Introduction
Juvenile violence has been very rampant in recent years. Children kill fellow children in circumstances that can only be explained by psychological reasoning. With the contemporary juvenile social trends, we are bound to experience more and more of these alarming incidences. Reasons like heartbreaks in adolescence, school bullying, and broken homes have been used to explain many of these incidences but one is obliged to question their appropriateness in specific cases. In this essay, we analyze the Lionel Tate case, Eric Smith’s case, and the case of an unidentified juvenile from a news article. Let us start with Lionel Tate’s case.
Reasons for delinquency
Lionel Tate’s Case
Lionel Tate, 12 years old, was allegedly practicing the wrestling techniques he saw on television when he murdered 6-year-old Tiffany Eunice. This happened on the night of July 28, 1999, when his mother brought Eunick to their home to stay with her for the evening. His mother, Kathleen Grossett-Tate had gone upstairs and after a while, Tate came to inform her that Eunick was not breathing. Later medical examinations showed that Eunick had been severely tortured for several minutes before her death. Tate was to confess later that he jumped from the staircase to fall on her. She had major injuries including lacerations, ruptured spleen, damaged rib cage, a partially detached liver, brain contusions, and a fractured skull etcetera. The fact that a psychological checkup on Tate showed that he did not have any mental illness proves that his actions were due to the life experiences he had been through. He was shown to have poor control for impulse, resentment, high potential for violence, and an inability to control anger. These temperaments are normally evident in people who have undergone unpleasant life experiences and so they strive to protect themselves from undergoing such experiences again. This can be substantiated by the fact that after being put under home arrest, he walks with a knife. He was thus so obsessed with protecting himself that he insensibly tried to learn wrestling tricks with a kid and therefore severely hurt her and killed her. Next, consider Eric Smith’s case (Burns 1).
Eric Smith’s Case
At the tender age of 13, Eric Smith was convicted of the second-degree murder of a four-year-old Derrick Robie. Smith had stuck Derrick with rocks, stripped his body naked, and sodomized him with a stick. Smith was a loner and he lived in anger due to the bullying he encountered in school. At home, smith’s stepfather did not seem to care enough for his stepchildren it was even proved that he was sexually abusing Smith’s sister. It, therefore, follows that Smith did not have adequate parental love. It can thus be argued that Smith’s behavior was due to a psychological problem developed from his past experiences. At one point, he was asked why he Killed Derrick and he answered that he killed him because he enjoyed inflicting pain on another person rather than the pain being inflicted on him. This shows that he had undergone substantial abuse and he had developed a passion for revenge. This is indeed a serious psychological problem considering the fact that he directed his revenge on an innocent child and tortured the child’s body after killing him (Leung 1).
Reaction to the cases
The above-discussed cases show that juvenile violence can be confidently attributed to the life experiences of kids. In all these cases the juvenile criminals develop temperaments and mental problems due to problems in their social life. They develop anger and overprotectiveness of themselves from past mistreatments or abuse. This anger and overprotectiveness make them lead lonely lives and thus their condition is aggravated. This way, they develop psychological problems that enable them to commit murders and feel as if they are doing nothing wrong (Burns 1).
From Lionel Tate’s case, it is evident that he had been affected by past life experiences. The fact that he had uncontrolled anger, violence potential, resentment, and poor impulse control show that he had been affected by his past greatness. This could be due to the fact that he was being raised by a single mother and lacked paternal love. Tate had behavior problems that included stealing, fighting, and assault etcetera, and had been suspended from school fifteen times. This shows that he was protesting against a lot of aspects of his relations. He can therefore be considered to have had undergone several problems for him to develop this kind of defensiveness. Thus this acts as evidence that his past life had tremendous input on his development of violence. In Smith’s case, his bright red hair, freckles, and speech problems made him experience a lot of bullying and isolation in school. This made him develop the attitude that everybody was out to hurt him. At one point, he said that he closed his ears to what other people said about him. This way, he lost his emotion and became vengeful to the world for not appreciating him and always doing things to hurt him. His murder of Derrick is very queer and we get the impression that Smith was seriously sick psychologically. He is said to enjoy murdering the kid and the investigations that follow. Thus the psychological problems that smith developed were due to the experiences he had gone through the courtesy of his bright red hair, freckles, and speech problems (Leung 1).
Despite the apparent relation of the stated juvenile murder cases to the past experiences of the children, it can be argued that the abnormality of the behavior of these juveniles was due to inborn characteristics. Smith was born with bright red hair and freckles that had an enormous effect on his esteem and social life. This, arguably, led to his solitude that in turn made him develop psychological problems. These psychological problems can be primarily related to the murder of Derrick. On the other hand, Tate was naturally violent and thus he accidentally killed Eunick while satisfying the violent spirit in him (Martin 1).
The argument that the mentioned juveniles committed these murders due to past experiences is the most appropriate. This is because, although a kid may be born with temperaments, his/her life experiences affect his/her acquisition of the basic values in life like self-esteem, self-confidence etcetera. These values have a large impact on the psychology of a person and thus their presence/absence in a person’s life could form the line between a murderer and a nonmurderer. This argument however assumes that all people have the same stress management capabilities. It assumes that if any child was put through the conditions Tate and Smith were going through at the time of the murders, they would behave the same. This is not true since different people have different cushions for stress and social problems (Martin 1).
With this argument, these children are psychologically sick and they need therapeutic help. They should be given this help while behind bars until their conditions are proven to be stable. The efficiency of the therapy will depend on the accuracy in the identification of the problem. Somebody like Smith, now an adult, could be having the problems he had as a kid. His condition may have been worsened by the trials of correctional facilities. If his problem is not fully identified, he will not get adequate treatment and thus he will not be fit to go back to society (Burns 1).
Conclusion
With the prevailing rate of juvenile murders, society should have a closer look at such cases as Smith’s case and see what can be done to reduce the occurrence of these crimes. Juvenile social behavior should also be analyzed to see its contribution to the occurrence of such crimes. This will reduce the number of children behind bars and also reduce the number of innocent deaths that occur as a result of juvenile violence. We should thus make sure that we raise our children to be free from early childhood emotional problems and make sure that they are free from any kind of abuse. This will ensure that their psychological welfare is maintained throughout childhood and thus they will be free from developing violence.
References
Burns, Kari. “Lionel Tate.” 2006. Web.
Leung, Rebbeca. “Why Did Eric Kill?” 2004. Web.
Martin, Dutch. “No More Second Chances for Lionel Tate.” 2006. Web.