Quote Originally Posted by SuperChuck
Ha!

I'm COMPLETELY opposed to the death penalty.

I also think it's rediculous to charge kids as adults.

J Edgar Hoover renamed all our prisons to "Correctional Facilities" and I really think he was on to something (about the correctional facilities, not cross-dressing). However, I think the prison system is a COMPLETE failure...

I had a revelation a couple years back. I was watching a documentary on Parris Island and one of the drill sargeants mentioned that roughly half the kids joining the Marines realize that they need discipline; they realize that they can either join the military or end up in prison. So what do you do with the people that go to prison instead? Treat them like Marines!

My "system" puts inmates through a 6 week boot camp loosely based on the Marine Corps model. Once the inmate passes boot (which, like actual boot, may take more than one attempt), the inmate can then join the prison system. The emphasis of the prison system would change as well. Education and hard work are stressed. Inmates are educated in a trade beneficial to the state and put to work. The work should be largely creative in nature: building bridges, levees, repairing municipal buildings, etc. The idea here is to create an understanding of improving society.

The current system brings 'em in, ferments them, and lets them out. Bring 'em in, fix 'em, and get 'em out.

I've never understood charging a child as an adult.
As a society, we have determined that a 15 year old kid does not have the understanding of right and wrong.
Yet, we decide that, if they do something REALLY bad, they MUST have full understanding.
That just doesn't make sense.

An army officer once explained why the army doesn't accept people older than 24 (or whatever the age is). If you tell a 17 year old to take that hill, they don't ask questions. If you tell a 27 year old to take that hill, they'll tell you no fucking way, there are guys shooting up there. The 17 year old understands that there are people up there shooting, but doesn't understand what it MEANS to wind up in a body bag. A 27 year old is typically more mature and self-protective.

If I had the same intellect I had at 15, I'd be dead.
The boot camp thing has been tried. The last one was dismantled a couple of months ago - it was in CA and was part of the Bureau of Prisons (BOP - Federal). The "creative labor" thing is and has been part of prison systems for decades. I don't know the stats re: what has been helpful and what hasn't. I do believe strongly that prison has become simply a bandaid for a symptom of much larger problem; you're right about the fact that the prison systems, federal AND state, are largely failures. The problem: lack of accountability.

On whether an adolescent has an abstract grasp of death, right and wrong, or whatever, varies from one person to the next.