Japanese Juvenile Justice
A number of brutal murders by young people has led to a total review of Japan's 50-year-old youth justice system. But is the introduction of new, more severe laws the answer And is crime amongst the young really as serious as some Japanese fear Hugh Levinson reports for Assignment.
Over the past few years, the people of Japan have been shocked by a series of horrific crimes committed by teenagers. It started in 1997 in the city of Kobe, when a 14-year-old killed a younger boy and cut his head off. He left the head outside a school, along with a taunting note. He was eventually arrested, but not before killing another boy. Another teenager murdered an entire family of neighbours and a 17-year-old killed a woman with a knife, during a bus hijack.
Ruriko Take lost her 16-year-old son four years ago, when a group of teenagers beat and kicked him to death. She was horrified when a family court sent one of the killers to a Juvenile Training School for less than a year. She explains:
'If a young person takes someone's life, they usually don't face a criminal trial. They are not punished. But who takes responsibility for ending that life? … The Juvenile Law here only deals with the problems of offenders – how to protect them and rehabilitate them. The sufferings of the victims are not taken into account at all.'
Media Hype
These crimes are apparently motiveless and quite different to the normal pattern of juvenile delinquency. Mariko Kuno Fujiwara studies Japanese society at the Hakuhodo Institute of Life and Living he comments:
'The crimes committed by the younger generation are quite brutal and quite cruel and are often committed by the type of kids we never thought would behave that way. That's puzzling and confusing and especially adults agonise over the fact that –“my God, this could happen to anybody.”'
Extensive and supercharged reporting has fuelled those fears. The Kobe murder and the more recent bus-jacking dominated the airwaves, with blanket coverage on most TV channels. However, statistics suggest that the cases highlighted by the media are exceptional.
Although the rates of general and violent crime by teenagers have risen in the last three years, they are still lower than they were in the 1980s and much lower than in the 1950s and 60s. One reason is that the declining birth rate means there are simply fewer teenagers around. And by comparison with other rich nations, Japan still has very low levels of crime. However that hasn't stopped people being frightened.
Juvenile Law Reforms
It was these fears that led politicians to revise the Juvenile Law, for the first time since it was passed during the Allied Occupation in 1949. The law emphasised rehabilitation over punishment, with Family Courts treating teenage offenders as wayward rather than evil.
The new amendments now give crime victims more information about Family Court hearings – a generally welcomed change. More controversially, they've reduced the age at which teenagers can face criminal prosecution, from 16 to 14. And teenage murderers will now be sent to criminal courts. Unusually, conservative politicians, without the involvement of bureaucrats or expert advisers, pushed through the law.
Whilst the revisions to the law have been popular with the public, they have been attacked by many academics, defence lawyers and even judges who believe that young criminals have the potential to become decent people. As family court judge Toshihiko Morino comments: