Pursuing UN Compliance: A Youth Protection Order?
| Author | Nigel Stone |
| DOI | 10.1177/1473225413505388 |
| Published date | 01 December 2013 |
| Date | 01 December 2013 |
| Subject Matter | Legal Commentary |
Youth Justice
13(3) 249 –257
© The Author(s) 2013
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DOI: 10.1177/1473225413505388
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Legal Commentary
Pursuing UN Compliance: A Youth
Protection Order?
Nigel Stone
The previous Legal Commentary (Stone, 2013) sought to explore the extent to which the
quantum of punishment should be tempered in pursuit of a distinctive and principled
approach to youth justice. This Commentary seeks to build on that inquiry, when seeking
to give fully authentic effect to international tenets and obligations and, as compatibly as
possible, the core foundations of domestic statute. To reiterate, relevant UN provisions
(United Nations, 1985, 1989) require: (a) the focus of intervention to be on promoting the
young offender’s development and reintegration rather than imposing retribution; and (b)
sanctions involving deprivation of personal liberty shall not be imposed save for serious
offences involving ‘violence against another person or evidencing persistence in commit-
ting other serious offences’ and ‘shall be used only as a measure of last resort and for the
shortest appropriate period of time’.1 In England and Wales the overarching statutory
framework requires courts with jurisdiction over children and young persons in criminal
proceedings to have regard for the welfare of the child (Children and Young Persons Act
(CYPA)1933 s.44(1)) and to the principal aim of the youth justice system, preventing
offending by children and young persons (Crime and Disorder Act 1998 s.37(1)).
To pose the challenge in the context of a recent and prominent sentencing exercise in
England and Wales, consider this account taken from news reports:
A boy aged 15 was playing football on open ground at a south London housing estate. When
a girl aged 14 walked through the middle of the game, interrupting play, he complained. She
reacted badly, angrily telling the boy that she would get someone to stab him. She then
phoned her 16 year-old boyfriend and told him that the boy, unknown to either of them, had
disrespected her. The boyfriend immediately went to the scene and confronted the boy, pick-
ing a fight with him in the course of which he fatally stabbed him. The girl and her boyfriend
were acquitted of murder but convicted of manslaughter. They were sentenced to eight and
Corresponding author:
Nigel Stone, School of Psychology, Elizabeth Fry Building, University of East Anglia, Norwich, NR4 7TJ, UK.
Email: n.stone@uea.ac.uk
505388YJJ13310.1177/1473225413505388Youth JusticeStone
2013
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