Charlie Myers, now awaiting trial for the murder of Jennifer Nelson, burned down a neighbor’s home in 2004 after breaking into it and stealing. His case reveals a deep flaw in Ohio’s juvenile justice system.Myers had already done time in juvenile prison twice before, and was not quite 18 when he torched his neighbor’s house. He appeared before a juvenile judge, who refused to allow him to be tried as an adult because of the series of tragedies that constituted the young man’s life. The Columbus Dispatch has a fine piece of journalism on the case today.
But this is not a story about bad judgment -- the judge did her best to follow the law, and no judge knows the future. This is a story about a juvenile justice system that misses the point.
Under current law, the system is concerned first with the offender, not society. Sometimes it works -- many young people who make teenage mistakes do not repeat them as adults.
But what about somebody like Charlie Myers?
Before someone like Myers can be tried as an adult -- and face adult penalties -- the juvenile court must hold what’s called an amenability hearing. Basically, if the judge thinks that any treatment, counseling or programming can possibly rehabilitate the young offender, he stays in the juvenile system.
It was supposed to get easier to try the worst young offenders as adults under the Juvenile Justice Reform Act of 2002 – but that amenability provision means that “bindovers” are still pretty rare.
Compare the juvenile law with what the law says about adult felony sentencing – that it’s to punish the offender and set an example to deter others.
We can do better. Here’s how: for a 16-year-old or 17-year-old who commits a serious felony – arson and burglary would qualify in my book – there should be no amenability hearing. Instead, the law should focus on the community, and state a preference to try the offender as an adult, with adult penalties -- although that preference could be overcome by sufficient evidence.
Research shows that adult prison time is not an important deterrent to other youths. Fine. There are two other truths about prison time for serious juvenile offenders: it’s deserved punishment -- and they won’t harm the rest of us while they’re locked up.
Charlie Meyer’s 2004 crimes would have put him in jeopardy of more than a decade in prison in the adult system, and if tried as an adult, he might have been there still.
He was not. Jenifer Nelson, 29, leaves behind a four-year-old son.
