The case is a clear demonstration of the futility of using the adult court system and adult criminal codes to deal with deeply troubled and troubling children.
Evidently even the mother went to social services years ago and warned of the dangers of keeping the brothers together.
what use (or indeed true Justice)will it be to sentence these children to lengthy terms of custody as though these horrific actions were not mainly the result of society’s shortcomings in detecting their problems and preventative treatment.
It must be emphasised that we are virtually the only country in Europe to subject children as young as this to the unnecessary ritual of criminal proceedings. Maybe Doncaster will be holding an internal enquiry but this is not good enough. surely we need an independent enquiry into what can be done about the relatively small number of children in England and Wales who are likely to prove themselves a danger to others and inter-alia our disgracefully low age of criminal responsibility. To those who recommend intervention below the age of 3: good idea but what do we do over the next decade for those who have already achieved that age?.”
Blake Morrison, in his thoughtful article on the Edlington case (Let the circus begin, 11 April), made the point that 10-year-old children in the UK, alone in the civilised world, are tried for serious offences by adult courts using adult criminal codes, suffering adult punishments.
Two recent cases disclose how unfairly these children are likely to be treated at trial. Take the case that caused the creation of our group. In October 2007 five boys appeared in the central criminal court and were sentenced to two years’ custody, having been convicted of manslaughter after a full adult trial. They were aged between 10 and 12 at the time of the incident concerned and the trial was given the full circus treatment. What went virtually unreported was that two months later the convictions were quashed by the appeal court. Neither the Crown Prosecution Service or trial judge had noticed that the evidence supporting such a serious charge was insufficient.
Again virtually unreported, in June last year a 14-year-old girl sentenced to 18 months’ detention for falsely accusing her brother and his friend of indecently assaulting her when she was nine had her sentence quashed by the appeal court. But the legacy of the Bulger case is the effect it has had in frustrating any attempt at law reform in this area. The fear is that as a result of Edlington the circus will go on for another generation.
Stephen Jakobi
Convener, Children Aren’t Criminals
following the UN report on the rights of the child issued today
,
we call for the immediate raising of the age of criminal responsibility to 12 as an interim measure, pending the outcome of the enquiry that government promised us in February of this year and which so far as we can judge has yet to commence.
WE have obtained some statistics from the Youth Justice Board on the criminal activity of the 10 and 11 year olds our government persist in designating as “youths.”
The activity disclosed is miniscule compared to older age cohorts.e.g in each of the years 2004 to 2006 only some 80010 and 11 year olds were found guilty by the juvenile court system of any category of offence.In older two year cohortsof 14 to 17, the comparable figure is 20,000.Or, put another way, only 1% of criminal cases before the juvenile courts concern this age group
Whatever the merits or demeritsof the current juvenile justice system, its codes of procedure and criminal law it must be conceded thata “one fits all” system that applies these basics to the immature pre-adolescent10 year old , in the same manner as with the mature 17-year-old is an affront to common sense as well as all national and international experience and evidence-based practice.
The campaign group “children aren’t criminals”, issued the following statement on the heels of The Barnardos study “Locking up or giving up - is custody for children always the right answer?”
,
Stephen Jakobi, the group’s spokesperson said.
These figures are not new, and have been publicised by such major organisations in the field as the Prison Reform Trust, and the Howard League for over a year. But whilst any publicity on the shocking number of very young children being locked up in England and Wales is to be welcomed, and indeed timely in view of the imminent forthcoming UN report on the practice, it is clear that the practice is the symptom of the major British disease of criminalising the very young.
The disease itself is an age of criminal responsibility, lower than any other comparable society in Europe.In Spain, Germany, France and Italy the median age is 14. In England and Wales it is 10.
Moreover, it is over 40 years since this problem was examined by any government enquiry. In February, we were informed by the Joint Ministers responsible for Youth Justice that they were that they were gathering evidence about how other jurisdictions deal with young people who have committed offences and part of that process would include obtaining comments and contributions from all interested parties: indeed we were invited to contribute. We have not been contacted in the eight months that have since passed and a letter of enquiry as to the progress of this investigation sent in July has received no response.
A 14-year-old girl who was sentenced to 18 months detention for falsely accusing her brother and his friend of indecently assaulting her when she was nine has had her sentence quashed by the appeal court, which said it “should never have been passed”.
The appeal court last week substituted an 18-month supervision order on the girl, whose allegations split her family and sent her brother into care.
Experts said the tragic consequences of her lie highlight the drawbacks of the low age of criminal responsibility in England and Wales - lower, at 10, than in other European countries. In many, such a case would not have come into the criminal justice system but would have been dealt with through child welfare procedures.
The girl, named only as O, was 11 when she made allegations in 2005 of indecent assault by her brother G and his friend J, which she said had happened two years before, when she was nine, G was 11 and his friend J was 12. G and J were prosecuted and convicted in April 2006. They were sentenced to supervision and made to sign the sex offenders register. G’s mother felt she could no longer have him in the family home and he spent two years in care.
In 2007, O’s mother discovered her daughter had lied about other things, and questioned her allegations against G and J. She admitted she had lied because she was “fed up” about G’s behaviour at home.
The police were called, but O changed her story again. However, she later confessed to her aunt that she had lied because she wanted G to be “told off” and had been scared of getting into trouble if she retracted.
She was charged with perverting the course of public justice and pleaded guilty. G and J both made statements for the court case. G described his miserable time in care and the bullying he had experienced, and J said he had “suffered greatly as a result of his conviction and consequent stigma”, the appeal court judges said.
The judge who sentenced O to 18 months detention had made condemnatory remarks about what she had done. The appeal court judges agreed that her actions were “quite dreadful”, but said “the effects of her behaviour could not have been imagined or understood by a child of her age”, only 11, when she made the allegation. The sentence of detention should never have been passed, they added. She and her family had required support, rather than punishment.
Dr Hamish Cameron, an experienced expert witness in child cases, said: “Early investigation by child protection professionals could have brought out the truth sooner. This welfare approach would have avoided the terrible effects on the three children’s lives and on their families.”
Alison Fiddy, of the Children’s Legal Centre, said: “The low age of criminal responsibility has repeatedly been criticised in the international community.”
