© Screenshot from youtube video by HumanRightsWatch
Florida has been unfairly and arbitrarily trying children as adults, according to a new Human Rights Watch report. The research slams Florida for funneling thousands of children into the state's adult justice system more than any other US state.
"Florida's direct file law is not effectively serving public safety... [and] is having negative, at times devastating, effects on the lives of thousands of children and their families
," the report's authors wrote.
The 110-page
investigation, titled,
"Branded for Life: Florida's Prosecution of Children as Adults under its 'Direct File' Statute" was released by New York-based Human Rights Watch on Thursday.
Researchers lambasted Florida for stamping children with the 'criminal' mark at a young age, despite most of the charges being for non-violent felonies.
"The children caught up in the 'direct file' law cannot legally vote, drink, or buy cigarettes in the state of Florida
," Alba Morales, a HRW researcher and the author of the report, said in a statement released alongside the report. "Yet they can be tried as adults with no judge evaluating that decision, and branded as felons for life
."
Comment: As is evident from the above, these are not as the Western media claims small isolated protests.