CENTER ON JUVENILE AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE PRESS RELEASE
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For Immediate Release: March 2, 2000

Dispelling the Myth: An Analysis of Youth and Adult Crime Patterns in California over the Past 20 Years

CONTACT: Daniel Macallair
E-mail: [dmacallair@cjcj.org]
Tel: (415) 621-5661 x310

California's Juvenile Felony Arrests Declined Sharply Over Last 20 years, New Report Finds

Youth Crime Falling Faster than Adult Crime Rate Despite Increasing Teenage Population

LOS ANGELES, CA - Juvenile felony arrest rates in California have declined by more than 40 percent in the last 20 years, while adult felony arrests have risen, according to a report to be released on Thursday, March 2, 2000 by the Justice Policy Institute at a press conference in Los Angeles. It is the first report to compare juvenile crime rates to adult crime rates over the last two decades.

California juvenile felony arrests statistics from 1975 to 1998 belie criminologists' dire forecasts of an increased crime rate due to a larger juvenile population. While California's juvenile population rose by a half a million since the middle and late 1970s, juveniles made up less than 15 percent of California's felony arrests in 1998, compared to 30 percent in 1978. Felony arrest rates for adults over age 30 increased during that same period.

"These findings debunk the belief that today's teens are more criminal than past generations," said Dan Macallair, associate director of JPI and co-author of the report. "Youth crime is falling even while the teenage population is rising."

A 1996 joint, bi-partisan task force to review juvenile crime - appointed by former Gov. Pete Wilson and chaired by Riverside County District Attorney Grover Trask - found that arrest statistics belied the public's concern about juvenile crime because the juvenile crime rate had actually been going down. However, Wilson and Trask are the primary proponents of Proposition 21, an Initiative on the March 7th ballot that would call for a wholesale revision of California's juvenile justice laws by extending the reach of California laws that allow minors 14 and older to be tried and sentenced as adults.

The report, "Dispelling the Myth: An Analysis of Youth and Adult Crime Patterns in California Over the Past 20 Years," found that California juvenile homicide arrest rates in the late 1990s are at about the same level as in the 1970s. The declining violent crime rates during the middle and late 1990s occurred while the teenage population was rising by more than half a million.

The report also found that:

• In the mid 1970s, juveniles were arrested for an average of 340 homicides and 650 rapes. In 1998, the juvenile arrest rate for homicide fell to 308 and 412 arrests for rape, while the overall juvenile population increased.
• Juveniles comprised 16.7 percent of violent crime arrests but only 12.1 percent of violent crimes cleared by arrest. For this reason, the U.S. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) argues that arrests overstate juvenile crime.
• A teenager was three times more likely to be arrested for a felony than an adult aged 30-49 in the late 1970s. Today the two have equal arrest odds.
• While violent crime rates have increased among all California age groups, youths show the smallest increase, young adults a moderate increase, and adults 30 and older major increases.
• The 1997 Juvenile Justice Bulletin by OJJDP found that between 1980 to 1996 violent crime arrests in the adult population for persons in their thirties increased 15 percent more than youth violent crime arrests.

"The imprisonment rate for people over 30 is skyrocketing - up 15 fold in last 20 years." said Mike Males, a Sociology instructor at UC Santa Cruz and co-author of the report. "The juvenile court has been accused of failing to control crime, but serious juvenile crime has been declining for 20 years. It is really the adult criminal court failing to control crime."

"The current crime trends among youth indicates declining crime rates into the next century," he said. "This report dispels the pervasive beliefs about the scope and degree of youth crime."

The report is based on data from the California Department of Justice's Crime and Delinquency in California (1975-98) and its supplement, California Criminal Justice Profiles (1978-98), which present arrests statistics by age, race, ethnicity, sex and offense, statewide and by county.

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