Justice for children

Children come into contact with the justice system in a host of ways – as victims, witnesses, because they are in conflict with the law, or as parties to civil or administrative processes, such as alternative care arrangements or asylum hearings, respectively. Children’s encounters with the justice system, along with information on the surrounding circumstances, are usually recorded by the authorities and service providers that form part of the justice sector. Such information is essential to monitoring and evaluating the performance of the justice system and to understanding the profile of children who come into contact
with it.

Children in conflict with the law – children alleged as, accused of or convicted of having committed a criminal offence – are guaranteed protection and fundamental human rights through several international and regional instruments concerned with child justice. Nevertheless, these children are all too often held in police custody, detention centres, prisons and other custodial settings in violation of treaties, norms and standards. UNICEF estimates reflect children in conflict with the law deprived of their liberty in the administration of justice (referred to as ‘children in detention’ for simplicity).

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Current levels

Worldwide, around 259,000 children were estimated to be in detention in 2024 (a rate of 15 per 100,000 children). Based on the available data, North America has the highest regional rate of children in detention at 34 per 100,000 children. Latin America and the Caribbean has the second highest rate at 26 per 100,000 (equivalent to a total of around 34,000 children in detention). South Asia has the largest number of children in detention with around 111,000 and the third highest rate at 24 per 100,000.

Trends

An estimated 67,000 fewer children are in detention today than in 2018. Regions such as East Asia and the Pacific, Latin America and the Caribbean, and North America have seen notable declines in both the rate and number of children in detention.

Administrative data systems on justice for children

High-quality and reliable information is necessary for all reporting and decision-making on issues involving children in contact with the justice system.

To support countries with strengthening the quality, availability and use of administrative data on justice for children, UNICEF has developed a tool that can be used to assess the capacity of statistical systems to collect, collate, analyse and disseminate administrative data on justice for children at subnational and national levels, consisting of two self-assessment questionnaires. Additionally, UNICEF has produced a maturity model describing how components of an administrative data system on justice for children function at varying levels of maturity. The aim is to facilitate the identification of general areas that would benefit from targeted intervention and investment.

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