# Children tried as an adult for murder **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 19, 2014, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-tried-as-an-adult-for-murder/691145 "2014-06-19T14:19:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2014, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-tried-as-an-adult-for-murder/691145/61 "2014-06-24T20:20:36Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > That’s a pretty good idea. Reminds me of the Roman custom that virgins were ineligible for the death penalty. But that could be easily solved by raping the accused before carrying out the sentence. If we’re going to euthanize a kid for a crime he committed as a kid, then we might as well get it over with. What’s the point of waiting til they’re 18? ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2014, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-tried-as-an-adult-for-murder/691145/62 "2014-06-24T20:34:47Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > We have the resources to keep people locked up for life. We’re not on the ragged edge of starvation and keeping a criminal in jail takes bread out of the mouths of innocent kids. Crime rates are going down across the board, not up, so this fear of being overrun by psychopaths clogging the prison system is misplaced. They are going in and out of prison with a revolving door in Arkansas. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2014, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-tried-as-an-adult-for-murder/691145/63 "2014-06-24T21:52:24Z")
Who is? 13 year old kids who set other kids on fire? Arkansas has lots of them nowadays? Or are you disputing that crime rates–including violent crime–are way down from the peak in the 80s and 90s? If the problem is letting violent criminals out of prison, and the criminals then commit other crimes, it seems to me that there are other solutions that could be tried rather than just euthanizing all the criminals. Maybe…not letting them go? ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-tried-as-an-adult-for-murder/691145/64 "2014-06-29T01:15:36Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > That’s a pretty good idea. That’s a disgusting idea. Besides, if twelve isn’t too young, is eleven? Ten? How young do you want to go? Why even have any age laws? Why don’t we let kids join the military, or vote? (How are we supposed to say, hey, it’s WRONG to harm children…and then turn around and do just that? Aren’t we supposed to be the good guys?) ---
**Author:** ![Vaevictis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/f04885/32.png) [@Vaevictis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Vaevictis)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2014, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-tried-as-an-adult-for-murder/691145/65 "2014-06-29T01:23:39Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Reminds me of the Roman custom that virgins were ineligible for the death penalty. But that could be easily solved by raping the accused before carrying out the sentence. > > If we’re going to euthanize a kid for a crime he committed as a kid, then we might as well get it over with. What’s the point of waiting til they’re 18? Could we get a cite on the Romans here? ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2014, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-tried-as-an-adult-for-murder/691145/66 "2014-06-30T22:42:49Z")
> **[Cassius Dio — Book 58](http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Cassius_Dio/58*.html#11)** > > Part of a complete English translation of Dio. Site contains many Greek and Latin texts, translations and related material. Cassius Dio on the downfall of Sejanus: > [@](#): > > By their order he was executed and his body cast down the Stairway, where the rabble abused it for three whole days and afterwards threw it into the river. His children also were put to death by decree, the girl (whom he had betrothed to the son of Claudius) having been first outraged by the public executioner on the principle that it was unlawful for a virgin to be put to death in the prison. [http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The\_Annals\_(Tacitus)/Book\_5#9](http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Annals_(Tacitus)/Book_5#9) > [@](#): > > It was next decided to punish the remaining children of Sejanus, though the fury of the populace was subsiding, and people generally had been appeased by the previous executions. Accordingly they were carried off to prison, the boy, aware of his impending doom, and the little girl, who was so unconscious that she continually asked what was her offence, and whither she was being dragged, saying that she would do so no more, and a childish chastisement was enough for her correction. Historians of the time tell us that, as there was no precedent for the capital punishment of a virgin, she was violated by the executioner, with the rope on her neck. Then they were strangled and their bodies, mere children as they were, were flung down the Gemoniae. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2014, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-tried-as-an-adult-for-murder/691145/67 "2014-06-30T22:50:15Z")
Heck, I’m “conscious” and I don’t see what Junilla’s offense was, either. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/children-tried-as-an-adult-for-murder/691145.md?page=3)