Should children be exposed to hard punishments for crimes?

[KALE CAREY]

There are cases like this that repeat a decades -old debate: Should young people be exposed to harder punishments for serious crimes?

Experts say – present a pendulum.

Three decades ago, the company saw teenagers who committed violent crimes as the “new breed” of criminals.

[Hillary Clinton, Former First Lady]

“It is often the types of children who are referred to as great predators, no conscience, no empathy.”

[KALE CAREY]

In a narrative media – due to the widespread term.

The pendulum swung heavily – much hard in terms of crime laws and had children brought to court as adults in court halls.

Then came a layer. The supporters fought back and fought for reforms.

The rhetoric then turned as a college for criminals around the prison, which led to teenagers entering and were willing to commit more serious crimes.

The goal: children help – no handcuffs.

But now this pendulum swings again – the punishment.

[Amy Borror, Senior Youth Policy Strategist, Gault Center]

“At least in the public narrative and some media and some legislators, more, according to the kind of Super -predator idea, in the idea of ​​children. We have to punish them.”

[KALE CAREY]

Amy Borror Amy Borror uses her role in the non -profit Gault Center to promote the conversation for rehabilitation – and focuses on why youth crimes not only do that.

[Amy Borror, Senior Youth Policy Strategist, Gault Center]

“The ecosystem for a child, the children who do not get involved in the court systemHose are places where the districts are safe and the schools are well financed, and parents have jobs that pay enough to keep a roof over the heads and food in their bellies. “

[KALE CAREY

CO-FOUNDER AND CHIEF LEGAL OFFICER MARSHA LEVICK OF THE JUVENILE LAW CENTER SAYS RACE STILL PLAYS A MAJOR ROLE IN HOW THE SYSTEM WORKS — INCLUDING WHO ENDS UP IN CORRECTIONAL FACILITIES ACROSS THE COUNTRY.

[Marsha Levick, co-founder/chief legal officer Juvenile Law Center]

“It was populated 50 years ago by black and brown children 50 years ago. It is still mostly populated by black and brown children. “

[KALE CAREY]

In the past fifty years, she says that it has been the same struggle – both inside and outside the judicial system – to end the racist differences that continue to shape the results for young people.

[Marsha Levick, co-founder/chief legal officer Juvenile Law Center]

“We know year after year, decade in the decade that the police are present in color communities. And children are picked up and arrested and stopped and searched for things and possibly that do not happen in white communities. And not surprisingly, this means that more of these children end up in the judicial system. “

[KALE CAREY]

The lawyers of youth jurisdiction call it anecdotically – leaves of youth criminal, with which harder laws and harder punishments are presented.

However, some legislators say that this is part of a culture of the non-consequence and then urges itself to turn back earlier reforms.

Louisiana, a state that has long been known to be hard, has already made this shift. In 2023, governor Jeff Landry signed a crime package in the legislative insulation of a measure that treats 17-year-old who is accused of crime as an adult in accordance with the law.

[Marsha Levick, co-founder/chief legal officer Juvenile Law Center]

“It was only in the past few months or two that they had a choice, a referendum on constitutional changes that would have gone further to put young people as adults in court, and they were rejected by the Louisiana voters of two to one.”

[KALE CAREY]

The Republicans of North Carolina said goodbye to similar laws in 2024 and aimed at 16 and 17 year olds who commit serious crimes. When the package was adopted, the legislator pointed out to an increase in violent crime by two percent – and an increase in property crime – as its reason for measures.

The office for youth jurisdiction and delinquency prevention published an estimate of the number of arrests in 2023 across the country.

Between 1980 and 2020 there was a steady decline in youth arrest rates – a maximum of 1996, with more than eight thousand young people being behind bars.

In a similar trend that was held in youth judicial centers, between 2000 and 2022 fell by 75 percent.

[Kim Hawekotte, Deputy County Administrator over Juvenile Justice]

“Youth crime has dropped since about 2010 and it continued on this trajectory to go, and then Covid met, and Covid really reduced the numbers.”

[KALE CAREY]

Less arrests do not mean that the crime is not available. In 2020… young people under the age of 17 were accused of murder, robbery and other violent guys, which, according to OJJDP, had almost 425,000 detention.

The deputy administrator of Douglas County, Kim Hawkotte, who monitors the youth jurisdiction in the U -Bahn Omaha, says that she saw a shift mail covid – more children who are charged with serious crimes, including classes 1 and two crimes.

[Kim Hawekotte, Deputy County Administrator over Juvenile Justice]

“If I look back for two years, I might have 20 to 25 young people in our community in the adult system for one or two crimes in class one. I can tell you that I still have 42 to date So these numbers have increased. “

[KALE CAREY]

The FBI Incident's national reporting system is based on the FBI has compiled information from almost 3,500 law enforcement authorities – between 2016 and 2022 18,000 in the United States.

If you look at the figures from 2022 compared to 2016, the total crime of young people decreased by around 14%.

Although youth crime has dropped in recent years, there is an exception: young people use weapons more often to commit them.

The use of firearms in young people increased by 21%… which means that weapons play a greater role in youth crime than in previous years

The data begins to move depending on the age.

For teenagers between 15 and 17, the crimes decreased by 23%. For younger children, the crimes rose between 10 and 14 – by almost 9%.

Some of the biggest drops were burglary, theft and robbery – but the murders committed by young people rose by around 65%.

According to Hawkotte, the community programming has worked after thirty years and has shown that it promotes the numbers and keeps children away from the system – bit by bit until they come to the root of the problem.

[Kim Hawekotte, Deputy County Administrator over Juvenile Justice]

“You really have to find out when this adolescent commits some of these hideous crimes. Is it decisive in this youth that they will continue to crime, or was it an impulsive behavior?”

[KALE CAREY]

Some of this question meant that many of the court dockets that we have seen over the years – many of which the youth court system we see today – shaped

The first youth court in Chicago Illinois was founded in 1899 – now in 2025. This number is in 50 systems in the USA

Six decades in 1966, when the Supreme Court of the United States said, young people earn a proper procedure before they can be sent to an adult prison.

A year later, Scotus found that the young person, who was accused of crimes, deserves a right to a lawyer and faces witnesses against them.

However, interest groups say that there are still children in court in 2017 without legal representation.

Roper is probably one of the greatest cases that have shaped the way in which young people are tried out against Simmons.

In 2005, Scotus said it was a cruel and unusual punishment to force the death penalty for everyone under the age of 18.

Even twenty years after the decision – the scientific binding raws that the judges used to neurological development of a teenager

[Kim Hawekotte, Deputy County Administrator over Juvenile Justice]

“Every time a young person goes into a prison in a prison, which from the point of view of brain development does not develop from the point of view of the brain. They stay at the age they were at the age they entered. So if you take a 13 -year -old and calculate this 13 -year -old with one or two crimes in the class one and are detained for the next 10 or 15 years, you will develop at this 13 -year -old level. “

[KALE CAREY]

A still developing prefrontal cortex, which is associated with age and environment, is what law enforcement agencies and some research work say that young people are more susceptible to gangs.

These groups will rely on the fact that young people commit their crimes – because in most cases faith is the crime system “forgiving”.

[Marsha Levick, co-founder/chief legal officer Juvenile Law Center]

“I don't think there is a lot of evidence that this is going on at all. And I also think that the commitment of young people is back in really formal gang activities that it is there and is not present in another place.”

[KALE CAREY]

According to the National Crime Prevention Council, public schools are used as a recruitment tool for gangs.

The Council website says: “You can recruit children at the age of nine because you know that the judicial system is more forgiving for younger children and that younger members can therefore be sacrificed with risky jobs for the gang.”

The National Gang Center has the latest figures for gang membership among minors.

The proportion of gang members under the age of 18 fell from 50 percent in 1996 to 35 percent in 2011.

Since the debate continues year after year – between accountability, understanding as well as punishment and possibility – a question remains:
Do we build a system that blames youth and at the same time invests in rehabilitation?

Because experts say that every statistics represents a story, and every young person in custody is part of a larger system and a society that determines the next steps.

Further information on this story and other detailed reporting can be found in the Mobilfunk app of the Straight Arrow News.

I am Kale Carey for just Arrow News