During my presentation last week, I focused on the violent crimes that juveniles commit and how the percentages of offenses have changed over the last fifteen to twenty years. Some of my focus for this presentation dealt with violence within schools- the alarming rates of student on student violence, as well as student on faculty/staff violence. I also provided many arrest statistics for juveniles who committed violent crimes. Statistics that compared juvenile trends to adult trends and statistics comparing black and white children were also an aspect of the presentation. The final part of the project looked at what some states have done to combat juvenile violence and also how they are treating youths that are arrested for such offenses. The most important thing to understand is what crimes fall under the category of violent offenses.
The are four components are 1) murders and nonnegligent manslaughter, 2) forcible rape, 3) aggravated assault, and 4) robbery. While I was doing the research for this, I found it difficult to find statistics for rape, assault, and robbery for juveniles. So much of my focus was on the homicide rates for youths. But during the last week I found some new numbers that reflect the trends of the other three. Robbery Rates- Declined 27% between 1981 and 1988 Increased 70% between 1988 and 1994 Fell substantially (33%) from 1995 to 1997Rape Rates- The arrest rate has remained steady from 1981 and 1997.
The high rate was 23 arrests/100,000 juveniles The low was 16 per 100,000 juveniles Aggravated Assault Rates- Declined 16% from 1994 to 1997 This level equals what it was in 1991(250 arrests/100,000 juveniles)Now, I will proceed onto the first topic of my presentation, violence within the walls of school. In 1996, students age 12-18 were victims of 255,000 incidents of nonfatal violent crimes. That same year, 10% of all public schools in the United States reported experiencing at least one serious violent crime. Most of these, undoubtedly, were aggravated assaults. There were also 4,000 rapes or other types of sexual battery and 11,000 physical attacks or fights which involved the use of weapons reported in the 1996-1997 school year.
The five-year period from 1992-1996 saw teachers or faculty members be the victims of 1,581,000 nonfatal crimes, 619,000 of which were violent. One possible explanation for so many crimes in schools, is the rise in gang activity and membership. A study was conducted from 1989 through 1995 on how visible gangs were in schools. In 1989, 15. 3% of students reported gang presence and 28. 4% recognized it in 1995.
That is nearly a 13% increase in only seven years. The second part of my project that dealt with the school setting looked at the amount of violence that occurs on school days as opposed to non-school days. Even though children are in school for only half the days of the year, 57% of violent crimes committed by juveniles occur on days there are school. Of those crimes, 1 out of every 5 occurs within the four-hour period directly following school (2-6pm). The obvious reason for this is, many children go home to a parentless house since most people are still working.
Or, if they go to an after-school program where there are more young people, there is also a higher chance of an altercation because kids are bound to have disagreements that may lead to violence. On non-school days, the number of violent crimes committed by juveniles increased with each hour that passed. The hours of 8 to 10 PM represented the peak time (see handout #1 for graph). The next part of my presentation dealt with juvenile violent crime arrest rates.
Over the last 30 years, there has an increase of 50% in juvenile arrest. Time spanning from the early 1970s through the late 1980s saw a relatively constant arrest rate. It was the end of the 1980s that saw a change occur. There was a 64% increase between 1988 and 1994, but that tapered off this decade as it had declined 12% by the year 1996 (no statistics from 1998 were ready at this time). Another point to go along with this deals with how juveniles act in comparison to adults.
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