By Melissa Coretz Goemann and Jeffrey Aaron, U.Va. assistant clinical professor of psychiatry and forensic coordinator at the U.Va.-affiliated Commonwealth Center for Children & Adolescents ... Studies have consistently found that adolescent offenders who are transferred into the adult justice system where they face harsher sanctions and less rehabilitation offend more, not less, and commit more serious offenses than their counterparts who remain in the juvenile system. Thus, while the impulse to punish - either for retribution or protection - is understandable, such punishment comes at the c...