The inspiration for this column comes from the recent probation of six teenagers guilty of drunkenly trashing a house in Haddonfield, NJ while the owners were away. The full story behind the $18,000 worth of damages is just as disturbing as the verdict. Not only are teenagers seeking extreme and dangerous levels of intoxication, they are doing so on other people’s property with a complete disregard for law, order, civility, citizenship, and personal safety. These kids are guilty of illegal entering, underage drinking, and property damage (the most extreme instances of this include ejaculating on stuffed animals, defecating on a Steinway, and spraying urine over furniture).

Why? One answer might be boredom. I watched Jesus Camp a few days ago, a documentary on fundamentalist evangelical Christianity. One little boy, Levi, said he turned to Christianity at 5 years old because he was bored. That seems a bit simplistic given the extremely stimulated and entertainment-driven society in which we live.

One parent whose boy stomped on a video game, offered an explanation after saying he was disappointed as a parent.

“Maybe it’s this society run amok.”

In previous blogs on “mom” culture and narcissism, I wondered if children are increasingly find themselves the center of the universe and mothers experiencing an oppressive radical extremism of the 50s housewife syndrome. Parents may argue that so much of the child’s daily experiences lie outside the home environment–and that even if you ground the child from social activities, the school environment is not within the realm of control. This, then, is where society takes a collective responsibility for social control. Hey, even fish organize themselves to rules and punish the disorderly!

Judge Di Camillo, who heard the case of the Haddonfield teens, decided to give them each one year of probation and to fine them the amount of damages not covered by the home owner’s insurance policy. That sum, that fine, totaled $750…that is, a combined total of $750 to be split by all six teenagers (5 boys and one girl). So, now I know that if I am teenager and engaging in criminal behavior, I can essentially not pay for my crime literally (after all, these kids are blowing that kind of money on their parties anyway) or figuratively (no jail, no permanent record, no school expulsion). The homeowner in this case has to eat the cost of a skyrocketing insurance policy following an 18K claim, deal with replacement of goods and repairs to her home, endure on-going harassment from teens (and angry parents whose kids were arreseted), and live in a community with no justice. As for the kids, they didn’t even think to apologize, nor were they directed to by the judge.’

As the fourth teen faced him, DiCamillo asked, “Do you think it would be a good idea to apologize?”

Worse still,

DiCamillo asked them and their parents if they wished to make any other statements. They all said no.

Only one parent made an apologetic statement in court.

Then his father stood and said, “I’d like to apologize as a parent to another for the conduct of my child.”

What is wrong with this judge? These children deserve to have their futures compromised. They deserve to live with the penalty and stigma of their crime. They are in high school, not grade school. They know better and are brazen about their antics, posting them to the web in pride without even attempting to hide their identities. These children are not first time offenders, just first time defenders.

This leads me in a bit of a long-winded way to the chicken and the egg.

Attorneys for some of the families asked the judge to order that the guilty pleas could not be used in any civil lawsuits that might arise from the vandalism.

The judge declined to consider the request yesterday.

Clearly, these lawyers know that the slap on the wrist with a silk ribbon (to modify the phrase) may prompt the justifiably angry home owner to consider the civil justice system on which this country’s legal system thrives anymore. They should be afraid of the consequences of such a suit. We have a problematically burgeoned civil legal system in the US but, in this case, maybe there is justification. When the criminal (juvenile here) system fails to deliver justice, the civil system provides an recourse.

Did the civil system develop because the legal system was backlogged, corrupt in places, and failing. Or, did the civil law system develop for profit but now serves a backup when justice is not met?