Wayne Treacy Sentence - Restorative Justice for a Child

This is a petition for sentencing in the case of The State of Florida versus Wayne Treacy. This is not about avoiding accountability. There is no debate that Wayne Treacy did something wrong. This is about finding justice that is fair in a very sad case involving many extenuating circumstances that extend outside the range of normal.

Wayne Treacy experienced extreme emotional trauma when he saw his brother hanging from a tree. From that point on, his life began to change. Something tragic occurred, but he did not wake up that morning with plans to commit a crime. A heated text message exchange in which he was told to “go visit his dead brother” caused a switch to flip in his head. Based on psychological evaluations, Wayne Treacy, a kid with no prior record, was in a state of “dissociative fugue” and not himself on the day of the incident. The doctors for both the prosecution and defense agree that Wayne was exhibiting symptoms of severe PTSD at the time of the incident as well as extreme depression. Psychological testing as presented by Dr. Neumeister shows that Wayne is not psychotic. Instead he is a kid who made a one-time tragic mistake during a time of extreme emotional distress. It is important to note, the doctors for the state and prosecution also agree that with help he is capable of complete rehabilitation.

Wayne’s prior record of being a model student and a well behaved citizen reveals the type of kid that he is. He is a bright seventeen year old boy with so much potential. He was an honor student enrolled in the International Baccalaureate program and a well-behaved and well-liked kid who had never been in any kind of trouble before.

For the last two years and four months Wayne has been held in a cell for 23 hours a day with only one hour to move about. His juvenile status does not allow him to receive the same opportunities or access to services that the jail offers an adult. Custody for a juvenile in an adult facility is far more extreme and isolated. Research shows that excessively harsh sentencing ignores the needs of juvenile offenders in regards to rehabilitation and reform. Our justice system is based on the belief that rehabilitation is possible. People are capable of change and kids have better odds of changing their lives with proper guidance.