Mind Over Matter
Registered Senior Member
What are your thoughts on a law that exempts offenders aged 15 to 18 from criminal charges, except if they committed an act knowing it was a crime?
Juvenile
- Thread starter Mind Over Matter
- Start date
Where I live, Florida, there's no such exemption that I've ever heard about. They do incarcerate many teenage criminals in a youth detention facility until they reach 18 then they are transferred over to a regular penal institution to serve their remaining time.
Mind Over Matter
Registered Senior Member
That means you state do not believe that 15 - 18 year olds would not know they were committing a crime.
Why? An 18 year old is a adult in most places, and would be tried as such. 15-17 year olds are definitely old enough to know what a crime is and what's not (unless they suffer from some sort of mental disorder). That's why we have a Juvie system...you can fuck up in your youth, and it doesn't carry over to your adult record....unless of course, you commit murder or another heinous crime that qualifies you to be tried as an adult.
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The only reason they put the youths in another facility is because they could/would be raped by the older inmates at a regulal prison. Introducing a 14 to 18 year old to much more violent criminals isn't what the state here thinks is a good idea. The youths are still behind bars but just with youths their own ages.
Fraggle Rocker
Staff member
No--if I've managed to unravel your double negative and figure out what you meant. It's because people of that age are still growing mentally and emotionally, so there is (theoretically) a greater chance of reforming them. Separating them from the adult offenders makes it (theoretically) possible to give them age-appropriate treatment that will allow them to become civilized adults.
Recently it's been determined that much of what we call "mature behavior," such as deferred gratification and rational risk analysis and management, is not fully developed until much later, in some cases in the thirties. So it would therefore be just as logical to separate the 19-29 year-olds from the older convicts. Except... the majority of people convicted of crimes are in their 20s. Most of the older convicts have been there since before they turned 30.
Mind Over Matter
Registered Senior Member
Unless someone is mentally impaired they almost certainly know right from wrong once they have reached the age of reason.
Now such people may be manipulated or coerced into committing crimes thus reducing culpability as far as mortal sin is concerned but it does not take away the fact that a crime is committed and they know that. What type of punishment or treatment is meted out is a different story but you cannot take an entire age range and exempt them from criminal charges.
Fraggle Rocker
Staff member
I don't know what you're talking about. I've lived in four states and worked in several others, and I've never been in a place where teenagers were exempted from criminal charges. Very young children, sure. But once they reach age 12 or somewhere in that range, they are charged and may be tried. They're not necessarily tried in the same manner as adults and, if found guilty, they are often not punished in the same manner as adults (especially never sentenced to death or life imprisonment except in the worst cases), but they are charged.
What state do you live in, where you have observed teenagers not being charged with their crimes? Are you sure they have actually not been charged? Are they sent to some kind of correctional facility without trial? I can see them being sent for psychiatric care if they're clearly screwed up; that can even happen to an adult who is "not fit to stand trial."
But nobody gets off. My wife worked in a psychiatric hospital for a couple of years. A lot of people would rather go to prison than be there.
Actually the US is the only place where people who were under 18 when a crime was committed are sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. Three countries have that as a possibility but 2 have never used it and are unlikely to ever use it (the same way that some countries don't abolish the death penalty, there just is no possibility of it ever being used). The US is also one of only a very few countries which has the death penalty and one of even fewer where it is applied to people below the age of 18 at the time the offence was committed. Again even those countries which do have it it is never used in most
dude, you need to get out more. The US is not the only place. granted, we aren't in good company, but what you stated in wrong.
and how much better off would so many of your countrywomen have been if Peter Dupas had been jailed at 15 when he stabbed his fist woman? Or at 16 when he broke into a morgue and mutilated 2 women's bodies? No where along his life of murder do you think he should get the death penalty?
Australia chooses to house its monsters. The US doesn't.
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Incarceration has no evidence that it actually works however even if it did as he didnt kill her (at least thats what the wikipedia artical implies) even as an adult he would have only been up for 2 or 7 years (depending if it had been before a judge or a magistrate http://www.laclawyers.com.au/document/Criminal-Law-__-GBH-__-Grevious-Bodily-Harm.aspx)
Even in the US thats a misdemeanor, you saying the US has started handing out life without or death for those too? I know you hand out life without for stealing 3 loaves of bread but really :bugeye:
No, death penelty doesnt work, and costs a shitload more than life without does
Thought we were talking about sentencing kids to life without the possibility of parole, not the death penalty. Even your screwed up country has finally abolished THAT human rights abuse
Its worse than you think, we even used to execute the mentally handicapped. Unless of course they can educate them in prison and smarten them up. Then they can be executed.
And we also execute the mentally ill. Just give them the right medication and off to the electric chair they go.
Oh, and its called the US. And every country has its issues.
He only got probation for attacking and stabbing a woman. And it would not be a misdemeanor in the US to break into a morgue and mutilate women's bodies ESPECIALLY considering his previous crimes.
He slid though your system. Its ok, it happens here too. No country is perfect
necrophilia (as close as i could find to interfering with a corpse) is an A class misdemeanor in the US or at most a C or D class felony, Florida is the sole exception which has it as a second class felony.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necrophilia
I would suspect that non sexual would actually be classed as lower considering that bodies are relitivily unimportant in the scheme of things. After all the state cuts bodies to pieces on a regular basis (why are they in the morgue after all). I wonder why you hold that crime as so horrific, that's a tiny thing, hell im all for the state stripping every useful piece out of a body (compleate body donation) with or without consent. Remember Da vinci himself (and LOTS of others) used to dig up and mutilate corpses
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necrophilia
I would suspect that non sexual would actually be classed as lower considering that bodies are relitivily unimportant in the scheme of things. After all the state cuts bodies to pieces on a regular basis (why are they in the morgue after all). I wonder why you hold that crime as so horrific, that's a tiny thing, hell im all for the state stripping every useful piece out of a body (compleate body donation) with or without consent. Remember Da vinci himself (and LOTS of others) used to dig up and mutilate corpses
you misread what i wrote. I said necrophilia was as close as I could find to "interfering with a corpse" and no Im saying that assuming we had done what you have said we should have and thrown him in jail when he attacked that women for the max penalty (more than likely the 2 years given that it was his first offence) the only crime that would have been prevented is the least significant crime and even that is unlikely, its more likely he just would have learned enough not to be caught (jail doesn't work, it just allows people to increase there skills).
Its like suggesting that a great victory could be accomplished by preventing Hitler from stealing a loaf of bread when he was a child while leaving the greater crimes untouched.
nope, didn't misread what you originally wrote.
OK, what do you want for criminals. Hugs and kisses? And really? You brought Hitler into it as well as DiVinci? Godwin's Law! You're all over the place.