Section 73: A child not over twelve is not punishable
Statutory text (Thai original)
เด็กอายุยังไม่เกินสิบสองปี กระทำการอันกฎหมายบัญญัติเป็นความผิดเด็กนั้นไม่ต้องรับโทษ ให้พนักงานสอบสวนส่งตัวเด็กตามวรรคหนึ่งให้พนักงานเจ้าหน้าที่ตามกฎหมายว่าด้วยการคุ้มครองเด็ก เพื่อดำเนินการคุ้มครองสวัสดิภาพตามกฎหมายว่าด้วยการนั้น
English translation
A child not over twelve years of age who commits an act that the law provides to be an offence shall not be punished.
The inquiry official shall deliver the child under paragraph one to the competent official under the law on child protection, in order to carry out the protection of the child's welfare under that law.
This English translation is provided for reference only and has not yet been firm-verified. Always rely on the Thai original.
Firm annotation
This provision sits in Book 1 (General Provisions), in the Title on Criminal Liability, and fixes the minimum age of criminal responsibility. It creates an absolute bar to punishment based solely on the offender's age, regardless of intent or the seriousness of the act, so no penalty of any kind can attach. The age controlling is the age at the moment of the act, not at trial. The threshold in this section has been raised by successive amendments over the years, so older Supreme Court decisions may apply the section to a lower age. It opens a graduated scheme continued in section 74 (over 12 to 15, no punishment but court measures), section 75 (over 15 to under 18, discretionary half reduction) and section 76 (18 to under 20, discretionary reduction).
Why this matters in practice
If the accused was twelve or younger at the time of the act, this is a complete answer to punishment: no fine, no imprisonment, no criminal record penalty can be imposed, and the matter is diverted to child-welfare protection rather than a criminal sanction. Because age at the time of the act governs, establishing the child's date of birth is often the decisive point. For families navigating how criminal exposure works for minors, early advice matters; see our overview of criminal law in Thailand.
Supreme Court decisions interpreting this section
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Supreme Court Judgment No. 7066/2554 (2011)
A child below the statutory age of criminal responsibility is not liable to punishment under section 73; the child's age at the time of the act is decisive.
The defendant caused death by negligence (section 291) while just over seven years old. The court held that, because of the child's age at the time of the act, the child was not liable to punishment under section 73.
Curated decisions with case numbers verified against the Supreme Court database. English renderings are the firm's editorial translation for study.
Cited in 10 Supreme Court decisions (1976 to 2012)
Selected citing decisions
- Decision 6728/2555 (2012)
- Decision 7066/2554 (2011)
- Decision 5646/2536 (1993)
- Decision 2564/2545 (2002)
- Decision 3298/2535 (1992)
- Decision 2249/2538 (1995)
- Decision 577/2532 (1989)
- Decision 786/2519 (1976)
This list is selected automatically, weighted towards judgments that turn on this section rather than ones that merely recite it when passing sentence. It has not yet been reviewed by the firm.
Most often cited alongside
- Section 91 6
- Section 83 6
- Section 78 6
- Section 56 3
- Section 32 3
- Section 33 3
Sections that appear in the same judgments as this one most often. The figure is the number of decisions.
Counted across the firm's corpus of 83,652 Supreme Court decisions, 1921 to 2026. The count is complete; the stated year range trims rare outliers so it describes where the citations actually sit. These figures are computed by us and are not official court statistics. How we count these, and what we measured
Frequently asked questions
Can a child under 12 be sent to prison in Thailand?
No. Under section 73 a child aged twelve or younger at the time of the act is not punished at all, so imprisonment and fines are unavailable; the child is instead placed under child-welfare protection.
Which age counts, the age when the act was done or the age at trial?
The age at the time of the act controls. If the child was not over twelve when the offence occurred, section 73 applies even if the child is older by the time of trial.
Related guides on ThaiLawOnline
Cite this section
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Plain citation
Penal Code, s. 73 (Thailand) -
Academic citation
Penal Code (Thailand), s. 73. ThaiLawOnline, https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-73/ (accessed 17 August 2026). -
Thai citation
ป.อ. มาตรา 73 -
Permalink
https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-73/ -
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<blockquote cite="https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-73/"><p>A child not over twelve years of age who commits an act that the law provides to be an offence shall not be punished. The inquiry official shall deliver the child under paragraph one to the competent official under the law on child protection, in…</p><footer>Penal Code, s. 73 (Thailand) — <a href="https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-73/">ThaiLawOnline</a></footer></blockquote>
The Thai text is authoritative. The English is an unofficial translation by ThaiLawOnline, free to reuse with attribution.