Lawmaker proposes clearing juniors' records of minor offences

BEIJING - A Chinese lawmaker proposed here Saturday the removal of criminal records of minor offences by junior convicts to give them a chance to rehabilitate in society.

Li Qihong, a deputy to the National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature, said on the sidelines of the NPC's annual session, which concludes Sunday, that her proposal was prompted by her 21 years of experience in handling 976 juvenile trials.

"The convicted juniors need a chance to clear their stigma and to be accepted by society," said Li, a judge at the Intermediate People's Court of Zhumadian, central China's Henan povince.

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The current criminal law requires all adult and junior criminal convicts report their criminal records when applying for education or employment. They are not allowed to take up posts like army service, civil servant, teacher and lawyer.

Experiment to clear underage criminal records has been carried out since last year in Laoling county, east China's Shandong province, where the local court worked with other government departments to issue a regulation on conditionally removing juvenile criminal records.

Under the experimental program, the criminal records of people under 18 years old who are sentenced to less than three years in jail or detention will be automatically cleared when the term is up.

The record will be confined to the local public security department's inner-system and can be used only if he commits another crime. Otherwise it's confidential.

Those who are sentenced to three to five years will have the records cleared if they commit no new crimes for a year after serving their terms; those sentenced to jail for five to 10 years will have the records cleared three years after the end of the term; and those sentenced to more than 10 years will have their records cleared after six years.

The experimental program does not fit those convicted of crimes concerning national security, drug trafficking, severe violence and recidivists.