News Release January 05, 2006 (Source: The Washington Examiner ) Juvenile Crime: Don't believe the hype ... believe in hope By Vincent Schiraldi As 2005 comes to an end, there is hopeful news about juvenile crime in the District of Columbia that will probably come as a surprise to most. Juvenile arrests are down for the first time in three years. The sharpest declines have come in the serious crime categories. And juveniles commit far less crime than adults do. At Mayor Anthony Williams' Fourth Citizens Summit in November 2005, some 2000 citizens reported that, while crime by adults was down, juvenile crime was up. This comes after more than a year of crime coverage in the media that has focused on juveniles as if they are committing crimes in greater numbers than before and in greater numbers than adults. Research has found that juvenile crime - nationally - is often covered out of proportion to its actual occurrence. This leads consumers of the news media to conclude that young people commit a larger portion of crime than they actually do, and that juvenile crime is increasing when it actually isn't. While juvenile crime is serious whenever it occurs, it is not increasing and it occurs much less frequently than adult crime. Metropolitan Police statistics through mid-December 2005 show that juvenile arrests in the District are down 2.3 percent versus the same period last year, while adult arrests have actually risen slightly. More importantly, homicides by and of juveniles dropped by 60 percent and 54 percent respectively since 2004. Overall, there were 16 times as many adults arrested in 2005 as juveniles and the adult arrest rate in D.C. is 31 percent higher than the juvenile arrest rate. In addition to the improving economic picture in the District, a lot of people worked very hard to get us to the point where we are experiencing the first drop in juvenile crime in three years. The Metropolitan Police Department and Court Social Services joined forces to develop a unique program aimed at youth who steal cars to try to turn them in the right direction (and juvenile arrests for car theft are down 10 percent from 2004). Last year, the D.C. Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services funded the Latin American Youth Center to operate an Evening Reporting Center to supervise, tutor and counsel youth for five hours every night of the week as an alternative to detention. Ninety-six percent of the youth in that program have not been rearrested or missed court dates since it began in July. Two new centers serving Wards 7 and 8 will open in early 2006. Page 1 of 2      1  2