In July 2012, Connecticut “raised the age” of juvenile jurisdiction, joining the vast majority of the country in bringing 17-year-olds under the jurisdiction of juvenile court. In 2015, Connecticut raised the minimum age at which a child could be transferred to adult court—either automatically by being charged with certain offenses or at the discretion of the trial court at the request of a prosecutor—from 14 to 15. A new proposal this year—Raised Bill 187—seeks to undo this commonsense legislation.

The changes Connecticut enacted were widely lauded as yet another step toward a fairer and more just system of punishment for the just barely teenagers. Social science had for years maintained that juveniles were less culpable, had a demonstrated lack of maturity and an underdeveloped sense of responsibility. Their criminality wasn’t a product of malicious will but rather a fundamental flaw in their developmental progress. Because of their age, they were unable to adequately grasp the magnitude of their actions, or resist the pressures of their peers, or have the foresight to understand the long-term consequences of their actions. This meant that, as they aged, they had “greater prospects for reform,” and thus any punishment meted out by the criminal justice system should necessarily give weight to their incomplete development.