The Dui Hua Foundation - Sharp Drop in Number of Juveniles Convicted by Chinese Courts

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Records of People’s Courts Historical Judicial Statistics: 1949-2016 (Renmin fayuan sifa tongji lishi dianji 人民法院司法统计历史典籍) were published by the Supreme People’s Court (SPC) at the end of 2018 and contain extensive information on the convictions of juveniles, including girls, by Chinese courts. Statistics are available for trials from 2002 to 2016, a period of 15 years.Table 1 shows the number of juveniles convicted, with a breakdown by gender. It reveals that the number of juveniles tried and convicted from 2008 to 2016 dropped by more than 60 percent. However, while the number of girls convicted by courts decreased until the end of 2016, the number of girls convicted as a percentage of juvenile convictions has increased.

Table 1. Total Juvenile Convictions, by Gender
Year	All Juveniles Convicted (ages 14-18)	All Girls Convicted	Girls as Percentage of the Year’s Total Convictions	All Boys Convicted	Boys as Percentage of the Year’s Total Convictions
2002	50,048	1,438	2.87%	48,610	97.13%
2003	58,870	1,792	3.04%	57,078	96.96%
2004	70,086	1,994	2.85%	68,092	97.15%
2005	82,692	2,188	2.65%	80,504	97.35%
2006	83,697	1,957	2.34%	81,740	97.66%
2007	87,506	2,007	2.29%	85,499	97.71%
2008	88,891	2,047	2.30%	86,844	97.70%
2009	77,604	2,075	2.67%	75,529	97.33%
2010	68,193	2,078	3.05%	66,115	96.95%
2011	67,280	2,146	3.19%	65,134	96.81%
2012	63,782	2,077	3.26%	61,705	96.74%
2013	55,817	2,001	3.58%	53,816	96.42%
2014	50,415	1,847	3.66%	48,568	96.34%
2015	43,839	1,777	4.05%	42,062	95.95%
2016	35,743	1,570	4.39%	34,173	95.61%

Source: Records of People’s Courts Historical Judicial Statistics: (1949-2016), 2018.

Tables 2 and 3 present the types of crimes committed by all juveniles and girls, respectively, since 2002. There has been a troubling rise in the number of cases of drug crimes committed by girls in recent years.

Table 2. Top Juvenile Crimes
Year	Violent					Nonviolent
	Robbery	Aggravated Assault	Rape	Brawls	Murder	Theft	“Picking Quarrels and Provoking Trouble”	Drugs*
2002	21,846	4,712	2,569	680	564	13,963	1,495	373
2003	25,626	5,814	2,959	602	644	16,872	1,647	400
2004	29,207	6,818	2,810	971	641	20,929	2,202	617
2005	35,288	8,095	2,845	1,315	678	23,961	2,631	874
2006	34,259	8,918	2,549	1,741	760	23,763	3,581	749
2007	34,217	9,285	2,667	2,318	672	25,397	3,818	916
2008	34,326	9,822	2,631	2,507	524	25,916	4,100	1,210
2009	29,884	9,278	2,593	2,661	550	20,812	4,005	1,268
2010	24,292	9,015	2,581	3,182	463	17,244	3,730	1,368
2011	21,714	9,825	2,585	3,727	558	17,316	3,865	1,543
2012	18,558	8,892	2,598	3,371	598	18,259	3,969	1,567
2013	16,464	7,891	2,310	3,364	470	14,713	3,358	1,748
2014	14,858	7,492	2,224	2,912	337	11,966	3,571	1,745
2015	13,164	6,142	1,936	3,106	317	8,997	3,323	1,595
2016	12,416	4,152	1,497	2,600	199	5,910	3,001	1,223

* Drug related crimes: smuggling,
trafficking, transporting, and manufacturing drugs

Source:
Records of People’s Courts Historical Judicial Statistics: (1949-2016), 2018.

Table 3. Top Crimes Committed by Girls
Year	Violent					Nonviolent
Year	Robbery	Aggravated Assault	Rape	Brawls	Murder	Theft	“Picking Quarrels and Provoking Trouble”	Drugs	Fraud	Extortion
2002	442	74	24	5	38	524	33	54	52	16
2003	524	99	34	3	34	738	15	87	79	15
2004	554	130	34	11	40	840	19	89	79	23
2005	636	115	36	13	26	850	49	112	114	30
2006	527	104	31	22	38	749	36	103	57	44
2007	534	157	46	21	29	709	43	107	72	31
2008	467	138	59	24	24	729	50	122	77	33
2009	456	158	58	38	29	641	71	124	85	45
2010	387	162	65	74	18	670	48	163	57	44
2011	347	186	56	73	35	650	67	204	73	20
2012	290	152	41	63	29	748	69	218	59	27
2013	199	164	53	52	23	651	82	213	96	22
2014	174	163	30	63	26	527	74	230	79	34
2015	145	126	45	58	21	427	52	232	92	19
2016	147	100	29	66	20	381	74	189	100	14

Source:
Records of People’s Courts Historical Judicial Statistics: (1949-2016), 2018.

Political crimes – endangering state security and organizing or using a cult to undermine implementation of the law – are rare. Twenty juveniles, almost certainly Tibetans or Uyghurs, were convicted of splittism and inciting splittism during 2010-2015. Eighty juveniles were convicted of organizing or using a cult to undermine implementation of the law during the same period; these are thought to be predominantly Falun Gong practitioners.A recent article published by Beijing News suggests there was a sharp increase in the percentage of girls convicted of crimes in 2017. According to the article, girls convicted as a percentage of juveniles rose to 6.56 percent for years 2016-2017. The SPC statistics volumes only cover trials through the end of 2016. However, China Law Yearbook 2018 provides a number for juveniles convicted in 2017: 32,778. Using this number and the 2016 number of 35,743 in the SPC volumes, we calculate that the number of girls convicted in 2017 was 2,925, the highest number since at least 2002. Expressed as a percentage of all juveniles convicted by courts, girls doubled from 4.39 percent in 2016 to 8.92 percent in 2017.

It should be noted that the statistics in the SPC volumes only cover juveniles convicted by courts. Juveniles can be held in various other carceral facilities without being tried by a court. Such alternatives include compulsory drug rehabilitation (qiangzhi jiedu 强制戒毒) centers, custody and education (shourong jiayu 收容教育) camps (for sex workers, including juveniles), “legal education” (fazhi jiaoyu 法制教育) campuses for “seriously poisoned Falun Gong practitioners,” “custody and rehabilitation” (shourong jiaoyang 收容教养) facilities for juveniles under the age of 16 who commit mostly minor offenses, and “work-study schools” (gongduxuexiao 工读学校) for juveniles who “engage in serious misbehavior.” There were 1,335 juveniles in “custody and rehabilitation” facilities in 2005, the latest year for which numbers are available. In 2013, there were 10,735 juveniles in 67 “work-study schools,” of whom 18 percent were girls.

Juvenile Justice Reforms

China stressed reform of the juvenile justice system in the 2002-2007 five-year judicial reform plan. During this period, emphasis was on infrastructure – specifically the creation of juvenile courts and the recruitment and training of judges for juvenile cases. During the 2008-2012 plan period, the emphasis was on process – how to best deal with juvenile crime. This period culminated in the passing of the amended Criminal Law in 2011 and the amended Criminal Procedure Law in 2012. The former recommended giving juveniles suspended sentences for minor crimes. The latter introduced a number of important reforms including “diversion” (sifa fenliu 司法分流 or fenliu chuzhi 分流处置), sometimes referred to as “postponed prosecution,” (futiaojian buqisu 附条件不起诉), sealing of juvenile records, and use of behavioral and psychological assessments at every stage of adjudication.In addition to implementing and assessing pilot projects in the provinces, the SPC also sent teams abroad to study foreign juvenile justice systems. From 2008 to 2017, Dui Hua joined with the SPC’s Office of Juvenile Courts to hold five in-depth exchanges with judges and other judicial officials and scholars – two in the United States and three in China.

Topics covered by these exchanges included reforms that made their way into the amended CPL. Dui Hua believes that the adoption of “postponed prosecution” – a process whereby an offender can apologize and pay compensation to victims as well as undertake other steps that demonstrate “genuine repentance and a willingness to reform” – is the main reason why trials and convictions of juveniles dropped more than 60 percent since 2008.

The Road Ahead

In the autumn of 2019, the National People’s Congress (NPC) released the draft of a proposed Law on the Prevention of Juvenile Delinquency for public comment. The draft focuses on prevention rather than punitive measures, stressing education, mental health, reduction of bullying, and a focus on multi-institutional collaboration to reduce juvenile delinquency. It renames “custody and rehabilitation” centers as “specialized schools.”A notable omission of the draft law is that it does not propose gender-specific measures. It is increasingly accepted that gender-specific needs require different approaches. This shortcoming may be addressed during the public comment phase of consideration.

Whether or not the age of criminal responsibility should be lowered from the current standard of 14 years old is a hotly debated topic in China. The draft does not mention this controversial proposal, but it is likely to emerge as a point of contention during the public comment phase.