Should Congress have Term Limits?

Should Congress have Term Limits? Term limits are limitations that restrict the number of years that someone can serve in an elected office. However, there are no limitations of terms for the members of Congress. They are allowed to run for reelection as many times as they want. The founding fathers intended that elections would reflect the political values of citizens and check the power of government. Term limits should be implemented to prevent career politicians because the founding founders never intended politics to become a career. The United States should have a national referendum to propose a constitutional amendment to institute term limits. The founding of the United States was a radical movement by a collection of like-minded individuals who had new ideas of freedom and self-governments. The backgrounds of the founding fathers were varying from scholars, statesmen, industrialists, and businessmen. The juxtaposition of their backgrounds fostered debate, new ideas, consensus, and descent. It can be said the each of the founding fathers were leaders, not only in their communities, but in their fields. Professional politicians were not yet a byproduct of the new American government. Also there were not yet distinct political parties or PACs or super PACs (Political action committees).   In the beginnings of this representative republic most congressmen did not serve more than a couple of terms. Most had lives, families, and business to get back to. They saw serving in congress as a duty and sacrifice in an effort to make the country grow and stronger. Term limits should be introduced to reinforce states’ rights, reduce corruption, and reinvigorate the republic. In the 1990 congressional reelection, voter’s reelected rate of incumbents exceeded ninety-six percent. Voters that disapproved by Congress just stayed at home and didn’t vote because it seemed that there opinion didn’t matter. It also made it difficult for voters to express their opinion about Congress. Two days before the election in 1990, there was a national survey that showed that sixty-nine percent of people did not approve of Congress. Fifty-one percent did approve of the congressmen that were chosen. The 22nd Amendment was added to the constitution in February of 1951. This limited the number of terms a president can serve. Franklin Delano Roosevelt served twelve years. Congress decided that there needed to be an amendment that limits the amount of terms that presidents can serve for. They made this decision not long after Roosevelt’s death. Term limits were put in place to restrict too much executive power. Fifteen states have adopted term limits for their state legislators, but states can’t limit the terms for U.S. Senators. On November third of 1992, in the Arkansas Supreme Court, amendment seventy-three (the term limitation amendment) was adopted by Arkansas voters. This amendment provided for limits of two terms for executive officials and state senators and three terms for state representatives. If someone served two or more terms as a member of the United States Senate from Arkansas, they would be ineligible for re-election as a US Senator from Arkansas, due to the term limitation amendment. â€Å"Its preamble stated: ‘The people of Arkansas find and declare that elected officials who remain in office too long become preoccupied with reelection and ignore their duties as representatives of the people. Entrenched incumbency has reduced voter participation and has led to an electoral system that is less free, less competitive, and less representative than the system established by the Founding Fathers. Therefore, the people of Arkansas, exercising their reserved powers, herein limit the terms of the elected officials.’†. (Stevens 5) In May of 1995, the Supreme Court made a decision ruling 5-4 in United States Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton. The ruling was that â€Å"states cannot impose term limits upon their federal Representatives or Senators. In the 1994 elections, part of the Republican platform included legislation for term limits in Congress† (Stevens 72). Term limits would make it difficult for the federal government to enact rules, laws, create agencies that strip powers from the states, for example EPA (environmental protection agencies), DHS (department of homeland security), DOE (department of education), entitlement programs, earmarks, and subsidies. The Constitutional power that the federal government is responsible for is entering into treaties with foreign governments. They also have the power to wage war, declare war, and win war.   Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3 of the United States   Constitution , which gives Congress the power â€Å"to regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes.† Section 8 also explains Congress may have the â€Å"power to lay and collect taxes†, declare war, regulate interstate commerce, coin money, and raise an army. â€Å"When the Framers met in Philadelphia in 1787 and wrote the constitution that governs us today, they addressed that failure and through the commerce and the privileges and immunities clauses that created a national free-trade zone. The original purpose of the commerce clause was primarily a means to eliminate trade barriers among the states. They didnt intend for the commerce clause to govern so much of our lives. Indeed, as James Madison, the father of our Constitution, explained, ‘The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite’†. (Williams 3) The longest someone has served in the Senate is fifty-one years, five months, and twenty-six days. The person who held this record is Robert C. Byrd. John Dingell Jr. served in the House of Representatives for more than fifty-three years.   Congressmen are not there long enough to gain power, or write legislation in the form of tax loop holes. Term limits will break the cycle of career politicians (people building power over time) and facilitate a return to the â€Å"common man† being involved in the political process. They will bring new ideas, new perspective, and reinforce â€Å"of the people, by the people, for the people.†Ã‚   The phrase â€Å"drain the swap† refers to removing career politicians from their elected office.   There are a lot of people who think that America is just filled with a bunch of career politicians, and we need to â€Å"drain the swamp†. Some of these career politicians aren’t accountable to the people. They stop doing what the people want and focus on running for reelection and how they are going to deal with things themselves. â€Å"Term limits in Congress would encourage members of Congress to make their time in office matter.† (Desantis 21). A member of the United States Term Limits advocacy group, Austin Sekel wrote that â€Å"term limits don’t exist to keep people out of office. They exist to make the regular rotation possible, and to create opportunities for new leaders to emerge.†Ã‚  (Sekel 7). Term limits aren’t meant to push people out of Congress. Without term limits, only certain people can run for election. Other citizens don’t have an equal chance of becoming a new congressman, when the same people get reelected every election. The Founding Fathers intended for other people to have a chance to become congressmen, develop new ideas, create opportunities, and become new leaders in America. The Founding Fathers were not career politicians. It is difficult to believe when they were developing the frame work and the foundations of the new republic, that they would purposely develop or create a mechanism that would introduce a class of citizen who would monopolize and control the political process over time. While removing the very strength of the public, by eroding states’ rights and coagulate consolidating power into a central government. The United States of America was built as a representative republic. There should be no career politicians, billion dollar contracts, trillion dollar budgets, or two thousand plus page bills passed by the federal government, with hidden kickbacks, special interest, and earmarks. The only time the federal government meaning the legislature should ever agree on anything should be in the matters of treaties, and war. The federal government was designed so that congress and the senate would find it extremely difficult to build consensus on any issue unless it was a clear and present danger, or such a massive societal shift that you could get more than 60 percent of the citizenry or their representative to agree to a national change. As it stands now, congress has turned into an elite club ran by career politicians, special interest, and power brokers. Instituting term limits would reinvigorate the republic, restore power to the states, and reduce corruption. Works Cited Liedl, Mark B. â€Å"The Case for Limiting Congressional Terms.† The Heritage Foundation, 1 Dec. 1990, www.heritage.org/report/the-case-limiting-congressional-terms. Staff, LII. â€Å"Commerce Clause.† LII / Legal Information Institute, 11 June 2016, www.law.cornell.edu/wex/commerce_clause. Williams, Walter E. â€Å"Commerce Clause Abuse.† Commerce Clause Abuse, 4 Oct. 2003, econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/articles/03/abuse.html. Murse, Tom. â€Å"The Pros and Cons of Imposing Terms Limits for Congress.† ThoughtCo, 9 July 2017, www.thoughtco.com/debate-over-term-limits-for-congress-3367505. U. S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton. Oyez, 24 Apr. 2018, www.oyez.org/cases/1994/93-1456. Stevens. U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton, 514 U.S. 779 (1995)., 22 May 1995, www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/93-1456.ZO.html. â€Å"The Limits of Term Limits.† Restoration: Congress, Term Limits, and the Recovery of the Deliberative Democracy, by Terry Eastland, pp. 54–55.

Problems of Conducting Research Into the Causes of Stress Essay

One problem when conducting research into the causes of stress is the generalisation of the sample, if the sample is restricted; this has limitations in terms of generalising the results to the total population. In the study by Johansson, a sample of only 24 workers was used and from a specific job type. This sample is unreflective of all job types and is too small to be applicable to the general population. Conclusions made may only be relevant to this sample. However it could be argued that the factors that cause stress in jobs such as deadlines and the dependence of others on you are common in all types of jobs and therefore using a sample of the specific job type becomes less restricted and applicable to other people in jobs with common stressors. A second problem when conducting research into causes of stress is the validity of measurements. Validity refers to whether the results measure what they are supposed to measure and this is often affected by the research method. The self report method is often questioned in terms of validity as participants have the ability to give socially desirable answers and steer away from the truth. In the study by Kanner, questionnaires were posted out to participants and a Hassles and uplifts scale was asked to be completed every month for 9 months and the Berkman life events scale after 10 months. This study, due to the use of self report lacks in validity, as researches are unsure as to whether data obtained reflects the true opinions of participants, which is an issue when trying to apply to everyday life. However the self report method is useful, despite it lacking in validity. It gives participants the freedom to write about their own subjective feelings and due to stress being individually perceived differently, it is useful in tailoring treatment to individuals to meet their needs. A third problem is reductionism, studies often reduce many factors that cause an individual stress to one factor, such as in the case of Johansson study, it was concluded work was the source of stress. However individual factors such as personality could play a role, researchers do not know that stress prone individuals are more likely to be in a high risk job. By failing to take into account other factors, resources and time may be used in the wrong area. However reductionism is useful as it does pinpoint an area that causes stress and allows in-depth research to be carried out to help participants.

Foster children and family resilience Essay

Foster children refer to minors or young people who have been removed from their custodial adults or birth parents by governmental authority. These children are placed under the care of another family either through voluntary placement by a parent of the child or by the relevant governmental authority if the birth parent has failed to provide for the child. Family resilience on the other hand, is the positive capacity of a family to cope with catastrophe and stress. It is also a feature of resistance to future adverse events. In this sense, family resilience goes hand in hand with cumulative protective factors used to counteract risk factors. Naturally risk factors are against positive development of a child coupled with low academic achievement and behavioral or emotional problems. Examples of some of the risk factors are low socioeconomic status, poverty and parent with mental disorder, drug abuse and abusive caretaking among others. McCord, Joan. (1993) reported that resilient family is the one which remain composed despite being exposed to misfortune or stressful events. Some of the characteristics of family resilience include among others:- †¢ A sense of self esteem which enhances coping effectively with challenges. †¢ Active approach toward an obstacle. †¢ Ability to view difficulty as problems that can be overcame, endured or solved altogether. †¢ Being able to know when enough is enough though after being considerably persistent. Problems with generic present-day parent education programs Most of the parent education programs that are developed target only general situations rather than focusing on specific parent characteristics or situations (Elmquist, 1995; Nelson, 1995}. They try to use general approach to solve all problems which limit effectiveness of parent education program. Also, researches undertaken have given conflicting information and differing theories to approach parent education resulting to conflicting advice to parents (Powell, 1990). The few studies that have been undertaken on family programs have not been comprehensive making it hard to generalize about which strategies are effective, for whom and for what outcome (Powell1989; Small, 1990). On the other hand, some social problems such as teen pregnancy, adolescence suicide, and drug abuse that frequently affect parents in the process of bringing up children are difficult to tackle using a generic program because they need specialized program (Medway 1989, Mullis 1999). Changes in lifestyle and family structure add to complexity of issues involved in raising children hence making it difficult to address using generic parent education programs (Mullis, 1999; Powell, 1990). Why might a very structured family environment work with young children, but cause adolescent children to rebel? Between the ages of twelve and nineteen is a period in a teenager’s life that determines what kind of adult he or she will become. This period of adolescence is known as the â€Å"formative years† and they are vulnerable to peer pressure. At this stage they may experience an urge to rebel against the pressures placed on them as youths. Also, they give in to peer pressure because of an overemphasis on the importance of social adjustment, lack of interest or communication on the part of the parents and teachers, and the unrealistic expectations that these entities create. (Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly and Reed Larson,1984) From another point of view, families are always both functional and dysfunctional. What tend to work for a certain group will somehow not always work for another. A structured family is functional for young children but dysfunctional to adolescents (Huber, 1998; Masten 2001) Families with young children are very structured and this contributes to stable and secure context to live within. This same structure contributes to rigidity and rebellious behavior among adolescences. It’s the balance between the two that’s functional and dysfunctional that determines the success of children rearing Strength of the foster care system The foster care system help parents in finding what their talents and strengths are in their role as parents. It also facilitate parents to use their talents and strengths more frequently to minimize stress, improve family communication and engage their children in problem solving. The system designed to assist children and adolescences whose development is negatively affected by issues such as parental neglect, abuse, emotional and behavioral problems (Benedict and White, 1991). It gives increased attention to emotionally disturbed children and adolescences and concentrates mostly on the necessity for alternative interventions to address their needs (Barbell, 1996; Brandenburg, Friedman and Silver, 1990). The system help on ensuring that, children are well catered for in a conducive environment. The system facilitates the recruitment and training of foster parent for they are considered vital partners in ensuring children gain a sense of self-worth and self-confidence. It also cooperates nationally to review the success of the foster care program. It mostly focuses on specifically designed treatment plans that focus on fulfilling the needs of the treatment foster care child (Hawkins, 1989). Purpose of the family resilience project. Family resilience project focuses on increasing successful behavior by using a family own expertise in addressing issues in treatment of foster care families. It allows families to view their behavior as both a dysfunctional and functional and put more emphasis on increasing functional behavior. Also it offers treatment foster care families specialized and individualized training directly geared toward bringing up children residing with them. On the other hand, another project goal includes creating more positive working relationship between treatment foster care family and biological family. It also creates an understanding among the family members hence enhancing an appreciation for being treatment foster care family. The project provides parent education training that is practical and that could be readily applied. Conclusion Family resilient project advocate reacting to child’s behavior immediately as compared to delaying the reaction because it yield more positive results. The foster care child knows the parent are serious when they don’t allow bad behavior to pass It also advocates use of set of rules that are flexible, concentrating more on what has worked. The project advocates the use of skills which include ability to think reflectively and being able to attempt alternative solutions for social problems. References Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly and Reed Larson. Being Adolescent: Conflict and Growth in the Teenage Years. Basic Books, Inc. 1984. New York McCarthy, John D. and Dean R. Hoge. (1984). The dynamics of self-esteem and delinquency. American Journal of Sociology, 2. 396-410. Mullis, F. (1990) Active parenting: An evaluation of two adlerian parent education programs. The journal of individual psychology. McCord, Joan. (1993). Problem Behaviors. Pp. 414-430 in S. Feldman and G. Elliot (Eds. ), At the Threshold: The Developing Adolescent. Cambridge, MA:Harvard University Press. Rosenberg, Morris, Carmi Schooler,, and Carrie Schoenbach. (1989). Self-esteem and adolescent problems: Modeling reciprocal effects. American Sociological Review, 6. 1004-1018. Scholte, Evert M. (1992). Identification of children at risk at the police station and the prevention of delinquency. Psychiatry: Interpersonal and Biological Processes, 4. 354-369 Powel D. R(1990). Parent education and support programs. Young children 41,47-53.

Children Who Kill Alex and Derek King

Children who commit parricide, the killing of one or both parents, are usually plagued with mental and emotional turmoil or live in fear for their lives. Whether or not such mitigating factors were true in their case, the lives of brothers Alex, 12, and Derek King, 13, changed irrevocably on November 26, 2001 when they bludgeoned their father to death with a baseball bat and then lit the house on fire to cover up evidence of the murder. Floridas Youngest Murder Suspects On December 11, a grand jury indicted both boys  for  first-degree murder. The Kings were the youngest children in the state of Florida to be put on trial for the crime.  Had they been found guilty, they would have faced mandatory  life sentences. After several long, convoluted trials—including a separate trial involving a family friend/child-molester who was accused as an accessory—the boys were convicted of third-degree murder and arson. Derek was sentenced to eight years and Alex was sentenced to seven years to be served in separate juvenile detention facilities. The Scene of the Crime On November 26, 2001, firefighters from Escambia County, Florida, raced through the quiet streets of Cantonment, a small community located about 10 miles north of Pensacola, in response to a house fire call. The homes on Muscogee Road were old and wood-framed, making them highly flammable. The firefighters learned that one of the homes occupants, Terry King, was inside. They broke through the dead-bolted doors and went about dousing the fire and searching for survivors. They discovered 40-year-old Terry King seated on a couch but he was already dead. Initially, it was believed that King succumbed to smoke inhalation and died in the fire. However, after a brief examination, it became clear that hed likely died as the result of blunt force trauma. King had been repeatedly bashed in the head. His skull was cracked open and half of his face had been smashed in. The Initial Investigation By early morning, a team of homicide investigators was on the scene. Neighbors told Detective John Sanderson, who was assigned to the case, that King had two young sons, Alex and Derek. Alex had been living in the house with Terry since theyd moved in during the previous summer but Derek had been there for only a few weeks. Both boys were missing. From early on in the investigation, the name Rick Chavis kept coming up. Sanderson was anxious to interview him to find out what his connection was with the King family. Through people who knew Terry, Sanderson got several red flags warning him about the 40-year-old Chavis possible relationship with the King boys. On November 27, a day after Terry died, the search for the two King boys came to an end when, as a family friend, Chavis brought the boys to the police station. The brothers were interviewed separately but their stories about the circumstances surrounding the night Terry King was murdered were the same: They confessed to killing their father. A Troubled Family History Terry and Kelly Marino (formerly Janet French) met in 1985. The couple lived together for eight years and had two boys, Alex and Derek. Kelly later became pregnant by another man and had twin boys. In 1994, Kelly, who had a history of drug addiction and was feeling overwhelmed by motherhood, left Terry and all four boys. Terry was unable to financially care for the children. The twins were adopted in 1995, while Derek and Alex were split up. Derek moved in with Pace High School principal Frank Lay and his family. Over the course of the next few years, Derek became increasing disruptive and got involved in drugs, particularly sniffing lighter fluid. He also developed a fascination with fire. Fearing that Derek was a danger to their other children, the Lays eventually arranged for him to be returned to his father in Cantonment in September 2001. Meanwhile, Alex had been sent to live with a foster family. However, that situation did not work out and he was returned to his fathers care. According to their paternal grandmother, Alex seemed happy to be living with his dad—but when Derek moved back in, things changed. Signs of Increasing Unrest at Home The boys mother described Terry as being strict, but very gentle, loving, and devoted to the boys. At trial, the jury learned that while Terry never physically abused his children, the boys may have felt threatened by what was described as their fathers oppressive stare downs.   Derek disliked living in a rural area and resented living by his fathers rules. Terry also took Derek off Ritalin, the drug hed been taking for years for the treatment of ADHD. While the move seemed to have a positive effect overall, there were times when he displayed a deep resentment toward his father. Music was another trigger that set off Dereks rude and aggressive and side. In an attempt to be preemptive, Terry removed the stereo and the television from the house—but his actions only made things worse, fueling Dereks simmering frustration and rage. On November 16, 10 days before Terry was murdered, Derek and Alex ran away from home. Family Friend/Child Molester Rick Chavis Rick Chavis and Terry King had been friends for several years. Chavis had gotten to know Alex and Derek and would sometimes pick them up from school. The boys enjoyed hanging around Chavis house because he let them watch television and play video games. In early November, however, Terry decided that Alex and Derek needed to stay away from Chavis. He felt that he and the boys were getting too close. Police retrieved a recorded message on Chavis phone from Alex who asked Chavis to tell their father that they were not ever coming home after theyd run away. When questioned, Chavis told investigators that he thought Terry was too strict and was mentally abusing the boys by staring at them for long periods of time. He went on to say that if the boys had anything to do with their fathers murder—which he thought they did—he would testify in court that they were being abused.  He also revealed that he knew Alex did not like his father and wished someone would kill him, and recalled that Derek had made a comment that he wished his father was dead as well. Contradictory Accounts Emerge James Walker, Sr., the boys step-grandfather, showed up at the King home in the early morning hours just after the fire had been extinguished. Walker told Detective Sanderson that Chavis had called him to tell him about the fire, and said Terry was dead and that the boys had run away again. Chavis also told Walker that firefighters allowed him inside Terrys house and that hed seen the badly burned and unrecognizable body. The first time Chavis was interviewed by Sanderson, the detective asked him if hed been inside the house shortly after the fire. Chavis said hed tried to get in, but that the firefighters wouldnt allow it (a direct contradiction of what hed told Walker). When Sanderson asked Chavis if he knew where the boys were, he said he hadnt seen them since hed dropped off Alex at the King home the day before Terry was murdered. After the interview, investigators asked for permission to look around Chavis house. They noticed a picture of Alex above Chavis bed. A search of the King home turned up a journal in the attic belonging to Alex. In it were notes written about his forever love for Chavis. He wrote, Before I met Rick I was  straight (sic) but now I am gay. This sent up more red flags to the investigative team who began to delve more deeply into Chavis background. It turned out that Chavis criminal record included a 1984 charge of lewd and lascivious assault on two 13-year-old boys to which he pled no contest. He was sentenced to six months in jail and five years probation. In 1986, his probation was revoked and he was sent to prison after being found guilty of burglary and petty theft. He was released after three years. The Boys Confession When Chavis dropped the boys off at the police station, they confessed to murdering their father. Alex said it was his idea to kill their father and Derek who acted on it. According to Derek, he waited until his father was asleep, and then picked up an aluminum baseball bat and bashed Terry 10 times on the head and face. He recalled that the only sound Terry made was a gurgling sound, a death rattle. The boys then set fire to the house in an attempt to conceal the crime. The boys said that the reason they had decided to kill their father was  that they  did not want to face being punished for running away. They did admit that while their dad never hit them, he would sometimes push them. The thing they feared most were the times that Terry allegedly made them sit in a room while he stared at them. The boys told investigators that they found his actions  mentally abusive. Both boys were charged with an open count of murder and placed in a juvenile detention center. A grand jury indicted them boys for first-degree murder. Since the law in Florida allowed them to be sentenced as adults, they were immediately sent to the adult county jail to await their trial. Meanwhile, Rick Chavis was being held in the same jail on a $50,000 bond. Chavis is Arrested Chavis had been called to testify during a closed-door grand jury proceeding regarding the boys arrest. Chavis was accused of hiding Alex and Derek after theyd murdered their father. Immediately after his grand jury testimony, he was arrested and charged with being an accessory after the fact to murder. Its believed that while Chavis was in jail, he tried to communicate with the boys by scratching a message in the cement in the recreation area. He was stopped by a guard before finishing. The sentence read, Alex dont trust†¦ A similar message to Alex and Derek—reminding them of who not to trust and reassuring them that if nothing changed in their testimony everything would work out—was also found on the wall of a holding room at the courthouse where Chavis had been held. Then, a few weeks later, a long note was found in Alexs trashcan cautioning him not to change his story and telling him that the investigators were playing mind games. He professed his love for Alex and said he would wait for him forever. Chavis denied responsibility for the messages. In April 2002, the King boys changed their story. They testified in a closed-door grand jury proceeding with claims against Chavis. Immediately following their testimony, Rick Chavis was indicted on  first-degree murder  of Terry King, arson, and lewd and lascivious sexual battery of a child 12 or older and for tampering with evidence. Chavis pled not guilty to all charges. The Trial of Rick Chavis Chavis trial for the murder of Terry King was slated before the boys trial. It was decided that the verdict for Chavis would be sealed until after the verdict in the boys case was reached. Only the judge and the lawyers would know if Chavis had been found innocent or guilty. Both King boys testified at Chavis trial. Alex revealed that Chavis had wanted the boys to live with him and said the only way that would happen was if Terry was dead. He testified that Chavis told the boys hed be at their house at midnight and to leave the back door open. When Chavis showed up, he told the boys to go to his car, get into the trunk, and wait for him, which Alex said they did. Chavis went inside the house. When he came back, he drove Alex and Derek to his own house and confessed that hed murdered Terry and set the house on fire. Derek was more evasive during his testimony, saying that he couldnt remember several events. Both he and his brother said the reason theyd killed their father was to protect Chavis. Frank and Nancy Lay testified that when they made the decision to stop fostering Derek and return him to his father, he pleaded with them not to go. He said Alex hated their father and wanted to see him dead. Nancy testified that before Derek moved to his fathers house, he told her that a plan to murder Terry was already in the works. It took the jury five hours to reach their verdict. It remained sealed. The Trial of the King Brothers Many of the witnesses at Chavis trial testified at the King trial, including the Lays. When Alex testified in his own defense, he answered the questions the same way as he had during Chavis trial, however, he did include more in-depth statements about his sexual relationship with Chavis and said that he wanted to be with him because he loved him. He also testified that it was Chavis, not Derek, who swung the bat that delivered the fatal blows. Alex explained how he and Derek kept rehearsing the story that they were going to tell the police in order to protect Chavis. When asked why hed changed his story, Alex admitted he did not want to go to jail for life. After deliberating for two and a half days, the jury reached a verdict. They found Alex and Derek King guilty of second-degree murder without a weapon and guilty of arson. The boys were looking at sentences of 22 years to life for the murder and a 30-year sentence for arson. The judge then read Chavis verdict. He had been acquitted on the charges of murder and arson. Judge Throws Out Boys Conviction The fact that the prosecutors charged both Chavis and the King boys with the murder of Terry King proved problematic for the courts. Prosecutors presented conflicting evidence in the trials. As a result, the judge ordered that the defense lawyers and prosecutor enter into mediation to clear up the discrepancies. The judge cautioned that should they be unable to reach an agreement, the verdicts would be thrown out and the boys would be retried. To add even more drama to the case, comedian Rosie ODonnell, who like many around the nation had been following the case for months, hired two tough lawyers for the boys. However, because the case was being mediated, any involvement from new counsel appeared unlikely. Sentencing On November 14, 2002, almost a year to the date of the murder, a mediated agreement was reached. Alex and Derek pled guilty to third-degree murder and  arson. The judge sentenced Derek to eight years and Alex to seven years in prison, plus credit for time served. Chavis was found not guilty of sexually molesting Alex, but guilty of false imprisonment for which he received a five-year sentence. He was later found guilty of tampering with evidence and as an accessory after the fact to murder, for which he received a total of 35 years. His sentences ran concurrently.  He will likely be released in 2028. After serving their sentences, Alex and Derek King, now adults, were released in 2008 and 2009, respectively.