Study Suggests Nearly 1 in 3 Young People Arrested By the Age of 23
A new study in Pediatrics suggests that something like 30-41% of people are arrested by the age of 23, which to some might seem very shocking initially. But considering that the latest FBI report shows violent crimes and property crimes dropped in every region of the US yet again, it's hard to say what this study really means, particularly since it's self-reported arrests and it does not differentiate between crimes.
According to USA Today:
The new data show a sharp increase from a previous study that stunned the American public when it was published 44 years ago by criminologist Ron Christensen. That study found 22% of youth would be arrested by age 23. The latest study finds 30.2% of young people will be arrested by age 23.
The original study lists the results as follows:
By age 18, the in-sample cumulative arrest prevalence rate lies between 15.9% and 26.8%; at age 23, it lies between 25.3% and 41.4%. These bounds make no assumptions at all about missing cases. If we assume that the missing cases are at least as likely to have been arrested as the observed cases, the in-sample age-23 prevalence rate must lie between 30.2% and 41.4%. The greatest growth in the cumulative prevalence of arrest occurs during late adolescence and the period of early or emerging adulthood.
USA Today gives further context to the data:
"I was astonished 44 years ago. Most people were," says Blumstein, a professor of operations research at the Heinz College at Carnegie Mellon University who served with Christensen on President Lyndon Johnson's crime task force.
Now, Blumstein says, youth may be arrested for drugs and domestic violence, which were unlikely offenses to attract police attention in the 1960s. "There's a lot more arresting going on now," he says.
The new study is an analysis of data collected between 1997 and 2008 by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The annual surveys conducted over 11 years asked children, teens and young adults between the ages of 8 and 23 whether they had ever been arrested by police or taken into custody for illegal or delinquent offenses.
The question excluded only minor traffic offenses, so youth could have included arrests for a wide variety of offenses such as truancy, vandalism, underage drinking, shoplifting, robbery, assault and murder — any encounter with police perceived as an arrest, Brame says. Some of the incidents perceived and reported by the young people as arrests may not have resulted in criminal charges, he says. [Emphasis added]
Localities handled many minor offenses more informally 40 years ago than they do now, criminologist Megan Kurlychek says. "Society is a lot less tolerant of these teenage behaviors," she says.
The difference in media summaries of the study are revealing. USA Today gives the aforementioned details, with the CMU professor explaining some of the reasons for these increased numbers. The rest of the article leans heavily on criminologists who are refreshingly skillful at panic-free elaborating on why the kids are getting in trouble and the takeway is that petty crime and drug charges are poor excuses to ruin a young person's life.
By contrast, ABC News and The San Francisco Chronicle are clearly pursuing the social cost angle of these numbers, which the original study apparently also delved into.
ABC has some worried medical experts:
"Those are alarmingly high numbers," said Dr. Eugene Beresin, a child psychiatrist at Massachusetts General Hospital and professor at Harvard Medical School. "There are social, economic, educational and family risks associated with arrests. And we all have to be worried about that."
Although an arrest doesn't necessarily mean a child, teen or young adult is a criminal, previous research has connected run-ins with the law with other problems—drug addiction, physical or emotional abuse and poverty, to name a few.
Beresin said a high number of arrests could also indicate a high rate of untreated psychiatric disorders, another factor that has been linked to criminal activity. According to the Coalition for Juvenile Justice, a nonprofit group, between 50 to 75 percent of incarcerated young people have diagnosable mental health problems.
Beresin later bemoans the country's lack of spending and says ""We're really asleep at the wheel right now when it comes to these problems with our young people."
But to put minds at ease, the FBI, as mentioned above, just released its report on violent and property crime over the first half of 2011 and rates fell in both areas as they have been since 2007. And by comparison and reminder that not all crimes have victims, the rate of arrest per 100,000 people for marijuana possession jumped from 104.9 in 1990 to 246.5 in 2007; for all drug crimes the rate jumped from 435.3 to 585.9 per 100,000 [Excel sheet.] The rate for violent crimes by actual juvenile (10-17 year olds) "reached a historic low in 2009," according to the Department of Justice.
There's just something fundamentally ridiculous about grouping 13-year-olds playing hooky and smoking weed or 21-year-olds murdering and raping into one (self-reported, again) study; if you're trying to draw any conclusions, the United States has a whole lot of laws and yes, being incarcerated at a young age probably does nothing for your mental health.
Reason on crime and criminal justice and on crime rates. Also Radley Balko in the July issue on "The Crime Rate Puzzle."
Editor's Note: As of February 29, 2024, commenting privileges on reason.com posts are limited to Reason Plus subscribers. Past commenters are grandfathered in for a temporary period. Subscribe here to preserve your ability to comment. Your Reason Plus subscription also gives you an ad-free version of reason.com, along with full access to the digital edition and archives of Reason magazine. We request that comments be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment and ban commenters for any reason at any time. Comments may only be edited within 5 minutes of posting. Report abuses.
Please
to post comments
This obviously means we need more police and bigger law enforcement budgets.
I think it’s clear evidence in support of my idea to transform public schools into actual prisons.
No one would know the difference. Seriously, It’d be treated like a rumor for years.
They tore down the 50’s public junior high school I attended, which looked like a dark satanic mill, and replaced
it with a spiffy new complex that looks like–you guessed it.
transform public schools into actual prisons
Funny, my ex often commented on how much most public schools looked like prisons.
Lucy’s been arrested five times. It’s true; her probation officer told me when I was buying some weed off of him.
Beresin said a high number of arrests could also indicate a high rate of untreated psychiatric disorders,
———————-
^^^^THIS is the takeaway from the pull quote from the ABC story. I’m calling bullshit on the numbers, but Beresin – referred to as a child psychiatrist – sees a business opportunity. Maybe I’m wrong but this smells like a contrived study that is pushing some agenda, perhaps like drumming up business for shrinks.
Since you aren’t in the field you probably don’t know this. In medicine, primary care is seen as one of the biggest areas in need of more practitioners per patient. Child psychiatry is one of the few (maybe the only) area that is even more poorly off.
No child psychiatrist has to look for work. Hell, even in poor areas of the country child psychiatrists can run pure cash based practices if they want. Demand FAR outstrips supply.
Also, it’s not like ANY doctor at MGH is in need of finding more patients. People show up from everywhere in the country to get treatment there.
Does this “arrested” include getting picked up by the cops because you tried to hide in the department store after closeing time when you were 8?
How about getting brought home by the cops after getting caught trying to buy booze with a fake id?
Getting caught setting things on fire in a local wooded area when you were 10?
Go on…
I was arrested once for drinking alcohol in a park when I was 20. Two notes:
1) I wasn’t actually drinking alcohol (others with me were). It shocks me that the number isn’t higher, honestly.
2) When the judge lectured me about not drinking while underage (we were all let off with a warning), I informed him that I had turned 21 between the arrest and the court date. He said, “okay, on your way then.”
I point this out to re-affirm that “being arrested” encompasses a huge swath of possible circumstances, a great number of which are pretty benign.
“It shocks me that the number isn’t higher, honestly.”
Squirrels put this in the wrong spot, it goes at the end.
Spoken like a true criminal.
Yeah I had momentarily forgotten you were my Sheriff now. I should be more careful in disclosing my law breaking past.
I was indeed arrested in that I was taken to the police station and kept there for a few hours before being released (and no I didn’t have the choice to refuse). I believe what happened was they thought there was a drug deal going on and so swooped in for the arrest only to find teenagers drinking beer.
Yeah my “arrest” was underage drinking/ public intoxication as well. I wouldn’t have called it arrest if they polled me though because I was merely cited and allowed on my merry way (to continue drinking). I bet many who self report would call it arrest though.
They’re probably neglecting the possibility that a large number of young adults would probably brag about having been arrested, even if it was just for having a fake ID.
I point this out to re-affirm that “being arrested” encompasses a huge swath of possible circumstances, a great number of which are pretty benign.
Having an arrest record is never benign, especially with employers getting more and more fanatical about background checks.
We should probably just arrest everyone as soon as they turn 13, so we can get their DNA and prints in the system. That way, no one will be unfairly stigmatized for having been arrested as a youth.
If this number is self-reported, I wonder if people are counting getting hassled as being arrested.
I was hassled by the cops a bunch of times, but… Sometimes, I thought if they wanted to…do shit they shouldn’t do…it made it less likely they were going to arrest me.
It’s probably easier for someone to file a brutality complaint against them if they arrest you.
I think the figures are higher in the libertarian community: either some bitch broke your heart, or a cop picked-up your ass
Being arrested usually encompasses “a cop picking up your ass”
Paul, I was naming the two pre-requisites for libertarianism
-no arrest statistics; ergo, the statistics are higher than average for your subgroup
The height of ignorance would be to look at these numbers and blame the citizens and young people of this country. The paradigm shift that needs to occur is to consider the laws of this country and the way we enforce them to be the problem.
I bet if you dig into these numbers you would find almost half of these arrests are for non-violent drug offenses, driven by a for profit prison system and government entities whose existence is based on the perpertuation of a prison state fueled by an outdate prohibition that the citizens no longer support.
The government and enforcement arms are at war with the citizens of this country and instead of repealing outdated laws and prohibitions, their answer is to arrest more young people in this country.
The President, representatives and any other parties that support continued prohibition are guilty of committing crimes against humanity due to their continued support of a failed drug war that incarcerated and kills people in this country and other countries around the world.
If you include alcohol in the “non-violent drug offenses” (which you should) then I bet you are right. Fuck prohibition.
I while agree with that, the citizens are the ones that keep re-electing the drug warriors, be it their Sheriffs or actual politicians.
And when legalization of pot came up for a popular vote in California, it failed.
The problem is that half the country is basically nuts on this issue.
Repeal the vast, unnavigable ocean of shitty and retarded laws, and I suspect you’ll see these numbers drop.
As much as I agree that we’re seriously fucking ourselves with an incomprehensible legal code… I’d bet most folks are picked-up for the same run-of-the-mill violations(drunk in public, shoplifting, domestic abuse, possession, DUI, curfew, etc.).
Beresin said a high number of arrests could also indicate a high rate of untreated psychiatric disorders
Die in a fire, “doc”.
What is truly alarming is that these categories and definitions have been so egregiously broadened over the period since I was in high school as to include many examples of hat were once collectively referred to as “growing up”. These horrifying new maladies are largely meaningless to anyone who doesn’t make their living exploiting them.
On the rare occasions when I peruse the police blotter in the local paper, there seems to be a preponderance of “Minor in Possession of Alcohol” charges, which of course includes “children” of the tender age of twenty. We’re fucked.
The tender of age of twenty is when small kids discover the dangling “limb” between their legs and begin questioning Santa, after all! You wouldn’t be advocating allowing these delicate dandelions alcoholic enjoyment, would you? Oh, you FIEND1
The people who have just been arrested, but not convicted of an actual crime, are still highly likely to get harassed by the Canadian border guards, so caveat viator. Last time I went up, while they were doing their usual harassing of yours truly (honestly I can’t figure out why they pull me in and search my car every damn time I cross, but it’s become a super fun ritual by now), they were also treating some American dude like shit because he’d been arrested for something, but never charged/convicted. As he sat down dejectedly beside me and learned I was actually a Canadian, he asked “why are they doing this?” I was too chicken/under surveillance to give him an honest answer.
So, US keeps arresting the youths for more and more dubious reasons, and Canada keeps assraping visitors for more and more dubious reasons, and: fun and profit for everyone involved!
If you complain about their search, do they say “why do you hate queen and country?”
I was going to say it must be the stench of weed, but then this is Canada we’re talking about.
They’re probably more worried about you smuggling in cheap American tobacco.
BFD. I would echo the other poster and be surprised the number isn’t higher. Was arrested myself for DUI, and while it dented my pocketbook, it didn’t put a dent in my career or future.
I might have been arrested on a ticket stop if I hadn’t been twice the size of the lone highway patrolman. He was a real prick, but after ranting and raving and toying with his cuffs and even his holster, he wrote the ticket and left.
I raged at my steering wheel for about two minutes before starting the car and driving off.
If I ever have kids of my own, I’m going to try to teach them a healthy disrespect for the rules – even my own. The more cleverness shown in circumventing the rule, the less the punishment will be.
How weak is a person you can control simply by saying “This isn’t allowed”
don’t despair, folks! think of it this way: 30-40% of 23 year olds have a healthy mistrust of law enforcement.
Pppt. I was arrested the first time at *12*, and spent at least more two nights in jail cells by 22. Kids these days are sissies. Another sign of the declining quality of American youth.
When I was 19, I was arrested in Virginia Beach for wearing a thong bikini. Fucking fascists!
Pics or it didn’t happen.
You just want to see my ass. Consider yourself mooned.
Nice!
I. Am. The 66 percent!
Do we get to protest out front of cop shops, demanding that the wealth of arrests horded by the 33% be redistributed fairly, and then get blasted in the face by cops with pepper spray?
We had better, man. But I won’t settle for less than a jail cell!
Argh. I should have read the thread before posting.
I bet the increase is from alcohol laws.
Per se DUI zero-tolerance standards for under-21s and public underage drinking.Throw in a trace amount of marijuana or possession of a non-prescribed pill and it gets even more “serious”.
I work with a lot of younger people with “records” from such offenses. They got booked, not just cited.
The authorities stake out parks, camping areas, rafting/canoeing rivers etc now too. Not good to quietly fire up a bowl when the Forest Service LEOs are watching you through big binoculars 500 meters away, or have game cameras trained on the tent sites (“check out the naked hippie chicks!”) Going permit-only back country backpacking or paddling? Not till the drug dog goes over all your gear. Sometimes half the people get searched and it turns up nothing. I hear stories about this shit all the time.
On a related note: An older friend of mine was confronted and threatened with denied entry at the Canadian border a few years ago for not revealing a past “arrest”. He was cited (along with everybody else) for being in a backyard at a private party where marijuana was being smoked…in the late 1970s. No one was arrested for possession and a lawyer friend got all the citations dismissed without anyone appearing in court. The “arrest” was on a database the Canadian customs guys had access to.My friend had no recollection until the Canucks filled him in on the date and address of the “crime”.
if you’re trying to draw any conclusions, the United States has a whole lot of laws and yes, being incarcerated at a young age probably does nothing for your mental health
Oh I disagree, sometimes getting oneself arrested wakes you up to one of the following things about life-
a.)the realization that the Justice System is pretty fucked up in general and it doesn’t give a shit who you are.
b.)getting arrested, booked and bailed out is no fun,
c.) all of the above.
These can be life-enhancing lessons to learn early on.
Knowing when to keep your mouth shut, being a convincing liar and a fast runner with excellent night-time navigation skills in an unfamiliar area can keep you out of a lot of trouble. Particularly the former two.
In Minnesota, they take away your license for DWI before you even get a trial. Something about a “Civil” suspension.
Call me crazy, but something seems unconstitutional about that.
You’re right.
People who question the constitutionality of some of our laws are often called crazy.
I am the 69.8%!
Since lefties are finally figuring out that they can’t fully ban guns, they have to turn the vast majority of people in to criminals who can’t legally buy them.
This is regrettably quite plausible.
-jcr
Getting arrested gets you laid. So of course young guys are going to say they’ve been arrested. How did they do this poll? Did some young lady like Lucy interview these young men? If so, they didn’t want to disappoint. I would advocate some more old fashioned street justice so more of these young men can get arrested and get their wicks wet.
“Getting arrested gets you laid.”
No it doesn’t.
No it REALLY doesn’t.
Laid across a table, maybe.
I posted this story here yesterday.
Surveys are crap because anyone can say anything.
Thats downright scary when you think abotu it dude. wow.
http://www.Complete-Anon.tk
What kind of person never got arrested for something?
Not a person I would consort with.