JUVENILE offenders, broken lives. They are so young. There are too many. Seeing all this moved Inspector Margaret Mary Marshall (pictured) to take a bold step out of her comfort zone of normal police investigations and instead pick up the cause for children'.
Over the years the 40-year-old detective observed with alarm and sadness the growing number of children caught up in crime.
Some of the most frequently occurring were sexual offences where children - most at a tender and delicate stage of their lives - were either the victims or the perpetrators.
Whatever the position, more often the impacts are adverse on the child.
She also observed, with the increasing presence of the mass media influencing a great part of a child's life, being a child was no longer as simple and innocent as it used to be _ a life revolving around school, family and friends.
It was complex and it mostly boiled down to choice - choosing the right or wrong.
"What I am doing right now is helping them make the right choice, we go to schools, to their communities, into their homes so that they don't end up at the police station or even behind bars one day," she said.
Inspector Marshall is spear heading a proactive move to reach out to children in their schools and tell them about the law what's on and what's not.
Years of investigations involving children made her realise that the future of the country were quickly being absorbed into the murky world of crime - from selling drugs in schools, smoking it, sexual offences like defilement, rape, assault and cheating in exams.
"It was no longer enough for me to just investigate the crime, I felt as a police officer I had to do something to stop the flow of children into police stations and prisons," she said.
"So we thought maybe if they were clear about the law, about what was allowed, the penalties involved maybe it would help them to think twice, thrice before making the wrong decision," she added.
So armed with the Fiji Penal Code Inspector Marshal visited several secondary schools around Labasa with officers from the Director of Public Prosecutions Office.
Next up are communities and home visits, and awareness programs with Parents and Teachers Association even primary schools.
"It's a proactive approach to make them know the law and actually refrain from committing offences and for them to know the consequences that lay ahead if they breached the law."
She told girls at a school, "Do you know that its illegal to be loitering in town late nights and that you can get other people into trouble if you leave with them without your parent or guardians permission?" she asked. Most didn't.
"If we can get them to stop loitering, which can lead to other offences; if we can get them to inform their parents of where they are going so that boys don't get charged with abduction; if we can get them to realise the right time to have sex and so forth, then we have succeeded in helping some children stay our of crime and wrecking their lives."
"My dream is simple - for children to know the law, for children to abide by the law and for children to be protected by the law - simple enough but it takes a lot of hard work," she said.
"I'll keep on carrying out this awareness, wherever, whenever just so I can save another child from making the worst mistake of his or her life," she added.
"But I accept that it'll take more than me, it'll take a community, everyone to properly raise a child to be a law abiding citizen."
Having worked for a while as a forensic officer she once handled the case of a young girl - just turned 13 - who died in a traffic accident after a joy ride late at night.
"I saw her lying there and missed what she could have become if only she had been at home with her parents and I vowed to work hard to ensure that it didn't happen to another child in this division."
