When a Minor Is Charged: Six Special Procedures Families Must Understand

When a minor faces criminal charges, the procedure differs from adult cases: appropriate adult presence, conditional non-prosecution, record sealing, and mandatory legal aid. Here are the six points families must understand, and four common mistakes.

The call comes at two in the morning: your child has been taken to the police station over a fight, a transfer of money for someone else, or a few bank cards sold for cash. Most parents immediately think about paying compensation, asking around for connections, and getting the child home. But criminal cases involving minors do not follow the adult playbook. From interrogation to prosecution, the law builds a separate set of protections around the child. Whether those protections are actually used, and when, often matters more than any favor sought afterwards. These six points are what families most need to understand at the earliest stage.

1. Age Is Not a Detail: Three Tiers of Criminal Responsibility

Article 17 of the Criminal Law sets out the tiers. A person aged sixteen or older bears full criminal responsibility. A person aged fourteen to sixteen bears responsibility only for eight categories of offence: intentional homicide, intentional injury causing serious injury or death, rape, robbery, drug trafficking, arson, explosion, and spreading dangerous substances. A person aged twelve to fourteen bears responsibility for intentional homicide or intentional injury that causes death, or causes serious injury by especially cruel means resulting in serious disability, where the circumstances are egregious and the Supreme People's Procuratorate approves prosecution. No one under eighteen may be sentenced to death, and minors shall be given a lighter or mitigated punishment. In practice, a gap of a few months is frequently the battleground: household registration, birth certificates, school records, midwife records, and bone-age assessment may all be obtained. If the family holds genuine birth documents, hand them to a lawyer early rather than trying to alter the age — which can create an entirely new problem.

2. An Appropriate Adult Should Be Present During Interrogation

Article 281 of the Criminal Procedure Law requires that, when a minor suspect or defendant is interrogated or tried, his legal representative be notified to be present. If the legal representative cannot attend or attendance is inappropriate, a representative of another adult relative, the school, the employer, the local grassroots organization, or a child protection organization may be notified instead, and this must be recorded in the file. The adult present is not a spectator: he can calm the child, help him understand the questions, object to inducement or coercion, and require that his observations be noted in the record. Many parents do not know they may ask to review the transcript, or what it means when the child says "it's fine, just sign". The period around the first interrogation often determines the space available for the entire defence.

3. Conditional Non-Prosecution: The Most Important Exit

Article 282 of the Criminal Procedure Law provides that where a minor suspect is accused of an offence under Chapters Four, Five, or Six of the Specific Provisions (offences against personal rights, property, and public order), the possible penalty is one year of imprisonment or less, the case otherwise meets the conditions for prosecution, and the minor shows remorse, the procuratorate may decide on conditional non-prosecution with a probation period of six months to one year. During that period the minor must obey the law, submit to supervision, and accept correctional education as required. If the period expires without breach, the procuratorate shall decide not to prosecute. Whether this route opens usually depends on three things: whether the victim forgives, whether the social investigation report supports community-based correction, and whether the family and school can provide proper guardianship. Restitution, apology, community certificates, and school records are therefore not formalities — they are the substance of the defence.

4. Sealing of Records: A Right to Silence, Not Erasure

Article 286 of the Criminal Procedure Law provides that where the offence was committed before the age of eighteen and the sentence is five years of imprisonment or less, the criminal record shall be sealed. Once sealed, it may not be provided to any entity or individual except where a judicial organ needs it for case handling or a relevant unit queries it in accordance with state regulations; units that lawfully query must keep the information confidential. Two caveats matter. Sealing is not erasure: judicial organs may still query, and certain sensitive occupations and military recruitment background checks may lawfully obtain the record. And sealing applies only to sentences of five years or less — above that, it does not apply. Treating "sealed" as "nothing ever happened" leads to poor decisions at exactly the wrong moment.

5. Legal Aid Is Mandatory, Not Discretionary

Where a minor has no retained defender, the public security organ, procuratorate, and court shall notify the legal aid institution to assign a lawyer. This is a statutory duty; families do not need to lobby for it. Some parents prefer to retain their own lawyer, which is entirely proper — but do not let comparison shopping consume the investigation stage. Whether counsel is involved before the first interrogation, the first identification procedure, and the first signed statement often changes the outcome.

6. Four Mistakes Families Make Most Often

First, coaching the child or pressuring a witness to change testimony can constitute the crime of obstructing testimony, or of helping to destroy or fabricate evidence. Second, rushing into private contact with the victim, promising a large settlement and then reneging, destroys the forgiveness and may be treated as interference with evidence. Third, trusting intermediaries who claim they can "get the child out": the money disappears, the case does not, and a new bribery lead may appear. Fourth, deleting the child's phone data or chat logs — recovery capabilities far exceed ordinary expectations, and the deletion itself is often treated as an aggravating circumstance.

Closing

The stated position of juvenile justice is education, persuasion, and redemption. But leniency in the statute does not automatically reach every child. It must be asserted through procedure: age evidence must be verified, the right to have an adult present must be exercised, social investigation must be supported, forgiveness must be genuinely obtained, and counsel must be involved early. The earlier this work begins, the more room remains. This article provides general legal information only and does not constitute legal advice on any specific case; individual matters should be assessed with a practising lawyer on the complete facts and evidence.

※ This article is general legal information, not legal advice on any specific matter. For your individual case, please consult a lawyer.