A new pilot program selects high school students as jurors for an alternative sentencing program for juvenile nonviolent offenders, instead of going through the traditional justice system. One up-side is that the offenders have the possibility of wiping their offenses off their records.
According to excerpts from the story:
No 16-year-old sips alcohol for the first time during second hour.
A jury made up entirely of Creston High School students kept circling back to that belief while deciding the punishment for a girl who admitted bringing alcohol to school.
"If this is what she's doing at school, I can only imagine what she's doing outside of school," said jury member Crystal Baird, a senior.
The jurors were taking part in a recent Teen Court -- a new alternative sentencing program for 11- to 16-year-olds who are nonviolent offenders and have admitted guilt. Rather than going through juvenile court, the offenders are sentenced by local high school students who are studying the legal system. Offenders who successfully complete their punishment get their criminal records scrubbed clean.
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