RE: Predictions: Crime and Criminal Justice in the 21st Century

["Brown, R Ken" <brownrk1@texaco.com>]

>Sunder wrote:
>> 
>> nnburk wrote:
>> >
>> > Predictions: Crime and Criminal Justice in the 21st Century
>> > ...
>> > 2.      As the large pool of young people born in the early 1990s
>> > become teenagers and young adults, there will be a dramatic
>> > increase in violent crime around the year 2005-2010.
>> 
>> I don't necessarily see this.  What do you base this on?  
>
>Um, actually, not _my_ predictions. Source was local LEA, obtained by them
from some  
>nameless seminar. (Sorry. Should have made that point clear earlier.)

It's pretty standard I think - as most crime is committed by 
young men aged between 15 and 25, the more of them there are
around the more crime there is. So sociologists predict
more crime  20 years after a surge in the birth rate.

AFAIR it's also been observed that  violent crime goes up 
in times of increasing prosperity but crime against property
goes up in bad economic times.

Of course none of that explains the huge secular trends in 
crime. In UK crime of all sorts fell almost continually
from about 1700 (& there are no real records much
before then) till the middle of this century. Since then it has been
rising. Who knows why? 

And how come the US murder rate is maybe 8 or 10 times the UK?
(actually that is unfair because the definition of "murder" is stricter
here, but it is at least 4 times different). Are we nicer people?
Not likely - the rape & indecent assault are no better here, & 
burglary is worse. 

> > > 5.      As faith in the criminal justice system declines, there
> > > will be a rise in vigilante-based incidents where citizens take
> > > the enforcement of crime problems into their own hands.
> > 
> > The rest of your prediction sounds like you've watched Robocop a few
> times too
> > many and actually BELIEVED it! :)  Care to back it up with reasons?
> > 
> 
> See above. <grin> Actually, haven't seen Robocop!
>