“Kids Being Charged with Felonies”
A felony is a crime in which the convicted may receive more than a year in prison for their actions. The paper that you are about to read is going to explore some of the issues about kids being charged with felonies. We will also examine some of the issues of how this is portrayed in our news media today. Furthermore, I will offer my opinion, on how kids being charged with felonies could be a positive step in the right direction.
It is real that in America today we have asked our kids to grow up at an alarming rate. There has been no other time in history that children are asked to be mature enough to handle adult situations with
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Triou was charged with a felony account of computer trespass among other charges in the New York Criminal Justice System. He had reportedly hacked into some files at his high school and deleted password- protected folders. (CNN 6-11-03) All of these cases have something in common. Nearly all of them the accused (a child) put themselves into a position in which they had some conflicts with trying to live a mature personality. Not to mention in all of the news articles found the writer acted very surprised. Listing many personality traits of the juvenile offenders to be laid back, quiet, and a joy to be around in some cases. Like adults these young people are forced to put on different masks in different situations.
Am I making this out to be a much too complicated question? Are the children of today being pushed to grow up faster and faster? The truth is that this is a complicated situation and we are a complex society that revolves around social norms and mores. It is clear that are children are starting to feel those culture norms at a much earlier age than before, thus requiring them to grow up at an accelerated pace. In our world today we have young kids that are very pro-efficient with computers, cell phones, and video games. It is in these realms that they meet people all over the world and are influenced in many ways. Positive or negative that alone puts are children in a much higher phase of intellectual maturity over their
Due to the fact that I myself was once a kid, I can personally attest Schlosser’s claim that, “[kids have a] fundamental need for status and belonging” (2002). I did not have a need per se for the hot new trend back in grade
After WWII the teenage culture began to solidify once the USA recognized teenagers as a different group. Perhaps most important, by the end of the 1950s intergenerational identification had been reinforced and, to some extent, legitimized (Altschuler). Instead of trying to contain the teenagers parents would allow the children to go after whatever they wanted. For example in the movie Rebel Without a Cause, the movie takes place within a day, the main character Jim is able to enter and leave the house as he pleases no matter the time. In the movie Blackboard Jungle the children are allowed to pick fights with teachers and commit crimes like stealing a newspaper truck. After living through the different wars and the Great Depression parents wanted their kids to peruse their dreams. By doing this teenagers would
According to T. Williams at https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/29/us/us-prison-population.html?_r=0, (2016). “The number of inmates held in state and federal prisons, fell to its lowest level since 2005 dropping by 2.7 percent.” However, while adult crimes seem to be decreasing. The opposite can be said about juvenile related crimes which seem to be increasing. In this paper, I will be providing my reasons as to why I believe juvenile related crimes are going up, as well as talk about two programs that are working to keep at risk youth out of the criminal justice system.
There has long been a debate over which, if any, are the most effective methods of crime control. Governments from bottom to top in our nation have poured over the issue with mixed results for as long as there has been a nation. Until very recently deterrence was completely based on fear of punishment. However, recent years have provided us with a more complete understanding of crime and its roots among the more desirable parts of our society, specifically the mind of a criminal. Through the study of psychology, specifically free will, determinism and social identity, we may find that situational crime prevention is a better means to deter crime in our nation.
In the United States, “an estimated 7,100 juvenile defendants were charged with felonies in adult criminal court in 1998” ("Juvenile Defendants"). These numbers portray how there were a lot of juveniles being charged. In addition to a large increase in the amount of crime, there was a change in the severity of the crimes that were committed, “the number of violent crimes committed by young people declined substantially from the 1990s to 2003, but then surged again that year, with the estimated number of juvenile murder offenders increasing 30 percent” (Kahn). These numbers show how juveniles were committing more crimes that were serious in the face of the law. These numbers are a brief snippet of
Public criminology takes information, research and education to the next level, as discovered through this essay. It doesn’t just include lab work, research and discoveries, it involves community based teaching in a way that the public can be informed and educated through upfront communication. Throughout this essay, the broad definition of public criminology will be discussed as well as its relevance to society. As with anything, there are challenges and promises that accompany public criminology and those will be stated in this essay. Examples will be given to help you learn the different concepts of public criminology and how it relates to our modern society. Given as a starting point, according to
To sum up, there is no doubt that there has been a gradual change in our society of children and that now
Parole (early release from prison) is often referred to as the back door to the US corrections system. The concept of parole dates back to the establishment of the Elmira Reformatory. The goal of the Elmira Reformatory was to rehabilitate and reform the criminal instead of following the traditional method of silence, obedience, and labor. Parole was originally set up to encourage prisoners to do well, keep their noses clean, and become model prisoners. Once a prisoner had shown rehabilitation and reform they were released prior to the execution of their full sentence.
As children become older, they start learning more and more about today's society - and how wrong it is. They learn about feminism, gender identities, politics, to name some things. The problem is that for the most part, the generations before us are the cause for problems, and those generations of course include our parents and teachers. When confronted about it, adults do not know how to be mature and lash out. They try to enact their authority by saying we should respect our elders, when they do not respect us. Respect needs to be earned, so of course it can be lost as well, which is what may happen to those older than us. Especially those so called "baby-boomers" often do not know that is is much harder for us than it was for them. A good
Crime measurement and statistics for police departments are very important when it comes to money allotment, staffing needs or termination and it is also used to determine the effectiveness of new laws and programs. There are three tools used to measure major crime in the United States: Uniform Crime Reports, National Crime Victimization Survey and the National Incident Based Reporting System- which is currently being tested to replace the Uniform Crime Reports. Although there different tools used to measure crime, crime rates can be deceiving. Each different tool reports a different type of rate, crime rates, arrest
From the beginning of time there have always been crimes against persons. People went by the saying “An eye for an eye”. You stole from your neighbor, they stole from you. You hurt someone, they hurt you. It wasn’t until the 1940’s people started taking a closer look into these crimes against person, which they later called victimology. This paper will look into victimology and their theories as we go back into the past and how victimology is now.
Juvenile offending is a concern in society today. Juveniles account for approximately 19% of the population but are responsible for 29% of criminal arrests (Cottle, Lee, & Heilbrun, 2001). Crime overall has been found to be decreasing throughout the last two decades. The issue is that the rate in which adult crime is decreasing is significantly greater than the rate in which juvenile crime is decreasing. Since the rate of juvenile crime is so high, juvenile delinquents are seen as predators and many believe they lack morals. The way in which media of today’s society constructs juvenile delinquency impacts the views of a community towards their youth and youth offenders. Media presents an inaccurate image of youth offenders as violent predators (Rhineberger-Dunn, 2013). This inaccurate image significantly promotes the myths that juvenile crime is rising, juveniles commit crimes that are primarily violent, and that juveniles are highly effected by recidivism and continue committing crimes into adulthood (Bohm, & Walker, 2013). It has already been stated though that crime rates have been decreasing over the last two decades so the first myth is refuted. The myth that juveniles primarily commit violent crimes is also very off. In most cases, juveniles are involved in property crimes and although there are some violent crime cases, they are very rare. When these rare violent crimes do occur, youth can be tried in adult court. The
Juvenile crime is a major problem in today's society, nevertheless it's one of the most
First of all, the world in which we live in depends a lot on financial
“We believe that when people make mistakes, they deserve the opportunity to remake their lives.” (Barack Obama) The youth of the world are seen as the future of our nation. With that being said there is a vast number of juvenile delinquents in this world. The problem that our nation is struggling is how to effectively punish these offenders, more specifically repeat offenders. Courts think that due to the fact that they are repeat offenders they should suffer the same consequences as adults because the action is believed to be intentional. Teenage repeat offenders should not suffer the same consequences as adults because most of them are victims by situation, and they need time to grow.