INTERNATIONAL REGULATORY ACTS AND JUVENILE CRIMINAL LAW OF THE WEST GERMANY AS MEANS OF PREVENTING JUVENILE DELINQUENCY

Abstract

The author has studied the main provisions concerning the protection of the rights of minors who committed criminal offenses, namely: the United Nations Minimum Standard Rules relating to the peculiarities of juvenile justice (the so-called Beijing Rules of 1985), the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child, the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination of 1994, the Convention on the Status of Refugees of 1951. The author has additionally analyzed certain aspects of the criminal liability of juveniles, which contain the provisions of other international regulations.

It has been specifically noted that the recommendations of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe No. R (91) 9 dated from September 9, 1991 “On Urgent Measures in Family Matters” contain provisions on increasing the role of the court in protecting the interests of minors. That is why the creation of special juvenile courts in the theory and practice of juvenile justice is of paramount importance. The most developed among the European countries is the juvenile justice model of the West Germany, where there are juvenile courts dealing with criminal offenses, where minors aged 14–18 and young people under the age of 21 are accused. Such courts are guided by a special regulatory act – Jugendgerichtsgesetz.

The author of the paper has studied different concepts of juvenile courts and the principles of their activity. The history of juvenile justice has made some adjustments to the traditional notion of the undeniable advantages of autonomous juvenile justice. On the example of different variants of the existence of such courts in the world the author has made the conclusion about the isolation of juvenile court, which is due to a set of legal norms (material and procedural), which in aggregate is its autonomy. Much of these legal norms are just applied within juvenile justice.