Should a Child Face Adult Sentences?

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Should a Child be Tried as an Adult? Have you ever saved a life? I did, I remember it so clearly, my young nephew was choking on a piece of meat and I used my CPR skills mixed with pure adrenaline to pound it out of him. Today, I’m grateful for the amazingly satisfying experience it was. Maybe you haven’t had such an experience but even if you have only helped someone with some small thing, you know that feeling. You may know how good it feels to help a fellow human being. My nephew was 5 years old and he learned a valuable lesson that day. He learned to fully chew his food before swallowing. This example shows you that his mind hasn’t yet fully developed to understand the consequences brought to him by his actions. It’s in this philosophy that I believe juveniles should not be tried as adults. A child’s immaturity is his most dangerous trait. Many children lack the ability to rationalize a stressful situation. Adults have a hard time making the right judgment calls, imagine the mindset of an emotional immature child? Compared to adults, children are more likely to take haste and depend on their irrational decisions making. This lack of maturity should not be held against the child. Furthermore, we should be protecting and educating our children, not taking out vengeance through irreversible punishments. By punishing a child through the serving of a sentence in an adult prison will only damage the child psyche and cause him to lash out to society. I believe in the saying “it takes a village to raise a child”. I believe Society is the village and we should look after our children. In addition, children in adult prisons are more and likely to: 1) be the victim of sexual assault, 2) commit suicide, or 3) be physically attacked due to their inferior appearance. Many people of today strongly believe in the “eye-for-an-eye” form of punishment. Many believe

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