Gold Coast lawyers outline a radical idea to scare young crooks out of the criminal life
They are not even in their teens and already before the courts but nothing seems to deter them. A radical idea of how to shock young crooks out of crime has been put on the table.
Police & Courts
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Repeat juvenile crooks need to be shocked out of their criminal ways with a trip to an adult prison or boot camps, according to criminal defence lawyers at their wit’s end with the system.
Lawyers are regularly seeing the same young clients come through the justice system but nothing seems to be deterring them from their ways.
Some believe sending juveniles on a supervised trip to an adult prison will be the only way to snap them out of offending.
“Scare them straight and take them to the (adult) jail,” one said.
Vered Turner Lawyers principal Vered Turner said from what she had seen it was a handful of young offenders who were committing a majority of the crimes.
“They’re bored,” she said.
“That’s the bottom line.
“These kids – ones that are committing offences – they don’t go to school so they are bored.”
Ms Turner said for the repeat offenders it was going to take something drastic to turn them around.
“I think what needs to happen is they have a program and they get taken to visit an adult jail,” she said.
“Where they can get frightened and see where they could end up.
“They need to go with some reformed criminal and take them through the jail and say ‘mate, is there where you want to be?’.
“You need to shock them but nothing shocks these kids.”
Ms Turner said such a program would only be suitable for the repeat offenders.
Allen & Searing Criminal Lawyers director Lisa Searing also said new measures needed to be taken.
“What we need is diversionary programs like boot camps,” she said.
“Something to get them on the right track.”
Ms Searing also called for more community policing.
Brett Beasley, who’s son Jack was killed in a Surfers Paradise attack by teenage offenders, and his family established the Jack Beasley Foundation to stop children carrying knives and help reduce juvenile crime.
He supported the idea visits to adult prison and boot camps.
“These kids need to have the s*** scared out of them,” he said.
He said nothing else was working and the entire youth justice system needed an overhaul which included harsher penalties.
“It was only last week that the Queensland government came out with higher penalties for riding scooters,” he said.
“If you can do that for scooters why don’t you break out these harsher laws for youth offenders.”
Mr Beasely described the youth justice system as “pathetic”.
“We are left with a lifetime sentence but these kids may get out to see their 21st birthday,” he said.
Gold Coast Police Detective Senior Sergeant Greg Aubort, who works with juvenile offenders, said it was about 10 per cent of young crooks who committed most of the crime.
“It makes sense to focus on those that are recidivist … those ones that you have to contribute quite a number of resources to get some sustainable behavioural change,” he said.
When asked if scaring the kids straight wast he right way to do, Det Sen Sgt Aubort said: “There are various ways of tackling this problem and what you are looking for is to make a connection with that young person’s reasoning.”
He said a part of that was understanding why young people were committing crimes, which included some kids dealing with homelessness, substance abuse or exposure to those in their home life.
“Some kids commit crimes for notoriety and sense of identity,” he said.
“Some are influenced by peer pressure
“There is probably a much greater per centage which can be guided into the right path.”
He said police worked with partner agencies to run a number of programs which include boxing, martial arts, general life skills and animal therapy, to try to show the offenders there was a life away from crime.
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