Abstract

CAMPOS ZUNIGA, Mayra  and  VARGAS ROJAS, Omar. Security measures in juvenile criminal law. Med. leg. Costa Rica [online]. 2006, vol.23, n.1, pp.33-50. ISSN 2215-5287.

Currently, there has been an arduous discussion about penalties in juvenile criminal law, topic which becomes especially relevant when we are faced to criminal conducts from people who are underage, in which their condition of not guilty or drug addict has been determined from the conclusions of respective expertise. The question leads up to two possible solutions: first, face it like a health problem and exclude it from criminal law; second, keep the traditional line, in which the criminal law can punish the criminal conduct, imposing a security measure. If we admit the first solution, the laws applicable are the Code of Childhood and Adolescence, contemplating the possibility of applying protection measures towards those who are in a vulnerable situation, in which we would put the cases of the not guilty and the drug addicts; this would imply admitting "security or protection" measures with a juridical nature of administrative sort. Position that would imply not only a weakening of rights, but would also violate what the Constitutional Chamber has said, when studying the scope of Article 39 of the Political Constitution, that the imposition of punishments and security measures have the guarantee of law reserve, which makes its nature jurisdictional and exclusive to when a crime is committed. The only possible solution, in order to respect this law reserve, is to apply, according to Article 9 of the Law of Juvenile Criminal Justice, the legislation applicable to adults and to admit the imposition of security measures in juvenile criminal justice.

Keywords : Security; penalties; measures; juvenile criminal law; not guilty; drug addict; weakening of rights.

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