A doctor and psychology professor at the Ateneo De Manila University (AdMU) on Monday told lawmakers that lowering the age of criminal liability to nine years old would lead the youth to a “negative” path to adulthood.

During a justice subcommittee hearing on correctional reforms at the House of Representatives, Dr. Liane Peña Alampay said that children as young as nine years old have discernment on whether or not what they’re doing is right or wrong, but they have no capacity to act on that knowledge.

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She said a child’s brain is not as developed as an adult’s, especially in the part of the brain that deals with the thought process on long-term consequences and impulse control.

“There is strong evidence that the brain is still developing through childhood and adolescence. A child’s brain is not the same as an adult’s brain. They are still growing, it is still being formed,” Alampay said.

“We can’t ask them to make complex decision because they don’t have experience to that,” she added.

Alampay said children subjected to abusive situations tend to have less brain activity, which limits their capacity to make discernment on what is morally right or wrong.

“There is markedly reduced activity in an abused child’s brain,” Alampay said.

With these neuropsychological evidence on a child’s brain development, Alampay said there is all the more reason to separate children in conflict with the law from hardened adult criminals.

“We cannot treat them the same way we treat adults. Whatever consequences we impose on their criminal activities, this does not mean we excuse them, but the consequences we impose must reflect on the normative environmental mitigating circumstances,” Alampay said.

“Children and adolescents are still changing. At an early age, when they are subjected to adverse consequences, this sends them to a negative path to adulthood,” she added.

Alampay expressed worries about incarcerating children with hardened criminals would have a negative impact on their formative years and make them believe that they are criminals with no chance of reformation.

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“The fact that they are identified as criminals, that they go through the criminal justice system, is already a powerful influence on their identifies and sense of self. Society will label them as criminals, even if that is not the intent of the law,” Alampay said.

“There is evidence, there is literature that establishes that contact with criminals whether in your community or in jail, will more likely result to the child behaving in ways that are criminal. It’s a basic process of molding,” she added.

Capiz Rep. Fredenil Castro, a deputy speaker and the primary author of the bill lowering the criminal age of liability from 15 years old to nine, resorted to questioning the expertise of the resource speaker who he claimed relied on other experts’ findings.

Alampay, a member of the Psychological Association of the Philippines and certified specialist in Developmental Psychology, believes she is an expert on a child’s brain development and neuropsychological functions.

“You’re talking about literature, and I’m talking about you as a person, not as literature… While you’re citing literature, you can’t be more knowledgeable than the authors of the literature which you presented this morning,” Castro said.

“These are not my ideas, not my thoughts. But it’s published scientific literature, these are scientific findings,” Alampay responded.

For his part, police Chief Supt. Eric Reyes said based on their experience, children are aware that they are committing a crime when they are arrested, and yet the police could not detain them because they are below the age of criminal liability.

But he added that the police “agree that children in conflict of the law should be treated as victims.”

On the other hand, Navotas Rep. Tobias “Toby” Tiangco, an author of another bill lowering the age of criminal liability, said children as young as 12 years old should know what is morally right or wrong.

“How would a child 12 years old not know na ang pagnanakaw, pagpatay ay mali? Hindi ko maintindihan bakit tinututulan,” Tiangco said.

Tiangco said children commit crimes mainly because of the lack of discipline in schools today.

“Dati ang teacher, pwede paluhin ang kamay ng estudyante. Ngayon, pagalitan ang estudyante, magrereklamo na magulang. There’s totally no discipline,” Tiangco said.

Dinagat Islands Rep. Kaka Bag-ao, who opposed the measure, said that based on police figures from 2006 to 2012 , only two percent of criminals are children and that the crimes involving youth offenders are mostly petty crimes such as robbery and crimes against property.

Meanwhile, Department of Social Welfare and Development Undersecretary Vilma Cabrera said that in 2006, or the year the law placing the age of criminal responsibility to 15 was passed, only 1,955 children committed crimes, or 2.67 percent of 73,181 total number of individuals who committed crimes.

In 2012, only 5,308 children committed crimes or 2.38 percent of the total number of individuals who committed offenses of the law, Cabrera added.

In House Bill 2, authors Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez and Castro sought to revert the minimum age of criminal liability from the current 15 years old to as young as nine years old.

The House leaders’ bill titled “Minimum Age of Criminal Responsibility Act” seeks to amend the “Juvenile Justice and Welfare Act of 2006” or Republic Act 9344, which set the minimum age for criminal liability at 15 years old.

The authors said children are being used by criminals as accomplices in their crimes, particularly drug trafficking, because these minors could not be held criminally liable.

“While the intent of protection of the Filipino youth may be highly laudable, its effects have had the opposite effects—the pampering of youthful offenders who commit crimes knowing they can get away with it,” Castro and Alvarez said in their explanatory note.

The proposed bill, however, exempts from criminal liability those under nine years old at the time of the commission of an offense.

But they would be subjected to a government intervention program, the bill read. RAM/rga

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