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Tina Rosler December 1, 2010 Assignment 4 Juvenile Murders: Who's Fault? Sociology Deviance Kimberly Bottema
Tina Rosler December 1, 2010 Assignment 4 Juvenile Murders: Who's Fault? Sociology Deviance Kimberly Bottema
Tina Rosler
December 1, 2010
Assignment 4
Sociology Deviance
Kimberly Bottema
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rise; case in point is the tragic killings that occur in our school
violence has spread out from urban centers into suburbia. How can we
delinquent, and who gets to decide this label and does the label itself
blame?
behavior, in part because the word “delinquent” was derived from a legal
patterns violate the law within the jurisdiction of the juvenile court.
One then has to ask that does the label “delinquent” to a juvenile push
them further on the violence path?[ CITATION Eri97 \l 1033 ]. Some suggest
it does, others do not support this theory. Regardless of your stance
For all the theory and speculation about why adolescents commit
murder, the answers seem to not differ that greatly from what we have
learned about adults who commit violent crimes. As with adults, some
kill because they have been traumatized and are unable to tolerate their
health problems vary widely (e.g., between about 30-90%, depending upon
higher than the roughly 20% prevalence rate found in the non-delinquent
mental health problems, and about 15-20% have a serious mental illness.
problems.
would be the cost that it has on society. What does it cost our nation
many studies over the years have tried to quantify the total direct and
society, the results have varied, but all conclude that nationwide costs
plagued by crime, and for the basis of this paper the most important
Are their early warning signs that are ignored by society and
family? I believe they are but also question if they are truly ignored
these signs. Some of the signs include early-onset delinquents who are
others have hostile intentions towards them. This belief, along with the
1033 ].
behavior during their teenage years) for these juveniles, peer pressure
families in which they are given a lot of freedom and are not very
closely monitored by the adults who are responsible for them [ CITATION
Jam10 \l 1033 ]. Families are greatly impacted by the children they help
they are affecting not only their family but also society as a whole.
''social and family factors are probably more significant than any other
causes'' of violence but said that there are also biological factors.
Dr. Mednick and other researchers have found that the criminally violent
of the evidence, however, leads him to believe that the origin of this
The above theory leads to yet another question. How can someone
who does not commit a crime get charged for the crime committed? Should
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parents be charged with their child’s crime? While yes would seem the
logical answer, I must say "No," with some qualifications. First of all,
why are some minor children criminals? They might have wonderful, God-
fearing, law abiding, caring and compassionate parents who have raised
them well, but other factors have run interference. Although parents
are responsible for raising and teaching their children what is right or
wrong, parents should not be held responsible for the crimes of their
children because they did not commit the crime and if they are not
present at the crime scene, how can they stop their child from
juvenile crime.
Children that come from great homes and have great parents still
planned because the “planner” and the “planee” are two different people.
when charged with crimes of their child especially when they had no
families rather than blame them. Along with that there is a desire to
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help families of not only victims, but also the family of perpetrators
whom both suffer greatly. People and families can be affected in many
certain emotions such as anger or fear are common, some victims don't
react in this way. Some retreat into themselves not speaking of the
One of the things that makes a violent crime particularly hard to cope
harm[ CITATION Eri97 \l 1033 ] . Getting victims help with these issues is
Families need to know they are not alone and they need to be able to
seek help for any children in the family so they do not follow in their
siblings shoes.
she said, ''you have more and more extremely disturbed people who are
children, Dr. Lewis has found that about four-fifths have witnessed
said. ''It curdles your blood to hear what the parents have done,'' she
said. Dr. Lewis is among the researchers who believe ''the best
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negatively affected and to blame at the same time. The basis for
Bosket whom fits the above theory that children without family support
delinquent can affect society and multiple families in the process due
mother was an alcoholic and his father, when not in prison, used to
violently beat him. Butch was sent to a reform school for robbery and
had begun to receive some positive help with his mental and self esteem
issues. When Butch was fourteen, he was sent to live with his father,
who had moved to New York after serving jail time for armed robbery.
James began to beat him and punch him again undoing all the benefits
from the reform school, and Butch was ready now to fight back. By this
advantage of being handsome. It did not take long before Butch was
arrested for armed robbery and received five years in prison, the same
as his father had before him. He was constantly in fights and was
one could compare Willie who by the age of eleven has been evaluated by
homicidal boy whom no one could reach. As related to his father’s life,
and a history of suicide attempts and daily threats against others. His
diagnostic evaluation was Antisocial Behavior, just steps away from the
was at the time, it was predicted that he would eventually kill someone.
Only a few short months later he would do just that [ CITATION Fox95 \l
1033 ].
By 1978, at the age of 15, Willie had committed two murders. Even
with sound evidence, there was not much a court could do to a juvenile,
despite his record and a clear indication that he might very well kill
again. Willie had made the claim many times to juvenile authorities that
his father was a killer and he was going to be one, too. Violence, he
had learned, won him respect. Growing up, he learned to throw temper
his own terms. His grandfather had sexually abused him when he was nine.
even had to face up to any of his criminal acts against others, because
maneuvered his way through the idealistic cracks of the system and
stabbed another boy with a fork, hit a counselor in the face, and choked
(James A Fox). Willie was placed with the Division of Youth for a
be free. The Division of Youth, for their part, felt they had done all
that they could. There were no programs or facilities for a child like
Albany for a special session, passing the Juvenile Offender Act of 1978.
Under its terms, kids as young as thirteen could be tried in adult court
for murder and would face the same penalties. This law reversed the
tradition of the past 150 years that children were malleable and could
be rehabilitated and saved. There was now an attitude that there were
truly bad kids and they should be locked away from society. It was too
late for Willie to be tried under this law, but it certainly changed
things for others his age. With the passage of this law, New York
became the first state to take this step. Yet as juvenile crime
statistics worsened around the country, other states followed suite. The
press, the public, and prosecutors in New York took to calling it the
Willie Bosket law. He got the notoriety he wanted, but not quite in the
killer just like his dad. After serving four years, Willie was returned
would continue his life of crime and 100 short days after his release he
would commit his third felony fall under the three-strike law. He was
(Butterfield, 1995).
number of young boys committing violent crimes like rape and murder has
increased dramatically in the 1990s, even as the murder rate for adults
has declined. Criminologists predict that this will only get worse. Some
state legislatures are making the age in which children are eligible for
on death row. In New York, 85% of the young people released by the
Division for Youth are re-arrested. Prison has come to represent a rite
have been put into place to help parents with parenting skills, and to
emotionally isolated child and helping him or her to connect with people
For Willie, this all came too late. A few months after he was
sentenced for stabbing the guard, he bashed another guard in the head,
water in the face of another guard. He soon came to be known as the most
dangerous criminal in the New York system, and was kept in a specially
of his cell is a sheath of plexiglass. Four video cameras keep him under
reckless violence of his youth, other times he feels sorry for himself
and all those things in life that he missed. And because of him, the
juvenile justice system will never been the same (Butterfield, 1995).
deemed him “bad” from birth? Did he have a brain anomaly that could
goes on in the mind of killer but with help from early intervention
were a failure of society to not only protect him from others but also
to protect him from his family and ultimately from himself. There is no
Works Cited
Amen Daniel, S. Y. (1997). "Visualizing the Firestorms in the Brain: An inside look at
the Clinical and Physiological Connection using Brain SPECT Imaging". Journal of
Phychoactive Drugs 29, No 4 , 307-319.
Butterfield, F. (1995). All God's Children: The Bosket Family and the American
Tradition of Violence. New York: Avon.
Heaton, P. (1994, January 17). Cost of Crim: 674 Billion. U.S. News and World Report ,
pp. 40-41.
Hickey, E. (1997). Murderes and Their Victims. Belmont: Wadsworth.
James A Fox, J. L. (2001). The Will to Kill. Boston: Allyn & Bacon.
James Butcher, S. M. (2010). Abnormal Psychology. Boston: Allyn & Bacon.
Mednick, D. (2008, April 10). Protecting Students Beyond Stopping Violence. Journal
News , pp. 4-11.
Robert Ressler, T. S. (1997). I Have Lived in the Monster. New York: Saint Martin's
Press.
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