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When he is caught, the courts usually spew him out again. If he is under a certain age, 16 to 18 depending on the state, he is almost always taken to juvenile court, where he is treated as if he were still the child he is supposed to be. Even if he has murdered somebody, he may be put away for only a few months. He is either sent home well before his term expires or he escapes, which, as the kids say, is "no big deal." Small wonder that hardened juveniles laugh, scratch, yawn, mug and even fall asleep while their crimes are revealed in court.
A New York teen-ager explained in a WCBS radio interview how he started at the age of twelve to rob old women. "I was young, and I knew I wasn't gonna get no big time. So, you know, what's to worry? If you're doin' wrong, do it while you're young, because you won't do that much time."
Another boy, 15, recalled why he shot a "dude": "Wasn't nothin'. I didn't think about it. If I had to kill him, I just had to kill him. That's the way I look at it, 'cause I was young. The most I could have got then is 18 months."
In Miami, Edward Robinson, 15, was accused of raping a housewife at knife point, even while police surrounded the home. "What you gonna do to me?" he sneered. "Send me to youth hall? I'll be out in a few hours." That taunt landed him in adult court. But his case was an exception. Most juvenile criminals are precluded from effective punishment. Says Andrew Vogt, executive director of Colorado's District Attorneys' Association: "In effect, we have created a privileged class in society."
That privileged class keeps enlisting ever younger members. Partly this is a response to juvenile laws. Older kids employ younger confederates—who tend to get off easily if caught—to push drugs, commit robberies and sometimes murder. In New Haven, two brothers, Ernest Washington, 16, and Erik, 14, along with four other kids, were arrested for robbing and killing a Yale student. Since Erik was underage, he confessed that he had pulled the trigger. He told New Haven Prosecutor Michael Whalen: "The most you're going to give me is two years." Erik, in fact, was bound over to adult court. At his trial last month, guess what? Erik denied doing the shooting. It did not help. He was convicted and sentenced to 15 years to life. Says Whalen: "He showed no awareness of conscience or remorse. He grinned like crazy. He probably figures that prison is not a hell of a lot worse than other places he's been."
Aside from this sort of calculation, kids seem to be developing a taste for sadism earlier in life. William S. White, presiding judge of the Cook County, Ill., juvenile court, thinks that a lower limit may have been reached: "I don't expect a six-year-old to be committing homicides." Don't be too sure. In Washington, D.C., a six-year-old boy siphoned gasoline out of a car and poured it over a sleeping neighbor. Then he struck a match and watched the man go up in flames.
More girls are getting involved in violent crime.