Juvenile Arrests

According to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP), a branch of the U.S. Department of Justice, an estimated 2.27 million juveniles (people under the age of 18) were arrested in 2001. This number represents a decrease of 20 percent from 1997 to 2001 and of 4 percent from 2000 to 2001. Most of the juveniles who were arrested were males, and were 15 or older. The only categories of crime in which juveniles under 15 accounted for the majority of arrests were arson (64 percent) and for sex offenses other than forcible rape and prostitution (54 percent). They also accounted for about 40 percent of arrests in the categories of non-aggravated assault, forcible rape, burglary, larceny-theft, and vandalism. Arrest rates for female juvenile offenders in 2001 were highest for prostitution and commercialized vice (69 percent of all juvenile arrests for these crimes), running away (59 percent), embezzlement (44 percent), larceny-theft (39 percent) and offenses against family and children (37 percent...