Left-behind girl murders friends

After the trial, she asked the police, "May I go to school tomorrow?" As a 12-year-old child, Chen did not seem to understand what life, death, crime or law meant because no one taught her these at the best years for learning.

The 2013 statistics shows that crime rate for left-behind children accounted for 70 percent of the all juvenile crimes nationwide, with a growing momentum in recent years. Apart from murder, other juvenile crimes such as fights, drug trafficking and sexual abuse also increased in recent years.

A judge from Hunan Province who has dealt with various criminal offences committed by left-behind children over the past decades showed great sympathy towards them.

"As is often the case, parent’s incapability of taking care of their children leads to juvenile crimes," said the judge, declining to condemn such children. "No one is born a criminal, not to mention the pure and innocent children. If even children have the desire to kill, then there must be accumulated distress and agony deep in their hearts,” he added.

The judge also called for more attention to the left-behind children. "We should be apologetic towards their offences. They are not only children of their own parents, but also children of our nation, our government and every one of us,” he said, “The indifference, selfishness and irresponsibility of the adult world ruin the kids, making them criminals before even growing up.”

In China today, there is a growing trend that parents give birth to children but lack the ability to raise them. Although problematic, the current situation seems difficult to change. In addition, the lack of legal protection and proper social mechanism have put left-behind children in an even more vulnerable condition.

And for those juvenile delinquents, they have nowhere to go in the society, and their future is both unpredictable and bleak.