Teen Crime

Teen Crime

4-22-13

California along with some otros states have ruled that teens mayores de fourteen (14) pueden ser juzgados as adults for murder u otros delitos. On March 7, 2000 proposition 21 was passed with 62 percent of the vote. California proposition states that teens from the age of 14 to 17 years old sean juzgados as adults and be sent to adult prison. Before proposition was passed minors from the age 14 to 17 pueden not be tried as adults and could only be held up to the age of 25 years old. This proposition se ha utilizado muchas times to convict teenagers for murders y otros delitos as adults.

Many people are trying to challenge proposition 21 saying that it violates juvenile due process of law que obtendrían in a juvenile court of law. There are not offered a chance to rehabilitate, and many people claim they are still minors y no entienden, o are immature and don't understand sus acciones. Here is an example from proposition 21.

“Under Proposition 21, prosecutors have the right to automatically file charges in adult criminal court in certain cases involving juvenile offenders.133 this means the juveniles are sent to adult court without a fitness hearing. Youths charge that “automatic adulthood” les niega the procedural safeguards required by Kent and constitutes arbitrary legislative classification that violates equal protection. They claim charging decisions that remove them from juvenile court without judicial hearing violate due process. They argue that arbitrary legislative classifications that require youths charged with certain offenses to be prosecuted as adults violate equal protection”

“While the Supreme Court has not ruled on the constitutionality of transferring a minor to adult court without a fitness hearing, the subject was the focus of a dissenting opinion in Bland v. United States. 135 This case involved sixteen-year-old Jerome Bland. He was charged in adult court for armed robbery of a post office in Washington DC...