Hugo Espinosa

Mr. Cook
ELA
14 October 2014



Juveniles who are over the age of thirteen should be tried as adults if they commit a
violent crime.
I support the quote Roy Barreros, the Colombian Senator from 2010. The senator is
correct because after age thirteen you start to develop that mental state where you know right
actions from wrong. The text states, Lawmakers named the bill for a girl who died after being
sexually assaulted and thrown against a wall by a 13 year-old. The quote above represents how
a thirteen year-old can rape someone and their family not even knowing that the kid knew about
horrible things like rape. The text also states, For many years, criminal justice systems treated
all offenders the same way. Adults and children accused and convicted of crimes had the same
rights and faced the same punishments. This quote expresses my opinion on how teens over
thirteen should be charged the same way as adults because the kids have that mentality to for
sure know what they are doing and act in crimes the same way an adult would.
I also support the senators quote because it should be true for El Ponchis. The text
states, He is accused of multiple crimes, including beheading four people and pushing their
bodies off a bridge. El Ponchis should be tried as an adult because he knew that beheading
people and throwing their bodies away was wrong on so many levels. Another similar case to El
Ponchis was the DC killer case . The text says, The police eventually caught the two suspects;
one was a seventeen-year-old boy. He had been abandoned by his father as a baby, neglected by
his mother, and spent time in a homeless shelter. The other was his mentor, who had
essentially adopted him and taught him how to shoot high-powered rifles at people. This quote
shows how a lot of teens know what they are doing and make a story of brain washing up. This
case seems like the teen was taught to shoot by his mentor, but it makes it look like after he
knew how to shoot they both agreed to murdering people because of previous events in life that
had happened.
Someone opposing my claim would claim that trying teens as adults would be unfair
because they were not conscious about what they were doing. I get what this opposing argument
would bring to the table, but I personally agree with senator Roy Barreros. The argument that is
opposing me is not carefully thought through because most likely these teens in the article knew
what they were doing. The only exception in this article would maybe be El Ponchis. I have read
about this before and El Ponchis was claimed by the cartel when he was eleven. My argument
clearly states my beliefs and reasoning for my claim. Adults or kids it should not matter the
person committed a crime they should all be punished the same way when proven guilty.