Arrest or Not To Arrest?

Arrest Or Not To Arrest…

They have the 10 year old boy responsible for the wild fires in California. Now the question of the hour is what to do with the 10 year old that is responsible for the destruction. During the fires there was an area of more than 800 square miles burned. It’s reported that 2,100 homes were destroyed. The carelessness of the 10 year old also sparked the Buckweed fire in Los Angeles County which destroyed 21 more homes and injured at least 3 people. The fires cost millions of dollars to extinguish.



The 10 year old boy who accidentally started one of the worst California wildfires could face charges. He is too young to be charged as an adult. He and his parents still could face millions of dollars in fines. If he is charged he could face removal from his home and become a ward of the State. To bring charges all the DA has to do is decide if the boy knew right from wrong (an easy standard to meet according to another DA in CA).

Since the State claims the goal of the California Juvenile Justice System is to help young suspects, do they think it will be a benefit to charge the child and place him in foster homes or in a State operated facility?

Children under 14 are nearly always charged as juveniles, not adults regardless of what the crime is.

“Peter Arenella, a professor at the UCLA Law School said any prosecution of a 10-year-old that aims to punish the boy, rather than help him, "is an absurdity. The only justification for that would be if, in some extreme case, there was a need to protect society from him." Barring that, he said, prosecutors should be reluctant to sweep the boy up into the legal system.”

“It's hard to see how stern consequences - taking the boy from his parents, for instance, and handing down a multi-million fine - would be helpful to the 10-year-old. Much of the decision of whether to prosecute him rests with Cooley, who like prosecutors everywhere has a great deal of discretion. Unless uglier details about the boy's behavior are discovered, he could decide that in this case playing with matches doesn't raise the level of arson - even if the boy admits he knew that doing so was wrong. As Means points out, children almost always admit they knew their actions were wrong when they are questioned by police or prosecutors, which can be a scary experience for a kid.”

Regardless of what happens it should be interesting. I would hate to be the prosecutor that would have to decide to arrest or not to arrest.






On a side note, I would like to say Thanks to all the men and women in the Fire Service out there. This was noted as one of the worst wild land fires and they have done an awesome job battling this blaze.