child victims

Child victims are minors who are the injured parties in a criminal case — that is, children who have been subjected to a criminal act, not children who have committed one. The term is descriptive and is used in legal and journalistic contexts to describe the role the child has in the case: as a victim, not as a perpetrator. In Danish criminal law, the legally precise terms 'injured party' (forurettede) or 'victim' (offer) are used rather than 'child victim' as a fixed category.

There is no single statutory provision defining 'child victims' as a separate legal status, but the particular vulnerability of minors is reflected across the legislation — for example in aggravating considerations and in the rules on special protection during investigation and trial.

In cases such as the Southport attack, where three children were killed at a dance workshop, 'child victims' is used of the murdered minors as the primary injured parties. In cases such as the Roskilde bedroom intruder, the term is used of the children against whom the trespass was directed while they slept. Common to both uses is that the child is the object of the criminal act.

The fact that the victim is a child may matter for how the case is handled and for sentencing. Acts directed against children are in many cases assessed as more serious than comparable acts against adults, because children are regarded as particularly vulnerable and unable to defend themselves in the same way.