Homicide Offenders by Age Group, Annually, 1976-1999
The strong correlation between age and likelihood of being involved in a violent crime, as a perpetrator or a victim, makes the subject worth of a closer look. Our teenage years are a time in our lives when we begin the transition from childhood to adulthood. It is a time when energy is high and the ability to control emotions not highly developed. In our teens and twenties we feel invincible, we take risks, we take drugs, we die in accidents at higher rates than later in life, we commit suicide at high rates, and we commit violent criminal acts at higher rate than at any other time in our lives.
The graph presents data on homicide offenders by age group from 1976 to 1999. The curve at the top of the chart shows all homicide offenders aged 18 to 24 years. Their homicide rates exceed that of all other age groups except for the period 1981-89 during which the next oldest age group (24-34) surpassed its younger peers in the dubious distinction of being the most violent age group. If we combine these groups and look at all people aged 18 to 34, we are looking at the group responsible for well over half of all homicides in the United States. Between 1976 and 1999, they represented an average 66.5% of all homicide offenders annually.
Among young teens, those aged 14 to 17 years, this period was one of great volatility. We see a sharp rise in the number of murders committed by these young offenders starting in 1989 and extending through 1994. This dramatic rise, from a rate per 100,000 people in the age group of 8.5 in 1984 to a rate of 30.2 in 1993, caused much concern in society as a whole. There were fearful predictions of what were then termed "juvenile superpreditors. " As juvenile crime rates soared in the early 1990s, state legislatures began to lower the age at which juveniles could be tried as adults. What was happening to cause the rise in juvenile rates of violent crime? And why, after 1993-1994 did the rate drop so precipitously?
Many believe that youth gangs and the cocaine trade are at the heart of the matter. Michael J. Sniffen presents a consensus theory in his article about the decline in youth violence that started in 1994. "Police executives, academics, and politicians have attributed the decrease to a decline in demand for crack cocaine, truces between remaining crack gangs that provided guns to juveniles in the 1980s, police crackdowns on illegal guns and stiffer sentencing of repeat violent offenders."
There was also a move to try juveniles as adults. Part of the impetus behind trying children as adults was an attempt to counteract a strategy used by gangs. In the late 1980s and early 1990s gangs began to use their youngest members to carry out the most dangerous and visible tasks with the understanding that, if caught, these youthful offenders would be subjected to lesser penalties than their gang "elders." Did cracking down on youthful offenders help stem the tide of juvenile crime? Or, as many argue, did these harsher sentencing guidelines come about after juvenile crime rates had already begun to fall? These questions are hotly debated in judicial and law enforcement circles.
Although the homicide rate fell during the period 1994-1999 across all age groups, the greatest decline was for the youngest age group, those aged 14 to 17.
Homicide Victimization Rates by Age, 1976-2000
Statistics on the age of homicide victims parallel very closely the statistics on offenders. More people in the age group 18-24 are murdered than are people in any other age group. During the early 1990s those 14-17 saw their rates of victimization rise sharply, paralleling their offender rates. As the offender rates fell in the late 1990s, so to did their rates of victimization.
When it comes to gender differences in both offender rates and victimization rates, the story is pretty clear. Men offend and are victimized at higher rates than are women. The next panel will look into these differences.
Source: U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation, Supplementary Homicide Reports, 1976-99, available at http://www.fbi.gov/. Victimization rates are from and FBI report, Crime in the United States 2000, October 2001, available online at http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/00cius.htm.
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