Adult Trial for Youth

* Re “In Law’s Eyes, 14-Year-Old Is an Adult,” May 11:

The shame revealed by the prosecution of a 14-year-old boy for murder is that laws, and the consequences for breaking them, are not part of a mandatory curriculum taught in schools beginning in grade six. Some teachers may rebel, feeling that children will be turned off by such reality instruction because it is not fun, but these educators should be reminded that neither is going to jail for life.

Most children have no other way of learning of the consequences for breaking laws because they do not read about it in The Times, see it on TV news, or hear it on rock radio, and some do not have parents who have the time, the ability or the desire to help educate their offspring. Children would be the main beneficiaries of such teachings. How can we deny them that opportunity?

JOE DENKER

Studio City

* My heart just sank when I viewed the picture of Hicks wiping tears from his eyes when Municipal Court Judge Frank Brown ruled that he could be tried as an adult for the senseless murder of Tariq Khamisa! After all, Hicks had the “munchies” from the marijuana he had voluntarily smoked and Khamisa had “dissed/defied” him by not handing over the pizzas, so naturally Hicks, with his overwhelming sensitivity for his fellow human being, had to murder Khamisa.

And now Hicks’ attorney says he is going to challenge the constitutionality of the new law. What about Khamisa’s right to life, liberty and the pursuit of a future!

There is no place in society for Tony Hicks.

CHRIS CHRISTIANSEN

Pasadena