Juveniles Should Always Be Punished For Their Crimes

A juvenile is a young person who are below the age of 18 accused. Based on some cases, they should also be considered as an adult. In June 25, 2012; the Supreme Court has made a ruling that juveniles who commit murders cannot be given life in prison. Four justices strongly disagree to this ruling saying how juveniles should always be punished for their crimes from how heinous they are. In my opinion, I believe that juveniles should not receive life in prison under certain circumstances. A family’s background, the brain works, and why these juveniles don’t deserve a life sentence without parole.
For a kid like José, he didn’t have a type of family to grow up with. José grew up hanging around local gangs and becoming a serious addict from on
drugs and alcohol since he didn’t have parents around. When José was born, his father who was a heroine addict disappeared then later on his mother disappeared also while she had problems of her own. Since he didn’t have his parents around to guide him, he participated in a deadly brawl in the fall of 1998. That night of the deadly brawl, he was drinking in an alley with four teenagers, two were immigrants from Mexico. They all started to fight but then it escalated quickly when one of the immigrants got his head smashed in while the other broke his ankle jumping over fences when they all fled from the scene. José and the other teenager helped the teen who broke his ankle by taking him home and getting him all cleaned up. José was charged with murder. A Prosecutor named David Soares said, “We looked at what the level of participation in the assault, how criminal was he, how culpable was he. And in José’s case … we saw that his involvement wasn’t that high”. José was given a big break when they saw that he wasn’t that involved with the teenagers death so he was given about half a year in juvenile hall. While he was in juvenile hall, José was working hard in school to graduate and was successful. Joe Mangelli, José’s teacher, went on saying, “He had a great personality and intelligence and openness, and I think the staff around here filled in the gaps for him and helped him to succeed, hopefully forever.” José was always a bright intelligent kid who was just growing up with a bad family and hanging out with the wrong crowd. Even after his release, he started to attend a community college after the staff that helped José in juvenile hall helped him receive books and a bicycle for him so he can go to school and he even got himself a job at a local parks department. Even though José has an adult record after being released from juvenile hall at the age of 17, he has actually made really good progress into his future. While he was on probation, José had to cut off all gang relations and take drug tests to make sure that he wouldn’t end back in court for time in juvenile hall or even worse.
One reasons for a juvenile making these horrible crimes are not only from growing up in a bad family, but can also be from immature brain growth.
In the article, “Startling Finds on Teenage Brains” written by Paul Thompson discusses a case in which a 13-year-old teen named Nathaniel Brazill, was found guilty on second degree murder after shooting a middle school teacher named Barry Grunow. During the trial, they asked Brazill on what and why he had these intentions of shooting one of his favorite teachers, but he didn’t have a reason on why. During this case, the court noticed on how Brazill’s immaturity throughout the incident. Paul Thompson went to gather research at the University of California in Los Angeles where he found the reasons why teens such as Brazill when he had no explanation on why he shot his teacher. Thompson discovered was that teens are missing the brain cells and connections that are being lost in the areas involving our controlled impulses, risk-taking and self-control. This explains on why most teens have violent passions to a person or multiple people, making drastic actions, and have a hard time regulating their emotions. So was Brazill really “planning” to murder his teacher since he brought a gun to campus? They accused Brazill in first degree before, but now they came to a final sentencing that Brazill would receive second-degree murder since they took into consideration of these research done on clearly understanding the mind of a juvenile.
Another case showing how a person’s mind should be considered in court is based on a 15 year old teen named Brendan Dassey.
Brendan Dassey’s story was discussed on a netflix documentary called “Making a Murderer” being accused of being a part of his uncle’s crime who is Steve Avery.
Brendan was being accused of taking part into killing a woman named Teresa. The film explains how Brendan is very unintelligent and shows footage on how innocent he really is. Brendan seems very confused on why he is being interrogated by the police and why they are asking for his story. He explains that he doesn’t have one because nothing happened and the police go on stating “That’s not what really happened. So why don’t you tell us the truth”. This got Brendan manipulated into giving a fake story so he gave one and after the officers leave the room, Brendan’s mother comes in and he says everything he said was a lie and he got that story from a book. So in the court they aren’t showing these evidence on how he really is innocent but instead Brendan is serving a life sentence for a crime he never committed because of the people who manipulated him from the police, the lawyers, the media, and the opposing side of this case. This is ridiculous that the court won’t consider looking over the evidence that shows that he is not guilty since the judge is still the same judge who sentenced Steve Avery for his life sentence to a crime he never did 18 years ago and now facing a life sentence once again. For this case they should give it to another judge and show the actual evidence obtained from the documentary into the court
case.