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Article: The juvenile justice dilemma.(Cover Story)
- Article from:
- Corrections Today
- Article date:
- February 1, 1996
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1996 American Correctional Association, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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To many Americans today, the country is a hostage -- but not, as one might first expect, to terrorists overseas. Instead, we live in terror of our own children. The murder reports we read in the paper or see on television are particularly horrifying: In San Antonio, Texas, Victoria Dalton, 13, is convicted of smothering two small children left in her care. Fifteen hundred miles away, in Portland, Ore., Brandon Roses, 10, is found guilty of murdering his 5-year-old sister because he claimed she was annoying him.
These are not isolated events. According to a Department of Justice report released in November, 23 percent of those arrested for weapons offenses in ...