Posted by
Billy email MADBillyD@aol.com on Thursday, December 03, 2009 11:19:32 AM
The United States Supreme Court this month heard arguments in a case that could
decide whether a child who commits a crime should be sentenced in some
circumstances to life without parole.
There can be no question that some minors who murder are unfit to be released
from prison for fear they might kill again. But what about crimes that don't
involve homicide? Should a 13-year-old be sentenced to life without the
possibility of parole? Such a case is now before the Court.
Perhaps if we focused more on redemption, rather than detention, the results
would be different.
(The above is part of a column written by Cal Thomas, Read more of the column below.)
Over the years we've managed to get the punishment part right, but what about
the redemption part? Prisoners have few advocates and often feel abandoned and
without hope. Clearly there must be a better way when the number of incarcerated
grows every year, along with the cost of warehousing them in places that serve
as hot houses of despair and training academies for hardened criminals. Many
inmates will be paroled and commit more crimes.
I solicited success stories from people who work with teen offenders. One
response came from Dr. Scott Larson, who serves on the board of Reclaiming Youth
International and is president of Straight Ahead Ministries
(www.straightahead.org) in Worcester, Mass. Larson writes, "My wife and I took
up to seven youth at a time between 1990 and 2000, and 10 of those youth were
locked up for manslaughter charges. Eight of those went to college; none were
re-arrested.
Larson says under current law, these youth "would all be doing life sentences
(10 to 20 years) in adult prisons, though in each case they were present, but
not necessarily the shooter in gang clashes." He says his group also works with
members of the Bloods and Crips gangs in Lynn, Mass., "and have seen them
reconcile and work for good in their community.
One size fits all sentencing doesn't and it shouldn't. Isn't it better to
attempt to reclaim children headed in the wrong direction than to doom them to
life in prison without parole? I think it is. Let's hope the Supreme Court
thinks so, too.
(Amen Cal. Lets focus on helping children and not putting them away in adult prisons. Read all of what Cal wrote Life for
Children?)
