Iranian Penal Courts’ Jurisdiction for Proceeding Juvenile Crimes

The young are citizens and in their being citizens they have special status because of being in the process of growth and formation of personality. Hence, criminal policy makers have developed special acts for the young and have defined certain conditions for them in order to settle the disagreements on the procedures of juvenile crimes. The formation of professional courts for the investigation of juvenile crimes is the most significant effect of this approach. The rationale underlying this approach has been to develop a special space in criminal justice system for interaction with the young offenders. However, there have been some fluctuations in and challenges against the policies of juvenile courts. Iranian criminal policy has deleted some of such special courts and has ignored some of such measures. Nevertheless, the legislator has paid attention to special courts for investigation of juvenile crimes in criminal procedure Act1392. This article addresses the Iranian legislator’s approach to juvenile courts for the investigation of appeal and non- appeal crimes.