EDHS Contemporary World Affairs

Members Login
Username 
 
Password 
    Remember Me  
 
EDHS Contemporary World Affairs -> Discussion Topics, Week I -> Teens locked up for life without a second chance
Post Info TOPIC: Teens locked up for life without a second chance
ghan28


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 81
Date:
Teens locked up for life without a second chance
Permalink  

CNN) -- It began as horseplay, with two teenage stepbrothers chasing each other with blow guns and darts. But it soon escalated when one of the boys grabbed a knife.

Quantel Lotts is shown at age 12, two years before he committed the crime that sent him to prison for life.

The older teen, Michael Barton, 17, was dead by the time he reached the hospital. The younger boy, Quantel Lotts, 14, would eventually become one of Missouri's youngest lifers.

Lotts was sentenced in Missouri's St. Francois County Circuit Court in 2002 to life in prison without parole for first-degree murder in his stepbrother's stabbing death.

It made no difference that at the time of the deadly scuffle, Lotts was barely old enough to watch PG-13 movie and too young to drive, vote or buy beer.

"They locked me up and threw away the keys," Lotts, now 23, said from prison. "They took away all hope for the future."

His stepmother, the victim's mother, has forgiven Lotts and is working with lawyers to gain his release.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/04/08/teens.life.sentence/index.html?iref=mpstoryview


What do you guys think about this? Is it right to imprison a young boy for life for something he did not mean to do? Even the mother of the victim forgave him and is looking to release Lotts. Do you think the criminal court is being too harsh with the punishment?



__________________
DaisyVo1212


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 238
Date:
Permalink  

i think a life sentence for a 12 year old is too harsh...yes he killed his stepbrother but he didnt mean to...children deserve a second chance to a future...yes it was bad...but a life sentence for an accident is too long

__________________

"nothing makes a woman more beautiful than the belief that she is beautiful"
LaurrenM


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 169
Date:
Permalink  

He should not have been locked up for life.. He should of been put in a mental facility.. He obviously has problems if at 10 he thinks its okay to stab his brother. Thats so terrible

__________________
Lindsey.Breeding.


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 92
Date:
Permalink  

i might have been a little harsh for a boy his age but i think that he should be in prison.



__________________

Lindsey

Sandy


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 127
Date:
Permalink  

i think a life sentence is unneccesary
he should have gotten help and hopefully get released later in his life
her should probably be there longer but not for life

__________________

"You never know how far you can fly until you spread your wings"
Ankz


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 88
Date:
Permalink  

If hes under 18 i thought they just send them to juvy, i can't imagine a 12 year old in prison.

__________________

-Ankur
LaurrenM


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 169
Date:
Permalink  

At the time of the crime, Tammy Lotts said she left her children for several days with her husband to get high on crack cocaine.

"But I don't believe that Quantel did it," she added. "They took care of each other. They didn't see each other as stepbrothers; they considered them brothers."

...... It further explained that he was also sexually abused as a child and had anger issues. I wouldnt want this kid on the street until he got the full mental help he needed

__________________
xn1coleex


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 119
Date:
Permalink  

what a life wasted.
awww he's now 23 and he didn't even get
to experience life as a teenager.

thinking about it....its like my little brother
who's in 6th grade going to jail & staying in there for
the rest of his life.
wow. how. sad.

i think a life sentence is pretty HARSH....

__________________
nicole pak :)
Ankz


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 88
Date:
Permalink  

LaurrenM wrote:

At the time of the crime, Tammy Lotts said she left her children for several days with her husband to get high on crack cocaine.

"But I don't believe that Quantel did it," she added. "They took care of each other. They didn't see each other as stepbrothers; they considered them brothers."

...... It further explained that he was also sexually abused as a child and had anger issues. I wouldnt want this kid on the street until he got the full mental help he needed



 Thats even more of a reason to keep him out of jail it probally even made him worse rather then helping him.



__________________

-Ankur
geriatric1991


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 235
Date:
Permalink  

i dont think it is a life wasted, he could try to bring a positive energy and vibe into the prison and maybe make the other people with life sentences a bit happier so maybe it is a blessing in disguise

__________________
Jaymie Parkkinen
Luis777


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 243
Date:
Permalink  

ok yea i think he should get punished for killing his brother but a life time in prison is to harsh...he was 12 years old he didnt really intend to kill his brother they were just messing around and things got out of hand but i think he should be in jail and maybe be let out and be on probation but lifetime is way to harsh

__________________
Ayesha


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 72
Date:
Permalink  

i think a life sentence was too harsh for a kid that age and who didn't even mean to do anything like that. he definitely should have been punished in some way, but not with something that extreme.

__________________

Ayesha Hussaini <3

~ MiNoRiTy MaJoRiTy ~
jacobcorbin


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 202
Date:
Permalink  

pEOPLE kill all the time and you dont usually hear about them spending life in prison with no parol. Thats just insane for one kid to have no secind trial. I think its a little too hjarsh

__________________
Ankz


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 88
Date:
Permalink  

geriatric1991 wrote:

i dont think it is a life wasted, he could try to bring a positive energy and vibe into the prison and maybe make the other people with life sentences a bit happier so maybe it is a blessing in disguise



 so your saying being prison is a blessing? He lost his teenage years this is horrible he shouldn't spend the rest of his life plessing people in prison. (dont take that out of context)



__________________

-Ankur
mannyg


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 71
Date:
Permalink  

how is being in prison a blessing. there is a differnce between being optimistic and then just being completely unrealistic about everything. obviously going to prison is a horrible experience.

__________________
geriatric1991


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 235
Date:
Permalink  

haha dont worry i didnt even take it that way until you put the parenthesis in. no its like the saying "bloom where you are planted" he should make the best of his situation and why not help all of the suffering people in the prison. and he should be in jail for his teenage years. he killed someone. im sure you wouldnt want someone like that out in the open. so i think he should take this opportunity he is presented with and he might end up being happier in jail than he would have been free. give it a try, it wont hurt anyone

__________________
Jaymie Parkkinen
ich_binJason


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 278
Date:
Permalink  

I don't think its right for juvenilles with troubled pasts to not have the possibility of parole. It seems he is trying to move on with his life with his head in the right place. Hopefully he'll be eligible for parole in 10 years at least and the Missouri Supreme Court reviews the case.

__________________
Go Magic! Beat La!
Ankz


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 88
Date:
Permalink  

geriatric1991 wrote:

haha dont worry i didnt even take it that way until you put the parenthesis in. no its like the saying "bloom where you are planted" he should make the best of his situation and why not help all of the suffering people in the prison. and he should be in jail for his teenage years. he killed someone. im sure you wouldnt want someone like that out in the open. so i think he should take this opportunity he is presented with and he might end up being happier in jail than he would have been free. give it a try, it wont hurt anyone


I understand what your saying and I agree people should make the best of the situtation, however thats not the point of the article its the fact that he never had a chance to bloom anywhere else besides prison.

 



__________________

-Ankur
Bam


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 131
Date:
Permalink  

well I think he should've been released within the first week of being locked up thats so unfair for a kid that young to serve the rest of his life for a mistake that happened I dont think he was trying to kill him they were just playing around.

__________________
By : DOMINIC
Co Captian Bwall.


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 97
Date:
Permalink  

SO sad..poor brother. even though he is so young he need to be able to learn his lesson. maybe prison life would force him to grow up way to fast and he might come out of there with more problems then when he went in. I think an alternate punishment should be enforced thoo...

__________________
[B]- team suits.
lookitspeter


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 112
Date:
Permalink  

Obviously we can't tell enough about Lotts's character to judge whether he deserves to be in prison for the rest of life but from what I see from the article, I don't think he deserves prison. For one thing, the fact that he has regrets and on CNN he says he oftens cries himself to sleep because of the pain he feels. He doesn't belong in prison. He should have been sent to juvie not prison. He commited the crime but the purpose of a punishment to persuade the person from doing it again. I doubt he would break the law again after spending his teenage years in prison. Since he's learned his lesson I think it'd be perfectly fine to let him go.

__________________

"Your distress about life might mean you have been living for the wrong reason, not that you have no reason for living."  Tom O' Connor


~MiNoRiTy mAjOrItY~
KevinDangerMann


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 92
Date:
Permalink  

That's messed up, for sure.
I say let him go

__________________
ericaedgley


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 104
Date:
Permalink  

The little boy definitely shouldnt have been sent to prison when he was 12. that is wrong. i mean, yes...he killed his stepbrother. it was an accident. im sure he really didnt mean to. he should be in juvy tho. not prison! that is horrible. we all know what goes on in prison..especially with men. disgusting things. and for them to put a little boy in there like that is wrong. ofcourse now that he is 23 its ok. but they should give him a fair trial and eventually let him go..and get him help. i wouldnt want my little brother to sit in prison his whole life. thats messed up.


__________________
saraheckberg


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 48
Date:
Permalink  

I think he committed the murder, spent time in jail, and should be released eventually. A life sentence is a little harsh but so is stabbing someone to death. Maybe being in jail while he was a teen was better than what his home life would have been. Based on his history of abuse, anger issues and the fact that his parents ditched him and his step-brother to go get high, he probably would have ended up in jail anyway.

__________________
Bonemail-(Christophe K)


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 258
Date:
Permalink  

Poor parenting. Poor child. Deal with it kid it's your fault.

__________________
It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds. 
Samuel Adams 
KevinDangerMann


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 92
Date:
Permalink  

Bonemail-(Christophe K) wrote:

Poor parenting. Poor child. Deal with it kid it's your fault.



 What a jerk think to say.
Give the kid a chance, he was only 14 at the time and I'm SURE it was an accident.
I mean, they're not even giving him parole



__________________
ghan28


Veteran Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 81
Date:
Permalink  

Bonemail-(Christophe K) wrote:

Poor parenting. Poor child. Deal with it kid it's your fault.



That's ignorant. You wouldn't be saying the same thing if you were in his shoes.



__________________
Page 1 of 1  sorted by
 
Quick Reply

Please log in to post quick replies.
EDHS Contemporary World Affairs -> Discussion Topics, Week I -> Teens locked up for life without a second chance


Create your own FREE Forum
Report Abuse 		Powered by ActiveBoard