Quick Hits – Charge him as an adult? Oh, that’ll work!

Once again, before we continue, though they may be the minority, there are some good folks diligently toiling on our behalf at the Kane County State’s Attorney’s Office. The fact that serious issues persistently stalk those corridors in no way justifies throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

But sadly, the fact I have to consistently remind you of those fine folks’ existence belies just how bad that office has become. And here’s another fine example!

In response to an October tip, an investigation by the Batavia Police, the Kane County Bomb Squad, the Northern Illinois Major Crimes Task Force, the FBI, and U.S. Postal Inspectors, led to the arrest of a 15 year-old Batavia High School Sophomore on charges of possessing bomb-making materials.

The youth has been held in the Kane County Juvenile facility since being charged.

But last week, KCSAO prosecutors filed a motion to move the case into the adult court system where, depending upon the variety of Class X felony finally applied, he could serve 30 years with no possibility of parole. As it stands now, he would likely remain in juvenile custody until his 21^st birthday.

So, aside from a prosecutor trying to make a name for herself on the back of a teenager in a slam-dunk case, what’s the point? How does this potential move make anything better for anyone?

A fifteen-year-old male’s brain is not nearly fully developed, and we all know exactly what’s gonna happen if he’s placed in an adult correctional center now, or at the ripe young age of 21. Should he manage to survive that “experience,” he’ll certainly be a far greater risk to society when he’s inevitably released.

I understand times have changed since the 1970s, but when I consider the stupid shit my friends and I did in high school, I can’t believe we’re still here!

My friend Tony and regularly built what we called “fireworks,” but they were nothing more than bombs we’d set off along the Evanston lakefront. My buddy Peter and I found two adjacent empty lockers and “borrowed” enough chemistry class equipment to build our own lab. And though our “experiments” never put the school or its inhabitants at risk, it was fascinating to watch exactly what happens when you expose solid sodium to water.

Let’s just say we had to exit that bathroom rather quickly!

My basic point is, depending upon whom you ask, having somehow survived those eminently questionable activities, I’ve turned out to be quite the upstanding and well-adjusted adult. But if Tony, Peter and I pulled that shit today, we be sent up the river without the proverbial paddle.

And what would jailing us have accomplished? Would it prevent the next real school threat from being carried out? C’mon! Does anyone really believe this absurd trumped-up charging effort will act as any kind of deterrent?

Considering the average teenager’s inability to see a scant three seconds into the future, if an isolated and/or bullied 15-year-old is bent on self-destruction to the point where he wants to take the rest of us with him, the fact that someone else got caught and nailed won’t even enter into his under-developed thought process.

And how did this young bomb maker come to light? That’s right! A tip! So, what do you think is gonna happen the next time a high school sophomore goes down this dark path? That’s right! He’s not going to say a word about it to anyone. Even a teenage boy understands something as simple as “tried as an adult.”

Though I’m sure you’ll do your best to do it, please don’t get me wrong! I’m not saying this kid should go scot free. But until someone tells me exactly what trying him as an adult will accomplish, I think it’s a vast KCSAO overreach that benefits no one and makes us much less safe.

Before you hit the send button like you did with the Elgin homeless and Aurora Wayside Cross Ministries columns, I have previously practiced exactly what I’m preaching here. My long-time readers know my bright red pickup truck was firebombed on my driveway by three drunk teenagers in April of 2016.

While I won’t cover the specific details of the deals I worked out with then KCSAO juvenile prosecutor Lark Cowart because it would be too self-serving even for me, if you run into Kane County defense attorney extraordinaire Gary Johnson, he has my express written consent to fill you in.

Coincidentally, Mr. Johnson is also the attorney for our unnamed 15-year-old.

Put more simply, these kids have their whole life in front of them, and within the bounds of reason, that existence shouldn’t be fully determined by one truly stupid mistake. If we put every 15-year-old in an adult jail for stupidity, there wouldn’t be a free 15-year-old left on the planet.

Thankfully, all is not lost. The only way the KCSAO will get their way is if the juvenile judge signs off on the motion, and I have enough faith in the process to believe she won’t do it. Considering we were all teenagers at one point, I cannot begin to fathom how humanity’s survived for 200,000 long years.

Maybe there really is a God!