KINGSTON, Jamaica – The Senate, on Friday (June 20), approved amendments to three pieces of legislation, which impose harsher penalties for murder, especially in cases involving the killing of children.

The Bills are the Offences Against the Person (Amendment) Act 2025, the Criminal Justice (Administration) (Amendment) Act 2025 and the Child Care and Protection (Amendment) Act 2025.

They seek to increase the mandatory minimum penalties specified for murder, to increase the minimum periods that must be served before an offender is eligible for parole and to adjust the term of life imprisonment to 50 years where the offence is murder.

Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Kamina Johnson Smith, who piloted the Bills, said that the Government is sending a strong signal that murder is wrong by raising the level of sentencing.

“The sentiment is real in the public that the sentences in many circumstances are not sufficiently strong to send a signal of the abhorrence,” she noted.

Outlining the measures, Senator Johnson Smith said that Clause Two of the Offences Against the Person (Amendment) Act 2025, seeks to amend Section Three of the principal legislation.

“Essentially it does four things. It seeks to increase the mandatory minimum sentence with respect to non-capital murder from 15 years to 30 years; it seeks to increase the mandatory minimum sentence for capital murder from 20 years to 50 years to be served before being eligible for parole; it increases the sentence to be served before being eligible for parole where the sentence is imprisonment for life, from 15 years to 40 years…and finally, it increases the sentence to be served before being eligible for parole, where a sentence of term of years is given, from 10 years to 20 years,” she explained, noting that the court can either sentence for life or a term of years.

Furthermore, Senator Johnson Smith said that where the victim of a non-capital murder is a child, the court shall add a period of up to five years to the sentence imposed.

“In respect of the period of time to be served before eligibility for parole, paragraph C and D have been rolled into one and its now C 1 and 2, which provides that where the court imposes a sentence of life or a sentence of term of years, once the victim of the non-capital murder is a child, they must add another five years to the period that must be served before the period of eligibility,” she noted.

Turning to the Criminal Justice (Administration) (Amendment) Bill, she said it seeks to amend section 42 (F) of the Criminal Justice (Administration) Act by increasing the term of years to be deemed as life imprisonment by increasing the period from 30 years to 50 years, where the offence committed is murder, and 30 years where it is an offence other than murder.

For Clause Two of the Child Care and Protection (Amendment) Bill, she said section 78 (3) (ii) provides that where a child aged 14 to 17 is convicted of capital murder, he/she shall be liable to be sentenced to a term of imprisonment for life or to a term not less than 30 years as the court considers appropriate.

“On sentencing, the court may specify a period of not less than 15 years that the offender should serve before becoming eligible for parole. The additional five-year periods that are to be added will not be added in the event that a perpetrator is a minor; those are for adult perpetrators of murder,” she clarified.

“We have really tried to strike the balance; we don’t want a loophole where the gunmen choose our youngsters as the ‘shottas’ because what they will be sentenced for is a drop compared to what they would be, so we are closing [the gap] so that everyone understands the message that this is not the path for your future. If you want freedom, don’t murder people,” she said.

Other senators who contributed to the debate were: Lambert Brown, Charles Sinclair, Abka Fitz Henley, Peter Bunting, Marlon Morgan, Prof Floyd Morris, Marlon Morgan, and Sherene Golding Campbell.

The Offences Against the Person (Amendment) Act 2025 was passed with two amendments; the Criminal Justice (Administration) (Amendment) Act 2025 was passed without amendment; and the Child Care and Protection (Amendment) Act 2025 was passed with two amendments.

–         JIS