To the editor: Charles “Andy” Williams, a 15-year-old on the time, was sentenced in 2001 as an grownup for 2 killings (“Shooter who killed 2, injured 13 in infamous SoCal college rampage might now go free,” Jan. 7). This was although California has had a juvenile justice system since 1903.
The definition of a juvenile has largely been anybody underneath 18. The idea of the juvenile system was that the thoughts of a juvenile was nonetheless creating and rehabilitation made extra sense than imprisonment. Nevertheless, a motion developed within the Eighties and Nineties to deal with juvenile offenders responsible of great crimes as adults, though they weren’t.
It isn’t {that a} 15-year-old assassin is extra mature than a 15-year-old shoplifter. It’s that society wished to punish the teenage law-breakers extra severely within the perception that it might discourage juvenile crime. The idea of juvenile “superpredators” got here into style.
So, Williams was among the many many younger offenders who’ve taken weapons to shoot up a faculty. The legal guidelines haven’t discouraged these crimes. College shootings proceed unabated. As with Williams, the perpetrators are largely troubled younger males with entry to weapons. It doesn’t appear as if attempting an adolescent as an grownup has accomplished a lot to guard the general public.
Erica Hahn, Monrovia
