Mist
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12 year olds stab friend to prove Slender Man is real
- Thread starter CaughtCross
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Cinge
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
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I'm ok with tried as a adult in this case. Mainly because it was planned and premeditated and the planned outcome was murder. They knew it was wrong, they knew the consequence , had plenty of opportunities to back out and even knew it was wrong to not feel any remorse for doing it. If the victim had died or dies(not sure if that's a possibility) I could even agree with life, since that would of been what they took away with a conscious decision. In this case anything less then ~20 years is bad imo.
BrutulTM
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I spent the last week around my buddy's 12 year old son and while he knows the difference between right and wrong, no reasonable person would consider him to be an adult. He is not close to adulthood in any aspect of his personality. Charging them as juveniles is not letting them off with no punishment and I think spending the next 12 years in juvie seems like a pretty reasonable punishment for these girls who are clearly fucked up but just as clearly not adults.
Also, just as an aside, when I was a juror in a murder case a few years back I learned that I did not really understand what the term "premeditated" means from a legal standpoint and from the posts here some of you guys don't either. I always thought that "premeditated" meant that you sat at home, made a plan, collected your weapons, and then went out and murdered someone. All it means, in California at least, is that at some point you made the decision to kill someone. You had the thought "I am going to kill this person" and then you did it. It doesn't matter if you did it 6 years before the murder or 6 seconds, only that you made a conscious decision to commit murder before you did it. The more you know.
Also, just as an aside, when I was a juror in a murder case a few years back I learned that I did not really understand what the term "premeditated" means from a legal standpoint and from the posts here some of you guys don't either. I always thought that "premeditated" meant that you sat at home, made a plan, collected your weapons, and then went out and murdered someone. All it means, in California at least, is that at some point you made the decision to kill someone. You had the thought "I am going to kill this person" and then you did it. It doesn't matter if you did it 6 years before the murder or 6 seconds, only that you made a conscious decision to commit murder before you did it. The more you know.
Jait
Molten Core Raider
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Yeap. Premeditation can happen in one second. Did a murder1 jury stint myself in Pomona a few years back. Half the jury had no idea there either.
Palum
what Suineg set it to
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Really? That's odd. Any murder that was conceived before it is carried out ispremeditated. I guess I always took the word itself for granted...
Anyway, regarding the 12 year olds. The truth is that regardless of the possible punishments, one must look at the act being committed. They had criminal intent, conspired to commit murder and attempted said murder, 'only' managing to commit aggravated battery. These are not the products of what one would nominally consider a child's mind. If they had rounded up 15 Jewish kids and executed them in a home-made gas chamber after watching the Hitler marathon on History channel, would they still be 'children' then? At what point is a crime severe enough? Or, more to the point of this case, when does a crimerequirethe equivalent mental faculties of an adult such it is only logical that someone be tried as an adult? What if they left a manifesto? How is the 'lack' of mental development in a 12 year old due to age any different from regression or the lack of mental development in a 30 year old due to other factors as long as they are not mentally retarded, only deficient?
iannis
Musty Nester
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At no point. Even Hitler had a childhood.
It is entirely possible to be a completely fucked up, hopeless, intransigent, black-blooded damien of a child. But they're still a child.
Your question really, if you look at it, is at what point is it ok to hurt them more? It's not about anything else.
It is entirely possible to be a completely fucked up, hopeless, intransigent, black-blooded damien of a child. But they're still a child.
Your question really, if you look at it, is at what point is it ok to hurt them more? It's not about anything else.
Chanur
Shit Posting Professional
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No its really not. Its about how much risk is there of them trying to take another life if they are out on the street.
iannis
Musty Nester
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The assumption there is obviously that juvie is gonna release them back into the wild and that a "real" judge is gonna... I dunno, some dark authoritarian fantasy. I don't find either is particularly realistic. Do you -really- think that they're gonna get community service for attempted murder? Do you think that social services are not crawling up the parents assholes as we type?
You guys really do, don't you.
Oh no. Life for these girls won't begin for at least 15 years no matter which court they go to. They have f-u-c-k-e-d up in a truly life altering way (not only for the girl that got stabbed).
There's a lot of ways to rationalize vengeance.
You guys really do, don't you.
Oh no. Life for these girls won't begin for at least 15 years no matter which court they go to. They have f-u-c-k-e-d up in a truly life altering way (not only for the girl that got stabbed).
There's a lot of ways to rationalize vengeance.
Palum
what Suineg set it to
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Which again misses the point, what's the difference between a 30 year old who acts like a murderous 12 year old and a 12 year old who is murderous? I guess your point isall children are innocentandall children deserve a chancewhich clearly, some are not and some do not. Why should we have to wait until they're 34 and start a killing spree in order to 'give them a childhood'.
iannis
Musty Nester
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No, my point is that all children are children. As children there are considerations they must be given. We even have a system to do exactly that. These considerations stem from multiple sources, many of which I am trying very hard to avoid, they're relevant but will descend into nothing but us calling each other stupid, evil fuckers. But the one which cannot be avoided is that there are literal physiological differences. Children are not little tiny adults. Children are children. One size does not fit all.
You're the one arguing all this other nonsense.
You're the one arguing all this other nonsense.
Melvin
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One difference is that children are mostly not responsible for the influences that have formed them into who they are: their environment and genetics are not their choice. Meanwhile a 30 year old has been responsible for making their own lifestyle decisons for as long as the 12 year old has been alive, and longer than a 12 year old has been sentient.
Another difference is that children at 12 years old are still years away from their "fully developed adult" selves, and even after making one of the worst decisions possible to make have a significantly greater than zero percent chance of turning out to be not a psychopath by the time they're done growing up. On the other hand, if a person at 30 years old makes a decision to kill someone, it's probably because their fully grown adult mind which is residing in their fully grown adult brain is broken beyond repair.
Edit: I honestly am having a hard time understanding how people can give 12 year olds as much credit as some of you seem to be giving them. How long has it been since you've spent any time at all with children? Have you ever?
Melvin
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A) I think the "evidence" that supports calling what these kids did as "cold calculated" is pretty flimsy, at best. Let me re-iterate: How long has it been since you've spent any time at all with children? Have you ever?
B) I don't think that children committing crimes this violent is common enough that there's good statistics readily available to laymen like us. I'd love to be corrected if I'm wrong though. So instead, I'm going to have to lean pretty heavily on common sense, which points entirely in the direction that 12 year old children, almost without fail, turn out to be considerably more mature and rational once they've stopped being children.
So now that rehabilitation is a concern of yours, do you support the argument that charging them as adults will offer them a better chance at being rehabilitated than treating them like the children that they are?
I fail to see how anyone could condemn two twelve year old children to death after we've had only a sparse amount of information from our super-hype-media.
Fucking seriously. You guys are speaking in absolutes. How the fuck do we know if they are remorseful? Not a rhetorical question, a real question. The best I can guess is your answer might be, "because the media says so." I'll not go into why that's grade-A retarded especially after what, two days, and you guys are calling for the axe?
I am not defending them, they need to atone and serve time for their deeds and hopefully become rehabilitated. I just don't think they are adults because they are not.
Fucking seriously. You guys are speaking in absolutes. How the fuck do we know if they are remorseful? Not a rhetorical question, a real question. The best I can guess is your answer might be, "because the media says so." I'll not go into why that's grade-A retarded especially after what, two days, and you guys are calling for the axe?
I am not defending them, they need to atone and serve time for their deeds and hopefully become rehabilitated. I just don't think they are adults because they are not.
Palum
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I don't think they should be put to death. They're also obviously not adults. That said, the 'absolutes' are also the people who say they need to be in juvenile court: "There's no way these little kids could have realized because KIDS!!!!!" I'm saying there is a line that some point in a person's development that, as it relates to acts of violent crime, is crossed to be consideredmature. I would say this is over that line.
I don't expect them to get life, but I don't think they should be treated like children.
Jait
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That's exactly it. At least in California. And you don't need to conceive murder. Someone cuts you off in traffic, and you immediately bash them with your car because you're pissed, they flip and die that's still premeditated murder. This is why we have so many "temporary insanity" bs defenses. Or in the case I had, some gang banging bitch had two guys with guns in her car, she thinks she sees some rival, tells them to shoot. Turns out to be a fucking nurse on her way home from a 12 hour shift: Murder 1.