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Kids make mistakes. All of them. It’s just a part of life. The parts of our brains that make decisions are not fully formed until the age of 25. Science has proven that a teenager’s brain just works differently than an adult’s.

Still, kids often face the same consequences as adults when they commit certain crimes. For instance, just this month, four teens were arrested for “tagging” dozens of buildings around Edgewater. The boys have been charged with felony criminal [...]

Teens are infamous for their lapses in judgment. In fact, it’s well-known that the teenage brain isn’t fully mature, and that teens lack the decision-making capacity of adults.

To mitigate damages of poor decisions early on, juvenile criminal records are kept confidential. This prevents juvenile offenders from being labeled as criminals in their adult lives. However, there are some exceptions to juvenile record confidentiality, two of them being background checks from college admissions offices and student aid lenders.

So when [...]

“He was a good kid. I don’t know what happened.”

“She just started acting out.”

“I always knew this was coming.”

These are the kinds of things you hear from parents, teachers, and others when minors get charged with crimes. They make juvenile crime sound unstoppable. Inevitable. Inexplicable.

It’s usually not, though, and whether you are attempting to prevent your child from going down this path or working to fight charges they’re already facing, it helps to understand what factors [...]