A Criminal Is Not an Adult at Any Age

A Criminal is not an Adult at Any Age

All children do stupid things. When I was about 7 years old, my cousin and I were throwing bricks and I was hit in the head. My grandmother was very upset and grounded me for a week. Needless to say, I never threw bricks again. Throwing bricks was a stupid stunt that I definitely learned my lesson from. However, there are kids who habitually do stupid things and seemingly never learn their lesson. In some instances, there are kids who take doing stupid things to a whole new level, and end up seriously hurting themselves or someone else, by committing serious crimes, or even worse, murder. Should these kids be tried as adults or should these kids be sentenced to counseling and a rehabilitative program? We will look at some of the reason why children commit these atrocities and at what I believe is the solution for this problem.

What are the characteristics of an adult? In my opinion, an adult is someone who is capable of providing food clothing and shelter for themselves. An adult would be gainfully employed and able to handle the day to day struggles that come and go with everyday life in a mature and constructive manner. Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines an adult as "Fully developed and mature". Do the children that are being sentenced as adults meet the above qualifications? The answer is a resounding and overwhelming NO! In an article written by Dr. Jeremiah Cameron - retired chairman of the English Department of Penn Valley Community College Kansas City, Missouri, he states "If a child does not have the judgment to drive at 14, to vote at 14, to go into the military at 14, then why do courts declare that he has the wisdom and judgment to understand the nature and consequences of murder at 14? Neurologists tell us that the prefrontal lobe of the brain, where judgment and thoughtfulness take place, is not fully developed at 14. And if the cingulate gyrus, which permits us to move from one thought to another, and the left temporal lobe are not mature, then awful behavior can result. Again, how responsible is the child?"

. The committal of a violent crime or murder is a very serious action, but a child of 14 does not fully grasp the permanency of death. Many of these children have been neglected. They have been supervised by violent television shows, video games and entertained by lyrics that portray the life of thugs, murderers and drug dealers as glamorous. .Due to parents having to work two and three jobs to survive, single parent homes, and school days being shortened, children are forced to grow up unsupervised and without proper guidance. Because of the freedom that is thrust upon these children, they are forced to face their problems on their on with out any input from a parent. These children make irrational decisions and tend to respond to situations in what appears to them to be grown up behavior; a serious criminal acts or murder.

Children commit crimes for a number of reasons. Sometimes these crimes are accidents; other times, these crimes are intentional. When children learn about adult things from the wrong source, the consequences