Letter of the Law: extending use of police cautions can help cut crime
Extending the police warning scheme to adults will help combat crime
Caution, said Victor Hugo, is the eldest son of wisdom. The police caution, which developed in England in the nineteenth century, is a formal alternative to prosecution in the less serious cases, and an effective means of diversionary justice.
When a juvenile offender, aged 10 to 17, commits an offence and faces prosecution, the Police Superintendents' Discretion Scheme enables a senior police officer to issue a formal caution instead, subject to basic criteria being met.
A police caution will usually only be given if there is enough evidence to justify a prosecution, the juvenile admits the offence, the parents agree, the offence is not too serious or prevalent, the juvenile has no serious criminal record and the victim finds it acceptable.
In 2013, a total of 1,059 police cautions were administered in Hong Kong, including 327 for shop theft and 221 for miscellaneous theft. In recent years, the recidivism rate among offenders, which means the percentage of juveniles reoffending within two years of receiving the caution, has consistently been below 20 per cent, with the figure in 2011 being only 12.6 per cent, which shows the scheme works.
In Britain, the cautioning scheme has been extended to all age groups because of its efficacy. Whilst youth cautions remain available for people aged 17 or younger, the police now give simple cautions for low-level crimes to adult offenders 18 and older as well.
In 2003, prosecutors there gained the power to issue conditional cautions to adults for more serious offences. Someone who is conditionally cautioned will have his or her prosecution suspended, though it may be revived if any of the conditions - which can include a financial penalty - are breached within a particular timeframe.
In January last year, the London-based Prison Reform Trust reported that the re-offending rate for adults within 12 months of receiving police cautions was just 18 per cent, significantly lower than the recidivism rate for people who served short prison sentences.
The wider use of the cautioning scheme is undoubtedly appropriate in Hong Kong, particularly for elderly offenders. Between 1991 and 2011, for example, there was a sixfold increase in arrests of women over the age of 60, and a threefold increase in arrests of men of that age. Poverty undoubtedly played a part. In many such cases a prosecution is unnecessary, and a formalised police warning will satisfy the justice of the situation.
Although a working group, chaired by a senior prosecutor, recommended more than a decade ago extending cautioning to offenders older than 17, that idea was blocked by hardliners, who claimed it would send the message that the government was going soft on crime. It is high time to revisit the proposal.
Cautioning offenders, of any age, is not just an enlightened response by enforcers but a powerful tool to combat crime.
