Should juvenile offenders be tried and punished as adults - Essay Example

Should Juvenile Offenders Be Tried And Punished As Adults Introduction Almost majority of the states in the United States of America has separate criminal justice system for the juvenile offenders and for the adult offenders. These states have established that juveniles cannot be considered as criminals as they are not committing crimes and their criminal like deviant acts are categorized as delinquent acts. In case a juvenile conducts a delinquent act, he/she first goes through the process of adjudication hearing and in this hearing the judge is responsible to identify whether the child has committed a delinquent act or not.

Once the criminal act conducted by a child is determined as a delinquent act, he/she are then punished in accordance to his/her act. In certain situations, the punishment awarded to the juvenile offender is similar to the punishments awarded to an adult and this has spurred the issue of whether juvenile offenders should be tried and punished similar to adult offenders or there should be a difference. Juveniles should be treated as adult offenders because: juveniles do commit crimes that are quite severe, severe punishments will lead to deterrence Body Juvenile offenders should be tried and punished as adults because they are indulged in committing same criminal activities that are being committed by adult offenders.

If the courts are punishing juvenile offenders for committing serious crimes in a relaxed manner, then they are simply treating adult offenders in a biased and unfair manner and the law of punishment should match the crime will be breached. According to FBI, during the period of 2012, more than 500k juvenile offenders were arrested for committing or being suspected of committing criminal activities that are categorized as violent crime (FBI 1). Juvenile crimes should even be treated as adult crimes and the punishments awarded to adults and juveniles should be the same for similar cases because this will assist in deterring criminal activity.

According to the crime deterrence theory, punishments should be severe enough to deter criminals as well as future criminals from committing deviant activities (Vito 52). This theory is based on the assumptions that all humans are rational decision makers and if they will perceive that the cost of committing a crime which includes punishment is higher than the benefits of committing a crime, they will refrain from indulging in criminal behavior. The theory states that if harsh punishment is levied on a convict, the convict himself may not commit criminal activity in future to avoid same punishment in future and these punishments will become an example for those who are planning to indulge in deviant acts and they may even be deterred from committing criminal behavior.

A research was conducted by Kidd in order to figure out whether young children involve in rational decision making or not and the researchers figured out that children were involved in rational decision making and they were well aware about the benefits of a particular decision (Kidd 110). Since it has been established that children make rational decisions, it would not be wrong to suggest that if children are awarded with severe punishments for their crimes, they would consider the cost of committing a crime while making a decision regarding whether or not to indulge in deviant acts.

Those who believe that juveniles should be tried and punished as adults state that the relaxed treatment being awarded to juvenile offenders does not deter their future criminal activity. According to Gottfredson, juveniles are most likely to be deterred from criminal activity if they are sentenced for a longer period of time especially in the case of drug related robbery related offenses (Gottfredson 40). On one end are those who believe that punishing juvenile offenders in the same way as adult offenders will benefit the criminal justice system and on the other end are those who believe that juvenile offenders should not be tried and punished as adult offenders.

They believe that if children are tried and punished as adults, they will not be deterred from future criminal activity and the probability of them involving in future criminal activity will increase if they are punished as adult offenders. In a study conducted by Singer and other researchers, the researchers figured out that adult punishments did not deter juvenile offenders from conducting future criminal behavior (Singer 530). Conclusion Juvenile offenders should be punished as well as tired as adult offenders but this should only happen depending on the severity of the crime.

If juvenile offenders and punished and tried as adults in violent crimes, the criminal justice will operate in a fair manner and doing so will lead to deterrence in criminal activity among convicted juvenile offenders and those who are looking forward to indulge in such acts. Works Cited "Persons Arrested." FBI. FBI, 16 May 2013. Web. 15 Dec. 2013. . Gottfredson, D M, And M G. Neithercutt. Four Thousand Lifetimes - a Study of Time Served and Parole Outcomes. United States, 1973. Print. Kidd, C, H Palmeri, and R.N Aslin. "Rational Snacking: Young Children's Decision-Making on the Marshmallow Task Is Moderated by Beliefs About Environmental Reliability.

" Cognition. 126.1 (2013): 109-114. Print. Singer, S I, and D McDowall. "Criminalizing Delinquency: the Deterrent Effects of the New York Juvenile Offender Law." Law and Society Review. 22.3 (1988): 521-535. Print. Vito, Gennaro F., and Jeffrey R. Maahs. Criminology: theory, research, and policy. 3rd ed. Sudbury, Mass.: Jones & Bartlett Learning, 2012. Print.