In response to an amendment to the Juvenile Justice Act (少年事件處理法), which went into effect on Friday last week, the Executive Yuan is to publish guidelines for determining which juvenile offenses merit intervention from the Ministry of Education and social workers, sources with knowledge of the matter said yesterday.
The guidelines would use the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child as a reference, the sources said.
Juvenile offenses under the guidelines would include running away from school or home, wielding a knife or other weapon, reading pornographic material, using or carrying controlled substances, and contemplating or attempting to commit crimes, they said.
The guidelines are to serve as a reference for educators and social workers on when to intervene in juvenile delinquency matters.
Carrying weapons, using drugs, or contemplating or attempting crimes are some of the most prevalent delinquencies among minors and would be covered by the act instead of the Criminal Code, Minister Without Portfolio Lin Wan-i (林萬億) said.
The Executive Yuan would soon unveil the guidelines to complement the amendment, which was designed to keep teenagers out of the court system and help prevent them from committing these kinds of infractions, he said.
The list could be promulgated immediately without having to pass a Legislative Yuan review, he added.
While reviewing proposals to amend the act, lawmakers last year abolished a rule that required minors aged seven to 12 to stand trial, based on the suggestions of international experts and the UN convention.
Because most crimes committed by children in this age bracket are theft, these cases have since been exempted from juvenile courts to be handled by school administrators or social workers.
The amendment requires juvenile courts to close all cases involving minors in the age bracket on the grounds that they would either “cease or desist reviewing them” or would “refrain from ordering the juvenile delinquents into custody.”
This in effect would transfer cases involving these offenses to the jurisdiction of the education system and social workers.
Taiwanese were praised for their composure after a video filmed by Taiwanese tourists capturing the moment a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Japan’s Aomori Prefecture went viral on social media. The video shows a hotel room shaking violently amid Monday’s quake, with objects falling to the ground. Two Taiwanese began filming with their mobile phones, while two others held the sides of a TV to prevent it from falling. When the shaking stopped, the pair calmly took down the TV and laid it flat on a tatami mat, the video shows. The video also captured the group talking about the safety of their companions bathing
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
Starting on Jan. 1, YouBike riders must have insurance to use the service, and a six-month trial of NT$5 coupons under certain conditions would be implemented to balance bike shortages, a joint statement from transportation departments across Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan announced yesterday. The rental bike system operator said that coupons would be offered to riders to rent bikes from full stations, for riders who take out an electric-assisted bike from a full station, and for riders who return a bike to an empty station. All riders with YouBike accounts are automatically eligible for the program, and each membership account
A classified Pentagon-produced, multiyear assessment — the Overmatch brief — highlighted unreported Chinese capabilities to destroy US military assets and identified US supply chain choke points, painting a disturbing picture of waning US military might, a New York Times editorial published on Monday said. US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s comments in November last year that “we lose every time” in Pentagon-conducted war games pitting the US against China further highlighted the uncertainty about the US’ capability to intervene in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. “It shows the Pentagon’s overreliance on expensive, vulnerable weapons as adversaries field cheap, technologically
RSS