Transcript Just how much delinquency is going on?

Just how much delinquency is
going on?
Defining/Measuring Juvenile Crime
Trends in Juvenile Delinquency, and
Abuse/Neglect
The Danger of Misusing Data
Measure of Interest for Juveniles
• Non-Delinquent Activity (Status Offenses)
– Hard to get reliable information
– Self-report probably most accurate
• Delinquent Activity (“Crime” for adults)
– Same sources of information as for adults, but
how to tease out age?
• Abuse/Neglect Cases
– Official Data very suspect
Uniform Crime Reports
• Best for Serious Offenses/Crime Trends
– Offenses Known to police (useless for JD)
– Arrests/Crimes Cleared by Arrest Keep
information for <18 years
• Bias = police discretion& practices, reporting
• Serious crimes <bias (discretion, reporting)
• Murder most reliable
• Downside = only most serious offenders included
National Crime Victimization
Survey (NCVS)
• National household victimization survey
– For juveniles, cannot assess property crime
– National Trends for Juvenile Violent Crime
can be estimated
• Aggravated Assault, Robbery, Forcible Rape (Not
Murder)
• Upside = dark figure
• Downside = know age of offender?
Self-Report Surveys
• No government sponsored annual national
level survey (not used for “trends”)
– Many different researchers with national
surveys, some longitudinal:
• National Youth Survey (NYS)
• National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY)
• Monitoring the Future Survey
• Best Uses = Correlates of Delinquency
– Especial for theory testing, but also race and
gender differences
Self-Report II
• The Good
– Measure all kinds of correlates
– Not subject to “official bias”
• The Bad
– Difficult to measure serious crime (rare event)
– Difficult to get/retain chronic offenders
• Therefore, SR surveys tend to measure minor forms of
delinquency
– Various survey biases (people lie, can’t remember,
etc.)
What do we know? Current Levels
of Delinquency
• 2001 UCR Arrest Information (<18 years)
– 2.3 million arrests
– Arrests peaked in 1994, and declined
thereafter (NCVS follow similar pattern)
• Violent Crime Index declined for 7th straight year
• Murder rate from 1993-2001 down 70%
• Self-Report: 20% of 12th Graders report
using an illicit drug in past 30 days.
Self-Report Example
MTF: Use of Pot in Past 30 Days
40
Percent Using in
Past 30 Days
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
1975 1980 1984 1988 1992 1996 2000
What does the NCVS say?
• Confined to Violent Crime
• Unsurprising much violent juvenile
offending unreported to police
– Average Crime Rate—1980 to 1998
• UCR: 5/100,000
• NCVS: 44-75/100,000
– Why? (From victim survey)
• Only 20% reported to police
• Of those, only 50% lead to arrest
NCVS Crime Trends
• The Broad Trend in UCR Violent Crime
Index is similar to NCVS (Violent Crimes)
– Both decrease in early 1980s, followed by
increase from mid-1980s to mid 1990s
– Both show substantial drop after mid 1990s
• Differences?
– NCVS offending drops more (60%) in late
1990s than UCR (27%)
Why has juvenile crime declined?
Juveniles have declined in the population?
NO: The proportion of juveniles has been
increasing in the 1990s (echo boomers are coming)
Poverty, Economy, Public Policy?
No clear indications of This
Best Argument I’ve Seen?
Crack Epidemic Produced most of the violence
in…now the drug markets have stabilized
“Super Predators”: Ideology and A
Fools Errand
• John DiIulio et al. Body Count (1996)
– Super Predators Thesis
– Juvenile crime rates will continue to spiral out
of control
– By 2010, some 270,000 “SP’s” will wreck
havoc on society
• TIME Magazine (1996): “Ticking Time Bomb”
– Advocated unsealing juvenile records,
mandatory minimums, waiver…”get tough”
• Legislation Follows (G.W. in Texas)
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