Читать книгу Criminology For Dummies - Steven Briggs - Страница 33

What do you do with a kid who commits a crime? In the United States, the system for dealing with juvenile offenders is different from the one dealing with adults. The primary reason for having a separate system is that society recognizes that because kids aren’t yet mature, society shouldn’t hold them fully responsible for their misconduct. Recent science supports the idea that until children’s brains are fully developed (at around the age of 25), they’re more likely to be impulsive and exercise poor judgment. Thus, it’s no wonder that roughly a third of all crimes are committed by people 24 and under.

When a juvenile is arrested, he’s assigned a juvenile counselor who works closely with him to get him back on the law-abiding track, which means identifying problems at home, drug use, or other environmental factors that are causing difficulty.

Most juveniles are given the chance to avoid formal trials and, thus, avoid creating permanent records by handling their cases informally. In other words, they admit their conduct to the juvenile counselor and are given some form of light punishment, such as community service.

For more serious offenses, or for chronic offenders, the system may treat the juvenile formally. This means he has the right to an attorney and a trial before a judge. If he’s found responsible (kids aren’t found “guilty”), the judge can sentence him to do some time in a local juvenile facility or even a state-run youth correctional facility — the equivalent of an adult state prison. However, recognizing that incarcerating kids is often counterproductive, there’s a strong bias against ordering kids to do time. Usually judges don’t incarcerate kids unless they repeatedly violate their probation.

For very serious offenses, such as murder or rape, all states have laws that allow judges to waive the kid into adult court. In other words, the kid is tried like an adult and, if found guilty, sentenced like an adult. So in most states, a 16-year-old murderer can be sentenced to life in prison. If you’re interested in more details about the juvenile justice system, turn to Chapter 22.