Statistics show that only about 25% of the rehabilitated criminals do not go back to prison after they are released. That is quite a big percentage for those who go back to jail. These statistics show that it can help certain percentage criminals, but it also shows that it doesn’t work for most inmates. People have been disagreeing about this case for a long time. No one seems to agree with the other, so should juvenile delinquents be put in adult prison, or should they be rehabilitated? A criminal should know the consequences and be ready to accept them for their wrong doings.

If a person’s son or daughter was murdered just because someone wanted to see how it felt to kill a person, wouldn’t one want justice for one’s deceased child? The government should not be biased in their judgment on children purely because of the person’s age. Jessica Wilde, the author of “Juvenile Criminals Must Be Tried as Adults,” says that the judiciary system should not make age-based exceptions. A case that Jessica Wilde referred to was:
In 1993, 2-year-old Jamie Bulger living in Bootle, England, was taken by two 10-year-old boys and was mutilated and murdered. The two boys laid his body on a railroad track with the intention of causing substantial injury, which would cover up what they had done to the child. The murderers were tried and convicted as minors and the boys have since been relocated and given new identities. (5)
The person’s child was just killed as an activity for fun. The children that went and killed his or her son or daughter were just given new identities and were moved to a new place without judgment. How would the person feel if he or she were in the mother’s shoes?

Some people would argue that children cannot be tried as adults because of various reasons. Mike Hendricks thinks differently by saying: “The fact is, kids are not adults. Their brains are wire differently. They don’t think things out the way we do” (7). It might be true that their brains are wired differently, but they still have their own mind to choose. In addition, rehabilitation does not help those young criminals. The National Center for Juvenile Justice Profiles thinks that “youth behavior is malleable” and can be reformed with rehabilitation. How does rehabilitation fix a person that knew the crime was wrong, yet they still committed it? Not sentencing these young criminals to adult prison can make other criminals of the same age group encouraged by knowing the fact that they won’t be going to adult prison for their crimes. If one puts an adolescent criminal in jail, the other undisciplined criminals would get highly discouraged to committing something wrong. By doing this, the other children will be scared enough to never commit an offense ever again for the rest of their life. Adult prison is a prospect that they surely do not want to face. I can assure that no child wants to go to prison.

People seem to think that children should not be put into adult prison; I have a question for those who think differently than I do. What if the victim was someone her or she loved with all of his or her heart, and their life was taken away because the murderer felt like killing someone? How would he or she feel about that? Would he or she want the person that killed his or her loved one to be “rehabilitated” and let him or her roam free for the rest of his or her life? I have complete confidence when I say that they would want that person punished in some sort of fashion or manner to provide justice to their deceased loved one. These criminals were “born…with the lack of human morals and cannot be treated or cured in rehabilitation centers. Morals are inherited from birth. People either have morals or they don’t. There is no gray area.” (Wilde 7). These young outlaws don’t seem to understand the significance of their actions. Their actions have a heavy impact on the victim’s family. These children should learn that everything they do will have a consequence. In conclusion, are children not responsible for their actions and what they have done? Although others may argue otherwise, I think that they should receive the punishment and the pain they put out onto others. It is not easy to recover from losing someone you know and love, and I can personally tell you what feels like. Children need to know that what they are doing is wrong. Excuses should not be made for them because of their age. Lets hope for the future that they can choose to do the right thing rather than the wrong thing. If they choose to do the wrong thing, they should accept the consequences.