Boys Charged With Murder After Sandbag Thrown From Overpass

I don't agree with your view on teens in general. The development of the brain between 21-25, 17-21 and 13-17 is vastly different. It's also vastly different when it comes to boys or girls, simply because of time of the puberty onset and the type of hormones. Hormones play a big role in a lot of cases when it comes to criminal behaviour, and it's dealing with these hormones what makes teens so different from adults. We're not even talking about general brain development here.

When you're a 14 old boy you don't have the same skills as an adult to think abstractly, making it very difficult for them to predict the outcome of their actions, which can be driven by hormones of a puberty onset that they don't know yet how to control. Even if they would remain unpunished, they will be traumatized by their own actions.

Minors are judged in europe similar to crazy people, because of the lack of realization. So in this case I would say it's not deserved, but I live in europe, we have all sorts cultural differences. Who am I to say what's right or wrong across the atlantic when someone died because of those boys, but over here I would think it's plain wrong.

The parents would be sued over here for damages, and there would be an investigation who let those kids unsupervised across that bridge, who let the sandbags over there and so on. They would be in a juvenile detention center of course but risking life imprisonment would be out of the question. You can only be trialled as adult over here when you're 18, or near 18.

And what happened to those kids who threw that rock from the overpass a few months ago and killed a guy?

If you kill the person, yes. If you are attacking someone and then kill that person, it is murder. How is that so difficult to understand? They didn't accidentally kill him, their planned act directly resulted in his death.

Ok. Say no more.

I wasn't really being serious when I said I could make a defense to get a 24 year old murderer off based on his brain "still developing". Basically, I'm just saying that even though their brains are still developing, punishment must be rendered in at least some form. The kids are old enough to know they did wrong. They're old enough to know that something bad would happen, and it did happen. Now, they may not be old enough to understand the severity of their consequences to the same degree as adults, but again that does not mean they should escape them. We don't just let kids and teenagers run around doing whatever the hell they want without correction. (and that's the whole problem with "their brains are still developing") These teens need to be seriously corrected. This is an extremely important teachable lesson for other teenagers with developing brains. This is to teach them that if you don't think clearly enough (which they DO have capacity for), bad things will happen.

And again, I'm not arguing first degree murder and not life in prison, or even 25 years, or even charged as adults. What I'm saying is they need to be charged with at least involuntary manslaughter and serve some time in juvenile correction.

You'd be amazed how many teenagers don't seem to grasp the notion of cause and effect, or are simply blind to it. When I was about 12 years years old I had to stop my then 14 year old brother from doing the exact same thing. I remember seeing his eyes, full of excitement of what he was about to do with the heavy bag full of garbage. He didn't even think of possible consequences, it didn't even cross his mind once. I had to literally scream at him and pull the bag out of his hands and explain to him what might happen.

Only then he came to his senses and was ashamed of what he was about to do. To this day I cannot believe how incredibly stupid, short sighted and irresponsible people can be. But the sad reality is that they can. I honestly think that these teens didn't want to kill anybody, but the outcome is just that. I would have said manslaughter, not murder. But still, they need to be punished severely, this is unforgivable.

If you attack someone and they inadvertently die from that attack with the intent being to not inflict death but only harm, then no, it is not murder. That's manslaughter, and that still carries personal responsibility. Homicide=the willful intent to end someone's life. Manslaughter=the ending of someone's life as a consequence of another action (whether it be through negligence, disregard, or some other factor) that did not involve the intent to kill. The result is not the factor at play, the intent is, and that's what lawyers fight to establish in a court of law.

I know you weren't serious, you just used it as an example to explain your reasoning. Of course there must be punishment. There's always punishment to rectify unacceptable behaviour. That's not the point that I disagree with. I think they should be locked up till they're 21 at least, their actions resulted directly in death.

It's the point of view you have on the teenage brain that I disagree with. But let's first be clear I'm just explaining my view on the matter from another continent. This might not even work over there, and bigger responsiblity for teenagers could simply a necessity.

You say you cannot let teenagers run around doing whatever the hell they want without correction but over here there will always be looked at the parents, the school, the sportsteacher for responsiblity. Over here teenagers are not considered responsible for their actions, just like crazy people. But crazy people are an anomaly, everyone has been a teen, and is somehting you need to go through.

Let me give you an example, about 5 years ago here (in belgium) 2 teenagers aged 17 and 16 stole a cop car, were chased by the police and shot at the police. The police officers didn't shoot back, made the car stop. Which wasn't that hard because it's forbidden to drive till you're 18, so they couldn't have a lot a practice. They couldn't have had a lot of practice firing a gun either. No way a minor would have been allowed to practice firing a gun. So they forced them to get out of the car and arrrested them. They let the teenagers ago, of course if someone would have gotten hurt, it would have been different.

We have a different take on the matter, and we give teenagers as little responsiblities as possible, it all depends of their maturity. The more mature they are , the more responsibilities we give them. This is no official matter though, this is basically something the adult caretakers decide. Still 13 and 14 years old is pretty young, and they won't have a lot of time unsupervised.

Stil we had a similar incident over here about three years back. Where a 16 and a 17 year old threw rocks off a bridge and it resulted in a man's death. Their parents will pay for the rest of their lives though. There's still differences with 13-14 and 16-17 but according to news the punishment was a juvenile detention centre, so the judge decided they were not mature enough to be trialed as an adult.

You still need to be responsible for ANY and ALL consequences that result from your actions. Much like the example I gave you before of a drunk driver. They don't intend to hurt anyone or cause property damage but it's a potential consequence for their actions. Do the crime.........do the time.

It's probably manslaughter in most eyes(of most countries) of the law, in Sweden is would totally be if they couldn't prove that the boys outright said they wanted to kill someone.

Of course, I don't believe I argued otherwise.

@MirkoS77: I dont know about you, but I sure knew better than to toss a sandbag onto an interstate.

Where the hell are their parents?

As did I. I'm not arguing they exercised good judgement, I wish people would read my posts carefully. All I'm saying is that I don't agree with a charge of murder but manslaughter.

Deserved

They're 13 years old. That's old enough to be beyond the scope of they're just stupid kids. Now, are the prosecutors over-reaching with murder? I don't know. But that's got nothing to do with their age, that has to do with the details of the crime. By 13 freaking years old you should damn well know that dropping sandbags off of an overpass could easily f***ing kill someone.

Sure they should know better, but just because people know that something can do something doesn't mean they actually realize it to be a reality. Especially when they're 13 goddamn years old. Why do you think so many young people (even older than this) engage in risky behavior, behavior that as adults we would think twice about? Because young people believe themselves to be immortal, that consequences are to be an afterthought and that it can't happen to them.

I'm sick and tired of people in here of projecting prudence of adulthood onto the actions of children. YOU may know better, I may know better, so may these children, but you can't tell me that at that age they aren't under immense peer pressure, are operating largely on emotion, and are not thinking about the consequences of an action that while they may understand it's wrong to do, don't have the full picture in their head as we as adults do.

Stop assigning your own situation onto others. Maybe no one else remembers what it was like to be a kid, but I sure do. Charge them with manslaughter, not murder.

F... that noise. I remember what it was like to be a kid and I sure as shit remember that I was goddamned smart enough to know that throwing a sandbag off of an overpass would likely end up with someone getting killed.

And besides, that's beside the point entirely. Whether or not these kids SHOULDN'T get charged with murder depends on how well the prosecutors can make their case. If their case is flimsy as hell and they end up losing when they could have gotten a conviction if they'd gone with a lesser charge, then yeah...they shouldn't have gone with the murder charge. Beyond that, no one knows what the hell the kids were thinking, what their intent was, and whether or not it LEGALLY fits the definition of murder. You don't know, I don't know. So it really just comes down to if the prosecution can get a conviction.

EDIT: "All I'm saying is that I don't agree with a charge of murder but manslaughter."

And correct me if I'm wrong, but don't states have legal definitions for things such as "murder" and "manslaughter" largely to AVOID stuff like prosecutors reaching too far with charges? What exactly are the LEGAL criteria that need to be met for "murder" and "manslaughter" in this case? Please don't guess, I'd like you to cite LAW and then argue how LEGALLY this constitutes manslaughter instead of murder.

If the prosecutors can pull off a murder conviction, more power to them, but I don't agree with it. You're going to tell me that all four of these kids woke up deciding to all become killers one morning? That they thought dropping a sandbag over an overpass was the most efficient way to become murderers? Like these 13 year olds woke up with the desire to become the new Dnepropetrovsk Maniacs? Right. I did some really stupid shit when I was young with my friends that I today thank my lucky stars I didn't end up getting someone hurt or killed, myself included, and I did it with no other consideration in mind at that time than my desire to be in with the group and enjoy the excitement of the moment of breaking the rules and rebelling. I remember that very clearly if nothing else. Long term consequences were not thought of, and if they were, were nothing but an impediment to having some fun, disregarded in the hubris of youth, oftentimes at the expense of others.

And you, just like the others, argue about being "smart enough" or having the right judgement. They're THIRTEEN. Does that mean there shouldn't be consequences for their actions? No, there should be, but there should be a bit of understanding. Kids exist in the moment, they operate on emotion (just like the article I linked above said). But continue projecting your wisdom as an adult, all the lessons you've learned, all the retrospection in your life you've been lucky enough to have, on kids who've had barely any time or experience in their lives to be able to benefit and learn from it.

Could it technically constitute murder? I don't know and neither do you, I'll leave that for the lawyers to establish. Where I stand opposed is that these kids shouldn't be thrown in a cell for the rest of their lives from what I believe was them being reckless morons trying to create some major chaos, but not with the intent to take anyone's life. I simply do not believe that, and I'm not going to change my mind.

Yeah, except here's the thing: I'm not the one who said that IT'S MANSLAUGHTER, NOT MURDER.

I mean, you can talk all day about how bad it FEELS to convict a kid of murder, but there's (at least in principle) a very good reason why this kind of stuff is legally defined. You can disagree with what "murder" should legally be defined as, and you can disagree that a particular case doesn't fit the legal definition of murder. But without knowing what murder LEGALLY even is in this case, how exactly can you or I say that it's manslaughter instead of murder? Are we supposed to just go off of our feelings and acquit the defendants anyway even if it DOES fit the legal standard for murder? I'm pretty sure that those kinds of feelings are taboo when rendering a verdict that is SUPPOSED to be impartial. I mean, hell...I've been to jury summons way too many times in the last few years (I thought selection was supposed to be random) and I've seen defendants who I could tell were guilty as shit without me ever getting selected for jury and hearing the defendants' case. Should my FEELINGS override the law?

Again, I'm not saying that what they did IS murder, I'm saying that I don't know because I'm not well enough versed in the relevant laws. What I AM saying is that such LEGAL criteria exist for a very good reason and that actually helps to PREVENT people from getting f***ed over by prosecutorial overreaching. If we just went off of FEELINGS then a lot of people would definitely get unjustly f***ed (moreso than now).

It might be manslaughter instead of murder, but don't try to sell me on that without even knowing what legally constitutes murder.

The you tell the same damn thing to those others in this thread claiming it's "deserved" and murder, because something tells me none of us are qualified on the law enough to ascertain such.

I don't think I was ever obligated to reply to every single person in a given thread.

But yeah, the same applies to them. it MIGHT be murder and they may even be correct in saying that it's murder. But unless they know the LEGAL criteria separating murder from manslaughter, then they're just speculating too.

I don't think there's any doubt that they did the act, so whether it's murder or manslaughter is ultimately just going to depend on if a jury can be convinced that it fits the definition of murder.

@MirkoS77: It was in the news a year or two back where three kids aged 13 beat a homeless man to death for a dare. So yeah some kids do decide on a whim "lets kill someone".

As for efficiency, how does that prove innocence? The Unabomber was very inefficient, most of his victims survived the attacks, so was he just a prankster that liked bangs? Since if his intention was to kill surely he would have chosen a more effective method to kill.

The Unabomber built something we call a "bomb". A device with no other purpose than to kill someone, of which he mailed to very specific targets. That isn't even analogous to kids throwing a sandbag over onto a freeway with cars whizzing by at 60-80 m.p.h. And I never said kids don't go out and kill, but yea....they beat someone to death. Attacked someone directly to cause their death. How do you make that comparison to four kids tossing a sandbag onto a freeway?

Frankly I'm sick and tired of this thread and have debated all I wish to. Believe what you will, think these four murderers, I really don't give a ****. They're probably going to be convicted of it anyway and spend the rest of their lives behind bars, so you have nothing to worry about.

Legally that is murder. It's not first degree murder but it's still murder. Your actions took a life.

Just pointing out that manslaughter technically is murder (third degree for voluntary, fourth degree for involuntary).

@JustPlainLucas: Okay then, in that case it's DEFINITELY murder. Thanks for clearing that up.

He deserved it.

It probably wasn't murder, but manslaughter (is this the right word for "accidentally" killing someone?). No idea how it is in America, but here they'll probably get away with it pretty easy. Kids can pretty much do what they want and just get some hours of work or maybe they need to get into a psychiatry for a while.

Manslaughter and about 10 years incarcerated would be about right. They can come out at 23, miss their teen years and get a fresh start as grown men in their 20's. A murder charge is ridiculous unless they specifically said they wanted to kill.