Реферат: Super Predators Essay Research Paper What is

suggesting juvenile predators are less discriminating in their targets. ·

While in the past most murders occurred between family members and friends, the

Federal Bureau of Investigations recently reported that 53 percent of homicides

are committed by strangers. · "Stranger murders" are now four

times as common as killings by family members. · Perpetrators of stranger

murders have a better than 80 percent chance of not being punished. [Source:

U.S. Department of Justice] Local police, prosecutors, and inner-city preachers

know that the kids doing the violent crimes are more impulsively violent and

remorseless than ever. For instance, Philadelphia District Attorney Lynne

Abraham who sits on the Council on Crime in America speaks of the frightening

reality of elementary school kids who pack guns instead of lunches. Likewise,

Dan Coburn, a former Superior Court Justice and Public Defender in New Jersey

recently wrote, "This new wrote horde from hell kills, maims, and

terrorizes merely to become known, or for no reason at all. These teens have no

fear of dying and no concept of living." Even maximum-security prisoners

agree. When asked by DiIulio what was triggering the explosion of violence among

today’s young street criminals, a group of long- and life-term New Jersey

prisoners did not voice the conventional explanations such as economic poverty

or joblessness. Instead, these hardened men cited the absence of people -

family, adults, teachers, preachers, coaches- who would care enough about young

males to nurture and discipline them. In the vacuum, drug dealers and "gansta

rappers" serve as role models. "I was a bad-ass street

gladiator," one convicted murderer said, "but these kids are

stone-cold predators." (Bennett et al, 1996, p. 40) Even more shocking than

the sheer volume of violent juvenile crime is the brutality of the crime

committed for trivial motives: a pair of sneakers, a jacket, a real or imagined

insult, a momentary cheap thrill. Here are some examples: · A 59-year-old

man out on a morning stroll in Lake Tahoe was fatally shot four times by

teenagers "looking for someone to scare." The police say the four