Juvenile Population Statistics

Gangs have been a growing issue across the United States for many decades now. Youth gang violence may have started around the ‘50s, but did not become a serious issue until the ‘80s and from there went through a downward spiral in some cities like downtown Los Angeles, which was where the notorious Bloods and Crips gangs both started. First, let’s simply define a gang as a group of people, mostly men ranging for ages 14-30, who claim territory and use it to make money for themselves and their neighborhood through illegal activities such as trafficking drugs and weapons. There are many reasons and components that are factored in when conducting research to hypothesize “why do people join gangs?” That is why it is necessary to compare and contrast all the social, biological, psychological, developmental, and substance abuse aspects and relate it to joining a gang. It is also important to touch base on the differences between males and females that join gangs, such as power differentials, social learning differences and social stratification differences.

Bartollas & Miller (2008) states that the future of the juvenile justice system faces a variety of challenges, the population of juveniles under the age of eighteen will increase between 2000 and 2025, about one half of the 1% per year. By 2050, it is estimated that the juvenile population will be 36% larger that it was in 2000. Given this population growth of juveniles in the years to come, it looks like the juvenile justice system will have greater demands placed on it.

In America on any give day, approximately ten thousand juveniles are housed in adult prisons and jails. Approximately two hundred thousand juveniles enter the adult criminal justice system each year and most have non-violent crimes. Juveniles in the adult jails lose out on the educational and psychological benefits offered by juvenile detention facilities and

“While the overall violent-crime rate has leveled off since 1990, the number of young people under age 18 arrested for committing violent crimes has skyrocketed, from 66,296 in 1983 to 104,137 in 1992.”( LaVelle, Avis. Sep 1994). The quickly increasing number of juveniles committing these crimes have increased the demand to have the offenders to be tried in the adult courts. Out of the fifty states forty-six have issued waivers for juvenile judges to transfer cases into the criminal adult courts. Out of the fifty states eight of them “have enacted legislative waivers that automatically transfer children as young as 14 to the criminal-justice system for violent crimes such as murder, rape, kidnapping, armed robbery and other felonies.” (LaVelle, Avis. Sep 1994) Some juveniles are automatically transferred to the adult criminal courts due to the severity of the crime and their past history. The transfer of juveniles into the adult courts has increased by more than 60% in the years between 1980 and 1992. (Juvenile Violent Crime Statistics.

“Of those children, youth, and young adults, a large number (65-70 percent) have at least one diagnosable mental health need, and 20-25 percent have serious emotional issues...over two-thirds of youth involved with the juvenile system experience mental health problems, most of whom can be safely and more effectively treated in community settings than in the juvenile justice system” (Smith).

14.) Since the 1980s the legislative changes to transfer laws was one of the ways to control juvenile crime. Legislative and prosecutorial used waivers to tried a youth as an adult. For some states did not like this waivers, so they would send the case back to juvenile court (Gabbidon & Greene, 2013). During 1985 to 2007 it seem that more African American youth was being transfer to adult court no matter what type of offense that was committed. In the 1990s for the offense against the person African American youth was transfer twice as much as whites and three times as more with drug offenses (Gabbidon & Greene, 2013). But by 2007 it was about the same for blacks and white juveniles to be transfer to adult court. In the 1980s about 20% of juveniles that was arrested was female, but between 1983 and 1997 the arrest for juvenile females had increased verses males (Gabbidon & Greeen, 2013). In 2009 juveniles under the ages 15 accounted for 3.8% of the arrested made and for those under 18yrs, it was about 14.1 arrests.

Analysis of the population of the US brings forward that it constitutes twenty-five percent of the total population who are under the benchmark of eighteen years and are classified as juveniles. This group of individuals has enlarged over the last three decades and is expected to exhibit an increasing pattern for another decade too. Demographic experts assert that juveniles can be divided into further sub-groups and with an increase in their overall population, number of children and youth in different classes will change accordingly. As the proportion of likable offenders rises, the juvenile justice system will display transformations in synchrony with it (OJJDP, n.d.).

Can we as a society truly reduce the rate of juvenile crime and violence? “Throughout all time there has been delinquency. It may not have had the delinquency label, but it still existed. Juvenile crime is mentioned as far back as ancient Sumeria and Hammurabi, where laws concerning juvenile offenders first appear in written form” (Rice, 1995, ¶ 3). To this day juvenile delinquency is looked upon as one of the most imperative concerns in crime. A number of studies have been performed concerning delinquency. Countless developments and strategies have presented the

Juvenile crime is a serious and growing epidemic. The figures of young people committing crimes that are serious, heterogeneous, or non-serious mirror those of offenders between the ages of eighteen and twenty.

According to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP), there are more than 70 million Americans, about 1 in 4 of those are younger than 18, which is the age group commonly referred to as juveniles (2014). A juvenile delinquent is created when one of these juveniles display disruptive behavior that is beyond parents control and or violates the law. The violations range from simple offenses like smoking or fighting to violent crimes like sexual assault or murder. The first juvenile court system was created in 1899, until then adults and youth were tried in the same criminal courts. In the 60s the Supreme Court overhauled and formalized the juvenile court construction by introducing due process protection, right to counsel and formal hearings for juveniles. For countless youth of all ages and genders, misbehavior is honestly an ordinary element of growing up but for a small group juvenile delinquency is the start of a lifetime of antisocial, rebellious behavior. Many speculate what causes a juvenile to display this disruptive behavior. Although juvenile delinquents make the choice to offend or break the law, a negative home and family life, socioeconomic class, and being a product of their environment ultimately contribute to juveniles becoming juvenile delinquents.

A juvenile is defined as not yet adult; young, childish, immature. In the United States, definitions and age limits of juveniles vary. The 16-20 year old age group has one of the highest incidences of serious crime (ojjdp.org). In 1994, juveniles accounted for 19% of all violent crime arrests in The United States. Although juvenile arrests for violent crimes declined 3% from 1994-1995 (the first decrease in almost ten years), the number of juvenile violent crime arrests in 1995 was 67% above the 1986 level. Among juvenile offenders, males make up 85% of the total arrests for violent crime index offenses (Colorado.edu). Females make up 34%. Boys ages 12-17 are one and a half more likely to be victims of violent crimes than girls.

Juvenile justice has been incorporated into the American society for over a century, but over time, this system has undergone through numerous shifts and changes before becoming what it is today. It is no doubt, then, that as the United States continues to grow, elect new officials, and change its views on major issues, the juvenile justice system will also see itself grow into something new and different to match societal desires of that time.

One of those is the reason that juvenile delinquency needs to be looked at more and fixed is, juveniles are involved or committed at least a quarter of all serious violent act, not to include murder in the past 25 years.(Juvenile Justice) In 1999 around 2.5 million juveniles were arrested and 104,000 were due to violent crimes. There were 1.7 million juvenile delinquency cases in the courts in 1997. (Juvenile Justice) About 2,000 were from homicide, 6,5oo for rape, 67,900 for assault and the rest were things related with drugs. (Juvenile Justice) With these numbers it shows why considering juvenile delinquency is very important to get that number down that it will

Juvenile crime is an increasing concern, in which numerous theorist continue to assert the probable causes and effects of juvenile delinquency (peaking during teenage phase 15-19) and its increasing provocations into adulthood (declining during the early twenties 40-60%) (National Institute of Justice, 2014).

One of the biggest problems the United States faces today is juvenile crime. Today the juvenile involvement in crime occurs for many different reasons in many different places. Ages still in the single digits all the way through 17 are committing illegal juvenile acts each and every day. Some of these crimes are done on purpose and with an intent and some of the crimes are done on total accident. Juveniles all over America in all different places are committing crime today and as you read this there are juveniles somewhere out committing crimes. “The reason experts feel juvenile 's commit crimes is because of risk factors when they were younger but experts still have not found the main reason why juveniles commit crimes” (Novelguide, 2015). Juvenile’s involvement in crime is something continuing to go down in numbers each year but the involvement is still very high and everyone wonders why that is the case.