Should the Youth Criminal Justice Act be Abolished?

In 2007 the number of homicides in Canada dropped by a dozen compared to the year before. However, an increasing number of homicides are gang related. According to a Statistics Canada report generated in October of 2008, 594 homicides were committed in 2007. About one-third of the homicides involving young people in 2007 were reported by police as having involved gangs. Indeed, the data showed that one in five of homicides are gang-related. Killings of gang members as well as innocent bystanders have been on the rise for the past 11 years.

In 2007, 117 homicides were said to involve gangs, 16 more than in 2006. Of those 117 homicides 74 were allegedly committed by young offenders. This rise continues a trend that has been seen since 1991, when Stats Canada first began collecting this type of data.

If more, and more homicides are being classed as gang related, it stands to reason that more, and more offenders will be youth offenders. With this in mind is it not safe to say that Canada's Young Offenders Act (more recently known as the Young Criminal Justice Act) is not providing an adequate deterrent to young people who offend.

Would Jasmine Richardson have had a part in the death of her parents if the YCJA did not exist? Would she have plotted murder had she known that she would spend the rest of her life behind bars? Perhaps not. Jasmine will be released back into society in 3 years. Six short years after she helped take the life of her family she will go free. Why? Because she was a minor when she committed the act of murder, and the YCJA says we can not keep her behind bars any longer than that. Jasmine's 26 year old accomplice Jeremy Allan Steinke (Steinke was 23 at the time of the murders) is serving a life sentence for his part in the killings.

Will Jasmine Richardson offend again? No one knows, but she has already committed the worst crime possible. She has taken a life. Should she not be punished accordingly for that crime? Richardson has spent the past three years incarcerated, and still shows no signs of remorse for her actions. Slap on the wrist justice will not serve as an adequate deterrent to children who wish to offend. Leniency on some criminal activities committed by a child can be understood, but should murder really be one of them? Should the young offenders act be amended? Should the YCJA exist at all? Does it cause more problems than it solves?