Culpability of trafficked people can be diminished or even extinguished

L & Ors v The Children's Commissioner for England & Anor [2013] EWCA Crim 991

Four people, three of them children, were trafficked to the UK and forced to commit crimes by their traffickers. The question is whether issues of age, trafficking and exploitation lead the court to disagree with the decision to prosecute.

Decision

The culpability of any victim of trafficking may be significantly diminished, and in some cases effectively extinguished, not merely because of age (always a relevant factor in the case of a child defendant) but because no realistic alternative was available to the exploited victim but to comply with the dominant force of another individual, or group of individuals.