As per existing law, rapists or murderers having age below 18 years are not considered equal with others and left from any tough punishment.
But many reports are coming from different parts of the globe regarding such criminal activities performed by persons below the age of 18. In many cases, the cruelty expressed by them are beyond imagination!
Do you think these criminals will be left only on the ground of their age?
If they are able to murder or rape, then they should be able to withstand the consequences. I don't know if there is cutoff for age. For example, if someone is one day younger than 18, is he/she forgiven if they commit a murder but condemned to death if they wait a day?
Dear Dr. Shibabrata Pattanayak , you asked a very long question. Both of them are very bad acts and should not be considered as minor.
As a father of females, rape is very bad .
So lets see some facts and then get into how rape can be stopped. Reasons
Most of males want rapes to stop. I, myself, feel very ashamed when I hear about rapes.Sometimes I also feel ashamed for being a male. But saying only men are responsible for rapes is wrong. Many women support their sons, husband and brothers fully knowing that he is guilty. This protection also gives them reassurance that what they did was not wrong.
How to stop rapes
Some minors are taking benefits of their age. Why it should be allowed. I agree with @ Amir W. Al-Khafaji, if they know to murder and rape, they are capable to know consequences.
Not at all.
Rapist means somewhone who is mature enough to commit such crimes.
I get incensed whenever I hear this. They must be held accountable and punished as per the punishments laid down for such offences. They were able to plan rape, robbery and murder. What indicates that they are immature?
When you let a rapist or murderer go in the name of age, you have succeeded in sending a time bomb into the society, he will also raise a hundred like him voluntarily or otherwise. Murder or rape are not minor offenses and so is the offender
No rapist or murderer should be considered as minor, because, if he has raped someone, he is already thinking like a major. Age is a relative term actually, even if legally it may not be so! How can one exert so much of brutal force without understanding what one is doing? And anyway victims deserve justice and so the punishment is justified!
Development of time makes a person mature. Compare the child of today with the child of past days. When science and technology was not so developed in the past, the child had just cause to say that he was in fact mature. But now, with the rapid development of science a child become mature before the normal course of time. Law should respond to this course of development. Age should not come in the way to book the rapist in iron.
The Massachusetts Supreme Court just looked at this question in terms of statutory rape. A juvenile defendant had argued that they should not be charged and punished with statutory rape because statutory rape recognizes the incapability of consent by juveniles, and thus, as a defense, he should not have been charged with that crime as he is part of the protected class the statutory rape statute was aiming to protect. The Court disagreed, though the Court tried to narrowly apply their decision to the facts of the case. If of interest:
https://www.mass.gov/files/documents/2018/04/25/12351.pdf
The question itself is an answer which is absolutely affirmative.
Any age if the offense committed is non bailable and cognizable, no Court of Law should consider the offender a minor. Nevertheless the justice is administered based on the Indian Penal Code provisions.
Let the matter be put up before the Law reform authority that age criterion be removed while adjudicating such offenses.
The law defines the age of puberty for an individual at 18, indicating that his or her mental and physical abilities are complete. This means that, as long as he is under 18 years of age, he is considered to be a minor and not fully responsible for his or her acts.
This is quite a black and white discussion while any judge should consider all possible shades of grey in between. Also for punishment of different grown-up murderers or rapists or criminals in general there might be circumstances that are to be considered.
I think, juveniles convicts are punished for their crimes by sending them to a penitentiary until their sentence duration is done.
Sheth Sir, Wonderful and valid answer. The law needs to be reformed specially penology and the age in our country
I feel that the punishment given to anyone committing any crime has to be as per the crime committed. If a juvenile commits an adult crime he/she needs to be tried as an adult not juvenile. (there needs to be proper investigation so that no innocent is punished)
This is a really sad discussion, but it clearly shows that it is very good that there is a specialisation in juvenile justice, criminology and developmental psychology and psychiatry.
It is an old and well-established principle of criminal justice that young offenders shall be treated differently than adult offenders because of their young age and the fact that they still are developing their character, personality, cognitive and mental abilities. BTW, this process doesn't end on the day of your 18th birthday - it may well go on until your late twenties. This principle is also recognised in international Human Rights instruments (Beijing Rules, UN Convention of the Rights of the Child).
Also, in Germany and some other European countries, young adults are included in the Juvenile Justice System and have been for many years. This is working remarkably well. And there are other and more effective ways to help the victims of a crime than being particularly cruel to the offender. Search for: Restorative Justice.
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