The art of politics is trial and error.

By any metric, Maryland’s 2022 Juvenile Justice Reform Act has flunked. The reform aimed to slash juvenile crime, but crime mushroomed instead.

Statistics do not lie. The Baltimore City State’s Attorney’s Office reports that charged offenders under the age of 18 in the first six months of the year climbed from 191 in 2022 to 590 in 2024, a jump of more than 300% in two years. Juveniles charged with automobile theft soared from 82 in 2022 to 212 this year. Youths accused of robbery spiked from 17 two years ago to 246 as of July 15, 2024.

These numbers are an undercount. They exclude juvenile crime that is not reported by the Department of Juvenile Services (DJS) to the prosecutor’s office. Reporting is discretionary. The crime may disappear into the ether, or the youth may be sent into diversion.

While juvenile justice seeks to coax and implore compliance with the law, adult justice seeks to punish, incapacitate and deter.

Crime, like war, has plagued the species from the beginning of time. Despite vast sums spent on research and experimentation, we remain clueless about why some turn to crime or how to reform those who have. Anyone who made such a discovery would become a billionaire overnight and be sought by every justice ministry in the world. No one gambles based on whether crime will rise, remain flat, or fall because no one has any clue. Crime counterintuitively dipped during the Great Depression.

Knowing what you don’t know is the beginning of wisdom, even if it means losing your job predicated on the opposite. That’s the problem with the 2022 Juvenile Justice Reform Act. It entrusts discretionary power over juveniles suspected of crime to DJS, which is clueless of the risk of recidivism and danger to the public if the juvenile escapes incapacitation.

Juvenile advocates are sticking their heads in the sand. They are pouring fuel on the fire by championing legislation that would require all juvenile crimes to be prosecuted in the juvenile division — even murder, rape and armed robbery. We’ve seen this rodeo before.

Mozart composed his first symphony at age 8. John Stuart Mill learned Greek at age 3. Yet pointy-headed researchers insisted that juvenile brains are stunted and that juveniles can be turned into Good Samaritans from hardened criminals by doting on them as they mature. Karl Racine, Washington, D.C.’s first elected attorney general, became a true believer. Rehabilitation became the watchword of D.C.’s juvenile justice system. Juvenile murderers were shielded from imprisonment and routinely released by the D.C. Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services to kill again and prey on the public at age 21.

In Maryland, a juvenile arrested for a crime that is not a felony or heinous crime, such as auto theft, is evaluated by DJS without considering the seriousness of the current charge or the threat to public safety if the juvenile were released. Based on an evaluation rigged for indulgence, DJS considers options: send the child home with no consequences or with a home monitoring system; or detention. The last option is a rarity. If it is chosen, DJS has 15 days to decide on a referral to the prosecutor’s office for trial.

Whether a juvenile is a strong candidate for recidivism because of multiple previous arrests or flouting of electronic monitoring obligations is not shared by DJS with the prosecutor. But change is afoot. Gov. Wes Moore in May signed a legislative package with more accountability. And when a new law takes effect in November, Baltimore City State’s Attorney Ivan Bates will require violations of home monitoring to be reported to the courts, prosecutors and defense counsel within 24 hours.

Juveniles charged and convicted of violent crimes need an equally forceful response from the justice system, including lengthy periods of incarceration. It is not that we love juveniles less, but that we love law-abiding citizens more that this option should be embraced as optimal.

Armstrong Williams (www.armstrongwilliams.com; @arightside) is a political analyst, syndicated columnist and owner of the broadcasting company, Howard Stirk Holdings. He is also part owner of The Baltimore Sun.