Current Event

It goes without saying that criminal situation in each district, in each city and each country to a great extent defines the overall level of life of the citizens. Each crime can have certain affect on each of them, therefore no one can stay indifferent when we are looking for a solution to make the environment less criminogenic. Moreover, delinquency is not only the question of safety, but often it is also the question of socioeconomic, political and cultural conditions. Especially this correlation refers to juvenile delinquency. Antisocial and illegal behavior of children and adolescents is especially alarming, because it reflects the deepest sores of the society on the whole and can have the most serious consequences in future. As Brown (39) admits, “the level and types of youth crime can be used by commentators as an indicator of the general state of morality and law and order in a country, and consequently youth crime can be the source of ‘moral panics’.” In fact, there are different causes of juvenile delinquency and there are different theories in criminology that tend to explain this antisocial behavior of youth. Among the most spread causes are mental disorders and such behavioral patterns as post traumatic stress disorders, conduct and bipolar disorders, and a list of social premises. The question of penalty is also rather controversial, and there is no one single principle of how to regulate the youth behavior with preventive or punitive measures. When we handle real cases, we face this problem.
Actually, juvenile delinquency is reported to have special attention from mass media and political forces. Thus, the case of Demarco Harris got into central news. This now 13-year old boy killed a young woman with the intention of robbery a year ago and now is sent to juvenile prison, where he will spend the next eight years, until he gets 21. Then the court will decide on whether he will be sentenced to death penalty or to life imprisonment. With no other variants, the crime of Demarco was intentional and the intent, the act and the result were severe enough to pass the strictest sentence.
However, there is still much time until the decision will be taken. On the one hand, the father of Trisha Babcock, the victim of the crime, can be understood when saying that the chance that the boy will have a chance to be set free is not justice for his daughter. “Just because you’re 12, 13, 14 doesn’t mean you can murder somebody and be set free when you are 21,” Mr. Babcock remarked (Falcon). Perhaps, that is really a case when the evil should be nipped in the bud. But on the other hand, the boy was too young to realize all the consequences of his actions. If given a chance, he has enough time to think over his behavior and way of life and to change for better. If he will be sentenced to death, he will lose the chance to improve forever. Death for death only seems to be just, but it cannot raise people from the dead. Whereas there is a chance that he will become an honest citizen with some socially useful profession. What if he can become a fireman, for instance, and save dozens or even hundreds of lives to make up for one mistake made in childhood? This is a utilitarian approach, but there is rational kernel here.
Besides, it is important to understand why the boy committed the crime. His mother admits that there was her guilt as she brought him up all alone. Really, there are some facts from statistics proving that the children brought by lone parents are more likely to commit a crime. Nonetheless, the outcomes depend not on the number of parents, but on the very relations between children and their parents. And the problems arise when there is lack of attachment from a child to a parent, and when parents lack supervision and control. When relations between parents and children are poor, the latter easier get under the influence of their peers. Further, according to Social Learning Theory, children are known for behavior modeling. Albert Bandura (as cited in Siegel and Welsh 166) postulated that “human learning is a continuous reciprocal interaction of cognitive, behavioral, and environmental factors,” and thus children easily learn violence from mass media and from people around them. Aggressive actions become the result of “instantaneous matching of the observed behavior to the modeled behavior” (Siegel and Welsh 166).
At the same time, the social strain theory of criminal involvement states that citizenry aspirations for some wells are normally instilled by society itself, and when one is unable to get access to them in a legal way, he becomes desperate and thus can violate the law to get the same economic rewards as the others. Probably, this is just true of Demarco Harris who felt deprived and unhappy in comparison with his peers, while he could not receive enough financial support at home and decided to act himself.