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Orlando police arrested a six-year-old Black girl for "throwing a tantrum" in her first-grade class. The cops handcuffed her, put her in the back of a police car and took her to a juvenile detention facility where they fingerprinted her and took a mugshot. wfla.com/news/florida/f…
The name of the police officer who made the arrest is Dennis Turner. Turns out he also arrested an 8-year-old boy on the same day in an unrelated incident. Department policy requires officers to get permission to arrest children under 12. He didn't.
So the department will investigate that part. But there is no minimum age for arrest in Florida.
In 2014/2015, 80 children under 9 were arrested in the state. In 2010, a 4-year-old was arrested with other children for breaking a padlock on a shed and vandalizing property.
In 2014/2015, 80 children under 9 were arrested in the state. In 2010, a 4-year-old was arrested with other children for breaking a padlock on a shed and vandalizing property.
In case you're tempted to say only in Florida, Florida is actually only one of 13 states that have no minimum age of criminal liability. eji.org/news/13-states…
Every time you read an article about a child being arrested, know it has happened so many other times and just not been reported. Maybe the child was in foster care, or the family didn't have the resources to contact the media, or didn't speak English.
It's so horrific and it is just a very small part of the reality of what Black and Brown children experience every day in this country's criminal legal system.
It's why we can't stop paying attention, even when these stories don't make the news.
It's why we can't stop paying attention, even when these stories don't make the news.
PS. Some media reports have suggested the 6-year-old girl was not taken to a juvenile detention facility. That's incorrect. The facility to which she was taken is divided into two buildings - one for administrative processing (JAC) and one where children are detained (JDC).
She was taken to JAC not JDC, so that's where that confusion likely came from. But all of it really happened - the arrest, the fingerprinting, the mugshot. I understand people not being able to believe it's true, but every single part of the story is just as I recounted.
I need to correct a statistic cited in this thread. The @EJUSA article I tweeted above refers to the number of states that have no minimum age at which children can be criminally prosecuted as ADULTS, which is 13.
@EJUSA @JJ_GPS Internationally, the most common age of criminal responsibility is 14. In the UK and Australia it is 10. I have not been able to find an example of a jurisdiction in a developed country outside the United States where the age is less than 10. sbs.com.au/news/how-young…
