Essay On Juvenile Incarceration
A Perversion of Justice
Our current criminal justice system frequently places juveniles into adult prisons and until just recently had mandatory life sentences for some juvenile crimes. The much divided Supreme Court ruled that mandatory life sentences were unconstitutional and as a result has sparked vigorous debate as many have joined the conversation regarding how juveniles are treated in prison and if our current system is working. Despite the fierce debate, current science and statistics seems to favor one side over the other. The current United States legal system is clearly flawed as alternative systems are superior, the current system adversely affects juveniles and their chance at rehabilitation, and recent findings on juvenile brain …show more content…
Current figures displayed by the Youth First Initiative indicate that normal juvenile prison facilities “ have a recidivism rate much higher than (current) rehabilitation programs.” This means that prisoners are frequently going to find themselves back behind bars which makes the entire imprisoning process pointless and compounds another serious problem. The costs of actually locking away these children can reach absurd levels as “the high end annual cost of incarcerating a juvenile is around 350,000 dollars.” All this indicates is that our current system is nothing more than a money sink that frequently produces no substantial …show more content…
Cognitive development research from Paul Thompson at the University of California shows that during the teenage years “brain cells relating to impulse control, risk taking, and self control are being lost at a rate of one to two percent per year.”(Startling Finds on Teenage Brains) This means that juvenile criminals are often influenced by factors outside of his control and will eventually be rid of the factor that influenced them into doing crime. This simply means that biologically “teens are not yet adults and the legal system should not treat them as such.” (Startling Finds on Teenage Brains) If teens can be proven be to biologically different in regards to impulse and emotion control then why are they treated the same in the eyes of the
Our current criminal justice system frequently places juveniles into adult prisons and until just recently had mandatory life sentences for some juvenile crimes. The much divided Supreme Court ruled that mandatory life sentences were unconstitutional and as a result has sparked vigorous debate as many have joined the conversation regarding how juveniles are treated in prison and if our current system is working. Despite the fierce debate, current science and statistics seems to favor one side over the other. The current United States legal system is clearly flawed as alternative systems are superior, the current system adversely affects juveniles and their chance at rehabilitation, and recent findings on juvenile brain …show more content…
Current figures displayed by the Youth First Initiative indicate that normal juvenile prison facilities “ have a recidivism rate much higher than (current) rehabilitation programs.” This means that prisoners are frequently going to find themselves back behind bars which makes the entire imprisoning process pointless and compounds another serious problem. The costs of actually locking away these children can reach absurd levels as “the high end annual cost of incarcerating a juvenile is around 350,000 dollars.” All this indicates is that our current system is nothing more than a money sink that frequently produces no substantial …show more content…
Cognitive development research from Paul Thompson at the University of California shows that during the teenage years “brain cells relating to impulse control, risk taking, and self control are being lost at a rate of one to two percent per year.”(Startling Finds on Teenage Brains) This means that juvenile criminals are often influenced by factors outside of his control and will eventually be rid of the factor that influenced them into doing crime. This simply means that biologically “teens are not yet adults and the legal system should not treat them as such.” (Startling Finds on Teenage Brains) If teens can be proven be to biologically different in regards to impulse and emotion control then why are they treated the same in the eyes of the