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Youth Violence, Guns, and the Illicit-Drug Industry

NCJ Number
162687
Journal
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology Volume: 86 Issue: 1 Dated: (Fall 1995) Pages: 10-36
Author(s)
A Blumstein
Date Published
1995
Length
27 pages
Annotation
This analysis of changing crime patterns in recent years concludes that the main change in homicide has resulted from a significant increase in youth homicide beginning in the mid-1980's and resulting from the recruitment of juveniles into illicit drug markets.
Abstract
A growing fear of crime seems to pervade the country and contributes to crime being reported as the country's most serious problem. However, data on murder and robbery from 1972 to 1993 reveal a pattern of oscillation around a strikingly flat trend. Nevertheless, a major increase began just after 1985 in the murder arrest rate of youths ages 15- 22. Factors intensifying fears are the greater degree to which homicide by the young is committed against strangers and the increasing involvement of guns in young people's homicides. These trends are related to the increasing involvement of youths in drug markets. Because the drug markets are illegal, the participants must arm themselves for self-protection. The resulting arms race among youth results in a more frequent resorting to guns as a major escalation of the violence that has often characterized encounters among teenage males. These findings suggest the need for policies such as active efforts to confiscate guns from juveniles carrying them on the street, to address the illegal gun markets that are selling guns to youths, and to reduce the size of the illegal drug market through more effective drug prevention and greater investment in drug treatment. Figures and footnotes