Court Opinion

ID: 9846942
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 03:50:53.40786+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:16:57.521862
License: Public Domain

Benham, Justice,
concurring.
While I concur in the majority opinion, I cannot help but believe that as we treat more and more children as adults and impose harsher and harsher punishment, the day will soon come when we look back on these cases as representing a regrettable era in our criminal justice system. As we were developing our juvenile justice system, we sought to treat children differently from adults because we recognized they had not developed the problem-solving skills of adults. We now lump certain children in the same category as adults and mete out harsh punishment to them, ignoring the differences between childhood and adulthood.