"From March to December 2020, the number of children in juvenile justice for violence against family members increased by 41%. The average age of those who have committed this type of crime, and therefore been placed in the community, is less than 15 years. These are therefore children who struggle to recognize the negative value of the actions they have performed within the family context which is more often than not conflictual, often highly ambivalent".
The profile of minors who use violence against their family members is traced Maria Carla Gatto, president of the Juvenile Court of Milan, spoke at the digital meeting 'The mental health of adolescents: intercepting, preventing and caring in the Covid-19 emergency', promoted last June 11th by the Francesca Rava Foundation, with the patronage of Fofi (Federation of Italian pharmacist orders) and Federfarma.
"We are therefore faced with a new phenomenon - states Gatto to the Dire Agency - which deserves to be explored in greater depth because violent acts are a consequence of the entire adult system, understood as a family system and in general as a social system. While once upon a time aggregation also had a territorial connotation, for example children gathered in neighborhoods and in this way the institutions had the possibility of controlling the phenomena - recalls the juvenile justice expert - today digital and social communication allows young people to join together to commit crimes even without ever having seen each other and without belonging to the same territory. In the absence of a different thought, the only reason for aggregation is to act together with violence. The world of institutions and society must organize themselves and learn to move with the same speed as children to stem and prevent the phenomenon, because - warns Gatto - we are faced with the explosion of a phenomenon which, beyond the contingent situation, finds its roots in the lack of an educational and healthcare plan for mental health aimed at identifying early signs of psychological and behavioral disorders in children".
Gatto is clear: "We must move promptly to identify the early signs of this child distress. The whole community, including the pharmacies which are an important presence in the local network, must not be afraid to see and must know what to do after having seen. This is why we need to do training and research, to understand the phenomenon even in its hidden manifestations."
Violence involving minors has many faces, as he recalls Lisa Di Berardino, deputy commissioner of the postal police and
of communications in Milan, which lists some data relating to crimes committed in the virtual world. "Statistically, from the
From 2019 to 2020, there was a 77% increase in treated cases of victimization of minors, therefore child pornography, cyberbullying, sexting, solicitation. This - clarifies the deputy commissioner - means that we have gone from 2,379 to 4,200 cases. Just as there was a significant increase, equal to 132% of cases treated, of photographic and video child pornography material produced and posted online by the minors themselves. A trend also confirmed in the first 4 months of 2021, with a 96% increase in complaints".
Another relevant element is the lowering of the age of the minors involved: "In 2020-2021 we have already recorded cases
in the age group 0-9 years, a group totally absent from our surveys in 2019". Also in this case, recalls Di
Berardino, it is the world of adults that must provide children with the tools, practical but also ethical and moral, to face the
both real and virtual life, "to distinguish good from evil, to be able to recognize when one has made a mistake. Parents and agencies
educational institutions must monitor and at the same time keep up with young people in terms of digitalisation who - concludes the deputy commissioner with a positive thought - have the ability to understand, they know what is needed. We must reach out to them and never give up."
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