The New Year’s Eve fatal stabbing in London of 16-year-old Harry Pitman shocked people internationally and highlighted, far from the first time, the agonising question of youth violence.
The trend is not restricted to the UK. Only a few weeks earlier, eight high school students were arrested on murder charges in Nevada after a 17-year-old boy was beaten to death. In Toronto, Canada, last year, a group of teenage girls were arrested following the stabbing to death of a homeless man; the two oldest among them were 16, the two youngest only 13 years of age. These are not isolated examples.
