Should Juveniles be Tried as Adults?
The American juvenile justice system was established in 1899 to differentiate between the crimes of children under the age of 18 and adults. However, more than a century later, juveniles are still tried and exposed to the adult justice system meant for fully mature offenders. In the 1990s, there were fears that youth violence was on the rise. These fears led to the creation of automatic charging and transfer laws, allowing juveniles charged with serious crimes to be prosecuted as adults. Those who support these laws argue that they increase public safety and deter future crime. However, years of research challenge the belief that trying juveniles as adults is the best thing to do. More recent studies are finding that juvenile minds are still developing and they cannot be fully culpable due to reduced impulse control, decision-making, and risk assessment. Recently, studies show that juveniles tried in adult courts may increase recidivism rather than decreasing it. There are also recent concerns over automatic charging laws and how they contribute to racial bias and patterns of overcharging. Most importantly, the juvenile justice system was created to rehabilitate juveniles and task them with community-based interventions rather than harsh punishment like the adult system. Because juveniles’ underdeveloped brains reduce their culpability, adult prosecution increases recidivism, automatic charging laws increase racial disparities and overcharging, and the juvenile system is better at rehabilitation, juveniles should not be tried as adults.
Juveniles are different from adults on a biological level. Juvenile brains aren't fully developed and they lack skills such as impulse control that otherwise functioning adults would have. Kwon from the Harvard Petrie-Flom Center explains that underdeveloped areas in a juveniles’ brain are associated with impulse control as well as rage and desire (Kwon). The juvenile brain isn't adequately equipped to handle strong emotions and impulses, leading juveniles to do things that they wouldn't do if their brains were more fully developed. Furthermore, juveniles who may commit crimes aren't likely to reoffend. Naugle cites that 63% of youth who enter the justice system never reoffend again (The Sentencing Project). This happens because as youth grow older, their minds become more developed and become better at impulse control. While these youths aren't completely blameless, courts have repeatedly decided that they are less culpable than an adult would be for the same crime. The Juvenile Law Center explains that cases such as Roper v. Simmons, Graham v. Florida, and other cases have been brought to the Supreme Court where the conclusion has been made that juveniles are less culpable due to underdeveloped impulse control and decision-making (Juvenile Law Center). However, juveniles who commit crimes should not be completely blameless. What is true is that juveniles should be tried and prosecuted as juveniles because of their underdeveloped impulse control and less likelihood of reoffending.
Furthermore, juveniles who are tried as adults actually increase their odds of future offenses and pose serious harm to juveniles in adult facilities. Naugle cites that when juveniles are tried as adults, they are more likely to commit violent crimes, more so than juveniles who went through the juvenile courts (The Sentencing Project). That is to say, if these juveniles were tried in the juvenile court they would be less likely to commit future crimes. There is also research suggesting that trying juveniles as adults does not increase public safety. In a study conducted in Baltimore, Tashea and Passarella found that 41% of juveniles who were exposed to the adult system but later transferred to juvenile court were arrested again (Tashea and Passarella 296). This statistic suggests that exposing juveniles at a young age to the adult system does not in fact increase public safety but increases the likelihood of offending.
On top of the failure the adult system has on juveniles to reduce future offenses and increase public safety, it also poses adverse consequences on juveniles exposed to the adult system. The Juvenile Law Center explains how juveniles in the adult justice system are at greater risk of sexual abuse, assault, and suicide (Juvenile Law Center). Naugle also supports the claim that youth held in adult facilities are at risk for physical and sexual abuse, as well as negative impacts on their mental health (The Sentencing Project). Knowing the impacts upon youth when trying juveniles as adults makes it clear that it is unacceptable for juveniles to be tried as adults. Prosecuting juveniles as adults seems to have the opposite effect of what is intended; it fails to deter future crime, undermines public safety, and increases the risk of harm to juveniles.
When juveniles are tried as adults, it is usually done so automatically due to automatic charging laws. Many states as well as the District of Columbia have automatic charging laws where youths who commit a crime, usually violent ones, are automatically tried as adults. These automatic trials reveal serious issues with juveniles being charged as adults. In their Baltimore study, Tashea and Passarella found that there was a noticeable disconnect between the initial charges and final dispositions juveniles faced when automatically tried as adults (Tashea and Passarella 295). Most of the time, the charges were either dropped or the youths received community-based sanctions (Tashea and Passarella 299). These findings suggest that many juveniles are initially processed in the adult system, but are later determined to be better suited for community supervision rather than being held at an adult facility. Despite this, as many as 1,900 juveniles were held in adult jails and more than 400 in prisons in 2022 (The Sentencing Project). This may not sound like much, but every youth held in adult facilities face the negative consequences that come with being a juvenile in the adult justice system. This shows that automatic charging laws are not only harmful to youth sentenced as adults, but all youth charged as adults. That being said, if youth are automatically charged as adults but don't end up being prosecuted as adults, it becomes questionable whether automatic charging laws are necessary in the first place. Rather than prosecuting juveniles in the juvenile system, automatic charging laws open the door for overcharging and unnecessarily expose youth to prolonged detention as well as harsher legal consequences.
The most appropriate way to charge juveniles is through the juvenile justice system. The juvenile justice system was specifically designed to prioritize rehabilitation and youth needs, making it the best way to treat juvenile offenders. In their article, the American Bar Association discusses how the juvenile justice system was created to shield children from lengthy prison times and harsh sentences from the adult justice system (The American Bar Association). Since its inception in 1899, the juvenile justice system has been working hard to keep children safe, but in the 1990s, new laws and ideas formed calling for juveniles to be tried and treated as adults (The American Bar Association). This goes to show that compared to the establishment of the juvenile justice system, the idea that some juveniles should be tried and automatically tried as adults is relatively new. This is unfortunate, because adult facilities don't have the resources required for juveniles to be rehabilitated. The Juvenile Law Center discusses how when youths are taken away from their communities and education by being held in adult facilities, it makes it more difficult for their rehabilitation (“The Juvenile Law Center”). Naugle also echoes the message that adult facilities do not have the adequate care to support a juveniles’ mental and developmental health (The Sentencing Project). If adult detention centers aren't fit to house juveniles, it raises the question as to why they are holding them at all. On top of this, community-based sanctions have proven to be more beneficial. Tashea and Passarella find that community-based sanctions lower recidivism and are more cost-effective (Tashea and Passarella 300-301). Because the juvenile system better addresses the needs of the youth, reduces future crime, and is more cost-effective, it makes charging juveniles as adults a very questionable move that does more harm to the general public than benefits.
It's easy to get caught in the argument that juveniles should be tried as adults. After all, youths should have accountability for their actions and the public should be kept safe from dangerous juveniles. In 2019 there were an estimated 8900 juveniles tried as adults in the United States (The Sentencing Project), and the most violent felonies and homicides usually lead to juveniles being tried as adults (Juvenile Law Center). However, punitive measures from being tried as an adult would not keep the public safe. The research shows that court intervention would actually increase recidivism in juveniles (The American Bar Association). It should be in the best interest of the public to keep juveniles in the juvenile justice system to reduce public safety risks. On top of this, juveniles are more capable of reform, even one reformed youth paves the way for a safer future for everyone. All juveniles, even ones who show psychopathic traits, show a decrease in these traits and criminal behavior as they age; if these juveniles are transferred into adult courts, the idea that they are criminals becomes instilled into their minds, making them less inclined to change their criminal ways (The Petrie-Flom Center). Overall, juveniles can still be held accountable in other ways other than adult courts. The juvenile justice system is specifically designed for juveniles who have committed crimes and now is not the time to move away from it. The evidence shows trying juveniles as adults reduces public safety and juveniles are best suited for reform in the juvenile system.
Even in the case of serious crimes, juveniles don't belong in adult courts, juveniles should be handled in the juvenile justice system. Science tells us that children are not mentally prepared for adult court and their minds aren't fully developed, reducing their culpability. The evidence also shows that juveniles tried in adult courts are more likely to commit future crimes including increasingly violent ones. Keeping juveniles in the juvenile justice system decreases future crime by way of rehabilitation, making the public an overall safer place. The automatic charging of juveniles is also a prevalent problem that needs to be reformed. These laws expose juveniles to the adult court system and its harmful effects while usually not charging juveniles as adults anyways. Ultimately, juveniles and the public alike benefit the most in the juvenile justice system. The juvenile justice system supports rehabilitation, reform, and a safer world.
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