Should Seventeen Year Olds Be Tried in Juvenile Court or as Adults

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Provide an appropriate title and an interesting opening paragraph to appeal to your stated audience (appeal with logic, ethics, or emotion).
Is it fair for one person, just seventeen years of age or younger, to be tried in a juvenile court, receiving a lesser sentence for under than someone who is just 5 months older who committed the same crime? Are juveniles under the age of 18 fully capable of being held responsible for their actions or are all juveniles mentally incapable of realizing their actions will have consequences? When you turn a certain age, you gain certain privileges. You have the ability to purchase certain things, the ability to purchase tobacco products at the local gas station, but most importantly the ability to be held responsible for your actions. To turn a new age every year is great but the age 18 sounds magical right?
2.Include a defensible, relevant thesis statement in the first paragraph. (Revised from Assignment 2)
Juveniles commit terrible crimes just like adults do and therefore no one should be exempt from equal punishment. A crime is a crime and for that reason Juveniles who commit violent crimes should be tried in the same way as adults. If minors who commit violent crimes were tried as adults and punished as adults, the number of violent crimes committed by youths would decline in my opinion. Consequently, in the future the number of violent crimes in general would decline as firmer penalties and punishments would be used to keep violent offenders in prison for longer sentences. Violent crimes can be defined as murder, rape, armed robbery, aggravated assault, larceny-theft and the like depending on state law (pbs.org). According to statistics the number of violent crimes committed by people under...

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... 29, 1998): C01. Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. 27 November 2006. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/OVCR

Johnson, Kevin. “Police tie jump in crime to juveniles.” USA Today. 13 July 2006. 27

November 2006. www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-7-12-juveniles-cover_x.htm
Males, Mike and Dan Macallair. “The Color of Justice: An Analysis of Juvenile Adult

Court Transfers in California.” Building Blocks for Youth. 26 November 2006. www.buildingblocksforyouth.org/colorofjustice/coj.html

Reynolds, Morgen. “Imprisonment Reduces Crime.” Testimony from the U.S. House of

Representatives Committee on the Judiciary (October 2, 2000). Opposing ViewpointsResourceCenter. 27 November 2006. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/OVCR

Vogel, Jennifer. “Throw Away the Key: Juvenile Offenders are the Willie Hortons of

the 90s. Utne Reader (July/August 1994).

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