Thursday, Feb. 26, 2004 | 9:28 a.m.
Sending children to adult jails, where they can be preyed upon by older prisoners, is not the solution to the tragedies that are motivating many people to crusade for tougher juvenile penalties.
Local officials claim that their decision "to be tough on teens who commit crimes" was spurred by a one-year increase in juvenile crime rates. It is fallacious to use any one-year spike in juvenile crime to justify punishing children in adult court. This short-term spike is possibly a statistical anomaly and should be examined in the context of nationwide declining trends in juvenile crime.
For example, the U.S. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention reports that "between 1994 and 2001, violent crime arrest rates dropped 46 percent for youths aged 15 to 17." Additionally, "between 1980 and 2001, the Violent Crime Index arrest rates for youths aged 15 to 17 decreased 13 percent and the rates for adults (including those aged 60-64) increased."
I don't think we need to treat the elderly more harshly, but I find it inappropriate for people to sell the fear of dangerous children running around when the facts show that it is instead elderly criminals on the rise while the numbers of youthful offenders are decreasing.
AARON M. CLEMENS
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