Supreme Court: Dealing with a case where the accused was subjected to trial by a regular Court having criminal jurisdiction but was later found to be a juvenile, the 2-judge bench of Hon’ble Madan B. Lokur and T.S. Thakur, JJ held that in cases where the accused was above 16 years but below 18 years of age on the date of occurrence, the proceedings pending in the Court concerned will continue and be taken to their logical end, however, the Court, upon finding the juvenile guilty, would not pass an order of sentence against him but instead refer him to the Juvenile Justice Board for appropriate orders. Holding that it is better to err on the side of caution in the first instance rather than have the entire proceedings reopened or vitiated at a subsequent stage or a guilty person go unpunished only because he or she is found to be a juvenile on the date of occurrence of the incident, the Court said that whenever an accused appearing to be a juvenile is produced before a Magistrate, a prima facie opinion on the juvenility of the accused should be formed and recorded and in case of doubt, an age enquiry should be conducted before forming any such opinion. [Jitendra Singh v. State of UP, Criminal Appeal No. 763 of 2003, decided on July 10, 2013]
Posted on: Mon, 22 Jul 2013 19:43:47 +0000
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