The U.S. Juvenile Justice System is broken. 10-year olds charged with murder can be tried as adults and face life in prison. The child criminal is not the same as an adult criminal. Being tried as an adult results in the possibility of spending the rest of their lives in prison sometimes without parole, this system needs to change.
Of every U.N. member states, there are two yet to ratify the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the United States and Somalia. The U.K. ratified the CRC in 1991, all of our closest allies have ratified two decades ago ironically on our soil. It is estimated that 250,000 minors are tried in an adult court annually. This needs to change. It is despicable that the only two of the 193 U.N. member states include the United States.