Jaunų pilnamečių (18-20 metų) socialinė branda – nepilnamečių baudžiamosios atsakomybės ypatumų jiems taikymo veiksnys
The Social Maturity of Young Adults (18-20 years) as the Factor for Application the Peculiarities of Juvenile Criminal Responsibility

Summary/Abstract: The article deals with the newly distinguished age group of young adults in the Criminal Code of the Republic of Lithuania. Legal norms foresee the possibility to apply the peculiarities of juvenile criminal responsibility to young adults (18–20 years), when their social maturity is equal to juvenile‘s maturity. The term of social maturity in this context creates the intersection of criminal law, criminology, psychology and sociology and makes the judicial practice applying the legal norm of young adults complicated. The author analyzes the concept and content of social maturity both from legal and psychological perspective, also comparing with international recommendations and legal regulation of other countries. A lot of attention is paid to the practice of the Supreme Court of Lithuania in criminal cases of young offenders. The author argues that the ambiguous concept of social maturity is the main reason why the evaluation of young adults’ social maturity is so rare. In judicial practice the content of social maturity is usually linked to the age of offender, occupation, mental health and some other factors, which, in author‘s opinion, is not enough for comprehensive evaluation of social maturity.

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