2. At the time of the visit, the Medium A centre housed 45 unsentenced and 12 sentenced male child offenders, and the Female Centre housed 5 unsentenced and 1 sentenced female child offender, aged 15. Children are accommodated separately from the juvenile and adult population. Many of the child and juvenile remand detainees have been sentenced for petty crimes but their parents or guardians either refuse or are unable to pay the small bail amounts or fines that have been set for them. Some children were serving sentences as short as 5 days, and the process of tracing their addresses often took too much time for it to be a pointless exercise. Where it is not possible to trace their parents or the children refuse to provide physical addresses, the DCS has no choice but to detain them. While much is done to ensure that they are placed in the Department of Social Development - managed secure care centres, placement is not always possible as these facilities also have limited bed space.