NCJ Number
181329
Journal
Forum on Corrections Research Volume: 11 Issue: 2 Dated: May 1999 Pages: 3-6
Date Published
1999
Length
4 pages
Annotation
This article presents findings from a study of youth court histories of juveniles in British Columbia (Canada).
Abstract
The data, collected by the Youth Court Survey (YCS) of the Canadian Center for Justice Statistics from the British Columbia Young Offenders Registry, pertain to individuals born from 1972 to 1975. They provide a unique, court-based view of the crimes and court experiences of individuals under the jurisdiction of the Young Offenders Act from 1984, when the oldest turned 12 years old, to 1993, when the youngest turned 18 years old. The study determined the feasibility of using year-of-birth or generation-based data from the YCS for policy-relevant research. This article focuses on youth-court histories that included offenses in the person or weapons category. Age-crime profiles are also presented to compare the potential of preventive and reactive strategies to reduce various kinds of youth crime. Although person or weapons offenses accounted for relatively small proportions of convictions, approximately one-fourth of the offenders -- 26 percent of boys and 23 percent of girls -- had at least one such offense in their court histories. These proportions varied significantly, increasing with each year of birth of the offenders. Age-crime patterns for common assault, the only offense in the person or weapons category that both male and female offenders committed frequently, suggest that girls tend to grow out of the activity while boys tend to grow into it. Female assaultive behavior peaked at age 15 at 2.1 offenses, 1.9 offenders, and 1.6 first offenders per 1,000 girls born from 1972 to 1975. For boys, the prevalence of offenses, offenders, and first offenders all increased sharply from 14 to 16 years of age, when a leveling off began. 6 figures, 1 table, and 4 notes