The variety of crimes dedicated by kids in Germany has risen by a 3rd in 2022 in comparison with the earlier yr, in line with statistics launched by the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) on Thursday.

A complete of 5.6 million crimes had been registered in Germany in 2022 — up by 11.5% on 2021. The figures additionally present an total enhance in crime of three.5% when in comparison with 2019, the final yr with out COVID-19 restrictions. 

The variety of suspects additionally has additionally risen by simply over 10.7% to only over 2 million compared to 2021. The variety of youngster suspects beneath the age of 14 has risen to 93,095 — a 35.5% enhance on the earlier yr. Around 189,149 suspects had been between the ages of 14 and 18 — in 2019 this determine was 177,082. The most frequent crime dedicated by kids and younger individuals is theft, adopted by assault, harm to property and drug associated crimes. 

“Children are the most vulnerable in society. Protecting them is my top priority,” Interior Minister Nancy Faeser, of the center-left Social Democrats (SPD), mentioned on Thursday as she introduced the statistics. She spoke of an “appalling scale” and of case numbers which have been rising for years.

Holger Münch, president of the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA), was eager to emphasize that evaluating the 2022 statistics with these of the 2 earlier years was “only conditionally” useful, because of the results of the pandemic. Overall, the crime stage final yr was “comparable” to that of the final pre-COVID yr, 2019, Münch argued.

The case of Luise F.

The launch of the figures is probably going so as to add gasoline to an ongoing debate in Germany over whether or not to decrease the age of legal duty. Under German legislation, kids attain the age of legal duty at 14 — earlier than which they can’t be prosecuted for committing a legal offense. In another nations, the age of legal duty is decrease: In England and Wales, the age of legal duty is 10, whereas in France kids could be sentenced at 13.

The debate was reignited by the killing of 12-year-old girl Luise F. from the city of Freudenberg in North Rhine-Westphalia on March 11. Two women aged 12 and 13 are suspected of finishing up the assault. The authorities say the post-mortem discovered a number of knife wounds and that the sufferer bled to dying. The two women, who’re mentioned to have confessed to the crime, have since been taken into the care of the Youth Welfare Office.

The crime statistics from different German states launched earlier final week replicate an total pattern of rising crime amongst younger individuals. In the southern state of Baden-Württemberg, for instance, the variety of youngster suspects went up by 33.4% on the earlier yr. A complete of 10,490 kids aged 13 and beneath had been suspected of crimes within the south-western state in 2022.

An previous debate revived

The figures prompted Baden-Württemberg’s Interior Minister Thomas Strobl and Justice Minister Marion Gentges, each from the center-right Christian Democrats (CDU), to put in writing a letter to their counterparts within the federal authorities calling for the age of legal duty to be reviewed. 

In the letter, which referred to the Luise F. case, the ministers ask “whether today the mental and moral maturity of young people begins earlier than it did in 1923” when the legislation referring to the age of legal duty was launched.

Calls to decrease the age of legal duty have additionally come from Rainer Wendt, the pinnacle of the German Police Union (DPolG). “It’s not about punishing children or sending them to jail, but about influencing their behavior, and criminal proceedings are very effective at doing that,” Wendt instructed DW, including that he believes kids at the moment mature a lot sooner than in earlier a long time.

“Courts can impose orders, they can monitor those orders, they can issue restraining orders and impose curfews,” Wendt mentioned. “The Youth Welfare Office can’t do any of that without the support of the parents, and, depending on the milieu in which the parents operate, there could be no cooperation at all.”

‘Unserious and unhelpful’

But the consensus amongst psychologists, social staff, and criminologists is essentially towards decreasing the age of legal duty. 

“I think [the debate] is completely inappropriate, unserious and unhelpful,” Sibylle Winter, a baby psychiatrist and senior guide at Berlin’s Charité hospital, instructed DW, including that extreme acts of violence such because the Luise F. killing had been “absolutely isolated incidents.”

As far as the brand new statistics are involved, Winter urges warning in terms of figuring out an total pattern exhibiting extra violence amongst kids. In 2015, 79,371 crimes had been dedicated by kids beneath 14. That steadily declined till 2021 to succeed in 68,725. The variety of crimes dedicated by 14 to 18-year-olds additionally fell from 218,025 instances in 2015 to 154,889 in 2021. 

“I can imagine that it is a peak following the COVID-19 pandemic, because the pandemic increased the psychological stress on children and young people, violence in family homes increased, but it will probably calm down again,” Winter mentioned.

The youngster psychiatrist additionally rejects the concept that kids at the moment are extra mature than in earlier a long time. Although kids beneath the age of 14 are assumed to know the distinction between proper and flawed in easy conditions, the proof from developmental psychology reveals that the identical doesn’t apply to extra advanced conditions. 

“Cognitively they are definitely not more mature,” she says. “They are also definitely exposed to more risks through this whole social media situation that we have – they are online much more and are confronted with content that they can’t process properly.”

Winter argues that whether or not or not there are present psychological points, a spread of efficient measures could be utilized independently of the legal justice system.

“Anyone who commits such a one-time act of serious violence must face some consequences, and these are also available within the framework of the youth welfare system and family court proceedings,” Winter concluded.

‘Hard instances make dangerous legislation’

Torsten Verrel, the pinnacle of the Department of Criminology on the University of Bonn, can be towards decreasing the age of legal duty. He says that the talk at all times reignites in aftermath of uncommon however excessive instances of kid delinquency. 

“There’s a nice adage from the US that says: hard cases make bad law,” Verrel instructed DW, including that the concept that decreasing the age of legal duty could be an efficient deterrent for kids is solely naive.

“Child crime usually takes the form of shoplifting and damage to property, all that would come within the scope of criminal law and nobody wants that,” he says. “Thankfully our political system is stable and sensitive enough to realize that this is a very populist demand that would lead to huge problems in practice.”

The proof from nations such because the US, England and Wales reveals that decreasing the age of legal duty doesn’t forestall kids from committing crimes, says Friedrich Lösel, former director of the Cambridge Institute of Criminology and now a professor of psychology on the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg.

“The key issue is that are no clear age thresholds in development. In fact, some are advocating that the threshold should now go up until early adulthood because the brain is not yet fully developed before 28 or so,” Lösel instructed DW. 

“I think we must really protect these young people as far as possible, but we should not only see them as victims,” he added. “They have intentionally carried out a serious offense and we need very intensive rehabilitative measures, in some cases in secure units.”

Edited by Ben Knight

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