Sentencing the parents, punishing the children? The role of the child's best interests in sentencing decisions concerning adult offenders

Korte beschrijving

This dissertation researches the role of the child’s best interests in sentencing decisions concerning parent offenders. This topic is important in light of the emerging international and supranational (soft) law provisions on the matter and the rapidly growing body of research concerning the (negative) impact of parental imprisonment on children. However, the best interests of the child principle is notoriously vague and contested, and its role in the sentencing context is insufficiently developed within criminal justice theory. Four main elements of the best interests principle are examined in light of the particular context of adult sentencing decisions: its scope, determination, weight in relation to other interests and procedural guarantees. This topic is researched through different methods, including a traditional legal analysis with a comparative aspect, a qualitative and quantitative case law analysis concerning South African sentencing decisions and qualitative in-depth interviews with Flemish criminal law judges.