Children in Prison.

Sara Kruzan: Life Without Parole for Killing her Pimp

Let's discuss the video that I have linked to this blog and the fact that we have children sitting in prison for life.

A 16 year old girl who had been raped by her pimp since she was 13 thinks there is no way out for her from this hellish life except to kill her pimp. She gets life without parole and then some. Fair? Is this justice? Let's take a look at that.

Now don't get me wrong on this, I hate my taxpayer dollars being spent on long drawn out trials just as much as the next person. I truly do.

I hate it SO much whenever a defendant gets on the stand and wastes taxpayer money and the Courts time by sobbing about what a crappy childhood they had or how they were entangled in the clutches of drug addiction or alcoholism or how they were abused by their husband/wife (whoever). My normal reaction is "so what"?? LOTS of people in this world are abused, raped, beaten, drug addicted, alcohol addicted and still they manage to see another way out of their situation. It happens every stinking day. These people don't resort to murder to get out of their situations.

However, in ever-increasing frequency you run across a person who truly had no other avenue available to them and this is the situation with this young woman.

She was raised by a neglectful (to put it mildly) mother. She had no father in her life. She was an isolated 11 year old when she met her future pimp. He treated her very well for a couple of years and worked his mind control "magic" on her before raping her at the age of 13 and then putting her out on the streets as a prostitute. Her hours were from 5 to 5.

Now where was her mother during this? My daughter was once 13. Do you think for a second that I would allow her to be gone during those hours? Uh, no. For that matter do you think I am going to allow her to run around with a grown man when she is 11 without me being present at all times? Uh, no. Neither of these scenarios would have happened. Not on a dare! However, no adult stepped in to protect this child. They in effect threw her to the wolves without a second thought.

Sara had NO ONE to protect her. She was a child left to her own devices and made to look out for herself. I don't care how "street smart" you are, when you are 11, your decision making abilities are not to the point that you can protect yourself from every situation that crops up. Not nearly.

For Sara, there was no trusted adult anywhere in her life that she felt she could turn to and ask for help. She absolutely fell through the cracks in her life. So, she did the only thing she could think of to do in her 13 year old mind. She murdered her pimp to put an end to this hell.

When she was sentenced, the judge told her that she had no "moral scruples". SHE WAS 11 YEARS OLD WHEN HE GOT HIS HANDS ON HER! Where in the world (or at least in her world) would she possibly have had moral scruples taught to her? Who in her world had the ability to show by example or to teach these to her? Who in her world even possessed them?

After she got to prison she had to look these words up in a dictionary because she didn't even know what they meant. Does that sound like a hardened killer to you?

Even she admits she should be punished for what she did. Even she admits that what she did was wrong. Why should she have to spend the rest of her natural life in prison when it is her mother and the pimp who should be punished. Well, the pimp did get his sentence, but her mother is free as a bird and able to do as she pleases while the daughter that she created sits in prison.

This is just not right!!

To date, over 2200 children have been sentenced as adults and sent to adult prisons in this country.

Prisons (at least in America) were initially created as a way to rehabilitate the criminals who could still be rehabilitated and only as a last resort to warehouse those individuals who needed to remain off the streets for the safety of the general public. Sara is no threat to the general public. She is a shining example of someone who could very easily be rehabilitated.

I'm all for the 3rd strike laws. If you didn't learn anything the first two times, then by the third time, you need to go away permanently. That's my take on it. But if you are a child, I don't care what heinous act you have committed, there is always the possibility, however slight, that you can be rehabilitated and at some point in your life, you can lead a productive and law abiding life! We aren't a country of psychics! How can anyone say with complete certainty that a child can NEVER be reformed? No one knows that!! And by locking that child up with adult offenders for any period of time, we are insuring that they are lost forever.

Stop sending money to other countries so their children can be educated and fed and clothed and protected! SPEND THAT MONEY IN OUR OWN COUNTRY SO OUR CHILDREN CAN BE PROPERLY FED, CLOTHED, HOUSED, PROPERLY EDUCATED AND MOST OF ALL - PROTECTED!

Start sending these children to juvenile facilities. Not the ones we currently have in place. They are nothing more than junior prisons and warehouses.

Let's spend the money to create facilities where the children will be emotionally, psychologically and physically cared for. Let's give them the tools that they obviously did not get from the adults in their lives to deal with life's numerous situations without resorting to violence. Let's up their opinion of themselves a notch or two. MOST of these children can be salvaged. MOST of these children can learn from their mistakes no matter how horrendous they were and can go forward and be productive law abiding citizens.

Many of them would need to be housed in a mental health facility for sure. But the money we would save down the road would far exceed the money we will spend to house these children in adult prisons for the rest of their lives.

What is wrong with this country???? Why do we turn our backs on our own children while all the time we are sending Angelina Jolie to foreign countries to help their children?? Why are people like Oprah and Madonna opening schools for girls in foreign countries while we have a staggering number of girls in this country every day who are being pushed into prostitution, raped, beaten, molested, etc. Are our girls not worth the time and money?? Are their girls more valuable than ours??

I am sick of this! Spend your time and money HERE. Save OUR children. Let other countries worry about their own children until we have taken ours back.

What hypocrites we are and don't think the rest of the world doesn't see that. We seem to be the only people in the world who doesn't.



But that's just me.