Officers complete course on handling juvenile offenders

TWENTY police officers in Eastern Highlands province graduated with certificates on how to administer juvenile offenders.
The three-day training was conducted by Unicef volunteer Katrina Elliot, Cathy Rimbau from Lae police
station, and Lian Yong from the magisterial services.
Eastern Highlands provincial police commander Chief Insp Augustine Wampe, while closing the workshop, stressed the importance of how juvenile offenders should be dealt with.
He said juvenile offenders were children whose minds were still developing and should be given special treatment when they were caught by police.
“Your approach towards juvenile offenders should be different from how you deal with adult offenders,” Chief Insp Wampe said.
Goroka zone Unicef director, Dr Arnold Calo-oy, said it was important for juvenile offenders to be treated differently.
Dr Calo-oy commended the police officers who gave up their time to attend the training, saying they should now be in a better position to address juvenile offenders.
The training was  aimed at equipping police officers on how to deal with juvenile offenders under the Juvenile Act 1993.
The workshop was the second for Goroka police and it was hoped that more similar workshops would be conducted for the officers in the near future.
A participant, Selot Supa, said the training was a real eye opener for them to diligently deal with juvenile offenders.
Mr Supa said they had been treating juveniles the same as adult offenders.
However, he said this would change after the training.