Execution Of Juveniles Essays - Legal Procedure, Trial As An Adult

Execution Of Juveniles Adult Punishment and Juvenile Justice Day after day in this country there is a debate going on about the death penalty and whether we as people have the right to decide the fate of another persons life. When we examine this issue we usually consider those we are arguing about to be older men and women who are more than likely hardened criminals with rap sheets longer than the height we stand (Farley & Willwerth, 1998). They have made a career of crime, committing it rather than studying it, and somewhere along the line a jury of their peers decided enough was enough. They were handed down the most severe and most final punishment of them all, death. Behind all of the controversy that this issue raises lies a different group of people that are not so often brought into the lime light, juveniles. This proposes a problem entangled with another; if we do decide to carry out death sentences, what is the minimum age limit? Can we electrocute, lethally inject, or gas any one who commits a crime that is considered capital? In this paper the issue of capital punishment for juveniles will be discussed, basically laying out a comprehensive look at the matter. First we will briefly look at the history of both juvenile justice and the history of the death penalty in regards to juveniles. Secondly we will take a short look at the two major court cases that dealt with this issue in the United States. Next this paper will present the factual statistics of the death penalty for juveniles and also take a look at our countrys stance on the issue in the international arena. We will then spend a short time looking at some views on the juvenile death penalty, reasons for the death penalty itself, and the arguments for and against the death penalty for juveniles. Lastly we will conclude with a few thoughts about the issue and the implications that we might have to consider. The history of the death penalty being imposed on juveniles spans all the way back to almost the beginning of our country. In 1642, Thomas Graunger of Plymouth Colony, Massachusetts, was the first juvenile, to be sentenced to death and executed in our country for a crime that he committed (Executions, 2000). Since the start of capital punishment (or the recording thereof) in 1608, there has been around 19,200 executions in the United States of all ages. Of that total number, experts believe approximately 356 of them were juvenile executions, meaning that the crime that the individual was sentenced for took place before the offender was eighteen years of age (Gonnerman, 2000). This accounts for about 1.8% of all executions from the start of capital punishment to present (Executions, 2000). Since 1973 there has been 196 death sentences handed out to juveniles and seventeen of those have ended in actual execution (Streib, 2000). Table 1 lists those seventeen individuals that have been executed since 1973, their date and place of execution, their race, and their age both when they committed their crime and when they were executed. The juvenile justice system was born in 1899 at which time it was recognized as separate from the regular justice system that dealt with adult offenders (Ricotta, 1988). At the start, the stated objectives of the juvenile justice system was ...to provide measures of guidance and rehabilitation for the child and protection for society, not to fix criminal responsibility, guilt, and punishment (Ricotta, 1988). By the stated objectives it would seem as though rehabilitation would be one of the most important goals of the juvenile system. So how are we able to decide now that a teenager is past the point of rehabilitation and deserves the final punishment? Or does the obligation to protect society become more overwhelming and leave us with no other option but to put someone to death? These are just a few questions that one might ask about our present goals in comparison to the initial goals that were established from the start. Next we will discuss the two pivotal court cases that set the precedent for our current juvenile death penalty statutes. William Wayne Thompson, only fifteen years of age, and three older persons were all found guilty of first degree murder back in December of 1983. He was convicted of murdering his brother-in-law in a most heinous, atrocious, and cruel (Ricotta, 1988) way. After the district court decided that their was no reasonable prospects for rehabilitation (Ricotta, 1988) it was decided that he would be tried as an adult. The Supreme Court of the United States had to decide

Principles of Plain English

Principles of Plain English Principles of Plain English Principles of Plain English By Mark Nichol Perspicuous written communication is fundamental in every aspect of human interaction or should I say, â€Å"Clear writing is important whenever people interact†? If I support the triumph of plain English over byzantine jargon and sesquipedalianism, I should. But rather than explain what plain English is, I’ll state what it isn’t: It isn’t all about short sentences. It isn’t all about single-syllable words. It isn’t elimination of elaboration at the expense of erudition. (I mean, it isn’t dumbing down.) Here are five areas in which plain English is, fortunately, making inroads: Business Remember when you saw a delivery truck or a repair van and could tell which products or services it carried or facilitated? That’s still often the case, especially with known brands, but how many times have you read text printed on such a vehicle and scratched your head, wondering, â€Å"What business is that business in?† Freight companies used to do â€Å"trucking,† then they provided â€Å"delivery solutions†; now, they’re all about â€Å"logistics.† But they’re still in the business of moving things from point A to point B. Many vehicles, however, especially those in the fleets of high-tech companies, either don’t offer any information other than the company name and a phone number (and perhaps a URL), or the van is labeled with meaningless phrases about â€Å"solutions† and â€Å"logistics.† Don’t these companies want potential customers and clients to know what they offer? Stationary corporate communications, including Web site copy, press releases, and mission statements, frequently fail to enlighten the target audience as well. Some companies, though, make an effort to deliver their messages with simple, straightforward language. Government Federal, state, and local government agencies have long been notorious for obfuscating official documents: In their efforts to project an air of authority (in more than one sense of the word), many government employees have produced reams of often impenetrable prose. Fortunately, the federal Plain Writing Act and two subsequent executive orders require government-issued publications to be written in simple, easy-to-understand English. Law It’s a cynical sentiment that the notorious density of legal documents is calculated to perpetuate the need for lawyers, but it’s hard to avoid feeling that way when confronted with an oxymoronically named brief or a contract that’s anything but contracted. Some attorneys will argue that legal writing requires precision and specificity of language, but that is a poor defense of gratuitously complex language employed when the supposed intent is to make the subject matter as transparent as possible. Many lawyers, however, now opt to write in simple sentences and avoid legal jargon. Law Enforcement You’ve seen it time and time again: The chief of police, or a spokesperson, drones on about how an investigation was carried out or how a crisis is being handled. Attempting to appear official and in control of the situation, the speaker overwhelms listeners with jarring jargon and multisyllabic meanderings. Police reports, similarly, often stiffly, obscurely relate simple sequences of events in a style that complicates rather than communicates. Now, fortunately, law enforcement agencies are turning to resources like the handbook Plain English for Cops to help personnel write simple, clear accounts. Academia and Scholarship Many academics, including those who write for popular audiences, write clearly and well, but just as many more seem to try to outdo their colleagues in trying to write journal articles and other scholarly documents in a style as bafflingly complicated and convoluted as possible and in doing so, are poor role models for younger professors, graduate assistants, and other students who read their research. As with other authority figures, researchers in the natural sciences and the social sciences alike often seem to below that dense prose enhances their expertise. Rationales for Rational Writing Bryan Garner, the dean of clear writing (and author of the authoritative yet coherent guidebook Garner’s Modern American Usage), offers these four motivations for writers to favor simple writing: 1. Writers of complex prose risk confusing themselves as well as others. 2. Reading complex prose is more time-consuming than reading plain English. 3. Writing plain English is hard work, and thus, if writers feel that they must labor to succeed in their efforts, clear writing is a well-earned achievement. 4. Clarity is the primary goal of writing. Again, these arguments should not discourage eloquence, and I admit that I sometimes indulge in overwrought writing (usually, for I hope is humorous effect). But join me in trying these tips: 1. Ask yourself whether curt, clear Anglo-Saxon vocabulary might be more suitable than Latinate language in any given passage. 2. Don’t avoid subordinate clauses or parenthetical phrases, but keep them to a minimum, and keep each one succinct. 3. Monitor your musings for redundancy and other enemies of conciseness. 4. Consider your audience when determining the degree of formality you will adopt in a given piece of writing. 5. Be cautious about incorporating jargon. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! 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