Posted on 03/19/2012 6:57:41 AM PDT by ConservativeStatement
Adolfo Davis had been 14 years old for just two months when he made the mistake that changed his life.
In October 1990, he was living on Chicago's South Side with a grandmother who could barely care for him. His father was gone. His mother was a drug addict. He was teased because he often wore the same clothes to school. He committed petty crimes to get money for food. He found family in a gang, and one night, two much older gang members brought him along on what he believed was going to be a robbery. Two men were killed, though Davis never fired his gun.
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
And he’ll be wearing the same clothes for a long, long time.
What IS right? The law presumably exists for a reason, namely that the citizens of the state saw fit to equate murder in the commission of a felony to Capital Murder. The Supreme Court didn't create the law out of vapor like it did in the case of abortion "rights".
Even though “His father was gone. His mother was a drug addict.”, the laws of God and country remain fair but tough.
I wasn’t talking about this case in particular, was talking more about the law in general.
But lets even go into this case, you have 14 year old boy with not much of anything now in your gang, sounds like probably an ok kid under a bad situation at this point though could be wrong, hasn’t been completely lost.. his buddy’s convince him to be lookout/driver for a robery, and it goes wrong... at 14 could the kid really forsee that possibility? Dubious, unless he was a hardened criminal..that he really could think that all the way through...
Again, I am not suggesting the kids should escape punishment, just saying the mandatory LWOPP law seems bad law because it is going to ensnare those that are not hardened criminals, and could turn things around, with those who are completely past saving.
I am not against throwing a kid in jail for life or even executing them under circumstances where it is clear without any shadow of a doubt they knew what they were doing etc.. (The hardned criminal) but I don’t think its appropriate that it be applied across the board to any case.
“Why should the defendant be treated more leniently than his victim or the victim’s family. I would be in favor interment based on the victim’s age expectancy”
I agree, as in, “Services at 11, followed by interment at 2 at Woodlawn Cemetery.
Given the environment he's in, I'd have a hard time believing that by the age of 14 the kid didn't know that armed robberies can go bad and when the do, people get shot.
There was a time when the law said it was OK to hang children for stealing hankerchiefs and burn people alive for being witches.
Personally, I have a problem with locking up a 13 year old for the rest of his life when he neither pulled the trigger nor gave the order for someone else to do so...
Then you'd be the perfect juror for the defense. Personally, I wouldn't bat an eye. And I certainly wouldn't be swayed by any of this boo-hoo bull flop.
I couldn’t care less about what happens to him. Make him a roll model for others so they might think twice before they make the same “mistake.” Life without parole is just right.
Don’t get me wrong, I would have voted to convict if the evidence directed me to, but locking up a 13 year old with no possibility for parole in those circumstances is ridiculously harsh. Its a harsher punishment than it would be for an adult because he has his whole life in front of him.
He should have served a few years, not his whole life.
Liberals teach that - conservatives don't. Are you living in liberal-land?
Liberal values in action - no fathers, zero responsibility, drug addictions just another lifestyle... this story is a yawn. It’s dog bites man...
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