Should Juveniles Be Sentenced to Life in Prison

Should Juveniles be Sentenced to Life in Prison

Heather Smith

CJA/374

7/5/2015

Pamela Knothe

In the United States where crime seems to be on the up rise and the prisons are overcrowded, we also seem to be on the up rise with juvenile offenders. The question is how do we deal with them and how do we make sure that they are getting a fair trial. Are we making sure that the punishment fits the crime, and should we be able to sentence them to life in prison?

When discussing juveniles and whether we should be able to convict them to life in prison, there are many different views on this topic. Watching in video from ACLU, those that were on there seem to think that it is inhumane and downright cruel to charge and sentence a juvenile to life in prison without the option of parole. There are a lot of people that would agree with this, but I think that there should be major factors involved for them to be able to make this decision. Any crime that a juvenile is convicted of and that they are given life without parole should involve some sort of heinous crime like directly and by their own free will causes someone to die and is convicted of that murder.

In my opinion, we cannot in all reality think that just because a child reaches the age of 18  that they will have a whole different outlook on the situation , there is no specific time that will their way of thinking and that they will realize that they have made some sort of mistake. When the juveniles are sentenced, the courts should take into consideration a few thing like do they have a previous history of mental illness, what type of situation were they in to cause them to think that committing the crime is the only choice he/she had, what is their situation at home, what type of people do they hang around, what are their parents like. All of these things should be taken into consideration because this can have a direct effect on this child’s life. Age can play a major factor but depending on the crime and they...