When Florida judges sentence children tried as adults, they give them higher sentences on average for felony crimes than adult offenders

mozz , 58 minutes ago

Could be that the crimes that lead to kids being tried as adults tend to be especially severe, warranting a longer sentence

The example listed, 40 years for armed robbery, seems definitely nuts. But by pure statistics, this isn’t necessarily a crazy result.

snooggums , 43 minutes ago

Nope.

Children tried as adults were sentenced to a little more than three years in prison on average for third-degree felonies — around 50% longer than the average sentence given to adults for the same class of offense. The vast majority of all felony charges are third-degree offenses, which are the lowest class of felony crimes and include burglary, some types of assault, drug possession and certain DUI offenses.

Children and adults had similar average sentences for more serious offenses that fall under first and second-degree felonies.

mozz , 10 minutes ago

Doesn’t that illustrate my point though?

Seriousness of charges isn’t necessarily the same as seriousness of crime. I read more about Knight’s case and it sounds like them departing from sentencing guidelines for armed robbery happened for the same reason as them wanting to charge him as an adult - I.e. that his actions were worse than you would think just from reading the name of the charge.

For serious offenses, they get treated the same. The only difference is for third-degree felonies, which it sounds like would be the main circumstance where that correlation would come into play. Why wouldn’t there be a difference in sentencing, when you’re specifically selecting for the more serious circumstances on the juvenile side and not on the adult side of the data you’re comparing?

Huckledebuck , 1 hour ago

Kids have more years to offer the system. Working as intended.

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