MANY mouths, both tactful and tactless spew vile words against Sen. Francis Pangilinan, the proponent of what is known today as the juvenile justice law.
The tongue-lashing started when the senator sponsored Senate Bill No. 1402 setting the minimum age of a juvenile delinquent to 18 to be exempted from criminal liability.
The bill became law -Republic Act 9344 known as the Juvenile Justice and Welfare Act of 2006.
Originally, the law sets the minimum age of 15 years old, subject to intervention. And the offenders aging 15 to 18 are also exempted from criminal liability, subject to intervention program; unless the offender has acted with discernment that he or she will be off the hook scot-free.
However, R.A. 9344 was amended in 2013 through R.A. 10630 that a child aged 12 to 15 who commits a serious crime shall mandatorily be placed to a special facility called Intensive Juvenile Intervention and Support Center or “Bahay Pag-asa.”
So with the revision of the law, the LGUs were mandated to build such center which Davao city has one in Barangay Bago Oshiro in Tugbok District to house the Children in Conflict with the Law.
The purpose of the law is pure and simple; to give the juvenile offender an opportunity to be transformed. But the law becomes a license for some to commit and re-commit crimes. Along this vein, President Duterte in so many instances criticized the proponent to the strongest term.
The president said Pangilinan is his friend. Perhaps this is the reason why Pangilinan stooped to the ground in bridled mouth like Pompey who left the city of Rome and lost the battle without unsheathing his sword against his friend Julius Caesar.
Be that as it may, but it is not Pangilinan alone that is to be blamed because the bill passed through the stringiest first, second and third reading of the Congress. It is judicious to point your dirty fingers to the 13th and the 15th Congresses and the then presidents Arroyo and Aquino III for signing it into law and the amendments respectively.