‘Culpability of children different from adults due to brain immaturity’
MANILA, Philippines – Children have ‘immature’ brains compared to adults based on scientific evidence and hence should be treated differently in terms of legal responsibility, the Juvenile Justice and Welfare Council (JJWC) said on Tuesday.
JWWC Executive Director Tricia Oco, during the Senate hearing on bills seeking to lower the minimum age of criminal responsibility (MACR), said that the brains of an average female matures at 22 years old and males at 25 years old.
The House of Representatives on Monday approved a bill lowering the age of criminal liability from 15 to nine.
“Culpability of children should be different from that of the adults because they have immature brains. Within 14 and 16 years old, that’s the time they really start to know the consequences of their actions but the maturity comes at the age of 25,” Oco said during the Senate hearing.
“That’s the reason why the treatment of children as opposed to adults should be different because we should really focus on their protection as well as rehabilitation,” she added.
Oco asserted that children must be given a chance so as not to “foster criminality and groom them as criminals in the future” and to give them a chance to be useful citizens in the country.
She also said that even though children know that their actions are right or wrong, it is “usually that their impulse that controls them,” adding that children could not be expected to decide as adults because of their immaturity.
“If you look at teenagers, when they make decisions, they don’t make it because that’s what’s being told to them as right or wrong but because of peer pressure. So it depends on their priority and also because of their immaturity,” Oco said.
“When it comes to decision-making, you cannot expect them to decide as adults because they really cannot because of their immaturity,” she said.
She noted that children also have difficulty in deciding what is right because they usually follow their leaders who are adults.
The JJWC executive director also pointed out that many of children in conflict with the law (CICL) have mental issues which make their executive functions lower than their usual age and their maturity on decision-making to be lower as well.
She also noted that the socio-economic status of a person affects their discernment on what is right and wrong because they don’t have the same exposure as children who are well-cared for and educated.
“For out of school youth, usually discernment starts at 18 years of age. It turns out that the socio-economic status of a person affects discernment of a person whether he knows what’s wrong or right or how he decides maturely about things,” Oco said.
“I think it’s a logical conclusion they don’t have the same exposure as children who have been cared for and nourished and educated by parents,” she added.
Data from the Philippine National Police showed that a total of 9,562 child offenders were reported in 2018.
Nine of the offenders were aged 5 to 9, 83 aged 6 to 8; 358 aged 9 to 11; 3,082 aged 12 to 15 and 5,047 aged 15-18. / gsg
