Crime and Punishment. But from what age? The shocking case in Cenei reopens the discussion about the criminal liability of children

The tragedy in Timiș brought to the fore an extremely sensitive subject: in Romania, children under 14 cannot be held criminally responsible regardless of the gravity of the committed acts. More than 250,000 people have signed a petition calling for the law to be changed and the age of criminal responsibility to be lowered to 10 years for murder or aggravated murder. The petition sparked a wide debate in society. I analyzed the situation from different perspectives: that of the psychologist, that of the criminologist, but also that of a former judge.

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What the Criminal Code in Romania provides and what happens in other countries

Crime. It's a hard word regardless of the age of the perpetrator. But what happens when a child is the author and when it comes to premeditation? The human mind can hardly accept such a thing. But judicial practice shows that such cases are, unfortunately, not just movie scripts, as in the case of the Adolescence series.

In Romania, there are no data on the number of crimes committed by children under 14 years of age. And this is because there is no punishment for minors who have not reached this age, regardless of the act.

According to the Romanian Penal Code, minors can be criminally liable for a crime only after they have reached the age of registration. And here things are nuanced. In the case of adolescents between the ages of 14 and 16, a medico-legal psychiatric expertise is also needed to establish discernment. After 16 years, expertise is no longer mandatory. At the same time, minors who are criminally liable cannot be imprisoned, but other custodial measures can be taken.

The overwhelming majority of states in Europe have legislation similar to that of Romania and establish that the age of criminal responsibility is 14 years. Just a few examples in this category are Germany, Italy, Spain, Austria, Latvia and Lithuania.

The lowest age of criminal responsibility is in Switzerland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland: 10 years. In Scotland, the other country that is part of the United Kingdom, the age increased in 2021 to 12 years. He has also been in the Netherlands for 12 years.

At the opposite pole, in the Czech Republic, Sweden and Denmark the age of criminal responsibility was set at 15 years.

Petition initiated in Romania

The killing of Mario, the 15-year-old teenager from Cenai, caused an uproar in society, and many voices are calling for a change in the legislation. The most signatures were collected by a petition requesting the lowering of the threshold of criminal liability to 10 years, for the crimes of murder or qualified murder, when the deed is committed with intent; premeditated; committed by a minor with discernment, established by forensic psychiatric expertise. After these civic initiatives, the Minister of Justice announced that a working group had been set up to analyze “the opportunity to change the conditions of criminal liability”.

Criminologist Dan Antonescu: It is necessary to align with social reality

Export criminologist Dan Antonescu, who was also head of the Homicide Service within the Capital Police, believes that even minors under 14 should be held criminally responsible for their actions, if it is premeditated. And the punishments should be commensurate with the facts.

“Yes, such a change is required. There are many cases where minors who have been informed and planned such an act have proceeded to commit it without thinking about the outcome of their actions. Here, indeed, a psychiatric forensic examination should be done to establish the degree of discernment, the degree of awareness of what they are doing and, by way of consequence, to receive the punishment, if they acted as major perpetrators of a crime. Because the current legislation provides for some reductions in punishment for juvenile offenders. (…) It would be useful to change the Penal Code, but let's not forget that they are treaties that Romania has signed. Treaties related to the rights of the child, to the rights of minors. There are a lot of aspects that make this endeavor difficult. But it is necessary to align ourselves not necessarily with European legislation, but with social reality, because at this moment children have access to a lot of information”.

Regarding the current threshold of criminal liability, set at 14 years, the criminologist says:

“By being aware of this information, where there is no education and psychological brake, these children are somehow encouraged to commit acts, knowing that they cannot be sanctioned by criminal law. In fact, by no legislation. The only ones who could be affected are the parents, but that's from the point of view of civil law”.

Dan Antonescu, criminologist expert

How far can parental responsibility go?

Should parents be held criminally responsible for their children's actions? Dan Antonescu says no:

“Many times the minor has a much broader, more pragmatic way of thinking and with a different value than the parent's. Because this child has access to information, he has access to all kinds of data that can lead him to the criminal environment. Let's not forget that there are many of them affected by drug use, alcohol consumption, but also by the consumption of information from the unregulated area of ​​the Internet, where such facts are often described in countless details that that young person does not have the ability to pass through a filter ensured by age and takes them as such and applies them”.

Instead, he is of the opinion that parents should no longer be asked for permission to carry out psychiatric forensic expertise.

“Example from a few days ago: such a child could not be medico-legally examined from a psychiatric point of view because the parent refused this. Or when you are dealing with a man who committed, planned or was complicit in such a deed and you give the right to the parent – who is normal to have a partisan position with his own child – it is abnormal to consider such an option. That child, that young person, must answer for his actions if it is proven – and this must be proven by such expertise – that he acted consciously and appropriated the result of his criminal action”thinks Dan Antonescu.

Which also adds that the medico-legal expertise must involve a very complex analysis:

“Because there are moments of awareness of the seriousness of the act, but also moments of bravery, of influencing the entourage. And here we can no longer speak of a life experience that can act that psychological brake. It is an extremely laborious, extremely complicated mechanism, through which he must demonstrate the fact that that child was aware, down to the smallest details, of the gravity and the result of his act”.

How much does the age limit matter? The psychologist's perspective

Psychologist Mihai Copăceanu comes with another perspective. He does not believe that lowering the age of criminal responsibility is the solution to reducing child crime. And he comes up with a study to support his hypothesis.

“One of the most recent criminology studies, carried out by researchers in Denmark (2025) and which included more than 162,000 people, had the clear objective of analyzing whether lowering the age of criminal responsibility would reduce crime. The results are clear: there is no evidence that lowering the minimum age of criminal responsibility would reduce the risk of 14-year-olds committing crimes. Moreover, the study found a significant increase in reported crimes during the analyzed period”.

In addition, the psychologist says the international rules of The United Nations and UNICEF recommendations do not support lowering the age of criminal responsibility either.

“The age of 14 is well founded and justified. Lowering the age is not a preventive measure, because criminal liability occurs after the act has been committed. Psychologically speaking, changing the age will not deter crime, even in serious cases. Perpetrators – adults or minors – with a consolidated criminal mindset, do not take into account the consequences of their actions, deny or minimize them and do not allow themselves to be influenced by criminal liability. In theory, criminals know the law, they know the possible punishments and the associated risks, and yet they don't stop committing crimes.”

Mihai Copăceanu, clinical psychologist

“In Romania, the problem is not age, but the way we manage juvenile delinquency”

According to the psychologist, instead of changing the age of criminal liability, Romania should manage criminality among children and teenagers in a different way.

“The real problem is the lack of adequate measures for the perpetrators of serious crimes who are not criminally liable. They cannot be set free without restrictions. The state has the obligation to adopt effective measures, to protect society and so that the perpetrators do not remain free for months or years until reaching the age of criminal responsibility. That's why the citizens' reaction – the hundreds of thousands of signatures and the community's revolt – is perfectly justified”says Mihai Copăceanu.

In the long term, the psychologist talks about prevention:

“The real solution consists in adopting a complex package of measures – legislative, social, psychological and economic – that will significantly reduce juvenile delinquency, whether the acts are committed at 17 or 13 years old. Real prevention means identifying people/juveniles with risk factors before they commit crimes, in communities, schools or cities, and complex, coordinated and effective intervention to reduce criminal risk.

The case in Timiș clearly demonstrates: if we had a national and a local strategy, coherently implemented, these children who today committed criminal acts could have been identified in time, and the tragedy would not have occurred. This is the real prevention, not the simplistic change of the age of criminal responsibility”.

A former judge's perspective

Former judge Cristi Danileț believes that criminal responsibility should be established according to the level of discernment, not age. He also referred to regulation.

“I say it is wrong for the Parliament to decide. There are areas of non-law – in the field of psychology, religion or intimate relationships the state is not allowed to legislate. It is illogical for Parliament to rule that a 13-year-old child who is perfectly aware of the crime he has committed should not answer anyway, assuming he lacks discernment, as long as the psychiatrist can say otherwise. In other words, it would be fair for a minor to be held criminally responsible for his serious actions if the psychiatrist, not Parliament, determines that he has discernment.” the former judge wrote on Facebook.

However, Cristi Danileț also specified:Any change from now on lowering the age of responsibility will not affect the Timis case. The age at the time of the crime and the more favorable law are taken into account”.

In 2025, the former magistrate also published a study on the subject of the responsibility of minors. The conclusion sounds like this:

“Establishing a lower age of criminal responsibility often stems from emotional reactions to serious acts committed by minors. But the law cannot be written under the rule of fear. It must express reason, not emotion. To legislate a biological limit, even while maintaining the expertise of discernment, is to perpetuate the fiction that moral maturity is measured in years. Accountability is not born from numbers, but from a real understanding of consequences. Juvenile justice is not a mere branch of criminal law, but a form of moral pedagogy. (…) The real reform must start from the principle that discernment, and only it, is the legitimate basis of the minor's criminal liability”.