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this post was submitted on 11 Sep 2024
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Right. Like the whole point of treating juveniles differently is that they are incapable of understanding the magnitude of what they are doing. If anything, the argument for treating them differently is the strongest when applied to very serious crimes like murder.
I think it's the exact opposite.
Juveniles may not understand that jaywalking or trespassing or resisting arrest is wrong, especially if parents haven't explained those things to them.
But even a ten year old understands that murdering your classmates is very wrong. Just ask one if you don't believe me.
Yeah... I'm all for compassion and understanding, but if someone is missing the voice in their head that says "Hey, we shouldn't be killing people" then their circuitry is broken, no matter what age they are or what their circumstances are. And that broken circuitry poses a real and present danger to everyone in that person's orbit.
I don't support punitive incarceration, but the general public has the right to exist with a reasonable degree of certainty that they're not likely to encounter a cold blooded murderer on any given day, and part of ensuring that is to incarcerate people who are known to kill others, at least until such a time that we can have a high degree of confidence that they won't be doing that again.
The person being a child doesn't really change that part of the social contract. I promise you won't be any less upset if someone you love is murdered by a child than by an adult.
Has there ever been a repeat mass shooter? Is the risk of recidivism really the right theory for understanding the incarceration of mass shooters? Even if we broaden the question to whether juvenile mass shooters are likely to commit other crimes, is that even true?
I don't have hard data, but probably not. Most probably don't get the chance. If they don't kill themselves and aren't killed by police, most of them are probably facing decades if not life in prison or even execution.
At least if we're talking about the sort of "classic" mass shooting scenario where a lone wolf type walks into a soft target like a school and opens fire indiscriminately.
If you open up the definition a bit, you might find some examples, though I don't really like doing that because they really seem like different kinds of scenarios to me.
You could probably find a couple gang or mafia types who have taken part in more than one incident where multiple people were shot. Same for certain terrorist/guerilla groups and such.
The beltway sniper attacks took place over about 6 months, though most of their attacks individually wouldn't count as mass shootings
After the Boston Marathon bombing the bombers shot an MIT police officer and then later had a shootout with police. Not mass shootings, and you could probably argue that everything that followed the bombing was just an extension of the original incident.
The shootings in Maine last year might count, since they took place at 2 different locations, but again you could probably argue that it was all part of the same incident.
That's what I can think of off the top of my head. Nothing that I'd personally feel comfortable labeling as "repeat mass shooter" but they are incidents that kind of lean in that direction that show that they may not be just one-off events and that the perpetrators may try to continue if not stopped immediately.
I feel like I've also seen a few cases where it was discovered that the shooters had plans to commit other attacks. We'll probably never be able to say conclusively if they actually would have followed through with those plans if given the opportunity.
Valid questions. Do we have firm answers to any of them? And absent firm answers, what kind of risks to the safety of the general public are we willing to accept in service of ideological values?
I also thought the entire reason for treating minors differently is because they're more likely to commit petty crimes and that shouldn't hurt their future.
A teenager who did a breaking and entering made a bad decision and should be given another chance. Their bad decision shouldn't haunt them for the rest of their life because that just ensures their only option is to continue committing crimes. A mass murder should not be given another chance. That's not a stupid decision a kid makes.