Discernment, not Age. Psychological and Legal Foundations of the Criminal Liability of Minors
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.63331/upasw/33/13Keywords:
discernment, criminal liability of minors, developmental psychology, juvenile justiceAbstract
The article explores the limits of legislative intervention in domains that exceed the boundaries of legal competence, such as morality and developmental psychology, taking as its starting point the issue of the minimum age of criminal responsibility for minors. The study argues that establishing a fixed age for imputability constitutes a legal fiction, since discernment is not a biological fact but the result of an educational and emotional process. Therefore, the criminal responsibility of minors should be determined through individual psychological assessment rather than by arbitrary age thresholds.
The paper proposes an amendment to Article 113 of the Romanian Criminal Code, stipulating that criminal liability should be established exclusively on the basis of forensic psychiatric expertise for minors under sixteen, regardless of chronological age.
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