Children can and do commit terrible crimes, juveniles make up a good portion of our countries incarcerated population. Every individual who commits a crime should be held accountable for their crimes despite age, whether its through incarceration or rehabilitation. As of January 1st, 2016, the law construing what happens when a juvenile commit some of the most heinous crime known to man is about to change. Trying juveniles as adults has always been a controversial topic to the public. It is a strong issue and there are numerous arguments to put forth on both sides, yet the action still remains that children do commit crimes and there has to be some sort of retribution to pay forward. As of now there are five crimes that are automatic transfers
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First degree murder is by far the most heinous of the five automatic transfers and is rightfully still going to be in effect after the 2015 year. This criminal act should not be taken lightly and the punishment should be no different than that given to an adult. According to The Rest of Their Lives: without parole for Child Offenders in the United States, 93 percent of youth offenders serving life without parole were convicted of murder. The report also investigated further into this number and found that 26 percent of those juveniles were convicted of “felony murder,” which means that anyone involved in the commission of a serious crime during which someone is killed is also guilty of murder, despite the fact that he/she didn 't directly cause the death. When it comes to civil matter juveniles are imitators of their peers which means they are immature and irresponsible when it comes to making decisions. There are a lot of cases in which a teen participates in a robbery or burglary and a co-participant comments the actual murder; regardless of the situation they are both charged with the murder of that individual. Instead of incarcerating non-violent juvenile offenders maybe the correctional system could focus on more of a rehabilitation system, after all Illinois constitution’s number one goal when dealing with criminal justice is
First degree murder is by far the most heinous of the five automatic transfers and is rightfully still going to be in effect after the 2015 year. This criminal act should not be taken lightly and the punishment should be no different than that given to an adult. According to The Rest of Their Lives: without parole for Child Offenders in the United States, 93 percent of youth offenders serving life without parole were convicted of murder. The report also investigated further into this number and found that 26 percent of those juveniles were convicted of “felony murder,” which means that anyone involved in the commission of a serious crime during which someone is killed is also guilty of murder, despite the fact that he/she didn 't directly cause the death. When it comes to civil matter juveniles are imitators of their peers which means they are immature and irresponsible when it comes to making decisions. There are a lot of cases in which a teen participates in a robbery or burglary and a co-participant comments the actual murder; regardless of the situation they are both charged with the murder of that individual. Instead of incarcerating non-violent juvenile offenders maybe the correctional system could focus on more of a rehabilitation system, after all Illinois constitution’s number one goal when dealing with criminal justice is