> Date: Thu, 10 Jun 1999 08:17:17 -0500
> Subject: [fla-left] FW: MCCOLLUM IS AT IT AGAIN!
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Hyde/McCollum Juvenile Injustice Bill, H.R. 2037, a danger to children
> Judiciary Committee Chairman Henry Hyde (R-IL) and Subcommittee on Crime
> Chairman Bill McCollum (R-FL) have introduced a new juvenile justice
> bill, H.R. 2037, which will be considered on the House floor next week.
> This
> new juvenile "injustice" bill presents dangers to children by:
>
> 1. Trying more children as adults
> H.R. 2037 allows federal prosecutors rather than judges the discretion
> to try children as adults, lowers the age to 13 in some cases at which
> children can be tried as adults in the federal system, and broadens the
> scope of federal crimes for which juveniles can be tried as adults.
> This provision would mean that more children would be placed in adult
> jails,
> and children could be placed in the same jail cells with adults. This
> places children at serious risk of abuse and assault, and flies in the face
> of
> current studies which indicate that trying children as adults increases
> rather than decreases youth crime.
>
> Placing children at risk of assault and abuse in adult jail H.R. 2037
> allows children to come into contact with adults in adult jails in the
> federal system. Children as young as 13 years old would be allowed to be in
> the same jail cells with adults. Allowing contact between juveniles and
> adults in adult jails would place children at risk of assault and abuse, as
> children are eight times more likely to commit suicide, five times more
> likely to be sexually assaulted, and twice as likely to be assaulted by
> staff in adult jails than in juvenile facilities.
>
> 2. Imposing new mandatory minimums sentences for children
> H.R. 2037 imposes new mandatory minimum sentences for children who are
> convicted of certain offenses. These new draconian mandatory minimums would
> likely impose harsher penalties on youthful offenders than adult criminals
> guilty of the same offenses. For example, any juvenile who discharges a
> firearm in a school zone would get a minimum 10 year sentence. An adult
> charged with the same offense would not be subject to the same mandatory
> penalty.
>
> 3. Opening juvenile records
> H.R. 2037 requires juvenile records of juveniles who are convicted of
> felonies in the federal system to be maintained in the same manner as
> adult records. Also, H.R. 2037 requires that all juvenile records be
> available for background checks with no protections to assure that the
> records would not be made widely available. Under H.R. 2037, juveniles'
> records could be shared with law enforcement, courts, the FBI, and schools,
> including schools in which the child is seeking to enroll. Opening juvenile
> records and allowing for broad dissemination of these records would have
> devastating consequences for the future employment and education of many
> children.