The only thing the courts could do was suspend him for eighty days out of school, because he is so young. His parents were not fined, but his uncle was because that is where he got the gun. In 1997, Proposition 21 was approved in California. This law authorizes prosecutors to bring felony charges against juveniles aged 14 and older, without having to get a judge s approval. This permits to sentence even petty juvenile felons to adult prisons, and exposes youths convicted of murder to terms of life without parole.
Different states have different age limits.
Some states do not specify a limit, meaning young aspects of any age can be tried as adults. Most states are trying to toughen laws governing juveniles so that they have less opportunity to commit another crime. In the past decade, almost every state has made it juvenile-justice laws harder because of the crime rates. Some states are trying to model their juvenile systems after their adult systems, and others are adding more layers to their large juvenile systems. Some states are so hesitant about how to try teenagers as adults because they believe the teenagers have a different potential to change.