THE WRONG APPROACH TO YOUTH CRIME
Dear Editor,
I will make no bones about it; despite being a member of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) – indeed, I am President of the Shepparton Branch – I can have no truck with the State Government’s decision to treat juvenile offenders as adults. They are not adults. Their brains are, as we well know from every single piece of neuroscientific evidence available, immature and under-developed.
Besides that biological reality, after a lifetime of working with adolescents – as a teacher, a Children’s Court probation officer, a government youth worker in our juvenile justice system (for 20 years), and a lawyer – I can categorically state that I have never met a juvenile offender who was deterred by a potential sentencing outcome. Most, in fact, have zero idea of potential penalties. (Think back to your own childhood).
Day after day, we can see ample evidence that violent adult offenders are not deterred by the potential penalties applicable for their crimes, yet, somehow, we apparently think that kids will be. 250 years ago, England publicly hanged children as part of its war on crime. It failed: of course it did!
There are many mindless (adult) forms of utter stupidity; this government decision is one of them.
Dr Dennis Dodd, Shepparton 3630
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