If you are 15 years old in this country, you can’t drive, vote or get married, but you can be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Sound strange? Eighteen is the age where our society deems you a legal adult. It is the age when you can first vote, buy cigarettes and sign legal documents. It is the age when our society deems a person responsible enough to make his or her own decisions. Yet, in certain places around the country, we are trying teenagers — and sometimes even children — as adults for crimes they committed when they were minors. This leads to harsher sentences, including life in prison without parole, which is far too extreme for childhood offenders.

Currently both federal law and the laws of 42 states allow child offenders to be sentenced to life in prison without parole, making the United States one of the few countries in the world to continue this practice. According to a report by the Equal Justice Initiative, a nonprofit law organization, over 2,225 juveniles have been sentenced to life in prison without parole in the United States. This issue has recently been brought to the national spotlight because of the case of Jordan Brown. Brown was only 11 years old when he allegedly shot his father’s fiancé, who was eight months pregnant at the time. A hearing is currently underway to determine whether Brown, now 12, will be tried in adult or juvenile court. If convicted in adult court, Brown could face life in prison without the possibility of parole.

The idea of a twelve-year-old walking into a prison and never coming out again is unthinkable. Yes, the crime that Brown allegedly committed was an absolute tragedy, but that is no reason to put a child behind bars for the rest of his life. Until recently, child offenders could even receive the death penalty in the United States. It wasn’t until a Supreme Court ruling in 2005 that the United States officially outlawed sentencing minors to death as a violation of the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of “cruel and unusual punishment.”

If children aren’t responsible to enough to sign legal documents or vote, then why are we treating them like adults and trying them in the adult criminal justice system? Children this young should not face life in prison. They should be rehabilitated in the juvenile system. A life sentence for a 12 year old might as well be a death sentence. A child like Brown could spend seven times as many years in jail than he did on the outside. Often, judges are forced to sentence these child offenders to life in prison without parole due to mandatory sentencing laws. The judges cannot take into account the offenders age or lack of previous record. Although mandatory sentencing laws may make sentencing more equitable and uniform, something is not working when this results in children being sentenced to life in prison without parole.

Children are fundamentally different from adults. According to the National Institute for Mental Health, their brains are still developing and are much more susceptible to impulsive and irrational behavior. This was part of the basis for the 2005 U.S. Supreme Court ruling banning the execution of childhood offenders, and this is one reason we shouldn’t send child offenders to jail for the rest of their lives. Our society doesn’t allow children to make legal decisions for themselves. If we don’t grant them the rights and privileges of adults, then we shouldn’t punish them as adults. This is not to say that we shouldn’t hold child offenders accountable for their actions. We should and must hold them responsible, but the focus should be on rehabilitation, not just locking these children away forever. The criminal justice system should not be the only place where we expect them to act like adults. There should be an age limit, and we should stick to it. All offenders under the age of 18 should be tried in juvenile court and held in juvenile detention facilities. In the case of Jordan Brown, he was initially held in the adult county jail until his attorneys successfully argued to move him to the juvenile facility. This is absolutely absurd. Imagine an 11 year old child in jail among adult men who have been convicted of violent crimes. That is unacceptable.

If our society believes that children shouldn’t be granted all the same privileges that we give to adults, then we shouldn’t treat them the same in the criminal justice system. Society has recognized that children are different than adults and because of this we have responded by limiting the legal decisions that children can make. If we don’t think they are capable of making the same legal decisions as adults, then we shouldn’t be punishing them like adults in court.

Megan Stile’s column appears on Wednesdays. She can be reached at m.stiles@cavalierdaily.com