Abstract: Objective To study the bone development in adolescents in China, and establish forensic skeletal age standard for estimation of the criminal responsible age in 14 years old male adolescents. Methods One hundred and three healthy boys aged from 13 years and 9 months to 14 years and 3 months in Lengshuijiang, Hunan, China were enrolled in this study. X-ray films of their left hand-wrist were taken dorsaventrally, and 15 selected sites on the wrist X-ray films were examined and measured under standard condition. The development grade was confirmed by maximum percentage to establish a method to estimate the bone age, which was then checked by single blind method. Results Development grade of the first metacarpal bone and the first phalanx Ⅳ was partially closed (less than 1/3), but the rest was non-closed. The cross diameters of all the osteoepiphysis were wider than that of all the diaphysis. The development grade of the fourth metacarpal bone and the fifth metacarpal bone as well as the adjacent third phalanx were different in both younger age group (<14 years, mostly non-closed) and the older age group (>14 years, mostly closed). The confirmed accuracy (in 30 boys) was 80%. Conclusion Our study seems to be feasible in establishing the estimation standard for skeletal age determination using developmental metaphysis and anthropometry. The standard may be particularly helpful in forensic practice for estimation of accurate criminal responsible age in adolescents.

Key words: forensic anthropology, bone age, age for penal responsibility