More than one in three children who have served time in Norway's special youth prisons have later been convicted of offences committed while locked up, an investigation by the Norwegian broadcaster NRK has found.
NRK reviewed every district court judgment from the past two years involving defendants under 18 and found nearly 800 young people convicted. Of those, 58 had spent time in youth prisons, and 22 were later convicted over incidents inside, 116 offences in total, mostly violence and threats against prison officers. Some cases were minor, such as smearing yoghurt on a door. In a similar review of 2008 to 2010, only two young people were convicted over incidents in prison.
The government is tripling youth prison places. Defence lawyer Mette Yvonne Larsen of the Norwegian Bar Association said turning so much of young people's behaviour into criminal cases was the wrong course.
Source: NRK
