From the PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER:
In many respects, our society is more interested in punishing wrongdoing than correcting it. Nowhere is this more obvious than in how we deal with juveniles who commit violent crimes.
Pennsylvania’s Superior Court is being asked to determine if Jordan Brown should be tried as a juvenile or as an adult for the fatal shooting of his father’s pregnant fiancee when he was just 11 years old. If Brown is found guilty as an adult, he’ll be sentenced to life without parole. If found guilty as a juvenile, he will be confined for no more than nine years, until he is 21.
There is no in-between in Pennsylvania. In other states, “blended” sentences allow some juvenile offenders to serve time until they reach adulthood, whereupon courts evaluate their rehabilitation efforts and decide if continued confinement is in order…
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