To the Editor:
Juveniles
Letters
The Young Are Different, Justices Rule
Published: May 18, 2010
Re “Justices Limit Life Sentences for Juveniles” (front page, May 18):
The Supreme Court’s decision in Graham v. Florida was a welcome recognition of the need to treat juvenile offenders differently from adult criminals when it comes to sentencing. As Justice Anthony M. Kennedy explained, “An offender’s age is relevant to the Eighth Amendment, and criminal procedure laws that fail to take defendants’ youthfulness into account at all would be flawed.”
Congress and state policy makers need to take this message to heart, and reconsider laws that allow young children to be transferred to adult criminal court for their offenses. As the report I co-authored last year showed, 27 states allow children age 12 and under to be tried as adults. In adult court, these children face very harsh sentences, up to and including life without parole.
In many cases, these sentences are mandatory, and the judge cannot consider the defendants’ youth. Even more troubling, the majority of these children are charged with nonviolent property and public order offenses, not capital murder and other horrific crimes.
Real change in this arena would begin with efforts to reduce the transfer of children to adult court.
Michele Deitch
Austin, Tex., May 18, 2010
The writer is a senior lecturer at the University of Texas and lead author of the report “From Time Out to Hard Time: Young Children in the Adult Criminal Justice System.”
