It will be possible to apply alternative punishments more often and in relation to a wider range of offences, particularly in case of minors 

Recently the Parliament of the Republic of Moldova has adopted a number of amendments to the Criminal Code and the Criminal Procedural Code aimed at improving the system of criminal sanctions for commitment of certain categories of offences.

Thus, the goal of the amendments and completions to the Criminal Code is to reduce the general maximum sentence of imprisonment in case of minors from 15 years to 12 years and 6 months, to extend the legal framework of applying constraint measures of educational nature, of the punishment enforcement suspension institution,as well as to apply punishment by unpaid community work for a wider range of offences, mostly for the offences that imply punishment with imprisonment or fine without an intermediate punishment.

The need for a wider application of the punishment with unpaid community work derives from the following aspects:

1. Analysis of the court practice shows that the majority of minors that commit offences are conditionally sentenced or get the enforcement of their punishment postponed, thus, children do not fully realize that they have committed a socially dangerous act and that they have been punished for this;
2. Experience of other states shows that the application of unpaid community work to minors has a positive effect from the point of view of their rehabilitation and leads to achieving the educational goals of criminal punishment.
3. Amendments and completions to the Criminal Procedural Code are related mainly to preventive measures applied to minors, which should be measures of last resort in case of adolescents who are suspected of having violated the law. It is proposed to reduce the duration of minor’s detention from 72 to 24 hours, to apply preventive arrest only in case of certain serious offences implying violence, particularly serious and exceptionally serious offences, and the criminal prosecution of minors should fall under the exclusive authority of the prosecutor.

The need to draft a bill also derives from the consideration of juvenile delinquency prevention, which is a problem since more and more children are left without parental supervision because their parents migrate abroad and, correspondingly, represents one of the priority directions of the activity of authorities that are authorised to deal with child and family protection.

The proposed amendments and completions promote the creation of an adequate juvenile justice system in the Republic of Moldova. Such a system implies strict observance of international and European standards in the field and a complex approach to the problem, both from the legal and psychological point of view, basing on the specific needs of each child in contact with the justice system as a victim, a witness, or a person in conflict with the law.