Eng215
Juvenile defendants are getting processed in a system that is not geared to deal appropriately with them. Focusing on punishment rather than rehabilitation for juvenile offenders, we put them into a system that is treating children in a manner that is fundamentally unfair. When a young person commits a serious crime, the criminal justice system seems ill-equipped to properly handle the situation. There are numerous problems with the adult court system as it pertains to trying juvenile defendants. Our system of justice doesn’t seem to have been made to handle juveniles who commit serious crimes. The blanket solution seems to be to treat such offenders as adults. The thinking seems to be on the order of “adult crime equals adult punishment. “The system is not geared to fairly try juveniles in adult court, juries tend to enter into such cases with an inherent bias assuming guilt for the simple reason that the juvenile is being treated as an adult, and the corrections system is ill equipped to properly rehabilitate juvenile convicts.
Juveniles can't vote, drink, drive, or serve in the military. They are judged to lack the emotional capacity or maturity to enter into these acts, but when they commit a violent crime, their lack of development or maturity is suddenly ignored. It is difficult to establish that a juvenile is capable of competently assisting in his own defense. A growing body of research indicates that juveniles lack the intellectual and emotional capacity to participate meaningfully in adult court proceedings. Often, it is the surrounding they grow up in that teaches them the wrong way to handle situations. Neuropsychologists say the human brain does not fully mature until 25. (Ortiz, 2004) Although some may ague that juveniles have adults to guide them through procedures, there have been numerous reported cases where the adults have not been present in key parts of the legal process. A juvenile in such situations might find the conditions of a courtroom proceeding too intimidating to be able to act appropriately on their own behalf. Additionally, once their eligibility to be tried as an adult is established, the defendants are robbed of the opportunity to argue want of understanding as an affirmative defense. They are assumed to be capable of understanding all of the implications of the act for which they are accused. A twelve-year-old boy from Florida named Lionel Tate in murdered his six-year old neighbor in 1999. The victim, named Tiffany Eunick, died when Lionel performed a wrestling move on her that he had seen many times done on TV. (Aguayo, 2006) According to the reports of the press at the time, Lionel, who was a fan of the pro wrestling entertainment franchise, had dropped his full the torso of the girl, leading with his knee during this “wrestling match.” (Aguayo, 2006) as a result of Lionel’s actions, the victim suffered from broken ribs, a fractured skull, and damage to several internal organs. (Aguayo, 2006) The result of all of these injuries was internal bleeding, leading to the death of the victim. (Aguayo, 2006) After two years, Lionel was tried in an adult court for murder in the first degree. (Aguayo, 2006) He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison without parole, the youngest person to receive such a sentence in modern American history. (Aguayo, 2006) Lionel, who was twelve years old at the time of the incident, could make no defense based on his flawed understanding of the reality of “professional wrestling”. (Aguayo, 2006) He could not arguer that he was unaware of the potential consequences of his actions. (Aguayo, 2006) Such arguments could at least bean made to mitigate his culpability for his act. Because of these deficiencies in his defense, Lionel was convicted of First Degree murder, which indicates that the prosecution was able to convince the jury that not only did he act with the specific intent to kill the victim; he acted with “malice aforethought”, which means he began the acts with the goal of murder in mind. (Aguayo, 2006) Lionel was sentenced to life in prison, Although that conviction was thrown out upon appeal. (Aguayo, 2006)
In many juvenile cases, jury bias is almost guaranteed by the system. In Lionel’s case, pre-trial proceedings took two years, during which Lionel grew for an obviously juvenile twelve-year-old to a nearly adult fourteen-year-old. (Aguayo, 2006) Although the jury was undoubtedly informed of the age of Lionel when he committed the act, they were subjected every day to the view of a fourteen-year-old who had spent his previous two years incarcerated. Despite instruction from the judge and arguments from the defense, this image must have been difficult for a jury to overcome. Coupled with the brutal specifics of the act, Lionel entered the trial with two strikes against him. In addition, jurors, as laymen, are unaware of the neurophysiologic differences’ between children and adults. (Ortiz, 2004) Because their brains are still changing and the prefrontal cortex-, which is an area of the brain responsible for regulating aggression, long range planning, mental flexibility, and abstract thinking is not yet fully developed in juveniles, it is impossible to reasonably judge then by the same standards as one judges adults. (Ortiz, 2004) The amygdale is the center of impulsive and aggressive behavior, and this portion of the brain is unlimited by the pre-frontal cortex due to its underdevelopment in juveniles. (Ortiz, 2004) The Supreme Court recognized this physiological difference in Roper V Simmons. Writing for the majority, Justice Kennedy cited a body of sociological and scientific research that confirmed that juveniles, as compared to adults, have underdeveloped senses of respobnsibility, and little sense of the consequences of their own actions. (Roper v. Simmons, 2005) In this research, juveniles were found to appear in disproportionately large numbers in almost every category of reckless behavior. (Roper v. Simmons, 2005) Anyone lay person in a jury would be unaware of these critical facts.
If the goal of incarceration is rehabilitation, the system does a great disservice to juveniles by punishing them as adults. It does not facilitate the child’s rehabilitation to put him in an adult prison adults who have been convicted of serious crimes. Prisons are not constructed with rehabilitation as a key goal, and they are unlikely to accomplish the goal specifically as it relates to juvenile prisoners. (Young & Gainsborough 2000) Children placed in facilities intended for adults are five times more likely to be sexually assaulted, twice as likely to be beaten by staff, seventy percent more likely to be attacked with a weapon and nine times more likely to commit suicide as offenders in juvenile facilities. (Young & Gainsborough 2000) Other aspects of the legal system recognize the differences between children and adults. Juvenile are not granted the same rights nor burdened with the same responsibilities as adults (e.g. voting, smoking, joining the military) because the law recognizes their inability to make decisions like adults. (Young & Gainsborough 2000) It is foolishly inconsistent not to apply the same standards in the criminal justice system. Exceptions to age limitations for the Draft and Voting are non-existent, so it should stand the reason that such exceptions should not exist in the criminal justice system. (Young & Gainsborough 2000) Recent shows that sending juveniles to adult court has no negative effect upon recidivism, but rather increases the incidence of recidivism for juveniles so dealt with. (Young & Gainsborough 2000) juveniles, especially when compared to adults, are placed properly in their development for reformation and rehabilitation. (Young & Gainsborough 2000) Prisons do not promote such activities; whereas juvenile detention centers do. Lionel Tate provides an excellent example of the “training” one receives in prison. After his life sentence was reduced, and he was released on probation in 2006, Lionel was again arrested for armed robbery. (Aguayo, 2006) At nineteen years of age, the was no question of his being tried as an adult. He was sentenced to ten years in prison. (Aguayo, 2006) The prison system took a juvenile defender and turned him into an adult criminal. A better way to approach juvenile offenders, even the most violent ones, is to make a reasonable attempt at rehabilitation prior to “giving up” on an offender and “storing” then away in prison for their entire adult lives. (Young & Gainsborough 2000) Punishment is a method whose utility has been clinically disproven for such goals as teaching new skills, or developing new habits, beliefsa and attitudes. These are goals that are associated with rehabilitation. (Young & Gainsborough 2000)
As time passes, the developing juvenile offender ceases to be the same person who committed the act. (Young & Gainsborough 2000) This fact illustrates the necessity of at least a case-by-case review of the development of juvenile convicts upon their ascension to adulthood. It would be reasonable to exercise such a review in the twenty-fifth year of the offender’s life, by which time their physiological and psychological development should have proceeded to a point when an evaluation of their future threat to society might be reasonably evaluated. (Ortiz, 2004)
Juvenile offenders should not be placed in the adult penal system. The legal system is not equipped to properly adjudicate such cases. Additionally, juries are prone to have inherent biases toward juvenile defendants. Finally, the adult prison system is not meant for or beneficial to juvenile offenders. (Young & Gainsborough 2000) The ideal solution to all juvenile crime is a juvenile justice system that caters to the specific needs of juvenile defenders. They should be focused upon rehabilitation and require such punishments that would aid in rehabilitation and development of those sensitivities that are absent when the crime is committed. One example of such a punishment would be community service specifically targeted to the offenders. In cases of homicide, having offenders participate in and help with survivor groups would be one way of blending punishment and rehabilitation. The juveniles should also have access to counseling and education so that they leave the circumstances better than they arrived. Finally, it is important that their records be sealed in order to avoid creating a stigma against the offender once they have been rehabilitated. Our current habit of trying and punishing juveniles as adults has no salutary effect of society and serves only to waste potential at best and create career criminals at worst.
Work Cited
Aguayo, Terry, (2006). Youth Who Killed at 12 Will Return to Prison, but Not for Life. New York Times, March 2, 2006.
Ortiz, Adam, (2004). Adolescence, Brain Development and Legal Culpability . American Bar Association Juvenile Justice Center. January 2004.
Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. 551 (2005)
Young, M. & Gainsborough, J. (2000) Prosecuting Juveniles in Adult Court: An Assessment of Trends and Consequences Retrieved from The Sentencing Project: http://www.prisonpolicy.org/scans/sp/juvenile.pdf on 5/7/14.
