When should a child be criminally responsible?

Children's brains are not developed to the point where they should be exposed to the criminal justice system, say experts
Jocelyn Wright
Dylan Voller
Dylan Voller.

Dylan Voller, the young man many will remember from the infamous Don Dale Youth Detention Centre footage, clad in a spit hood, shackled to his chair and stripped half-naked, says he still feels the system failed him.

Almost three years after the ABC’s Four Corners episode sparked national outrage, he says he’s been left with no ongoing support for the emotional trauma inflicted during his time in juvenile detention.

“Being in a place like Don Dale, especially being stripped naked and being assaulted and stuff like that, that makes your mental health go to a whole other place,” he says.

Dylan is now 22. He stands tall and lean, dressed in a shirt and tie, a little nervous addressing the audience during the Justice Health Conference in Sydney last month.