Varela explained that in cases involving minors, the most common evaluation was sexual abuse and assault, compared to the evaluations in adults, which usually involve personal injury.
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“By comparing all the sex crime evaluations conducted in 2020 between the adult and child populations, which were 3 thousand 12 cases, 2 thousand 587 were minors, which corresponds to 86% of the evaluations carried out”, Indicated Varela.
The counties where most evaluations of minors are conducted are Panama, West Panama, Chiriquí, Veraguas, Bocas del Toro. “One in five children evaluated corresponds to the province of Panama, just as one in five corresponds to the province of Chiriquí,” he said.
The specialist stated that the cases are dealt with immediately, as soon as the authority asks for it, that is, the expert’s opinion leaves immediately, on the contrary, when clues are collected requiring criminological analysis, it takes a little longer to get the result of tests .
Varela pointed out that Nationwide there are only 87 experts from the Forensic Medicine sub-directorate related to evaluations of child victims.
Psychological impact
The forensic psychologist David Frías, He said that child sexual abuse and maltreatment causes psychological damage that can last into adulthood. The most common signs that minors are present are emotional disturbances, low self-esteem, stress, anxiety and self-harming behavior, so it is important that the psychologist conducting the intervention on the minor does this professionally to determine which traumatic event caused. behavior.
Frías argues that shelters should be temporary places where children are supported by professionals, allowing them to reintegrate into their family or society, but unfortunately children are admitted to the shelter and this also has consequences for mental health.
“The most appropriate is that the shelters are places that offer the fewest tools for reintegration into their families, in the same way that they give the tools to the family. What we see, however, is that as a result of the processes that take a long time, the child is held for a long time and this has repercussions on the psychology of the child, ”explains Frías.
There are only 25 forensic psychologists nationwide Last year they had to attend 1,664 cases of sex crime and 350 cases of child abuse, which is a big question.
Budget
Vera Varela pointed out that they had applied for $ 50 million for this year but were given $ 48 million, of which $ 1.5 million has been cut, but the needs are many, not just hiring suitable experts, but needed to modernize infrastructure.
“The judicial mortuary in Panama is obsolete, it is falling apart and it is necessary to build a new judicial mortuary in keeping with the present time, in accordance with the modern requirements and accreditations. We are an institution that asks to accredit processes, laboratories, departments and experts, so the resources are needed to respond to justice, ”he said.
Varela concluded by saying that while they affect the investigative phase when these cases go to court, they also have a social duty to present statistics so that government policy can be taken and the safety, education and provision of health services can be improved, which also has implications for crime prevention.