SOUTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY PHINMA

Villa Aznar Urgello St., Cebu City

AGE OF CRIMINAL LIABILITY: A DELIBARATION TO

PHILIPPINE JUSTICE SYSTEM

Survey Report

Hariette Rohanne C. Gadoina (11-STEM GEN A3)

Angel Hannah B. Tarucan (11-STEM GEN A3)

Judith Lopez Caracut

Teacher

November 2023
 Introduction

We have known Youths as being sent to school to learn and to value education, most

especially to have a right conduct for the children to properly behave in preparation of reaching

their career and be responsible and to be a law-abiding citizen. But nowadays, numbers of cases

of youth under juvenile delinquency are increasing.

Republic Act No. 9344 or the "Juvenile Justice and Welfare Act" defines the Juvenile

Justice and Welfare System as a system dealing with children at risk and children in conflict with

the law, which provides child-appropriate proceedings, including programs and services for

prevention, diversion, rehabilitation, re-integration and aftercare to ensure their normal growth

and development.

The Juvenile Justice and Welfare Act of 2006 (JJWA; R.A. 9344) can transform the life

of a CICL (Child in Conflict of the Law); In one of documentaries of Atom Araullo's Specials

'Batas Bata', he showed a different shade to the life of youths. A ragged, messy, and chaotic life

of some youth here in the Philippines that opened the eyes of many.
 Augusto "Daga", a young man, now 23 years old was once a CICL who grew up from an

extreme poverty grew up with a father who was abusive and alcoholic, Daga went down a path

not uncommon for those who grow up in extreme poverty, without proper nourishment and

structure he dropped out of school and became involved with a gang of boys from his

neighborhood. Tempted by what he now calls "vices"-alcohol, tobacco, drugs he found the life

and camaraderie of this neighborhood gang much more appealing than academics. It was an

escape from his family life and a space where he felt like he belonged. Between the ages of 14

and 15, while intoxicated, he was coerced by fellow gang members to murder a boy from a rival

gang during a fight. He was caught and sent to a MYRC, the substitute for a Bahay Pag-asa in

his city rather than a jail or prison, due to his young age. Upon his release, he made his purpose

in life; he started to avoid those wrong doings that he was making and decided to make a new

beginning. He started to sell hot buns at the street of divisoria; and now, it's a must to buy the

famous hot buns in divisoria who went viral in TikTok and are adored by many.

This young man is not only a product of a system of inequality in the Philippines, but a

damaged global system in which poor children encounter the juvenile justice system at

disproportionate rates. Filipino president Rodrigo Duterte was pushing to lower the MACR from

15 to nine years old. This is an ineffective, harmful, and misguided approach to combating crime

amongst children in the Philippines. The negative ramifications of lowering the MACR are far.
 reaching. The result will be a regression from the progress made toward implementing UN

juvenile justice doctrines including the UNCRC, Beijing Rule, Riyadh Guidelines, and Havana

Rules. It will have a profound negative impact on the lives of poor children. Rather than

lowering the MACR, the Philippines must allocate more resources and funding into ensuring the

complete implementation of the JJWA. Indeed, lowering the MACR will only exacerbate

existing inequality and injustice. It is the wrong fix to a broken juvenile justice system. (Mullen

and Tittman 2020)

Scope of Survey

President Duterte, who is behind a bill lowering the age of criminal responsibility from

15 to 9 for two reasons: school-age thieves and drug-runners must be “taught responsibility” and

that the Juvenile Justice and Welfare Law is “soft” in dealing with children in conflict with the

law (CICL). Citizens have been debating whether this will have a good impact on the country

since the year of implementation of RA. 9344. The aim of this study is to report on the opinions

of our senior high school students at Southwestern University about this subject. The scope of

the study is limited to grade 25 people of grade 11 and 12 inside the campus. The survey will

only take 1 day to finish. Each volunteer of the study will be given a short questionnaire about

their opinion on the idea of lowering the age of criminal liability in the country.

Table 1: Respondents Profile

Table 1.0 Frequency and Percentage Distribution of Respondents According to Sex

Sex Frequency Percentage

Male 13 52%

Female 12 48%

Total: 25 100%
Table 1.0 shows the frequency and percentage distribution according to sex. Among the 25

respondents 13 of them are male, and 12 of them are Females.

Table1.1 Frequency and Percentage Distribution of Respondents According to Age

Age Frequency Percentage

15 2 8%

16 11 44%

17 9 36%

18 3 12%

Total: 25 100%

Table 1.1 shows the frequency and percentage distribution of Respondents according to Age.

Among the 25 respondents 2 are 15-year-olds, 11 are 16-year-olds, 9 are 17-year-olds, and lastly

3 of them are 18-year-olds.

Table 1.3 Frequency and Percentage Distribution of Respondents According to Grade Level

Grade Level Frequency Percentage

11 14 56%

12 11 44%

Total: 25 100%
Table 1.3 Shows the Frequency and Percentage distribution of Respondents according to Grade

Level. Among the 25 respondents 14 of them are from the Grade 11 department and 11 of them

are from the Grade 12 department.

Purpose of the Survey

As the numbers of cases of youth under juvenile delinquency continues to increase, these

issues should not return to the back burner. This survey aims to know the opinion of the Students

at Southwestern University PHINMA on lowering the criminal liability in the Philippines,

juvenile justice system, and factors that made this issue to continue firing to our society despite

of the projects and laws that the government is implementing.

Data Collection method and tools

For the benefit of both the inquirer and the respondents, the pen-and-paper interviewing

approach is used in this study.

This approach involves doing in-person interviews with each respondent one at a time in their

classrooms while the pollster has a printed copy of the questionnaire in hand. And give them

plenty of time to complete the questionnaire.

Results and Discussion

This chapter shows the result of the Survey conducted in the study to the age of criminal

liability in Philippines. The table presented is in accordance with the survey questionnaires. The

result of the survey is given below.

Question 1: In your opinion, at what age should a child be imprisoned if it commits a crime?

12%

32%
20%

12%
24%

14 15 16 17 18
Table 2. Shows their answer on what they think is the right age for a child to be imprisoned if

they commit a crime. Among the 25 respondents, 32% of them say that 18 is the right age for

criminal liability in our country. Followed by 24% with 16 years old as the proper age for

criminal liability, and 20% say that 15 years old is the right age when a child could be

imprisoned if it commits a crime. While both 12% of those who are saying that 14 and 17 are the

appropriate ages for criminal liability.

Question 2: Do you agree that we should lower the age of criminal liability in the Philippines?

44%

56%

Yes No
Table 3. Shows their opinion on whether to lower the age of criminal liability in the Philippines.

Among the 25 respondents, 56% of them agree to lower the age of criminal liability in our

country, while 44% disagree.

Analysis and Discussion

The proposal to amend the minimum age of criminal responsibility has elicited polarized

reactions in the Philippines. On one side are the politicians led by President Duterte, who are

behind a bill lowering the age of criminal responsibility from 15 to 9 for two reasons: school age

thieves and drug-runners must be “taught responsibility” and that the Juvenile Justice and

Welfare Law is “soft” in dealing with children in conflict with the law (CICL). On the other side

are human rights advocates vehemently opposing the bill on the ground that studies in the social

sciences link emotional and mental immaturity to youth offending, not to mention the

Philippines‟ binding commitment to protect children's rights when it signed the Convention on

the Rights of the Child (Aguilar 2020).

According to the results of the survey, the majority agrees to lower the age of criminal

liability and the facts can't be hidden that there are times where youth really make a crime; but as

to what the Humanitarian Legal Assistance Foundation Project Office, Carmelita Torrefiel, says

that with proper implementation of Child Protection, the number of cases linked with CICL can

be prevented. Through proper guidance and implementation, a child in conflict with the law can
be put into rehabilitation and corrected instead of bringing them to prison. Putting a child into a

prison will never help them to grow, instead give them the penalty where a child can bear and at

the same time will help them to make themselves grow.

Summary and Conclusion

Findings

When young people engage in deviant acts, what do the officials think are the reasons? Is

it their youth that makes them prone to violations? Are they for or against the proposed bill to

lower the age of criminal responsibility? More importantly, at their level, what do they think

must be done?

The result of the survey shows that the majority is agreeing to lower the age of liability in

the Philippines. They believe that despite a very young age, youth already have knowledge

regarding moral law and excluding them from the law would only encourage them for their

wrong doings.

But like that, Local officials see youth offenders as people who are not intrinsically bad or evil.

Offending is generally perceived as stemming from factors outside of the individual. Three main
themes could be generated from their responses: Lack of maturity, Peers are more influential that

parents, and Rewards come easy.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the ratification about lowering the age of criminal liability should not be

brought back to the backburner; it’s an issue that affects us all, together with the future. We may

agree to lowering the criminal age of liability, but we can’t hide the fact that there will always be

a lot of factors and reasons why Youth were able to do those actions.

Studies also say that a child’s brain is not fully developed until the age of 18. Moreover,

poor economic status caused many people to resort to criminal acts in order to live without

limited opportunities, hunger and vagrancy.

Consequently, diversion has become the norm in handling the CICL. It is believed that

diversion prevents the formation of a delinquent self-image and the occurrence of stigma from

significant others (Bazemore & Umbreit, 1995). Without a criminal record, the youth offender is

given a chance to redeem himself/herself. Through RA 9344‟s adoption of restorative justice, the
CICLs are not viewed as criminals but as persons with problems in their social environment

involving their family, peers and community, and who needs to be rehabilitated for them to

reintegrate successfully with their families and communities.

Recommendations

In light of the conclusions above, the following practical steps are recommended:

Training should be given to all barangay officials in regard to the importance of adopting

rehabilitative justice because the study indicates a clear manifestation of their inability to reframe

their response to the CICL. They continue to believe that rehabilitation is too soft as it does not

guarantee that the CICL will not re-offend.

Still, despite the programmatic recommendations, it does not necessarily defuse the

lingering contradictions within the implementation of the Law, for it goes back once more to

how justice is exercised. The Philippine state, a postcolonial entity with legacies of punitive

subjections, is still yet to come up with its own legalities. Worse, the present directives and the

proposed ones reveal the inherent cynicism of political figures and their relationship with their

temptation to solidify their stranglehold. Discussions regarding criminality and legality,

therefore, should never be divorced of political and social considerations. A thorough critique is
hence needed, in order to properly comprehend the myriad cracks in the parchment curtain, or

the fissures in the national edifice. (Guimaran 2020)