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 faculty rampage might now go free,” Jan. 7). This was even if California has had a juvenile justice system since 1903.
The definition of a juvenile has largely been anybody below 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 Nineteen Nineties to deal with juvenile offenders responsible of significant crimes as adults, despite the fact that they weren’t.
It’s not {that a} 15-year-old assassin is extra mature than a 15-year-old shoplifter. It’s that society needed to punish the teenage law-breakers extra severely within the perception that it could 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. Faculty shootings proceed unabated. As with Williams, the perpetrators are principally troubled younger males with entry to weapons. It doesn’t appear as if making an attempt a youngster as an grownup has executed a lot to guard the general public.
Erica Hahn, Monrovia
