Biological evidence now demonstrates that the adolescent brain is structurally different from the adult one, which supports making a distinction between adult and juvenile crime. In the prefrontal cortex of a fifteen-year-old, the areas responsible for self-control are undeveloped; many parts of the brain do not mature until about twenty-four. While the full implications of this variant physiognomy cannot yet be mapped, holding children to adult standards is biologically naïve. On the one hand, kids who commit crimes are likely to become adults who commit crimes; but on the other hand, kids
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