For example, if the perpetrator was 17 and had a record of crime despite being placed in the juvenile justice system, the judge can come to a reasonable conclusion that juvenile detention is an ineffective plan of action. Precedent also becomes critical in setting a non-tangible code of conduct for how perps should be tried based on previous cases. Over time and as more cases arise, this code of conduct has assimilated into a fairly conducive protocol on how and when a juvenile should be tried in adult court. People get outraged without thinking about our laws. They are there for a reason, to protect human life.

Some states have transfer laws that allow or require young offenders to be prosecuted as adults for more serious offenses. For example, in Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina, Texas, and Wisconsin, the juvenile/adult line is drawn at age 16. In Arkansas, the age at which a juvenile case can be transferred to adult court is 14, and in California it’s 16. Yes it might be young in some people’s eyes but it is how the law was decided. While juveniles may be held responsible for their actions, research shows that they are less blameworthy than adults and are more capable of change and rehabilitation. Some say that punishing children the same way as adults does not advance public safety. 

People who commit crimes as juveniles are more likely to be recidivist. FBI data shows that people who commit petty crimes generally move on to commit more serious crimes, until they are eventually held accountable. Sometimes letting people out, with wishful thinking that they have been reformed, can cause more harm to the community, when the person commits another crime such as murder, taking another person’s life. Is it fair for multiples people to lose their life in the hope that one person will be reformed ?

It is not just a charge thrown at the juvenile, it’s by no means taken lightly. There are a lot of steps involved into making such a decision and there are multiple reasons why the juvenile is being tried as an adult. It doesn’t mean that the kid is going to receive a death sentence, not at all. There are many different charges for juveniles and adults. Obviously adults usually get much more serious charges for their crimes, while most juveniles commit petty crimes that don’t lead to serious charges. But what happens when a juvenile commits a serious crime ? Here are a few examples of teenagers who have committed very serious crimes and were tried as adults.

• Omaha teens charged as adults in murder of 64-year-old man, carjacking.
• Two 15 year-olds suspected of killing a 52-year-old woman in January will be charged as adults for murder, NEW ORLEANS.
• Wichita teen arrested in deadly drive-by shooting formally charged with murder as adult
• Kodiak teen formally charged as adult for beach explosion that injured 11
• Pa. teen charged with vehicular homicide, third-degree murder in fatal crash
• 15-year-old boy from Vancouver was responsible for the Eagle Creek Fire after throwing a firecracker into a dry ravine in the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area.
• A 13 years old girl stabbed her 9 years old brother to death.

Those are just a few examples of teens who committed serious crimes leading to an adult charge. There are consequences to every action. Would it be fair, to let a 15 years old teenager who callously murdered an innocent person, to simply charge them with community service ? A teenager absolutely knows right from wrong. It does not have anything to do with the brain not being developed enough.

On that note I don’t even know where the scientific proof of such a claim comes from, that our brains do not completely develop before the age of 25 years old. We also have people who defend these kids who commit murder saying that their brain is not fully developed. I have never heard, read, from solid sources, that our brains stop developing at the age of 25. I’m not talking about random sites or reddit, Quora as solid sources.

As we grow up, we learn a lot of our behaviors from our parents and our entourage, just like animals do. We start acquiring a lot of knowledge to help us advance mentally and emotionally, with our parent’s help. It is up to our parents to raise well adjusted teenagers that will thrive in society without harming people. Some teenagers, I will admit, even though, having good parents, education, seem to just be void of any empathy and go on to commit crimes anyway. But for the most part and the majority of people, we learned almost everything from our parents, besides school. Even very young people know that certain behaviors are wrong. Even a 2 months old puppy learned that going potty in the house is wrong. This is why you need to teach them to go outside, and they eventually learn not to relieve themselves in the house.

However, when kids are killing other people, there is something terribly wrong with that kid that is not age dependent. Psychopaths and narcissists do not come from innocent children, that one day, at age 12, flip out and become evil. Children can be straight up evil. Perhaps the terminology should just be changed, but children definitely deserve to be punished by law if they commit heinous crimes. They have been that way, just waiting for the opportunity to do something terrible. For example, Carly Greggs, the teenage girl accused of killing her mother in cold blood and attempting to kill her stepfather. We will never know why she killed her mother. Some say that she did it because her mother was snooping in her bedroom to look for evidence that she was doing drugs and had burner phones. If that is the case, or even if it wasn’t it, how can anyone defend the teenager by saying that they made a mistake or their brain was not fully developed…This is just one example out of many others.

So, my question is: if so many “kids” are already acting like psychopaths and narcissists at such a young age and are involved in violent and bloody murders; then why would you allow them to drink and drive at that age as well ? I know it’s not the majority, but a lot of teenagers get stopped for DUI, causing accidents, crashes, killing people.

It’s not about being a mistake, being a teenager, or doing something stupid. It’s about hurting people or damaging properties, using ressources, money from the state and more. They are being charged as an adult so the punishment fits the crime. Why do kids and juveniles commit these crimes in the first place ? Should the parents be blamed ? Is it lack of parenting ? Where does it start ? Some people might say that, most kids over the age of 10 are old enough to make conscious decisions, know what is right from wrong, but do they ? I know for a fact that when I was around that age, it never occurred to me to kill an innocent person knowing that there would be severe consequences to doing something like that. Of course we are all allowed as human beings, to use self defense to defend our lives and there is nothing wrong with that. I did steal money from my parents, even though I knew that if I got caught, I would be punished for doing that. I knew that for doing something wrong, there would be punishment. I got punished plenty, I got spanked as well and It never occurred to me to kill my parents, even though i was severely physically abused, like a lot of other people who didn’t kill or hurt their parents.

So what happened over the years ?

A lot of parents refuse to take the blame for their kids’ actions. I also noticed that there is a deep lack of parenting out there with some kids, and that it happens more often, but when parents do punish their kids especially in public, they are criticized for it or stared down like they are doing something atrocious. The refusal from the government and parents to punish their kids for their actions is leading to more violent crimes. People are so busy working, taking care of the kids, or have kids that they didn’t even want in the first place and there goes the necessary parenting to teach those children that what they are doing is wrong.

There are also a lot of kids that don’t suffer the consequences of their actions from their parents. They are treated like royalty and given everything, without having to work for anything at all and there are spoiled kids who think that the world revolves around them. A lot of those kids end up having no respect for their parents later in life either, because they were never taught to respect them and older people. Have you noticed the lack of respect from kids towards older people lately ? Kids at school don’t seem to respect their teachers anymore. When I used to go to school our teachers were allowed to punish misbehaving kids, with controlled and acceptable punishment. I also know a lot of people who were spanked as kids and turned out to be great adults who learned the word respect.

We are starting to see that indeed, parents are starting to get charged as well for the crimes committed by their kids. When I was a teenager myself and everyone I know, we never thought in a million years to commit such a crime that would land us in prison. Serious crimes are really becoming problematic nowadays and becoming more and more serious even putting innocent people’s lives in danger. How do we defend this, saying that it was just a mistake ? As humans, we do make mistakes. Mistake : an action or judgment that is misguided or wrong. I would never say that a murder committed by a juvenile was a mistake. Taking an innocent life is not a mistake, it is a decision made by a teenager who does not fear consequences. Starting a large wildfire and costing the state millions of dollars in damages, ruining the scenery for everyone else and putting people’s lives in danger is not a mistake. It is a decision made by a teenager who never thought one second, that, during a drought, it would be a really stupid thing to do and cause damage and risk people’s lives and destroy the homes of many. Throwing a barrel full of gasoline on a bonfire and injuring 11 other people is not a mistake. It’s a very stupid decision made by a teenager that thought it would be cool to impress his friends by creating an explosion.

Driving by shooting people and killing them is no mistake. When you own guns and your child kills his sibling it is your responsibility as a parent to have that gun locked up so your kid doesn’t have access to it. Many lives could be spare if people stop defending these kids that commit such disgusting crimes. I think that not only might it deter other kids from committing crimes but also serve as an example that in life, there are serious consequences when you decide to act foolishly and do something so stupid that someone dies or destroys our beautiful nature. A human life is valuable as much as the person who takes it.

It is the responsibility of all adults in this world who decide to have children to protect and safeguard all the children from a harmful things and people as well as teach them that certain behaviors are not acceptable.

It’s not unheard of for a juvenile to be a violent criminal while still in middle school. Society has a duty to protect itself from violent criminals, even if the criminals are children. A person murdered by a child is just as dead as one murdered by an adult. It’s a conundrum that is difficult to solve. I agree that trying young children as adults is sometimes ridiculous, but what do you tell a grieving family when the juvenile system gives the person who murdered their loved one a slap on the wrist ?

What are your thought on the subject ?