Public Views on Sentencing Juvenile Murderers

• Published date: 01 January 2006
• DOI: 10.1177/1541204005282312
• Date: 01 January 2006
• Author: Robin King Davis,Brandon K. Applegate
• Subject Matter: Articles

10.1177/1541204005282312Youth Violence and Juvenile JusticeApplegate, Davis / VIEWS ON SENTENCING JUVENILES

PUBLIC VIEWS ON SENTENCING

JUVENILE MURDERERS

The Impact of Offender, Offense,

and Perceived Maturity

Brandon K. Applegate

Robin King Davis

University of Central Florida

Concerns about juvenile murderers were raised by increases injuvenile homicide rates

between the mid-1980s and mid-1990s. Little is known, however, about what level of

punishment the public desires for such youths. Using a randomly selected sample of

Florida citizens and a factorial vignette survey approach, the present study assesses the

impact of characteristics of the offender, aspects of the offense, and perceptions of a

youth’s maturity on public preferences for the punishment of juvenile murderers. Our

findings show that the public favors short sentences of incarceration or less punitive re-

sponses in most cases and that the most salient determinant of punitiveness is the type of

murder committed. These results are discussed in light of prior research and current

policy directions.

Keywords: juveniles; punishment; attitudes; murder; homicide

In the decade between the mid-1980s and the mid-1990s, the United States experi-

enced dramatic increases in juvenile homicides. Bureau of Justice statistics data show that

homicide offending rates for youths ages 14 to 17 more than tripled from 8.5 per 100,000 in

1984 to 30.2 per 100,000 in 1993 (Fox & Zawitz, 2002). A closer look at the data reveals

that juvenile homicides are unique in this regard. Bernard (1999) has drawn together arrest

statistics, clearance rates, and victimization data to demonstrate convincingly that a sup-

posed wave of serious juvenile crime during this period in reality reflects methodological

artifacts. The exception, he notes, is juvenile homicide, where a more detailed analysis of

multiple data sources “cannot account for the large increase in juvenile arrests for homicide

between 1984 and 1993” (Bernard, 1999, p. 353). Juvenile homicide levels have dropped in

recent years. In 2000, the rate had declined to 9.3 per 100,000 (Fox & Zawitz, 2002). Still,

concerns about serious, violent offending had set the stage for changing approaches to

juveniles accused of murder (Lotke, 1997).

Perhaps the most widely observed and reported legislative responses were expan-

sions of statutes mandating adult court processing for youths charged with particular of -

fenses. Legislative exclusion—that is, statutorily mandating that youths meeting certain cri-

teria do not fall under the special jurisdiction of the juvenile court—represents one means of

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Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice, Vol. 4 No. 1, January 2006 55-74

DOI: 10.1177/1541204005282312

© 2006 Sage Publications

“getting tough” with juveniles who commit “adult” crimes. Murder is invariably among the

offenses for which juveniles are moved to the adult criminal court. In a recent summary of

the statutes of 33 states and the District of Columbia, Feld (2000) reported only 2 states did

not have provisions for automatically excluding juveniles charged with at least one form of

murder.

There exists a paradox in considering the appropriate punishment for juveniles who

commit or even attempt murder. On one hand, the severity of the crime would suggest harsh

punishment, something that the efforts to transfer youths to the adult court are meant to as-

sure. Penal law prescribes severe sentences, including the death penalty in many jurisdic-

tions, for homicide. Also, as we discuss in the following section, the public’s desire for pun-

ishment is at its highest levels for this offense. On the other hand, the diminished maturity of

children and adolescents suggests that they are less culpable for their actions. Developmen-

tal psychology offers evidence that “adolescent choices about involvement in criminal ac-

tivity may reflect cognitive and psychological immaturity” (Scott, 2000, p. 292). Further-

more, the law recognizes reduced responsibility as a mitigating factor in sentencing

(Zimring, 2000), and some commentators recommend specific sentence reductions for

juveniles when they are tried as adults (Feld, 1997).

As Steinbert and Schwartz (2000) observe, adolescence is an important transitional

time, when physical, emotional, intellectual, and social development is not yet complete.

The literature on adolescents shows that teens differ from adults in several ways. Adoles-

cents are more susceptible to peer influence, tend to place relatively greater emphasis on

short term than on long-term consequences, are less risk averse, and are more impulsive

(Grisso et al., 2003; Scott, 2000; Steinberg & Schwartz, 2000). These differences in

psychosocial functioning indicate immature decision-making capabilities among adoles-

cents. Thus youths, particularly those who are at the lower end of adolescence, may be less

responsible for any criminal behavior (Fried & Reppucci, 2001; Zimring, 2000).

Still, shifts in juvenile justice policy have moved the United States away from con-

ceptions of young offenders as relatively blameless. When a separate juvenile court system

was first established at the close of the 19th century, youthful offenders were regarded as

childlike and largely innocent. Broad social circumstances and poor parental guidance were

to blame for their transgressions; punishment was undeserved. Juvenile justice has certainly

changed in the past century, and in the past two decades, an era of more punitive reforms has

been ushered in (Bernard, 1992). As Scott (2000) contends, current “policies explicitly or im-

plicitly present adolescent offenders as indistinguishable from adult counterparts, and reject

the importance of youthful immaturity in assignments of criminal responsibility” (p. 297).

Thus, observations of juvenile justice policy reveal a system oriented toward harsh

treatment of juveniles who commit violent crimes. It is not clear, however, to what extent

the public truly embraces this tough stance or how these views may be balanced by percep-

tions of the immaturity of youths. The present study adds depth in this area by examining

how people want juvenile murderers punished and the ways in which these views are

shaped by characteristics of the offense and the offender. Prior studies on perceptions of ho-

micide are reviewed to provide a conceptual and empirical backdrop for our analysis.

Public Views of Murder

It is no surprise that murder often tops the list when people areasked to assign punish-

ment for various crimes. Hawkins (1980), for example, had respondents assign punish-

56 Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice