Juvenile delinquency and parental responsibility: what are Éric Dupond-Moretti’s leads?

“We have to tell parents again that they are holding their kids,” said Éric Dupond-Moretti during the riots of June and July 2023, where a third of those accused were minors. To deal with the increase in acts of delinquency committed by increasingly young individuals, the government should present by the summer a bill relating to “parental responsibility and the criminal response in matters of delinquency of minors. The newspaper Opinion revealed the first measures. The long-awaited text should contain two sections, one for parents, the other for minors.

Sanction the parents

First part: parental responsibility. The Minister of Justice wishes to strengthen an already existing article of law which aims to sanction parents who evade their legal obligations towards their child. The penalty incurred, three years of imprisonment and a fine of 45,000 euros, could thus be toughened and supplemented by a community service sentence. The father and mother will also be held equally responsible, even if they no longer live together.

Strengthening judicial controls

On the juvenile justice side, the bill should provide for the strengthening of judicial controls, with, for example, compulsory night reception for young delinquents in dedicated establishments. In the event of non-compliance, they could be sent to a closed educational center or to detention. The objective: to get the young person out of their neighborhood before they become entrenched in delinquency.

The rest of the measures are still under discussion and should spark lively debates in the National Assembly. Among them, the lowering of the criminal age, the suspension of family allowances for parents of delinquent children or the removal of the minority excuse.