i feel the same as you do here. I was meant to write a paragraph on the age of criminal responsibility but my paragraph is all over a place. I don't even know if you can really call it a paragraph anymore bc its just a chunk of rambling :/
when you write an essay, the point of everything is to prove your argument or thesis statement. If you're saying that a law is highly ineffective, the evidence is used to support this.
before you start writing, you need to make a judgment on the question - for example, "Assess the effectiveness of legal responses in providing justice for children and young people."
Based on your knowledge, you make a judgment. Age of criminal responsibility could be a paragraph in this. You then make a smaller judgment on the effectiveness of the age of criminal responsibility (which likely supports your overall judgment)
Think about your criteria here, protection of individual rights, meeting society's needs, application of rule of law, accessibility, responsiveness etc. Does the current age of criminal responsibility meet the needs of children, does it achieve justice for victims/society, does Australia fulfill its international obligations under UNCROC, does Australia effectively respond to calls to raise the age? From here on you make a judgment again (for the para), and the criteria you used to do this becomes what you use to assess this in relation to your LCMDI.
when writing a paragraph structure it like this
Point - eg. the age of criminal responsibility is of limited effectiveness in achieving justice.... (answering the question)
Legislation - introduce the legislation:
The Children (Criminal Proceedings) Act 1987 NSW, governs the jurisdiction of the Children’s Court and sets out the main provisions relating to criminal proceedings against children.
Evidence - Section 5 of the
Children (Criminal Proceedings) Act 1987 provides an irrebuttable statutory presumption: a child under the age of 10 cannot commit an offence.
Explain - However, this statutory threshold of 10 is contentious as it violates
The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child 1989
Link - therefore has not responded to adequately protect children's rights and meet society’s needs, thereby failing to achieve justice...
You should have little pockets of evidence, explanation, and links within a larger paragraph. When you're writing it, you are using all your evidence to work toward a conclusion that supports your argument.
You should also include a counter-argument for a well-rounded essay
again for example:
The common law presumption of
doli incapax, established by
R v Gorrie, is a rebuttable presumption that can be refuted by the prosecution. This means that the onus is on the prosecution to prove the child had the mens rea to know that what he or she did was seriously wrong in the criminal sense. For example, the case of
R v SLD (2002) whereby doli-incapax was rebutted successfully serves as an example of the effectiveness of this presumption. The offender was found to possess the criminal intent to form mens rea and jailed for 20 years. Thereby,
doli incapax was able to uphold justice for the victim, and society was protected because …..
I hope this helps in some way
