Teen crime deserves an ounce of prevention…

Frontiersman editorial board

In past issues we printed stories about two separate crimes committed by 17-year-olds. As they make their way through two separate courts -- one a system of justice for young people and the other a system for adults -- it's confounding how the difference came about by a small margin.

One recent case involved second-degree assault charges brought against four Sutton teens accused of brutally beating a Native man with two-by-fours, pouring hot wax on him, then urinating on him. He was left for dead on Christmas Eve, and the teens were just charged this week.

Those teens will be tried as juveniles.

Another involved a teen-ager who allegedly stabbed and beat his friend last week over a girlfriend, then took him to the hospital. The victim suffers from near-fatal internal injuries and head lacerations.

That teen will be tried as an adult on first-degree assault charges.

Two similar crimes committed by young people of the same ages, but there's a big difference in how they will be tried.

Second-degree assault is a Class B felony, which means the teens were not automatically waived into adult court. They are in custody at Mat-Su Youth Facility. First-degree assault is a Class A felony, so that juvenile was sent into the adult system, and lodged at Mat-Su Pre-Trial Facility.

State juvenile confidentiality laws make it impossible for us to know if any of the teens have prior offenses; we might suspect that to be the case. Criminal justice experts continually emphasize intervention with first-time offenders as our best chance to catch wayward juveniles before they become dangerous felons. Perhaps such intervention could have prevented one or both of these heinous crimes.

That's why programs like Mat-Su Youth Court are so important. The youth court serves as a third justice system that is available only to first-time misdemeanents. Incidentally, Mat-Su Youth Court is quite literally hanging by a thread after the state budget grants that have funded it for the last six years were denied.

We believe it's up to the local community to make up the shortfall. Youth court lobbyists should ask the Mat-Su Borough and the cities of Palmer and Wasilla to increase funding for the program. It will be a short term band-aid at best, but hopefully the politicians will find a way to fund the program for this year with a minimum of bickering posturing. Once that is done, youth court board members need to work on a long-range plan that moves their program out from under the politicized wing of local government and bolsters their grant seeking abilities.