Lowering legal age to 10 meaningless: Lambley

By ERWIN CHLANDAIf you got all excited at your last Eastside BBQ about the new CLP Government lowering the legal age of criminal responsibility from 12 years to 10 years you could have saved your breath. As Robyn Lambley's informative newsletter points out, children under the age of 14 in the NT are protected by doli incapax ("incapable of wrong").

It presumes that a child between 10 and 14 does not have the capacity to differentiate between right and wrong.

The presumption requires the police prosecution to prove that a youth offender has the capacity to understand right from wrong and is therefore responsible for the crime they are alleged to have committed, says the Independent MLA for Araluen and the new Speaker.

"Due to the large volume of youth offenders coming through the NT courts the police prosecution do not have the resources to disprove doli incapax for all cases. This is why invariably we see young offenders routinely 'getting off' without consequences.

"There are very few examples of the NT police prosecution successfully disproving doli incapax – only one to my knowledge.

"It has been put to me that it should be the role of the defence to prove doli incapax rather than the onus placed entirely on the police prosecution to prove against doli incapax.

"This is why we see the same kids continuing to reoffend again and again. They are protected by doli incapax."