A new video documentary titled “Your Neighbor’s Child” was recently aired on Wyoming PBS and discusses shocking shortcomings in Wyoming’s juvenile criminal justice system.

According to Wyoming Kids Count, Wyoming has no separate juvenile justice system, so a juvenile can accumulate a criminal record in adult courts for minor offenses like smoking in school or skateboarding on a public sidewalk. The film features interviews with Wyoming lawmakers including former U.S. Senator, turned juvenile justice reform advocate, Alan Simpson. Simpson was briefly jailed when he was teenager for shooting mail boxes and punching a cop and seeks a return to policies that focus on rehabilitating kids like him.

Next to Wyoming, Colorado has one of the toughest juvenile trial and sentencing structures in the United States. While there is no formal juvenile justice system in Wyoming, most juvenile trials in Colorado are handled by District Courts and District Attorneys get to decide whether kids will be tried as juveniles or adults. In many cases, an adult trial means an adult sentence.

Reaction to your “Your Neighbor’s Child” is typical. One comment at the the Laramie Boomerang, read, ” Why do we not hold children and parents accountable. It is not societies fault but parents who think it ‘takes a village to raise a child’. It takes parents and if children are held accountable for actions at a young age we would see less problems. Just like the person who gets 7 DUI’s in 5 years. Prosecute them and punish them the first time and maybe they will think twice. ”

The problem is that when kids are punished for minor offenses they don’t learn “to think twice” about what they did. They learn to “think twice” about how they got caught. In other cases, kids get caught up in bad situations. A friend commits a serious crime like aggravated assault. Rather than turn on their friend, they try to help him or her and become a party to the crime.

The bible says, “Judge not lest ye be judged.” Whether you’re a Christian or not, that’s good advice. As a society we have a responsibility to educate both youth and parents. The fact is that the law entraps young people and rather than trying to sort out what happened, we just throw kids away. That isn’t right. People like Alan Simpson and the makers of “Your Neighbor’s Child” deserve a great deal of credit for working to make things better for children and their parents.

The greatest miscarriage of justice happens when a supposedly self-correcting system fails to correct itself. Alan Sudduth was convicted as a juvenile for murder in 1995 and sentenced to 70 years in prison on a plea deal.  The problem is that Sudduth didn’t actually kill anyone and someone else has repeatedly confessed to the murder.

According to Westword, the Colorado State Court of Appeals ruled unanimously that Sudduth waited too long before filing his appeal based on ineffective counsel. Sudduth’s attorney, Alison Ruttenberg, is appealing to the state supreme court. While the Court of Appeals may be technically correct according to the law, they have utterly failed to recognize the injustice that has been done.

As a general rule, there is no statute of limitations on filing murder charges and there should be no statute of limitations on overturning a wrongful conviction. The Arapahoe County District Attorney in 1995 knowingly filed adult charges against Sudduth when the preponderance of evidence pointed to someone else.  Sudduth was too young and too naive to understand the gravity of the decisions his attorneys were making on his behalf. The reason we have court appointed attorneys is to protect defendants against their own ignorance of the law. If they fail to effectively and faithfully represent the interests of their client, the system fails. No judge should ever condone that–whether it fits on their calendar or not.

Sudduth deserves parole.

The story, from this USA Today Article, basically goes like this: a Miami man was wrongfully accused, tried, and convicted of crimes he did not commit.  He was convicted based upon faulty evidence which had been manipulated by the local prosecutor who was looking to score a win.  By the time the truth came to light the life of an innocent man, and that of his wife and children, was ruined beyond repair.  How could this happen?

Sadly, the case outlined in the article is far from the only example of this.  As our technology advances, DNA testing has freed many people from prison, and from the convictions they were wrongly given.  In all of these cases, no matter what the differences are, you will fine one common thread: somewhere, at some point, the prosecuting attorney chose to pursue a conviction at all costs, rather than justice at all costs.  Pandemonium around events such as the recent UT shooting (University of Texas) help us understand why prosecutors, as elected officials, get carried away with the pursuit of conviction rather than the pursuit of justice.

The reality of America today is that law enforcement, like all other public functions, has limited resources.  Investigating crimes, chasing criminals, and legal prosecutions cost money — lots of it.  Resources are scarce, and the waste that would incur from admitting a wrongful arrest, releasing the former suspect, and beginning the investigation all over again, would be enough to make any prosecutor look bad to his bosses.  Essentially, there is a great deal of pressure on law enforcement personnel to get the job done, quickly, efficiently, and correctly; the first time around.  When the uncertainties inherent in human life intervene, and for whatever reason an innocent person is accused of a crime, that pressure all too often prevents justice from being done.  Rather, the prosecutors push ahead with the case, despite faulty evidence and flawed witnesses, because they need to look good to the public that elects them.  Unless they want to be out of a job.

It is exactly this pressure that makes prosecutors biased attorneys, and should prevent them from having the power to choose to charge child offenders as adults.  Despite the best intentions, despite the desire to see justice done, prosecutors simply do not have the requisite distance to enable them to examine cases objectively.  Judges do, and for that reason, Colorado needs to change its current justice system.  Let the sad stories of destroyed lives show us all that it does not take a willful decision to wrongfully imprison someone, it only takes one overworked and underpaid prosecutor choosing to take the easy road.  This should never happen, but when it happens to young people, it is even more sickening in the eyes of justice.

A recent article in The Pueblo Chieftain by Jeff Tucker announces that the new direct file law passed this spring has gone into effect. The article lists the circumstances under which a juvenile can be direct filed by a district attorney as an adult. In general, a juvenile can now be charged as an adult by a district attorney if:

1. They are between 14 and 15 and commit 1st degree murder, 2nd degree murder or a violent sex offense.
2. Juveniles may also be charged directly by a district attorney if they are over 16 and commit certain felonies.

Pueblo District Attorney Bill Thiebaut complains that the new law doesn’t give District Attorneys enough discretion. Thiebaut told The Chieftan that he isn’t concerned with the 14-day waiting period that district attorneys must now adhere to in filing adult charges, but is concerned that the new law does not allow a district attorney’s office to use its discretion in choosing to file adult charges.

In a written statement to The Chieftain Thiebaut said, “Because the breadth of discretion that our legal system vests in prosecuting attorneys carries with it the potential for both individual and institutional abuse, a district attorney must be sensitive to the community norms while exercising the powers of the office, and to the broad discretion that the law vests in a district attorney’s decision-making.”

It is important to note that Thiebaut’s statement can be read several ways. If he meant to say that he has nearly as much discretion under the new law as he did under the old law, he should clarify that. If that’s not what he meant, he should be aware that the new law allows district attorneys an enormous amount of discretion.

While the enacted law lists criteria that district attorneys should follow in direct filing juveniles, it also makes absolutely clear (on page 5) that:

“The amount of weight given to each of the factors listed…is discretionary with the district attorney.”

Further, the act states (on page 7) that:

“At the discretion of the district attorney, the provisions [listed] shall not apply to charges for first degree murder…second degree murder…or any sexual offense eligible for direct file.”

The fact is that district attorneys still have TOO MUCH DISCRETION and are allowed, in effect, to be judge, jury and executioner when it comes to treating juveniles as adults. Prosecutors aren’t judges and shouldn’t be judges, but do have an ethical obligation to seek justice. Direct filing kids with no judicial review is unjust in the light of myriad studies that show kids don’t have the decision-making capacity of adults. District attorneys know that direct filing kids is wrong…they just have political reasons not to care.

I don’t know exactly how tall John Caudle is, but all anyone has to do is look at a picture to know that he wasn’t simply being sent to bed without dinner. The 15-year-old murder suspect who is on trial for defending himself against severely abusive parents only weighed 97 pounds when he was arrested. But according to prosecutors he killed his parents because he didn’t want to do his chores.

So let’s put the facts in context. A healthy weight for a 15-year-old male who is 5 foot, 1 inch tall is 123 pounds…at the low end.  According to MotherJones.com, Caudle is almost 6 feet tall. At that height, Caudle should have weighed at least 147 pounds. If he were healthy, he might have weighed as much as 187 pounds. The only fact that the jury in Caudle’s trial really needs to be concerned with is that Caudle was being systematically starved.

What enrages me is that had Caudle died of malnutrition or starvation, his parents might have only gotten 16 years for child abuse resulting in death. And yet, if convicted in adult court under direct file provisions, Caudle could get as much as 80 years for defending himself.

All of this leads into a wider problem: According to ChildWelfare.gov, “Colorado [has an] estimated…50 percent to 60 percent of child deaths resulting from abuse or neglect [that] are not recorded” that way. What that means is that Colorado’s prosecutors simply aren’t enforcing child abuse laws.  Maybe if Colorado’s prosecutors were less focused on convicting kids for defending themselves and more focused on tracking down and prosecuting abusive parents, we could eliminate parricide in Colorado.

I guess prosecutors would rather spend millions of taxpayer dollars to incarcerate a kid for life than actually work to protect him and end the cycle of violence.  Apparently, it’s just more politically expedient to nail a kid whose friends can’t or don’t vote than it is to adhere to your own ethical standards.

Alamosa Prosecutor Dan McIntyre wants us to believe that if John Caudle killed his mother and step father it was over a dispute about chores. That would tie things up nicely.  Never mind that the child he wants to try as an adult spent 14 years enduring severe neglect and abuse.

According to a recent interview with family friend Cecile Dinsmore in The Valley Courier, Caudle’s mother Joanne Rinebarger was an abusive drug addict who “killed every bit of joy in [John's] life, and took everything that he loved away from him as punishment.”

…But never mind all that because what is really on trial in the case of the State of Colorado vs. John Caudle is really justice vs. politics; right vs. wrong. McIntyre is seeking two consecutive 40 year sentences. Unless he expects Caudle to live to be 95 in prison, that’s a slow death sentence. McIntyre needs us to believe that he’s trying a “monster” because that is the only thing that justifies the monstrous vengeance he’s seeking.

More than anything, McInTyre needs us to believe that monstrous vengeance is justified. If we don’t believe that vengeance is necessary then he can’t justify it to himself. Like most prosecutors, McIntyre knows that kids are different from adults. He knows there are numerous studies (see references) that show  kids are prone to risky, emotionally driven behavior. McIntyre knows that adolescents, while maturing, are not mature enough to make adult decisions in the heat of the moment.

Finally, McIntyre knows that using the practice of direct file to mete out cruel and unusual punishment to John Caudle is unconscionable. If John Caudle killed his mother and his step father then he ought to be incarcerated, but he shouldn’t be warehoused in cold storage for the rest of his life. As a child, Caudle deserves a chance at redemption.

Trying Caudle as an adult using direct file is wrong. McIntyre knows the difference between right and wrong; he just doesn’t care.

In the end, everything that Dan McIntyre knows makes him more of a monster than John Caudle will ever be.