Juvenile Justice Research

Anthony Laster was only fifteen years old when he was charged as an adult for crimes that he did not understand. He was facing "strong armed robbery and extortion" and sat in jail for four weeks because his family could not afford his bail. His crime? He stole two dollars from another kid from his school. Anthony cannot communicate more than the level of a five year old. Although Anthony's charges were dropped that does not remove the trauma that he faced. There is a fine line between giving consequences to juveniles who commit crime and ruining their entire life. Let's say that the charges against Anthony had not been dropped, then what? According to Florida Department for Corrections the average jail time for a robbery conviction in the year 1997 is 6.9 years. That is almost seven years of hard time that Anthony Laster would have served. He would have come out roughly around twenty two years old, all for stealing two dollars. Let us consider Anthony Laster to be lucky. Laster is an excellent example of the justice system being too hard on juveniles.
Now let's look at the case of Ronnie Vera. Washington Monthly posts "He and a friend were caught stealing a bike in a neighborhood by a prominent community activist in Tuscon. Ronnie turned to run. His friend pulled out a gun and shot and killed the community activist. One year later, a jury convicted both Ronnie and his friend of murder." Ronnie was only sixteen years old at the time. He is now serving a twenty-five to life sentence in an adult prison. Ronnie was charged with first degree murder and burglary in the first degree. Ronnie is in no doubt guilty of theft, but murder? No. This is yet another example of the justice system being too tough on juveniles.
Cracking down on juvenile crime does not work as a deterrent. It does not work because adult prisons are too harsh. The adult prison system does not correct inmates. Juveniles who go into adult prisons at a young age and come out in their midlife will struggle with finding a job, not violating their parole, and adjusting to life in the real world. Howard Husock, the vice president for policy research for The Manhattan Institute for Policy Research said "About 700,000 inmates are released from state and federal prison each year. Of those released, about two-thirds re-offend within three years." While I do not believes that the crimes that juveniles commit should be taken lightly, a mistake a person made as a kid should not ruin their whole future. The two-thirds of the inmates who are released then return, return with a reason, but for those who are juveniles at the time of their incarceration were not taught any better. The human male brain is not fully developed until the age of twenty-five, so a young man who is incarcerated let's say at the age of seventeen will still be developing mentally for eight years in prison. Eight years. What they have learned and developed in those eight years sets them up to be re-incarcerated.


http://library.cqpress.com/cqresearcher/document.php?id=cqresrre2001042700&type=hitlist&num=0
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/1999/9906.twohey.littleton.htm
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35263313/ns/business-careers/